[QUESTION] Abandon Mirroring?

[scorge]

I found this thread on WA, it got me thinking so thought i would discuss it here, i am all for getting rid of mirroring, seems a lack of imagination at the cost of making it easier to class balance for mythic...

"Abandon mirroring and let each career stand on its own. Balance is harder, sure, and moreover I'm certain it's a long road through the patches to individualize careers for whom mirroring was an initial backdrop (although, query if changes to those careers should even be made). But it's a worthy pursuit, and it has the added PR benefit of being more akin to the products of the lessons from DAOC: That is, separate but equal can actually work here; e.g., our healer gets the CC, your nuker gets the CC, and his, um... CC/melee/healer... thing, gets the CC, or your rdps gets a pet, mine gets high ranged damage sans pet, and his gets... magic?

I remember the last time I made characters on DAOC, I had to actually spend time thinking about the realms, because there were some things I could do with one realm that I just flat couldn't with the others, and if I committed to one, I was limiting my class choices on that server. On one hand I really wanted to have shroom fields at my disposal, but on the other hand, who doesn't want a pet that heals him? It wasn't as simple as just picking one of the choices and then helping oneself to a smörgåsbord of alts, with total liberty to choose your realm's iteration of one of the four classes if you felt like you wanted to play one (oversimplifying, I know). That's a good thing. It's good for realm unity and it's good for seeing to it that a blighted or overpowered class gets the help it needs, since the "the mirror is the same, so it's balanced" argument doesn't work without mirrors.

I suppose I'm arguing a moot point here, since I know better than to expect something that seems now to be so ingrained to be altered. But I can hope. Even if mirroring is here to stay, as a foundational perspective, I hope at least the careers and the realms have the possibility to grow and develop beyond and apart from their counterparts. If we have to have mirroring, at least don't make it a straightjacket (dare I site the paladin-shaman link in WOW that resulted in such a grotesque abortion of realm identity as now exists there?)."

 

[Xandax]

Mirroring in this situation, doesn't have to mean the classes are identical but simply that they fulfill the same role(s) using similar mechanics.
There can still be differences - which there already are - between the mirrors.

I think the mirroring concept is good because it - ideally - makes that both factions have access to similar (not identical) roles and mechanics. One of the disadvantages in DAoC was the large differences between the realms, and while it can provide fun to be "unique" it was also easy to see the frustration originating from the balancing of the game for (many) players.

 

[Legean]

Problem with DAoCs system was that some classes were simply better than others, Eldritch, Sorc ect. which meant people ran those all the time in their groups and other classes were undesirable. They came a long way to balancing this in the end but some classes were still relativly weak, Thanes, Minstrel ect.

Mythic I think rightly wants all their classes to get an equal look in based on percentage of people playing them which I think can only help the game.

As said in the post above the mirrors aren't identical anyway and what you quoted about pets is essentially what has been done. White Lion being the mirror of Marauder and having a pet so MDPS and Squig Herder being the mirror of Shadow Warrior and having a pet RDPS, with their mirrors having a different mechanic.

The only classes I think are similar are the healers, for obvious reasons, but even then their damage or utility spells do differ quite a lot!

 

[Toel]

Considering there's only two realms I believe it'd be best to stick with the mirroring. However I do find them a bit too identical.

 

[Zebolt]

They should make a real mirroring system instead imo. Where all the abilities are the same on the mirrored classes for the two sides. Only skins and names should differ. Givf true ballance! :>

 

[aika]

They should make a real mirroring system instead imo. Where all the abilities are the same on the mirrored classes for the two sides. Only skins and names should differ. Givf true ballance! :>

would be so boring.

 

[exponentiaL]

would be so boring.

I think Vipsiepipsie was being sarcastic there.

 

[Cadelin]

They should make a real mirroring system instead imo. Where all the abilities are the same on the mirrored classes for the two sides. Only skins and names should differ. Givf true ballance! :>

My side can have the luri skin and your side can have the Troll skins!

I personally thought that recently, for competitive 8v8 RvR the balance between realms in daoc wasn't bad. However I know that this isn't a view shared by a lot of people. Anything other than mirroring will result in people whining about things not being balanced and it will make some classes naturally alot stronger than others.

 

[pikeh]

well what does a random WoW player like Zebolt know about anything!!12

 

[Zebolt]

well what does a random WoW player like Zebolt know about anything!!12

Haha, indeed!

 

[Rayko]

I fully support your idea of removing mirroring... I never liked it, it's the easiest way to balance realms for sure, but it removes the unique utility of every character! I liked the system in DAoC alot more too... Just take all kinds of spells, styles and skills and spread them over all classes for every realm. How many classes do we have now? Was it 20? Well, in my eyes there's only 10 then

However, I'm sure they won't do this