Balance issues in DAoC (Long)

[Huntingtons]

then they should put em on the same kind of timer? Oo

 

[Bubble]

Rami-
I think you've been a bit to bias in your conclusions

I've played Albion and Midgard on the US servers and Albion Hibernia on the EU servers.

Alot of your post seems to be an infil rant, your 'fix' was to take away any special point to being an inf (IE- Turn dragonfang into Diamondback) (take away the Inf special RA with no replacement?) Playing a Nightshade for 4 Realm Ranks kind of opened my eyes to the situation. At RR1 my rps came from Adding at RR2/3 i duoed with other stealthers. At RR4 (AP2 etc) i could kill a RR7 inf with little effort using a Diamondback (Garrote/AH backup) combo, i outdamage infs in every way when i had AP up (oh also 75 AF charges too ) funny more shadowblades killed me than infs (Rambo whine inc)

Oh i was buffed to the teeth

 

[rivan]

Stun, Mez, Root & Snare are serveral of the most important and powerful abilities that exist in DAoC (and in that order, in my opinion), and the current distribution of these abilities often leads to situations where we have overpowered classes.

Minstrels: A stealth class, already loaded with abilities [Rest Song/Power Song/DD Instas/Mez/De-Mez/Charm/Speed/SoS/Ablative], being given a 9s Insta Stun has lead, undeniably, to the domination of Infil/Minstrel combos in Steath Wars(TM), especially coupled with the arguably overpowered 2.5 SpecPoint Infils.

Mana Chanters: A baseline castable stun, damage debuff, nuke and snaring pet. Without the stun, its not nearly so formidable. A stun is not really an appropriate crowd-control method for a high-damage output nuker.

Pac Healer: An Area-of-Effect Insta Stun is insanely powerful. Couple this with a few AoE Casters, and you have potential mayhem.

In my opinion, there should be a review of which classes get these abilities. There should be no AoE Instas of any kind, especially Stun/Mez. Stun should not be given to any high damage dealers, that's where it becomes too overpowering. A nuker class should not be able to stun, a competant melee class (espeically with stealth and dds) should not be given an insta stun. No class should be able to AoE Stun. Stun is the single most powerful ability there is- to render someone completely helpless and still open to damage; it should at least be castable.

Sort out CC, and a lot of the problems RvR faces, vanish.

 

[chretien]

The game is not designed to be balanced across a particular range of classes or between one class and a comparable class from another realm, but balanced across an entire realm.
All realms have access to much the same 'toolkit' - Stealth, CC, nukes, tanks etc but the combinations are different leading to the percieved imbalances. If everyone ran around solo and unbuffed regardless of class then it would be fair to complain if one realm had a class that could always beat comparable classes from other realms. Given that the normal unit of RvR warfare is the group and this contains a maximum of eight people, spreading the core abilities over more classes weakens a realm as they can't include all the things they'd like in a single group. The best situation would be to have eight or fewer classes in a realm, that way you'd always be able to cover every single base in an rvr group.
A class to my mind is only overpowered when it has a negative impact on the RvR experience of two or more realms - a good example of this is the Savage. Not only did it overpower tank groups from other realms completely, giving Midgard a near unstoppable group set up for several months, but it also made several Mid classes obsolete at a stroke.

The 'stealthwars' are in my view a distraction and not something to base balance issues around. The game was not designed to be played solo and class v class parity was almost certainly not a consideration. If stealthers were grouped in normal rvr groups then I dare say there would not be one tenth the amount of whines on these boards.

The name of the game is Realm versus Realm not stealther versus stealther or even group versus group.

 

[Rami]

Rami-
I think you've been a bit to bias in your conclusions

I've played Albion and Midgard on the US servers and Albion Hibernia on the EU servers.

Alot of your post seems to be an infil rant, your 'fix' was to take away any special point to being an inf (IE- Turn dragonfang into Diamondback) (take away the Inf special RA with no replacement?) Playing a Nightshade for 4 Realm Ranks kind of opened my eyes to the situation. At RR1 my rps came from Adding at RR2/3 i duoed with other stealthers. At RR4 (AP2 etc) i could kill a RR7 inf with little effort using a Diamondback (Garrote/AH backup) combo, i outdamage infs in every way when i had AP up (oh also 75 AF charges too ) funny more shadowblades killed me than infs (Rambo whine inc)

Oh i was buffed to the teeth

Maybe you're right. But my point is, why have a class that compete 1 minute every 15 minutes? Or not being able to compete at all at low RR. Why not just balance out the class so it can compete no matter if they have the RA or not and remove it completely.

 

[Rami]

Hibernia used to be the only realm with endurance regain, and the only realm with PBAE.

Now Midgard (The meleerealm *cough cough*) has better PBAE than us. Our endreg blows, the only good thing about it is its range.

 

[bashir]

i just cant understand why savages are pure tanks with spells? a taunt is deffo a spell :< haste is a spell? and so forth, it just doesnt make sence... im not gonna join in this already lame and pointless discussion so i'd leave it here...

ok... so all "tanks" that got a none-style icon available for their quickbar are actually casters?
BS and you know it. Only Warriors/Armsmen/Blademasters are tanks if you look at your claim.

So don't whine about that. Pally got Taunt too. Friar too... want more?

 

[Zaffa]

ok... so all "tanks" that got a none-style icon available for their quickbar are actually casters?
BS and you know it. Only Warriors/Armsmen/Blademasters are tanks if you look at your claim.

So don't whine about that. Pally got Taunt too. Friar too... want more?

point is savage can get pure tank RA's such as DET, and they got a taunt shout

other classes with taunt shout, such as pally and friar dont have access to those RA's

and pally is just as much pure tank as a savage is tbfh

 

[Gahn]

Erm

ok... so all "tanks" that got a none-style icon available for their quickbar are actually casters?
BS and you know it. Only Warriors/Armsmen/Blademasters are tanks if you look at your claim.

So don't whine about that. Pally got Taunt too. Friar too... want more?

In fact Pallies Champs and Reavers don't have access to Det ...
Armsman Warriors Blademasters and Heros doesn't have ANY kind of self buff like Savages have, period.
That's y some1 moaning bout em be a bit over EVEN after 1st nerf.

 

[Eroa]

point is savage can get pure tank RA's such as DET, and they got a taunt shout

other classes with taunt shout, such as pally and friar dont have access to those RA's

and pally is just as much pure tank as a savage is tbfh

why dont skald and bards get stealth ?

(you know this can be drawn out forever so stop making those silly comparisons)

 

[Gahn]

And again about "balanced" poit of view

Most of u says that opening Shade class to Celts / Shars would make Shades overpowered ...
Let's discuss a bit this sentence:

Briton Starting stats
All 60
Raising stats
Dex, Qui, Stre

Celt Starting stats
All 60
Raising stats
Dex, Qui, Stre

Strange eh? They are EXACTLY the same, tho Infils got still 2.5 spec points, Shades 2.2, so in what way Celts Shades would be overpowered against Briton Infils?
I can change my idea IF some1 gives me good reasons and not the utter bs about defending an undefendable positon about it.

 

[Gahn]

Eheh

why dont skald and bards get stealth ?

(you know this can be drawn out forever so stop making those silly comparisons)

That's y on 1st instance Mincers shouldn't have stealth ^^

 

[Umilard]

Bards and skalds don't get stealth becouse they aren't rogues, bard is a healing & cc-class and skald is a viking in base..

I wouldn't really whine if they did get stealth tho, if they remained on 1.5 skillpoints/level they would have to sacrifice other stuff to get good stealth.

And i agree that minstrels in the current state is overpowered, with ablative and the new (why did we get this one again?) dd i can take down pure tanks in pure melee with a little bit of luck. Heck, i even beat Paladins (below rr5 ones atleast) in duels.

Maybe a solution would be to remove one of our dds and only keep the high one, that would take us back to being a class that do crap damage, as it is now minstrel do quite abit of damage (170+130 from dds every 15 seconds is alot)

 

[Shinlu]

What about clerics?
They really need a boost imo.
All we have atm is heals heals heals and bof.
Since Mythic won't do anything about our gimped smite-line
we should be given something that higher our usetility.

The insta-pbaoe mezz is a joke.
AoE-stun would be gr8 but I think that would never
happend.

healer > druid > cleric
from my experience.

 

[Whisperess]

Most of u says that opening Shade class to Celts / Shars would make Shades overpowered ...
Let's discuss a bit this sentence:

Briton Starting stats
All 60
Raising stats
Dex, Qui, Stre

Celt Starting stats
All 60
Raising stats
Dex, Qui, Stre

Strange eh? They are EXACTLY the same, tho Infils got still 2.5 spec points, Shades 2.2, so in what way Celts Shades would be overpowered against Briton Infils?
I can change my idea IF some1 gives me good reasons and not the utter bs about defending an undefendable positon about it.

It's called RA's. Nightshades at RR5+ are already doing very very well. Give them +20 str and +20 con to boost ( for 15-20 less dex ), and there's your answer. Or even worse, +40 con with Shar's. Basically you would have a Shadowblade with great RA's.

If they opened up shades for Celt/Shar, they would have to tweak the RA-section too, which would probably piss off the existing shades and make them a carbon copy of the other stealthers.

Just my opinion, ofc.

 

[Revz]

Ok, first of all, let's take a look at the population of Prydwen:
Active Characters:
Albion: 4,758 (39%)
Hibernia: 3,217 (27%)
Midgard: 4,149 (34%)
Total: 12,124

This is pretty much how it looks on all servers. Here are the same stats for Excalibur:
Active Characters
Albion: 7,025 (43%)
Hibernia: 3,961 (24%)
Midgard: 5,358 (33%)

This is pretty much how it looks on all servers.

Why?

* Albion has 14 playable classes, Hibernia has 13 and Midgard has 12.

* Albion has two "unique" classes, Friar and Minstrel.

* Albion has the infiltrator, the uber killingmachine that makes you kill alot! Perfect for all the younger players (Sorry, has to be said, it's a fact) since they mostly want instant-action.

*Albion has platearmor. This armor is better and looks better than other armors. This draws the attention of alot of players since this armor is unique for Albion only. Sure, Hibernia has scale... we'll take that up soon.

-snip-

You missed out the number one, biggest reason why Albion has a greater population than every other realm in almost all circumstances. It is the same reason that nearly 20% of all EverQuest characters are human (despite there being 13 races to choose from at the time of the suvrvey and humans having no racial benefits at all). When they don't know what they are doing people generally go for what is safe and well known to them. This means they play humans in EverQuest and Albion in DAoC. Of all the realms Albion is the most identifiably human and based on very well known history, myths and legends. People associate with it much more easily than the other two realms and feel most comfortable there when they are starting out.

Nothing to do with the relative power of the classes I'm afraid as I would guess that 99% of people don't research this before they play. It's also the reason why Albion probably has the most casual players, idiots and newbies who don't know what they are doing.

 

[Morchaoron]

newbies are the future imo

 

[Nxs]

Cant be assed to read all this thread, seen it all before - its prolly been said before but if not.....

Remember that although Alb have 2 more classes than hib and 1 more than mid, this results more often than not in an unbalanced RvR group, I saw a post on VNBoards some time ago, somethink like to provide the basics for an RvR group, Alb's need twice as many players as Hib's due to the spread of utility.

A healthy debate is good from time to time, but check out all the facts, you can look at this from any angle, eg Alb is the only realm not to have an AOE INSTA stun/mezz

<crawls back into hole>

 

[Huntingtons]

ok... so all "tanks" that got a none-style icon available for their quickbar are actually casters?
BS and you know it. Only Warriors/Armsmen/Blademasters are tanks if you look at your claim.

So don't whine about that. Pally got Taunt too. Friar too... want more?

yes, either remove det. from savages, or from game, or give it to all

 

[Rami]

Remove RAs all together tbh...
And SC

Givf back the old days

 

[civy]

The thing is that the bluecon pet and the gimped spear do not weigh up against the superior bow damage scouts have + slam which basically gives them a free critshot (or run away for that matter)

The bluecon pet stops both the running away and the critshot.

Buffed up
Scouts = Hunters (some specs scouts are better others hunters are better). Rangers > Scouts.

Unbuffed
Hunters>Scouts. Rangers>>>>>>>>>Scouts.

 

[Glacier]

Generalization sux... mythic adding SC made it like that.. adding ToA they puting back the ability of a Unique char... not like when SC came and up to this point; almost every different person you meet will be the same as the next man.. Capped SC CCR spec etc ;x

Saying that Hunters own Scout when buffed (now) all comes down to the time and effort the person behind the char has put behind it... not just another: PL'd in 3 days 50thrust, 44crit, 35envenom, 35stealth(or whatever..) max SC'd Fotmfil.. now that wont matter anymore.. in most cases..



...oh .. and evade1+chain > plate imo ;o

 

[Gizor]

Eventhough many of you people say that Merc. & Zerkers are pretty equal damage wise, you got to consider the fact that Merc. got Dirty Tricks and Zerkers got "Bear-mode"/Berserk, <- which suck compared to DT, imo.

Dirty Tricks: This ability is Native to the Mercenary. These hired hands will do anything to win a fight - including this dirty trick of throwing dirt into the enemy's eyes. For 30 seconds, the Mercenary has a chance of throwing dirt into the enemy's eyes whenever he swings. If hit, the enemy will miss 25% more often, and fumble 50% more often for 10 seconds. This ability can be used once per 7 minues.

Savage that has been DT'd = level 4 Viking
Berserker that has been DT'd = level 2 Seer ;o

Berserk: This ability is native to the Berserker, and allows him to do more damage than would normally be possible by throwing himself into a berserker rage, transforming into a Vendo (BearPerson) during combat. Berserk makes every hit for a certain time a critical hit, but can only be used once every 7 minutes.

^^and the Berserker gets some sort of "defence penalty" or something, while he goes into this "RAGE". (SO HIT THE BEAR!!!!)

 

[Garok]

Eventhough many of you people say that Merc. & Zerkers are pretty equal damage wise, you got to consider the fact that Merc. got Dirty Tricks and Zerkers got "Bear-mode"/Berserk, <- which suck compared to DT, imo.

Dirty Tricks: This ability is Native to the Mercenary. These hired hands will do anything to win a fight - including this dirty trick of throwing dirt into the enemy's eyes. For 30 seconds, the Mercenary has a chance of throwing dirt into the enemy's eyes whenever he swings. If hit, the enemy will miss 25% more often, and fumble 50% more often for 10 seconds. This ability can be used once per 7 minues.

Savage that has been DT'd = level 4 Viking
Berserker that has been DT'd = level 2 Seer ;o

Berserk: This ability is native to the Berserker, and allows him to do more damage than would normally be possible by throwing himself into a berserker rage, transforming into a Vendo (BearPerson) during combat. Berserk makes every hit for a certain time a critical hit, but can only be used once every 7 minutes.

^^and the Berserker gets some sort of "defence penalty" or something, while he goes into this "RAGE". (SO HIT THE BEAR!!!!)

What good is increased fumbles against takeing out support classes (light tanks main role) compaired to Crit Hiting every hit.

Also DT is resisted on anything over and Orange con so pretty useless in Fg PvE (ie DF.. ML's etc).

 

[Sycho]

Eventhough many of you people say that Merc. & Zerkers are pretty equal damage wise, you got to consider the fact that Merc. got Dirty Tricks and Zerkers got "Bear-mode"/Berserk, <- which suck compared to DT, imo.

Dirty Tricks: This ability is Native to the Mercenary. These hired hands will do anything to win a fight - including this dirty trick of throwing dirt into the enemy's eyes. For 30 seconds, the Mercenary has a chance of throwing dirt into the enemy's eyes whenever he swings. If hit, the enemy will miss 25% more often, and fumble 50% more often for 10 seconds. This ability can be used once per 7 minues.

Savage that has been DT'd = level 4 Viking
Berserker that has been DT'd = level 2 Seer ;o

Berserk: This ability is native to the Berserker, and allows him to do more damage than would normally be possible by throwing himself into a berserker rage, transforming into a Vendo (BearPerson) during combat. Berserk makes every hit for a certain time a critical hit, but can only be used once every 7 minutes.

^^and the Berserker gets some sort of "defence penalty" or something, while he goes into this "RAGE". (SO HIT THE BEAR!!!!)

I wish worked like that, shame it doesn't :/

Vendo mode is sooooooooooo good at taking unguarded classes out and dirty tricks can be good WHEN it lands(which is not very often compared to what it used to be)

So DT=vendo(overall they are both good)

Group rvr vendo can be better though solo dirt tricks is normally better but one thing people tend to forget DIRT TRICKS ONLY EFFECTS 23(might be slightly less actually) of the 30 odd or so classes in daoc.

Both have the same amount advantages and disadvantages from what i seen using each.What i have seen from a zerk though, is the LA specline should have a side style or chain and they should have flurry.

 

[Gizor]

What good is increased fumbles against takeing out support classes (light tanks main role) compaired to Crit Hiting every hit.

Also DT is resisted on anything over and Orange con so pretty useless in Fg PvE (ie DF.. ML's etc).

First of all, are we talking about PvE? no, atleast I am not
And light tanks main role is to take out support? Hmm..in todays (well before toa, dno now) RvR, there is one (maybe 2) what you can call a heavy-tank or main tank or whatever, and rest are light tanks, i.e Mercs / SvGs / BMs etc. Light tanks are the once that actually deal all the damage, and this is not only agains support, some teams actually goes for the other teams(realms) tanks before support, and leave interupting up to other classes.

And to Sycho, cba to quote again, and I do not know if its even neccesary...anways...Let me see, in a normal alb group you have how many Mercs. ? 2 / 3 (all depending on diff. group setups etc.) maybe 4? (I dno) still, that leaves use with several tanks with DT and do not come here and tell me that not one of the Merc. doesnt get in a DT on some of the others tanks, f. eks a Savage, and everyone is whining about SvGs doing so HUGE amount of damage, well, the DT will for sure stop the SvG from doing dmg for a short while, which is a great advantage, in my opinion.
And another thing, how many Berserkers are there really in a "Mid-grp" these days, 1 maybe, for PF.
For the issue about Berserkers getting flurry and LA-line getting a side-pos is something I totaly agree on...

Anyways, this is just my two cents in this case...maybe something is wrong, I dont know, but I'm here to discuss, which is great when your bored

 

[Vladamir]

Gizor;

This is in no way a criticism just a response to your idea of an alb tank group setup, its unlikely that it would be 4 mercs, more something like this;

Cleric x2
Paladin
Sorc
Minstrel
3 damage dealing tanks, merc/arms, generally whats available .

Although then again if a minstrel was unavailable its better to take a 4th det tank along and run at sorc (with end chant sprinting) speed .

 

[Sycho]

Well gizor only thing is DT doesn't land that often, think it's like 30% chance or so, yes this from what i have seen and i have played sycho for aggggeeess now(120 days played on him) , DT was way less resistant before the 1.62 patch though it's 7min timer now, but when it lands it may stop a savage styling 1 hit or so... if not maybe 2-3 if lucky.Also you have to hit the target to use DT which is crap if you are MA sometimes Oo

Even savages themselves can probably notice it's not as good as some people think in group rvr.It's because of savages utility compared to a zerk is why zerk hardly get groups same with a thane compared to a warrior, midgard is just like alb, has half classes that need to be reworked on altogether.But with the ra changes coming those classes will be viable again if group purge is available for all realms but will make cc'ers more pissed off :/

Can't win in daoc whatever they decide to do.

 

[Gizor]

Although then again if a minstrel was unavailable its better to take a 4th det tank along and run at sorc (with end chant sprinting) speed .

Was what I was thinking about, although it will never (ALMOST) ever happen that an alb group will go out without their precious SOS..erm..Minstrel
Saying 4 Merc was just to take it to the edge xD

 

[Daedalus]

You know.. I'm more interested in the monthly BountyPoint output per realm. Not to mention the amount of active accounts per realm per server to see which realm is actually the most 'nerfable'.

I think that this page allows us to do that, partially:
http://daoc-stats.com/realmstats.php?server=Prydwen

Anyway. I really suck at statistics, so someone who's the master of stats, please check it and verify it, and conclude anything if you can, please:

What I've done, is this. "Chars RP Lastweek" / "Chars Active" = rp per active character per week on average.

The results are:
Alb: 3230 rp per active character per week on average.
Hib: 4256 rp per active character per week on average.
Mid: 3522 rp per active character per week on average.

Albs having all the Strength Relics, and Hib having all the Power Relics.
(as of 06-03-2004 00:38 ETC)

So.. what does this mean? Do Albs need more love? Do hibs need nerfs? Is it that simple? I'd say that Hib needs nerfs and more players. But hey, players are hard to implement in a patch.