Would NCsoft please respond to the numerous , and justified , posts about the obvious PVP balance problems between ranged DDs {archers/nukers} and melee DD classes? It's obvious that anyone knowledgable about the high end PVP part of this game knows that ranged DD classes dominate PVP by a huge margin.
C4 made the situation much worse instead of better. Nukers can now do almost twice as much damage over time as they did in C3 (where they were aleady overpowered) with the additions of Arcane Power, Dance of Siren, Prophecy of Water, and the Hot Springs "debuff". All archers get a slowing special that almost always lands and those that are lucky enough to get a Draconic bow get +88 critical to a weapon that is ranged, has the highest patk and critical value in the game.
I never understood why the ranged damage in this game does 5 times more damage than melee attacks, when melee attacks need to close the range to execute an attack. Shouldn't this be the opposite? Add to this, the classes with ranged attacks are either very fast (archers) or have slowing and buff removing debuffs (nukers) to keep melee DDs from ever closing the gap.
Overall, in any PVP fight ranged DD classes do about 5 to 10 times the damage that melee based DD classes do, yet the melee classes typically have about 2 times the HP and CP of range DDs, if they are lucky!!!
Really NCsoft, can you explain your design decisions here? Ranged DD classes are better in PVP, PVE, and raiding. Almost everyone who rerolls or subclasses chooses one of the range DD classes because of this. Care to comment on this problem?
Just so you know, I'm not a whining melee player. I saw the problem long ago and rerolled a archer and subclassed a nuker. So don't think I'm whining about my class. My classes are way overpowered and this game is suffering.
I still think the pvp in L2 was balanced as if it were a RTS game and not a one on one game. And remember dying("sucking at pvp") is all good as long as it is for the team/clan/empire. But, thats just my opinion.
Furthermore, I don't think the gank squads were intended to be in the game, or rather they were put there to further politics and "story-line" of the server. The kind of gank groups running around (full teams vs one or two people exp'ing) works the same way as if you were playing any RTS and found someone stealing your resouces (EXP in this case) and killed that lonely peon with some of your finest knights.
Ok, so in my opinion, the biggest pvp prone areas would be castles and fights for Raid Bosses. And both of those require large numbers. Also in those the confusion is usually high and melee can sneak up on people.
Why would anyone tolerate this disbalance? Because it is for the clan. Everyone wants to win, but without that peon...your clan just might not make it. Therefore the players of Korea probably choose their characters morso on what the clan/alliance needs and less on what class is the "pwn3r3st".
I dont have a problem with it. But then again my class is a Tyrant. You nukers/archers....bring it. I will take that bow/spellbook of yours and shove it where the sun dont shine.... ;-) Have a nice day :cool:
All kidding aside...There are limitations to each class and its up to the rest of us to find those weaknesses. And nukers/archers have them. Dont overestimate your abilities and think the rest of us are going to let you walk over us.
Tell the Destroyers and Tyrants out there that you want to PVP heads up and see their responses. But then again, I am biased towards the orcs, as you can tell.
I think there is a PvP problem, and I don't think it is because I don't know how to play my class. Please explain to me why when I am fighting in mass or 1v1 PVP I have yet to close the gap between me and a mage. I am -slow- I have low MDef (even with OE'd top jewels) and in every siege I have been in I die 20+ times, never to a melee class. I am always slept, slowed, or Para'd before I have a chance to let off a single attack.
Sure, tyrants can get in there and do some damage, but they are mad fast and have an effective stun and slow attack. I want to know why nukers get MDef passives and I don't. I want to know why nukers get to deal the most damage (nukes) -and- control the flow of combat (crowd control). Nukers have the ability to effectively decimate multiple melee characters in a very short period of time, especially when they stack Acumen+Acumen+Casting speed tats.
And nukers arent as squishy as they should be when they apply +Con -Str tats. I cant - my matk, why should they be able to - their patk? And that is just in PvP! In PvE they can take the same armor setup they used at lvl 40 (Deamon set) ant take it to lvl 75 easily. Their weapon's matk matters less than a weapon's patk as well, as spell damage is based on the lvl of the spell while melee damage is based on Patk. When was the last time you saw a Gladi take Chain Armor and dual stormbringers to lvl 75? By 2-shotting mobs with BSPS, nukers also make more money than melee in PvP.
Are we seeing the trend here? Nukers have everything. Great PvP, easy PvE, they dont need to upgrade gear for PvE, and yet they make more money. Something is wrong with the balance in this game, and though we wont get one, I would like an official response to this.
Comparing classes in this game would be like saying : "Why can't my peon in Warcraft 3 decimate that guys Knight". Yes it is sad, but that is the way the game seems to be made. As to why Nukers get mdef passives, I think that is so % wise they do the same amount of damage. Lets say Nuker has 5k hp/cp, melee has 10k hp/cp. So Nuker hits melee for 1k damage, other nuker for 500damage. Otherwise nuker vs nuker would be who threw the first spell or two.
And seriosly. Nuker=Damage Dealer. They are supposed to have high damage with low defense.
Melee=Tanks. They are supposed to have high health and lower damage capabilities.
That is how it runs in all most every mmo. The truer issue is kiting of the enemy, which becomes alot less of a problem when everyone is piling up close to get to a RB or the door of a castle.
1v1 should not really be a comparison unfortuantly. And if you are going to do 1v1 you should do them self buffs, the moment outside buffs enter it becomes 1v2 or 2v2 etc.
Ok. 1v1 Self buffs:
Me V. SH my lvl: 3 hits Dead
Me V. Sorc my lvl: Surrender-3 hits Dead
Me V. Necro my lvl: Para /socialdance 4 hits Dead
Me V. SPS my lvl: 3 hits sleep /socialdance 2 hits Dead
If we start at 0 range it looks alot like that except that they interrupt my stun attack with a sleep or para.
And why am I a Peon? Where in the class descriptions does it say that Warlords are worth less than nukers? Yes this is the way it is right now, but it is not the way I think the game was designed! (Hint hint official people, this would be a good spot to comment! Thanks for your outstanding customer support!)
1v1 are not really about balance, and have you taken your warlord to seiges? And yes, if you read my first post, I said classes are probably balanced more like a RTS than a pvp mmo. But I guess you just skipped that?
And if you are going to do 1v1 you should do them self buffs, the moment outside buffs enter it becomes 1v2 or 2v2 etc.
Perhaps I misunderstood that. ANd yes, I heard that you said that classes were balanced like RTS games, what I was -asking- is why anyone would choose to play, in your words, a Peon rather than a Knight. This game -should not- be balanced like a RTS game. You gotta read my posts bud, I make it pretty clear that I read your post. I also make it pretty clear that I siege my Warlord quite alot. Re-read my first post.
We are aware that ranged vs. melee class balance is an important concern for many players, and we have been following all recent threads on the topic closely. We regularly report this feedback to the development team; we appreciate all the comments everyone has provided and we will continue to pass them along.
Thers so many SICK balance issisues problem in this game even a moron can see that. Just to mention one of them.
Compare BH vs WS. An BH is 100% IDENTICAL to an WS when the WS does not summon it summon, but hell what hapens when the WS do summon it's summon? yes it's damage output is more then DOUBLED the BH.... Thats just something very noticable and mo freeking mat needed to see how unbalanced just that alone is. And this is just Mele vs Mele.
Even my Dwarf with far beyoind 6-7k HP/CP still get 4-5 shoted in BO earing towards nukers, I can't even gete up to them befor I lost more then 60-70% of everything then yeah my super low damage output to beat off 3k+ HP from em when I hit for like 200-300HP LOOOOL I say.
Thers a lot more problems then just thoes I mentioned, I can only fully describe my class so.
Also saying that L2 is an Strategy game and folow the strategy's games rules is just mayorly dumb, this is an PvP game everyone should folow the same rules and have the same grounds to beat the others, it should be about 'skills' of hte players, and hell not about what class you play.
It's true that it can be ballanced that some classes have adventages over others, but hell in L2 thers classes who got no adventages at all who can get crushed no mater what even by classes 20 lv's below them.
Mistryl you just made my day. I did not expect to see a reply. I take back my sarcastic comment of 2 or 3 posts ago. Although, these threads have been going since C3, and C4 gave a couple sneaky nerfs to melee (NEVER taking zerk again, look what it did to my mdef!). I guess thats not your fault tho.
I will agree with you that it should be based on skill, but as it stands now, I would have to say this game is balanced as a RTS game. And from what I know Koreans do love RTS games (Starcraft/Warcraft 3) So it only makes sense that they would enjoy a game built like that.
yeah too bad, but aren't there more melee in Korean servers? I have no idea, but from all these **** threads popping up every day, I think I read somwhere that they have more melee there.
Like I said, let's all migrate to the Korean servers and show them EE and Paladin noobs what a real Nuker rush can do to their lovely little carebear servers. I bet they would immediately release a hotfix if the Koreans would feel the same pain as we do... or are we just too dumb to play this game? Or too smart? I don't know.
OK this is the prob and reason why nothing changes ....is cause all these lil kids get on here and say ooooo wwaaaa oh im just fine with my class and u should reroll if you"suck at pvp" ya know wat if u are one of these ...then just leave the forum cause all of this is about improving and making changes to the game so BLAHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH u all suck for leaving the game like this ....all over the game there can be new passives added and new SA's ...set bonuses on armor and other huge improvements if u think hard enough .....kind of makes me wonder if the team that patches the game acctually has the numbers of people it needs or the funding .....cause for me its too slow pace LOOK AT WAT IM WRITTING ALL U GAME DESIGNERS hurry it up and ppl wont leave the game
i have had too many ppl leave the game cause it doesnt seem like the gm's care or because they are getting a cut from the farmers wich is prob true
=.=
u all better fix this game up or the farmers will continue to make players leave .....i personally love the game and its why im on here but i know too many that have left ....
The balance of everything looked set to be evened up a bit by the time everyone is level 78. Sure damage dealers could output more damage still and ranged still had range + damage. But the melee classes all got rather nifty skills which were pretty strong in the right situation.
This was true until they decided to give four nukers superpowerful nukes. No other class got anything remotely like what nukers got in terms of a damage increase. That's without adding the crazy side effects of all of those spells.
I can't see any valid reason why they gave nukers such a huge boost at 76. No other class really gets anything useful until 77 or 78. But of course most nukers get the insane nuke at 76.
The problem they face is if they do a blanket boost to patk to try and help melee's dish out more damage, who benefits the most from this? Archers. If Archers become super strong then Nukers will be overwhelmed and we have the same problem except it's Archers on top.
A solution needs to be created that can benefit the close range melees without boosting archers. But can any of you see a situation where melee's who have bow's wont use them even if they are boosted? They'll still use bow's cause they likely have even more benefit and make them stronger.
I think a CP increase for specific melee characters and perhaps passive mdef for those that lack it. In addition to unlocking all the tattoo types for all classes should assist in balancing without taking melee's out of context.
But the 76 and 77 super nukes will still be there dishing out the crazy damage so the above changes I suggest wont really catch melee's up so much as bring them to the same stage they were at before nukers get those nukes.
Oh and still one of my favourite personal changes that should have been in from the start is to stop nukers from being able to sub necro and necro from being able to sub nukers. A Necromancer is more a nuker than a Summoner. This is confirmed by NC giving them the supernuke at 76. Overall there would be less nukers running around if this simple restriction was added.
The game has better balance if classes are played more equally. But many westerners want to be the solo mission uber guy who can own everyone alone. I mean look at how many people play team based games like CTF and CS.. usually a team of soloers rather than a team of teammates.
If you're in a clan that has a great siege and earns themselves a castle, the nuker with 900 pvp score is no more a winner than the melee who has 10 pvps, they are part of the same team and play their own roles. Too many people seek individual glory and play to win at all costs.
If NC decides they want to bring up melee's or adjust the balance slightly as some are requesting, extreme sudden tweaks shouldn't be implemented. It should be subtle gradual tweaks that overall help to balance things. But of course the doomsayers continue to say reroll nuker/archer and as people do this whatever problem with balance there is, is multiplied dramatically.
Even the most fundamentally balanced game can be completely screwed up by the players.
And seriosly. Nuker=Damage Dealer. They are supposed to have high damage with low defense.
Melee=Tanks. They are supposed to have high health and lower damage capabilities.
If melees are suppose to be tanks why do they die so easily vs nukers and archers? I'm sorry, even a CON build melee is going down in seconds vs any mage that knows what they are doing. Nukers and archers do 5+ times the damage of melee classes and melee class do NOT have 5 times the HP/CP. There is your problem.
I offer a challenge to those that think there isn't a problem. Put togther a full melee group of any levels vs our 1 mage group. The melee group will lose every time, even if the fight starts at close range.
Allow the battle to begin at the range that most fights start out at (900+) and you can have 2 full melee groups. I gurantee you my mage group will destroy the 2 melee groups and it won't even be close. My clan will put forth 100m bet. You will see what a L78 mage group is capable of in this broken game.
I'm tired of all these people crying about their C1-C2 FOTM classes getting the nerf bat.
Havent seen that being commented in this thread at all, except by you. And this have nothing to do with it either, this thread is about making the game balanced for all classes, not making ANYTHING overpowered.
And seriosly. Nuker=Damage Dealer. They are supposed to have high damage with low defense.
Melee=Tanks. They are supposed to have high health and lower damage capabilities.
If melees are suppose to be tanks why do they die so easily vs nukers and archers? I'm sorry, even a CON build melee is going down in seconds vs any mage that knows what they are doing. Nukers and archers do 5+ times the damage of melee classes and melee class do NOT have 5 times the HP/CP. There is your problem.
I offer a challenge to those that think there isn't a problem. Put togther a full melee group of any levels vs our 1 mage group. The melee group will lose every time, even if the fight starts at close range.
Allow the battle to begin at the range that most fights start out at (900+) and you can have 2 full melee groups. I gurantee you my mage group will destroy the 2 melee groups and it won't even be close. My clan will put forth 100m bet. You will see what a L78 mage group is capable of in this broken game.
You are 100% correct. The problem is that you are correct when you say every time.
I'm still not so sure about the overall game balance though. Here's the problem.
We sieged a few weeks ago. My side has ALOT of melee's, including 2 or 3 high level WL's.
The other side had mostly mages, including a bunch of high level one's.
They attacked, we defended.
At the end of the day, we won. So there's got to be some balance to it all. I mean based on all of our experience, the large mage alliance should have pwned us and good. But they didn't. In fact, they never could get control of the outter courtyard. Our melee [censored] hid behind the walls, with our stuns ready and our archers and mages on the walls just waiting.
While I would like to stand a chance with my melee group against a mage or archer group.. I'm not sure what the end result would be if they did balance the game at that level.
Congratz. That is an example of the point I was making. Smart tactics outweigh brute strength. If the melee engages the nuker at full range, full mana, with warning....isn't the melee playing the nuker's game? Don't play to the enemy's strength (and complain about the outcome). Be smart enough to get them at a disadvantage, make them play YOUR game instead.
To all those who say there is no issue here or think that the currnet situation is fine, Reroll a Tank Class like DA or Paladin.
I personnally am a Dark Avenger, my class can solo fairly well. I do even better with my 2box Prophet. And I can make a balanced group rock for hrs on end. (But good luck finding a spot in a grp) I get passed over time and again for a high output DD (ranged or melee) and any grp will take a BH over me or another Nuker over me.
At 64 I have over 9K CP/HP with buffs and I can still be dropped before I can even get to the Mage nuking me. Thanks to Deflect Arrow archers are not soo much of a problem, but i still get crit hit for 1-2K Dmg by them and then they will just run me into the ground. My slow skill is so pathetic I have a hard time getting it to land on a person 10 lvl's lower then me.
For those who are going to mention my Panther, yes it does alot of Dmg also and has nearly as much HP as me. That unfortunatley doesn't stop it from getting 4 hit by any Ranged DD within 5 lvl's of me.
I have played a Tank since Prelude to Chaos and I am simply to stubborn to quit playing him. But whenever I finally make it to 75 I'm definately subbing a Ranged DD.
PVP is supposed to be what this game is all about...but it simply is a waste of time to show up knowing that you'll get dropped before you can even get to the guy that is Nuking you.
To those that believe every class has a purpose... I refuse to beleive that my purpose is to get dropped first at the forfront of of every Melee charge in PVP. It is simply easier to go Nuker/Archer then atleast I'll get a shot off before I go down.
And seriosly. Nuker=Damage Dealer. They are supposed to have high damage with low defense.
Melee=Tanks. They are supposed to have high health and lower damage capabilities.
If melees are suppose to be tanks why do they die so easily vs nukers and archers? I'm sorry, even a CON build melee is going down in seconds vs any mage that knows what they are doing. Nukers and archers do 5+ times the damage of melee classes and melee class do NOT have 5 times the HP/CP. There is your problem.
I offer a challenge to those that think there isn't a problem. Put togther a full melee group of any levels vs our 1 mage group. The melee group will lose every time, even if the fight starts at close range.
Allow the battle to begin at the range that most fights start out at (900+) and you can have 2 full melee groups. I gurantee you my mage group will destroy the 2 melee groups and it won't even be close. My clan will put forth 100m bet. You will see what a L78 mage group is capable of in this broken game.
You are 100% correct. The problem is that you are correct when you say every time.
I'm still not so sure about the overall game balance though. Here's the problem.
We sieged a few weeks ago. My side has ALOT of melee's, including 2 or 3 high level WL's.
The other side had mostly mages, including a bunch of high level one's.
They attacked, we defended.
At the end of the day, we won. So there's got to be some balance to it all. I mean based on all of our experience, the large mage alliance should have pwned us and good. But they didn't. In fact, they never could get control of the outter courtyard. Our melee [censored] hid behind the walls, with our stuns ready and our archers and mages on the walls just waiting.
While I would like to stand a chance with my melee group against a mage or archer group.. I'm not sure what the end result would be if they did balance the game at that level.
What you mention is not that rare. Balanced alliances especially in castle sieges usually win. Melee soak up hits, stun and cause havoc once they get amongst your damage dealers, especially nukers. If you're melee groups are setup with sws/bd and healers rather than neglected like so many alliances neglect them, then these groups will be very useful in a siege situation and indeed other pvps.
With a few simple subtle tweaks like I mentioned in my previous post in addition to players not all trying to play the same strong classes, the perception of balance would be improved.
The main annoying advantage that Archer and Nuker parties have is the ability to jump any melee group and demolish them. Infact they can jump any group that's not a full DD group and demolish them. Of course surprise plays a large part in it, but even if the Nuker party was jumped by a gang of melee you can't see the melee winning very often.
How do we go about solving this? We know that whoever surprises the other while they XP is likely to be the winner especially if they are capable of good damage at range.
Can that situation ever be balanced? If you think about most PvP situations you get involved in, can any of them be even close to achieving a good balanced as far as ranged v melee are concerned?
It's extremely hard to achieve a good balance for these two things.
In the early days as a nuker if you failed to kill your assailant before they reached you, you were pretty much dead. But in those days nukers didn't do much damage and didn't cast that fast so they had little to no chance against even the slowest melee. Of course Sorc/Sps faired a bit better with Aura Flare but still were not what they are now.
Should it go back to that? If a melee gets next to a mage they are dead and the only way a mage survives is to kill them beforehand? Would this kind of thing work in all situations?
Ideally you would have something close to this. But there will always be some situation down the line where even this method seems unbalanced, whether because most mages kill most melee's before they get next to them, or because the melees always get to the mages and the mages always die.
Alright, I agree it would be nice to see some actual balance where skill meant more than everything. Including Levels.
But as it stands, is it not so hard to view this game as balanced in the traditional way of a RTS?
Dwarf-collect raw materials for the clan and craft things (much like the "peons" "grunts" of War Craft.)
Melee-Meatshields, and needed for pve to tank (especially raid Bosses). These are kind of like the hundreds of nights you throw in before the others clean up.
Archers/Nukers/"Ranged DD's"-The assassin's and protectors of the clan. They probably level up the quickest so they can help the dwarfs hold on to the "good resource spots". These guys are like the higher level classes of Warcraft, cleaning up the other guys. Basically destroying the oposition.
I am not saying thats how it should be. But really this is how it seems now, and perhaps thats the way they balanced the game.
And sure it sucks to compare your class to a low peon, but I am betting they think "for the clan" while we think, "for me".
Without the even the smallest of gears, the machine would not work.
Bighands, something I've been curious about but unable to test...
When melee classes are able to set traps and use those kind of tactics, they seem to turn out ok. That is, it seems to lend itself readily to the defending side of a seige.
How would it work with roles reversed? If you were the attackers and they were the defenders, could your clan have charged across the empty field toward the enemy clan's ranged units and won the day?
If, on the attack, superior tactics can win the day for the melee-weighted clan, then I'd say we have a balance. If the ranged-weighted clan mops you up, then unfortunately we don't actually have a class balance. If the defender has the advantage regardless of who makes up the defending clan, then the advantage isn't going melee/ranged, it's simply going to the home team.
Umm...SPS? He wasn't saying that it was. I think you kind of missed the point here.
I'm not agreeing with Malkavian, but the point he was making is that L2 may have been mistakenly balanced as if it were a RTS game...and the fact that it isn't one is why it's imbalanced.
It isnt a RTS and wasnt ever intended to be, and so cant be compared to one. Thats like be comparing it to halo a fps.
With RTS games you have different roles yes, but they have different costs, if lineage were to be like that then mage should level x2 slower then melee.
It isnt a RTS and wasnt ever intended to be, and so cant be compared to one. Thats like be comparing it to halo a fps.
With RTS games you have different roles yes, but they have different costs, if lineage were to be like that then mage should level x2 slower then melee.
Precisely. It wouldn't work at all, if they did that...
Full circle, now. That's exactly the reasoning he gave for why balancing L2 as if it were an RTS would lead to a broken game ;)
I think pvp is balaneced. Certain classes are built for pvp, if ur a pve char, then stay away from it.
Mages are pvp chars, and are balanced when you think of it as mage vs mage. The same is true for archers. Archers and mages also stand a good chance at defeating each other. Out of all the 'DD melee' classes specifically built for pvp, they do well. Gladiator and tyrants for example, they are pvp built chars and they are good at it. I can kill my fair share of mages and archers. What should in no way be happening is some sort of balance which allows a dorf to kill a mage, that should never happen. Ever.
Dwarf-collect raw materials for the clan and craft things (much like the "peons" "grunts" of War Craft.)
Yo, PvP, let's go have some fun ... no, there is no room for you in a party, LF DDs, go dig deep into dungeon and grind and farm ... we need 500 SoPs in clan WH to craft.
Guess who'se gonna get them in their new A weapon? SoM or Elyssian? Naaah, equip mage, we need them to pwn enemy clan ...
No fun for them, they are just farming peons.
Melee-Meatshields, and needed for pve to tank (especially raid Bosses). These are kind of like the hundreds of nights you throw in before the others clean up.
2 of best tanks in our clan rolled mage. Why? They come to battlefield, die in 4 hits by mage group, respawn, die again ... they refused to go to sieges. Because there was no fun for them. Everyone was happy "I have 14 kills, I have 28 pvp" ... they had -20% death.
Yeah, sure, they are just cannon fodder, they do not deserve to have fun too ...
--
RTS? OK, but you forget one thing: those masses you fabricate in RTS are computer controlled and do not care. But player that plays any character has their own emotions, ambitions, expectations. Non-asian version of this game has no such high population to cover all RTS needs, plus ... westerners are not that bound into classes and roles, it's not in our blood to accept getting married in 14 and live as farmer because 20 generations before were all farmers. We won't be satisfied, we want more, we want pwn. Ever thought of fact why those unpopular farming roles are "outsourced" in China, while proud US players "want to have fun"? RTS won't work here in form you described.
Bighands, something I've been curious about but unable to test...
When melee classes are able to set traps and use those kind of tactics, they seem to turn out ok. That is, it seems to lend itself readily to the defending side of a seige.
How would it work with roles reversed? If you were the attackers and they were the defenders, could your clan have charged across the empty field toward the enemy clan's ranged units and won the day?
If, on the attack, superior tactics can win the day for the melee-weighted clan, then I'd say we have a balance. If the ranged-weighted clan mops you up, then unfortunately we don't actually have a class balance. If the defender has the advantage regardless of who makes up the defending clan, then the advantage isn't going melee/ranged, it's simply going to the home team.
Another question that should be asked is whether or not the defenders would have been better off with a nuker group replacing that melee group. From my experiences (I've been in sieges every week) I would argue that a nuker group would be better due to their versatility.
The melee group succeeded as played, but would the outcome be different, possibly easier, if those melees were nukers? I'd have to say yes. Nukers on defense are BRUTAL!! More so than melee classes in my opinion. Why? They can engage on the siege field where melee aren't that good, necros can fear & nuke siege golems where melees can't do anything to them, a nuker group can kill a dwarf summoner easily where a melee group can't, and a nuker group can fight any ranged battle, and we all should know by now that many sieges are won in ranged combat on the field, on the walls and in the rafters of the inner castle.
I think pvp is balaneced. Certain classes are built for pvp, if ur a pve char, then stay away from it.
Mages are pvp chars, and are balanced when you think of it as mage vs mage. The same is true for archers. Archers and mages also stand a good chance at defeating each other. Out of all the 'DD melee' classes specifically built for pvp, they do well. Gladiator and tyrants for example, they are pvp built chars and they are good at it. I can kill my fair share of mages and archers. What should in no way be happening is some sort of balance which allows a dorf to kill a mage, that should never happen. Ever.
What do you say to the people who have spent 2+ years leveling up their poor PVP character when they want to PVP? "Sorry, your class is bad at PVP, stay offline".
I'm sorry to disappoint you but Gladiators are really bad in real PVP, possibly the worst PVP class, same for Tyrants.
How so? I can kill archers and melees thats 2/3 class types. I have no problems dieing to mages, thats the way it should be. When you choose your class you know what your letting yuorself in for. Seriously who ever created their BH under the delusion they were excellent at pvp? no one. They chose that class for the pve elements.
Yeah it sucks to be the peon. I said that. I also said that they probably think for the clan not "whats fun for me". While here we only think, "whats best for me"," *I* have to be the pwner".
They want the clan to be the best.
And I have already agreed balance sucks in this game, I just think everyone is going at it like: "[censored] they screwed everything up, what where they thinking?" When they may have designed it this way. Call me the devils advocate. And I am just hanging around here with friends until a better pvp game comes along anyhow, doubt this will ever be truly "balanced".
Edit: @ whoever said no fun for the people farming mats or being meatshields. Maybe they like pve more than pvp? Maybe the BH/WS choose their class because they liked grinding for mats or playing the market. And maybe the tanks made tanks because they liked tanking for groups or Raidbosses? Maybe not everyone cares to be the super duper terminator of Pvp?
What precisely would "more balance" achieve? A queen is only as free as the spaces before her. Even a Pawn can fell a King, but rarely unassisted. That is balance.
Melee classes should not beat any DD at range, one on one, with any degree of regularity. Sorry, it had to be said.
But more can be done to at least to improve a melee's perceived chances of winning.
I think the answer is to improve SA's on weapons and armor. How about swords that absorbs/halves magic damage? Armor that is Fire, Earth, Wind, Water or more comprehensively magic spell type resistant? Or blunts that can be thrown to interrupt arrow release or spells? Or even better, why not let shield enchants decrease damage taken or increase % pdef? Novel idea there.
About choosing pvp/pve: sure, they choose class to pve well, but "this is pvp game" and you cannot avoid it in some form or another. Then people get frustrated when they continously loose, even if they know they have chosen class for pve.
I think bow users as mages should have the chance of cancelling. Firing a bow is a difficult thing, if you get hit it would cancel you. Also Bows shouldnt be able to be fired on a target at point blank range, the arrow wouldnt get the driving force it would need. I dont want things more realistic, i just think they are good ideas...
I also suggest that mage cancel rate be reviewed, these days they all have greater concentration and 50% or w/e it is on their armour SA, its really rare you'll cancel them. Another thing, why is archer firing speed so fast? I personally think haste/zerk/dance should not increase bows firing rate, keep it low and damage high and they are then more in-tune with all other classes. Maybe give EE a buff which increases archer fire speed by a bit, that would make them more usefull.
/flame me
Bighands, something I've been curious about but unable to test...
When melee classes are able to set traps and use those kind of tactics, they seem to turn out ok. That is, it seems to lend itself readily to the defending side of a seige.
How would it work with roles reversed? If you were the attackers and they were the defenders, could your clan have charged across the empty field toward the enemy clan's ranged units and won the day?
If, on the attack, superior tactics can win the day for the melee-weighted clan, then I'd say we have a balance. If the ranged-weighted clan mops you up, then unfortunately we don't actually have a class balance. If the defender has the advantage regardless of who makes up the defending clan, then the advantage isn't going melee/ranged, it's simply going to the home team.
More than likely a portion of our success was due to the fact that we realize and understand the makeup of our forces and make an effort to leverage it as best as possible.
There are times that we have made the charge you mention across open field straight into the ranks of mages. The outcome varies, but we've gotten pretty good at having the High HP classes up front, and the ranged units slightly behind us. If we get it right, the mages lose. Why? Because while they are pouring their mp into our high hp's our DD's are killing them.
There are in fact uses for Melee's in sieges. ie.. flag rushes, taking out life crystals, blocking the relic room doors, blocking the relic ramp..
In general though, the gap between melee units and ranged units is large. I myself attribute this to NC forgetting one key balance issue. RANGE.
Logically, if a melee can close the range and get next to an archer or mage, it should be a sure victory for a the melee. I mean cmon.. a guy in robes is **** sure not going to stand there and take it while a guy with a sword or axe is cleaving his head in. Neither will an archer, in fact, one simple tweak they could make to fix archers would be to lower their accuracy if the target is too close.
That right there is the core of the problem. Range itself is a HUGE advantage. If the melee can overcome the range issue, he should win the fight.
About choosing pvp/pve: sure, they choose class to pve well, but "this is pvp game" and you cannot avoid it in some form or another. Then people get frustrated when they continously loose, even if they know they have chosen class for pve.
Yeah, well in my theory of how the game was/is balanced the pve people would just pve, mostly avoid pvp. If pk'ed out of a spot or something, then the "protector" types would come and help them get that spot back.
And this game was designed for Korea/Eastern areas. Not us, Not Westerners. They just figured "hey it does good here, lets try it over there" Doubt anything will ever change so long as the easterners like the way it is.
Bighands, something I've been curious about but unable to test...
When melee classes are able to set traps and use those kind of tactics, they seem to turn out ok. That is, it seems to lend itself readily to the defending side of a seige.
How would it work with roles reversed? If you were the attackers and they were the defenders, could your clan have charged across the empty field toward the enemy clan's ranged units and won the day?
If, on the attack, superior tactics can win the day for the melee-weighted clan, then I'd say we have a balance. If the ranged-weighted clan mops you up, then unfortunately we don't actually have a class balance. If the defender has the advantage regardless of who makes up the defending clan, then the advantage isn't going melee/ranged, it's simply going to the home team.
Another question that should be asked is whether or not the defenders would have been better off with a nuker group replacing that melee group. From my experiences (I've been in sieges every week) I would argue that a nuker group would be better due to their versatility.
The melee group succeeded as played, but would the outcome be different, possibly easier, if those melees were nukers? I'd have to say yes. Nukers on defense are BRUTAL!! More so than melee classes in my opinion. Why? They can engage on the siege field where melee aren't that good, necros can fear & nuke siege golems where melees can't do anything to them, a nuker group can kill a dwarf summoner easily where a melee group can't, and a nuker group can fight any ranged battle, and we all should know by now that many sieges are won in ranged combat on the field, on the walls and in the rafters of the inner castle.
You are wrong.. and here is why.
When a melee dies and respawns he does it with about 80% health, one GHP and he is back to full HP. When a mage dies he respawns with the exact same amount of MP he had when he died.
The smart Melee commander unleashes a totally relentless assault on the mages. Eventually they will be out of mp, whereas the melees will not be out of health. Yes, it will be costly to the melee units at the start of the battle, but as time goes on, they will get thier revenge on the mages.
We use our excess of melees on defense to totally and completely block the doors. You simply cannot run through because there are too many bodies in the way. Mages do not get that luxury, and it's only a matter of time until those guys on the parapets run out of mp.
About choosing pvp/pve: sure, they choose class to pve well, but "this is pvp game" and you cannot avoid it in some form or another. Then people get frustrated when they continously loose, even if they know they have chosen class for pve.
Yeah, well in my theory of how the game was/is balanced the pve people would just pve, mostly avoid pvp. If pk'ed out of a spot or something, then the "protector" types would come and help them get that spot back.
This is an interesting and quite possible theory. If that is what they had in mind when they designed the game then I suspect they made a terrible flaw. It's not in human nature to not want to be able to take the fight back to your aggressor. From a game design point of view, I'd ask myself how long it will be for the PVE crew to get sick of being killed and calling for help and they decide to find another game with better PvE.
AOE ranged nukeing screws up the whole blocking effect, if a melee breaks ranks to mvoe outa the way then the whole blocking effect is pointless as everyone will pour in.
Also you dont spawn in with 80% hp, im quite sure its less. And 1 ghp would heal a mage to full not a melee, we need like 3 which is up to 45 seconds of healing. Also theres the exp loss of just being cannon fodder, i doubt you will find very many volunteers willing to die 4-5 times and lose 4-5% at high lvls. Also MP isnt such a big factor on sieges, most nuker parties have the SwS songs and the summon dance which increases MP regen rate + decrease mp spell cost, not to mention another party of SE/EE waiting in the wings to recharge them.
About choosing pvp/pve: sure, they choose class to pve well, but "this is pvp game" and you cannot avoid it in some form or another. Then people get frustrated when they continously loose, even if they know they have chosen class for pve.
Yeah, well in my theory of how the game was/is balanced the pve people would just pve, mostly avoid pvp. If pk'ed out of a spot or something, then the "protector" types would come and help them get that spot back.
This is an interesting and quite possible theory. If that is what they had in mind when they designed the game then I suspect they made a terrible flaw. It's not in human nature to not want to be able to take the fight back to your aggressor. From a game design point of view, I'd ask myself how long it will be for the PVE crew to get sick of being killed and calling for help and they decide to find another game with better PvE.
I honestly would be interested to see how gameplay performs on Korean servers. But yeah I agree and have agreed that being the lowly farmer that has to just take the pk's would suck. But then I have the western mindset...
AOE ranged nukeing screws up the whole blocking effect, if a melee breaks ranks to mvoe outa the way then the whole blocking effect is pointless as everyone will pour in.
Also you dont spawn in with 80% hp, im quite sure its less. And 1 ghp would heal a mage to full not a melee, we need like 3 which is up to 45 seconds of healing. Also theres the exp loss of just being cannon fodder, i doubt you will find very many volunteers willing to die 4-5 times and lose 4-5% at high lvls. Also MP isnt such a big factor on sieges, most nuker parties have the SwS songs and the summon dance which increases MP regen rate + decrease mp spell cost, not to mention another party of SE/EE waiting in the wings to recharge them.
I've seen it happen on more than one occasion. We held the gate for so long that our mages were begging for recharges, yet our melees stood fast. AOE isn't going to help you get through those gates that are being blocked by 50-60 people in heavy armor, and that sure is alot of HP to try and chew through while under fire from the parapets. ;)
I think bow users as mages should have the chance of cancelling. Firing a bow is a difficult thing, if you get hit it would cancel you. Also Bows shouldnt be able to be fired on a target at point blank range, the arrow wouldnt get the driving force it would need. I dont want things more realistic, i just think they are good ideas...
I also suggest that mage cancel rate be reviewed, these days they all have greater concentration and 50% or w/e it is on their armour SA, its really rare you'll cancel them. Another thing, why is archer firing speed so fast? I personally think haste/zerk/dance should not increase bows firing rate, keep it low and damage high and they are then more in-tune with all other classes. Maybe give EE a buff which increases archer fire speed by a bit, that would make them more usefull.
/flame me
I've played both a mage and an archer.
As a mage, I always thought that a fireball, even AOE should completely charbroil archers in their light armor. But then it occured to me that maybe the elves came up with something fireproof. :) That's when I figured that mages, Spellhowlers in particular, should have the ability to change the weather, generating artificial wind, thus decreasing the accuracy of archers altogether. Really, what's the point of being a mage if you can't make a storm out of thin air?
And as an archer, I always wanted a kill shot skill that instantly killed a mage who is wearing nothing but robes. Here, put on these drapes and you tell me whether you can stop a trained archer from sending an arrow straight through your heart at 40 yards or less.
Ya so I'm playing a BountyHunter since open beta... was the first char i created and I'm still playing it was my main, no other char completed the second class change, although I have quite a few alts.
I liked the style of the female dwarves, wahtever you think of it... contrast is a good element for character stories and little girls with axes and heavy armor that spend most of their time behind forges, or stealing loot from monsters offer lots of it. :)
I didn't know anything about balance at that point, not to mention that it was not screwed up that much in prelude. But I was aware that I woud not be able to hunt solo well or even PWN anyone in PvP. But that was ok since I've never had and never will never have the temper of a true griefer/ganker/whatever.
So I had to decide between Scavenger and Artisan. Artisan sounded cool with those golems, but crafting seemed a little too time consuming and boring to me, so I went for the fun route. Making money while hunting and trading with your goods. First I was not too successful, as materials were low in demand... while a bronze set was something great to have. ;)
Then followed the period when people started crafting high C grade gear and needed mats and the BountyHunters still were allowed to keep all their spoils. I had a hard tme finding groups as I could not add much to its success, but some good friends who I shared my spoils with helped me out, life was good back then and looking at an inventoy full of mats at the end of the day can be a great satisfaction. :)
Well you know what happened. Bounty Hunters get only 1/9 of their only skill, farmers camp every single rewarding spot, melee classes in general got less and less pupolar.
And not even in their golden period Bounty Hunter was appealing to many players. Not because they didn't want the wealth but because the wanted the wealth and the ablity to PWN at the same time. Wealth can be bought on ebay, skills can not. To the game balance it would have been essential to have one BH in every, yes every single hunting party. As it's now we need hundrets of farmers to balance the rate at which XP (need for gear) and wealth (gear) is created. With disastrous effects for the game.
So what can we conclude? Give nukers spoil or us dwarves a few uber-nukes and the farmers would be gone? Would be worth a try imho. :)
I think Peon doesn't quite fit tho. If our skills wouldn't be available from uncle IGE the Bounty Hunter would be a respected and well represented class, essential for every clan. On the other hand if dualboxing would be forbidden as it should be, healers would be have a higher status than Peons, too.
But like someone else already said... we are not Asian, we want PWN. ^^ We're simply not campatible with L2.
Yeah, we want PWN, but this game is and will continue to be designed for easterners and not us westerners. So that is a moot point.
And honestly I think without any third party influence (in game resellers, or pro-farmers) That every clan would function somewhat like its own "city" (going towards my RTS theory a bit) where everyone helps the BH's spoil up mats in clan groups, and then the artisan crafts things for everyone cheap. No real reason to buy things on the markets, except the most basic of mats.
I know a clan that functions like this, kind of a socialism/communist(how it was intended, Not how it went) approach, and it seems like everyone there always gets the gear they need. I would say that it works like it was intended....or they ebay like hell.
fully buffed Magical Barrier and Song of warding i have close to 1k mdef at my level.
I still never resist spells for any mage even close to my level. How come?
I have my arrows deflected and evaded by people by level how come i dont resist any spells or they dont fail on me?
I think a good way to balanace the game is put magic evasion or something similar in. I see see a friggen fireball coming at me why cant i dodge it like i would a friggen arrow?
This will help tryants archers daggers (light armour) glads and Dwarfs. They trade off their pdef to avoid all attacks magical and phsyical.
i don't see why you ppl always need to mention ppl by region. do you not communicate with ppl from other places? here's a simple fact: all ppl wants to succeed (pwn), and if one doesn't feel that they're being appreciated when doing his/her job, he/she will just look for other jobs (job satisfaction).
no one wants to be peon, no matter where you come from.
-------------------------------------
Malkavian, you need to look at the whole picture when you think about your RTS theory. there're at least 3 factors that you're missing, not including ebaying:
cost of unit/charactor
tech tree
build/lvl speed
you compared melee/mage to peon/knight (personally i think marine vs battlecruiser a la starcraft is much better comparison), respectively, but you didn't take the above factors into play. peon is the basic unit, no upgrade necessary to train; knight needs tech upgrade to train. peon costs a fraction of the cost compare to knight. one can train more peons than knight given a limited time frame.
same can't be said about melee/mage in L2. those of us who has experience in both classes know that melee is more costly and slower to lvl compare to mage, with or without external support. on top of that, melee are less valuable when it's time to fight. thus your RTS theory doesn't hold.
How physical damage is calculated:
[attacker's patk] x 70 / [defender's pdef]
How magic damage is calculated:
(square root of [attacker's matk / defender's mdef]) x [skill power] x 91
Plug any number you want into that and you'll notice huge discrepancies. These numbers come from the prima guide and as far as i've been able to find out are still 100% accurate.
Noob glad tbh, at first i lost to WS but now i know the secrets of the gladiator and have never lost since. I bet this glad was a noob and attacked the golem first, lol, also i doubt he used charge stones. So many noob glads out there makeing my class look bad. I think i know of only 2 other glads on the whole of bartz besides myself who actually know how to pvp.
Yup and I really wonder why that is not fixed yet.
I mean it kind of works with regular attack... even if the target is moving your char will follow it and when it stopps you automatically hit. You don't even have to click a second time. Thats still not perfect as you cannot hit a moving target even if it's moving slower than you, but better than first following your target at same speed for ages and then getting "out of range" while standing right next to it, while your char simply stands there and does nothing.
Can't they simply copy the normal attack code?
And about "people want to PWN"... ya true, of course everyone likes to see his efforts appreciated. But maybe people from different cultures, education and social status use different measures. Some might only feel "successful" when they can shoot 10 enemies dead in a row. Some might feel successful by keeping a PvE party going for ages with good healing. Some find pleasure in crafting equipment for the clan or selling it for good profit.
What matters is how others see what you do.
In Korea the EE is the most popular support class. Here even SEs get dualboxed because noone appreaciates the service of a good healer, nor do many find it funny to be in a group that forces one to sit for 20 minutes then throw some buffs.
There can hardly be as many farmers in Korea due to their account registration system (social ensurance number required so I heared) yet their economy is working, probably because the service of a good BH is appreciated and supported. While most of us would rather spend all their pocket money on ebay before they'd sacrifice 1% of their XP to invite a "useless" BH.
See the differences? In Korea everyone and his mother plays this game so it has a broad range of different characters which do not all enjoy PvP. Over here hardly anyone knows this game and those who play it do it for the "hardcore PvP", which in my humble opinion is not the main aspect of the game.
It also has a hardcore clan system, a hardcore economy, a hardcore quest system and hardcore raiding. But that's nothing you can advertise MMOs with in the western world.
fully buffed Magical Barrier and Song of warding i have close to 1k mdef at my level.
I still never resist spells for any mage even close to my level. How come?
Aside from mdef and mdef buffs there are buffs that resist magic, buffs like Elemental Protection, Flame Guard, Storm Guard, Aqua Guard, Invocation, Divine Protection, etc.
The main problem is not enough SwS and Prophets exist, not enough Elven Elders and Bishops exist.
People ignore the classes that help melee and magic defense and go with classes that help mystics a lot like SE and BDs. They overpopulate great support classes for nukers and underpopulate classes with great magic defensive buffs and then complain there is no balance. Its obvious this is a player issue and not game design. There are clans out there that have a healthy balance and you will not see them complain too much about nukers.
Caleria: Thers a lot of things you don't know, first off I will be short, buying selling items in Korea is not breaking the eula of the game, botting sure is thoght, Thers also charter transfer with amny oher things.
Your where right thoght, EE WAS the most popular suport class over there, thats far far FAAAAAR from the case right now they want SE and Warcryer there now nothing else is wanted, Also right now the most popular PvP class in korea is nukers, preferly necro's, hell just look at the latest PvP final event in korae LOL, and you can see what win and what pwn [censored] everything, yes an nuker trio... heh? Suprised? Korea is not different from us at all.
Where are you playing from?? This might be due to latency problem. Lionna is a USA WEST server if you live very far from this region you are bound to have delays...which means your attacks are executed on the server half a second or more after you press the attacking shortcuts.
worst problem with melee vs ranged is that when they "kite" u and u try to hit u get "out of range" even if u stand on top of them..
Caleria: Thers a lot of things you don't know, first off I will be short, buying selling items in Korea is not breaking the eula of the game, botting sure is thoght, Thers also charter transfer with amny oher things.
Your where right thoght, EE WAS the most popular suport class over there, thats far far FAAAAAR from the case right now they want SE and Warcryer there now nothing else is wanted, Also right now the most popular PvP class in korea is nukers, preferly necro's, hell just look at the latest PvP final event in korae LOL, and you can see what win and what pwn [censored] everything, yes an nuker trio... heh? Suprised? Korea is not different from us at all.
Bottom line though: Korea>US. Any game design decisions are made for them first, not us. We are an afterthought. If they like it the way it is, we are [censored]. Enjoy.
Oh, and I wasn't saying it should be balanced as if an RTS, I am saying it sucks now because it looks like it was balanced that way.
Bottom line though: Korea>US. Any game design decisions are made for them first, not us. We are an afterthought. If they like it the way it is, we are [censored]. Enjoy.
Oh, and I wasn't saying it should be balanced as if an RTS, I am saying it sucks now because it looks like it was balanced that way.
The entire point was, thers no difference between ours and theres play style, whoever made that up I duno.
Where are you playing from?? This might be due to latency problem. Lionna is a USA WEST server if you live very far from this region you are bound to have delays...which means your attacks are executed on the server half a second or more after you press the attacking shortcuts.
worst problem with melee vs ranged is that when they "kite" u and u try to hit u get "out of range" even if u stand on top of them..
None of that matters, go and try hit a moving person in-game and you'll see.
quite honestly I have only ran into that bug a few times, usually with archers. If I'm chasing someone who is running, I reach them, swing, start running again, repeat. Its a run speed thing I'm sure. But quick classes like SwS hardly have problems with this, and daggers wouldn't care because they could just do specials when they reach.
I also don't spam attack either, I think that may cause people problems as well. Attack the player once and you keep attacking, unless they white and you are purple or something
Basicly what us non ranged combat players want to say:
Hello, we want to have fun as well! Give us a bit of PWN!
(And the cant hit moving target thing is very very annoying, give us at least the mob attack mode. They dont ever seem to have any problem hitting moving targets)
"And daggers could simply do specials when they reach their target..."
Ya thats how it should be... however for some reason yet unknown it doesn't work like that. You run up to your target, hit the skill button, and instead of dropping your target you get to read that stupid "out of range" notification... which is also the last thing you see before the nuker mobs the floor with your sorry laggy melee behind. :p
Just be happy that you don't seem to be affected, but don't claim there is no such problem.
And yes the PvP portion of the Korean players most likely play the same way as ours... but I doubt that the whole Korean youth are bloodlusting leetskeetkids that pwn noobs on L2 all day... and since there are so many of them playing L2 there must be a slightly different player base. Maybe it doesn't appear that loud and is not represented in raid, siege and pvp videos, but thats exactly what I mean... the people who are not that "hardcore-pvp".
>>and daggers wouldn't care because they could just do specials when they reach
I wish it were true... it's not; when you cant hit entangled sps (target too far) there is smth very, very bogus.
When ever i try to unleash on a slower but still running target it will save stupid error msg, then my character will actually stop moving which gives them time to get away from me, so annoying. Fix this then alot of the melee suck vs ranged threads will go because we will be able to hit our targets.
sucks to be all you guys, hehe. I'll test it out in the open and fraps it one of these days because I haven't had this problem since like the middle of C2.
Im not to fussed by it tho, because i dont pvp ranged classes much, im a melee and i stick to what i do best, tearing other melees a new hole.
What gets me is people say there melee suck cos it died to an archer on the siege field or what ever, when im on the siege field, ill only fight other melees, im not even near to where the archers are lol.
I believe a balanced melee/ranged siege army will overcome a pure ranged force even on defence. Assuming even levels/gear and numbers.
There are many problems in the game, almost all of the balance problems are accelerated dramatically by the actions of the playerbase.
Clans are supposed to be teams of people that work together to achieve their goals.
This is one of the clearest examples that trashes those idiotic statements which some people come out with like "without farmers the economy is dead" and the like. Without farmers this game would be more balanced in every possible way imaginable.
The game is supposed to require cooperation. You are supposed to find a Warsmith for your clan to craft things. You are supposed to have BH's in clan able to help you get materials. You are supposed to have a Tank in the clan for your raid content and difficult huntspots. It goes on and on.
We are supposed to depend on one another to get our items and experience and to build the strength of our clans.
Because of farmers and the secondary market, we have a situation where anybody can start the game and get as much or as little gear/adena as he wants and he doesn't need to cooperate with anyone. So you have a steady stream of glory hunters with too much money to burn. This creates a massive farming operation that is only getting worse, not better. Farmers are everywhere because they make so much money.
Then you have clans supporting the farmers to accelerate their clans growth, using them to gain levels too. These clans are typically the do anything to win variety and usually are all ranged dd's either through rerolls or subclasses.
They hardly bother with played buffers, cause there is a great source of spare buffers if they want them. They can use their farmer friends to level them, buy them, borrow them.. etc.
All of these things contribute to a huge lack of balance in the game. It's very much the players fault that the game is perceived this way. Not all players are like this but the idiots are always the easiest to spot.
If there were no farmers from the start, we'd have an economy that involves every one of us. You wouldn't be able to rely on cheats or farmers to accelerate your growth, you would have to earn it. This might mean befriending a BH, finding a trustworthy Warsmith and many other things. Your clan might have to hunt in places to spoil the materials you need to craft. How many of those play to win hardcore clans do hunts like that? They don't, they buy from farmers or get given from farmers, or they just buy the full item. All they do is XP/gank and many of them don't even XP just sit afk in farmer parties.
There's your problem right there. The secondary market and the cheats available for the game allow people shortcuts to the high levels and to obtaining good items. The game is supposed to operate a risk vs. reward system, especially in PvP. The theory being that if you kill your enemy a few times they might decide the XP loss is too great and go elsewhere, in this way we can have victories and losses, otherwise it's just a treadmill of non stop PvP which no one cares about (hi WoW).
This kind of player doesn't have to worry much about XP, either cause they are an easy to XP class with many buffers around or because they cheat/get powerleveled.
There are way too many people like this in the game on every single server. Alliances full of them, these are the alliances that hold most of the castles and lockdown areas and do what they want.
Against groups of players like this, balanced forces can't do anything. This kind of group creates a huge warp in the balance of the game. They don't play the game the way it was intended by the creators and they reap many rewards from it.
If I look at the clans which behave like this and compare them to clans which don't. I see a large gang of people obsessed with winning in PvP, chosing the best gear/class for that victory and leveling it in record time. I see a clan that cares nothing for XP because they might get it from farmers while they sleep. People in these clans are always richer, despite paying millions of adena to farmers for gear/levels and whatever else (assuming they didn't befriend them to leech it for free).
Compare this to the balanced clans where the players are typically in much worse gear, always busy trying to craft something or kit out their clan. They have a variety of useful classes and are not quite as high level, or if they are it matters a lot more to them and took them a lot longer. They are likely to be fighting farmers for the right to hunt in areas or raid rather than take a cut from protecting the farmers. These types of player are very vulnerable to the others above. They cannot compare in PvP cause the others have more time to PvP (don't have to farm mats, hunt for xp etc.), have better gear and higher levels and of course, they are all PvP classes.
This is the overall problem with the game, it's the players that create the warps in balance.
The balanced clan example I mention would probably have a great time fighting a similar clan. It isn't really a matter of probably, it's true.
Both clans would have closer limits to what they can do with regard to gank parties. They would have to offset XP time in order to hunt their enemy. In a fight they will know when they are going to stop because they lost too much XP. All of the games features work better for these people and you wont hear much complaints about balance from any of them.
I think there are flaws in the game which NC needs to work on with regard to ranged and melee, but the largest part of any problem there is, is completely down to the players.
If you took all the people who have never cheated/bought adena and stuck them on a server without farmers or any cheats. Watch how well the game would work and how much better it would be for everyone.
Of course that wont happen, which is a shame as this game is a very good one if played properly.
I believe the Koreans are slightly different to what we have here, but it's a combination of subtle things rather than them being completely different. I view them as being more teambased and most players being more friendly.
In my opinion mmorpg servers are usually well balanced in terms of good vs. evil. Evil being those who do anything to win, cheating etc. Good being those who follow the rules.
Usually this ratio of good and evil would be about 70:30 in favour of good, perhaps even 80:20, around those numbers anyway.
On these servers it seems to be completely reversed in favour of evil. No game can function properly with such a great population of evil. Purely because those categorised in evil are always very strong due to their playstyle and always cause much more havoc and harassment than the good.
This is why we have server domination problems on many servers. Large groups of the evil category form together in an unstopable army which wipes out everyone and controls everything. There is simply not enough of the good side to overcome the evil or to even challenge it on most servers.
The secondary market is the single worst thing to happen to gaming ever.
Companies such as NCSoft need to make a clear line on their stance with regard to the secondary market. If they want to create games which sell items for real money then that's their choice, but keep it seperate.
The games that are not meant to have such things must be cleansed of that plague.
Then those that want to cheat and buy their way to victory can play the games that allow their tastes in gaming to be explored and those that want to abide by the rules and enjoy the world created for them as it was intended can play the way they want to.
Of course there will be a good and evil population in any of them, but without extremely high numbers or cheats (of which evil has both in L2) evil will never ruin the game for good. However, they will have still have plenty of fun performing their evil role and harassing people the way they want to.
MMOG's and communities are always very interesting and intricate and they demand far more effort and monitoring than I think most companies give them.
Thats a long *** post you got there, i stopped half way thru when you went off topic talking about e-bay and the likes.
I dont play a ranged class i play a melee and i personally think PvP is about as balanced as it can get. I dont want to see any changes to a system which seems to work for me. people will complain that they get hit for insane damage, but they dont mention there personal set up or why they were fighting the ranged in the first place. Range is supposed to own melee. Why do you think we have guns irl, because it owned the sword, so its correct that mages and archers should rip up melees. There is no pvp disbalance.
Thats a long *** post you got there, i stopped half way thru when you went off topic talking about e-bay and the likes.
I dont play a ranged class i play a melee and i personally think PvP is about as balanced as it can get. I dont want to see any changes to a system which seems to work for me. people will complain that they get hit for insane damage, but they dont mention there personal set up or why they were fighting the ranged in the first place. Range is supposed to own melee. Why do you think we have guns irl, because it owned the sword, so its correct that mages and archers should rip up melees. There is no pvp disbalance.
LOL your talking against yourself, a tiny example here. About guns thers no guns but there is archers, in wars long ago sure archers where powerfull, but htey where FOOD to the swordsmen when they got close up, why? becose they culdnt really attack from that distance, plus they had no armor to survive more then one hit, PLUS they had no way to defend themself, no shield no nothing.
The melee swords didnt get into the archers faces. Archers typically fired in volleys and mowed down rows and rows of melees, then when they got close, they had their OWN melees to fight them, or they would drop the bow for a shortsword.
worst problem with melee vs ranged is that when they "kite" u and u try to hit u get "out of range" even if u stand on top of them..
Yep, not only do you have to close the range to take a single shot, but when you do the terrible game mechanics don't let you attack. Instead, you usually just follow the target around. And even if you do get a swing, you do a whopping 100-300 damage.
Add to that, many times you'll be chasing around your target and out of no where you'll teleport back about 20 feet, being further away from your target. This isn't a ping issue. My ping is 50 to the server, 0 PL, on a perfect connection.
Among numerous other play balance fixes, they need to find a way to allow players to attack with melee weapons when next to their target instead of having to PASS BY THEM to take one swing. Maybe allow melee attacks to move and attack?
I believe a balanced melee/ranged siege army will overcome a pure ranged force even on defence. Assuming even levels/gear and numbers.
Put your adena where your mouth is. Our ranged siege groups will put up 100m vs your mixed melee and ranged siege groups. You will lose, I gurantee it, and it won't be close.
Bring an army leveled unassisted by powerleveling/cheating and you would see the merits on both attack and defence where a balanced force can defeat an entirely glass cannon force.
Both sides with the same number and both sides 100% played characters only.
Melee's create a hole in mages during a siege by way of destroying their mana pool. The only way mages can circumvent this is an army of 2boxed SE/EE's to recharge them. But the melee's can't really 2box an army of overlords and bishops to keep their HP up to make an attempt at draining the additional mp the SE/EE's provide. Which is why I say played characters only.
I believe a balanced melee/ranged siege army will overcome a pure ranged force even on defence. Assuming even levels/gear and numbers.
Put your adena where your mouth is. Our ranged siege groups will put up 100m vs your mixed melee and ranged siege groups. You will lose, I gurantee it, and it won't be close.
Pure ranged alliances are never successful, never have on our server anyway. Its always the well built and balanced alliances/clans that succeed. I would say an archer-heavy alliance would do better than a nuker-heavy alliance but even then there has to be balance, there has to be support. Look at lvl 76+ melee skills, they will DEFINITELY influence seiges and mass PvP without a doubt.
I understand there are a lot of people who play this game for 'pvp', and believe this game is designed for 'pvp', however, it's not really designed for 1v1. It's supposed to be about castle seiges, and ruling all. Now, there is pvp, but it's Massively Multiplayer pvp, multitudes attacking, defending. Never in history did anyone try to rule the world with only footmen, or only archers, but with a well balanced army of different 'classes' of soldiers, from infrantryman, to the calvalry, archers, etc. Each playing their part, each 'class' somewhat the antithesis of other classes.
I guess the point is, quit trying to own every class in 1v1, that's not the way anything works, anywhere. If everyclass is the same as every other class, what's the point in having classes.
I play my nuker, and i play him like a nuker, stay the hell away from physical damage, cuz i'm one shot dead, and nuke from a distance, then piss and moan when i'm out of mana.
I play my glad, and I play him like a melee class. Get up close and personal, kick the hell out of everything i can, then piss and moan when I'm out of hp and mana.
Each class has a role in the battle field, and it's not taking out every other class, it's to take out those classes that you can, so the other classes can do their bit as well. An all mage party is dead the first time they get hit, mages aren't squat without a meat shield, period. It's the reason i quit playing my SpS.
Still there is just way to many who fail to seem to get this thread, nobody here want to be able ot own anyone in 1vs1, they want it to be WELL balanced, and not geing owned by chars 20 levels below themself just becose they are rangers. Everyone should have the same chans to win in battles, it should be about skill how well you know to play your class vs other classes, and not about being nuker or mele as it's curently is.
Nobody here have asked to make there class powerfull to actually beaet them, they have asked to make it more even and not like every choricle have done making the difference between them biger and biger.
isn't it 1 out of 3 in Korea play l2? So makes sense that there would be some killings everyonce in awhile. That by no means says the entire playerbase acts that way. I also read somewhere that "e-gangsters" sell in game protection for real life money over there. Go figure.
I do favor changes for melee to be able to get into melee range faster and more reliably in combat (sprint skill on a timer)... however...
I do not believe it is possible for the OP to ever be able to consider himself balanced without adding something or nerfing something that would be so massively overpowering for melee as to make the game pointless for anyone who wasn't melee.
I am not sure where he gets his numbers... but they aren't by testing with even leveled/equipped/buffed mages and melee.
Just as an example comparison, the Warlock is now a direct and even match for a mage or archer.
The warlock uses MELEE to kill.
That melee is a combination of pet and summoner, but it is nonetheless MELEE that kills.
The melee system works, the melee just need a way to get in there... especially against archers who are currently invulnerable. (Mages are already catchable.)
Caveats:
-I am quite surprised about the hot springs "debuff" as it does seem rediculous.
-I am extremely surprised they put in a critical SA on a bow...
-Necros are overpowered... 9k Hp mages with full nukes AND and insanely powerful pet are over the top and then some.
FYI anyone complaining about sleep now is just showing how inexperienced they are at PvP.
In another MMO i played one of the dominate players of the game got irl stabbed because he pk'd to many people in-game. A zerg of 3 tried to kill his character and the 1 guy beat em all off, they then traced his address somehow and zerged him irl and killed him. Quite shocking. They were korean i believe, the game was LoM. I would have thought we would get more stabbings in a NA/Euro game tho.
I have played a Tank since Prelude to Chaos and I am simply to stubborn to quit playing him. But whenever I finally make it to 75 I'm definately subbing a Ranged DD.
hehehehe, same here i wont quit on my pally, even tho im the worst class in the game. i dont even use holy strike, its worthless so i stopped lvling it up.
O well, back to getting the crap beat out of me.
If only you poeple put all this thought and effort into something useful, like school or work. This game could really care less what you want/think, just some don't know that yet...
If only you poeple put all this thought and effort into something useful, like school or work. This game could really care less what you want/think, just some don't know that yet...
I'm in college, this game comes after school, work, car, and girl.
just because people enjoy a game and put ideas of what it should be like doesnt mean they dont have lives beyond that.
I auto-X alot, play paintball on a team (milti-sim.), and have other hobbies, i think ur post was just to say something that u would hope everyone would think ur cool.
this is the internet man, get out of HS no one gives a [censored] of what u think about people.
(square root of [attacker's matk / defender's mdef]) x [skill power] x 91
defender mdef is out of sqrt.
in sqrt is sps bonus.
unless you have a newer source for m. dmg eq, he's right. the mdef is inside the sqrt. c1 prima guide page 26. there's no mention about a sps bonus either
Somebody has to make a forum museum, where the greatest posts are stored in there, and fill it with skyler's posts.
Too bad I cant rate him with 5 stars again.
Taraza, to test the bug, use a melee attack skill, like power strike, fatal strike, hammer crush whatever. You click on the skill, target keeps moving, your toon follows it and when it reaches it you get "Target too far" message, your toon stops and it's game over for you.
this bug also also exist for range atk. back in c1, where mystic actually cast slow, if you're trying to cast a nuke at max range and the target is moving away from the caster, then "target out of range" error pops up. what really bother me is that why is it so difficult replace this error message to a auto-use skill when this condition occurs.
The more I think about it... why is there such a message anyway? o_O
If you are REALLY out of range, the code makes you walk close to the target. There is a command that lets you stand still while using skills, but nobody would ever use that because if you want to use a skill, you want to use that skill at all costs. :p
So you run towards your target and in theory your skill is launched when you get into range... but instead... when you get into range you get that error. o_O You wouldn't get that error about being out of range if you wouldn't be within range in the first place.
My brain starts to hurt so I'll stop thinking about it. But there must be something messed up in communication between different modules of the code... and the devs are just to friggin lazy to sort that problem out because it means a lot more work than adding a few new fancy graphics which attract more new customers on top of that.
Somebody has to make a forum museum, where the greatest posts are stored in there, and fill it with skyler's posts.
Too bad I cant rate him with 5 stars again.