Should Armsman get Loved?

[Gladiatorrr]

Hello...
For those who read this, I would just like to say that I am an armsman for those who dont already know me and I was wondering whether Armsman should get a bit of loving from mythic. ?

The reason being is this: I chose to be an armsman for the plain and simple reason... Armsman should be the best in mele combat! Also they had a ranged attack which was there Xbow! They also had the mighty polearm weapon which i thought was a good idea to have!

Now with the multiple changes with DAOC and alot of classes getting some 'loving', Armsman seem to be left behind and forgotten about! I mean, what do they have? what is special about an armsman?

In my opinon, why choose an armsman when you can be a paladin and get: severel chants, (even healing themselves and grp) resist chants, AF chant, damage chant etc... They can resurrect people who have died, and basically are IMO armsman with upgrades!!
Another little thing that annoyed me was that paladins got a 'pulling' chant/spell. One of the main reasons i chose an armsman in the 1st place was of there unique ranged Xbow to pull with. Paladins now got that too!!!

So what if we get a chance to use polearm, so what if purge is only 8pts, so what if we get a few more hit points than a pally and it is only a few! This still doesnt make us anywhere near as good as a paladin!

In my opinon, this really does need looking at, as alot of people wont choose a class which was once a formidible class and great to play.

Im sure there maybe alot of paladins who wont agree with me but deep down, you yourselves must realise that armsman havent got that killer instink that they once had.

Signed: Gladiator!

 

[cHodAX]

Couldn't agree more. Mercs hit harder, Paladins live longer and are more group friendly. Albion doesn't need Armsman anymore and that kind of sucks to be honest.

 

[Wij]

Rubbish. Armsmen are your primary tank. They can last for years and still do more damage than a pally. Not as boring as warriors. Get Determination and farm RP.

 

[Vegy]

With the right spec you can multi-role, a 2h/polearm spec will outdamage a merc per hit, possibly overall due to the fact that your first attack isnt effected by swing speed.
Pallies hit for shite, xbow does a very reasonable ammount of damage aswell.

 

[Coim-]

It's 4 points for purge, not 8. And tbh, warriors are a LOT better than armsmans. Warrior > Hero > Armsman...

 

[Gladiatorrr]

Ok ok... So, the way you said: 'Armsman are YOUR primary tank' means that you are not an Albion. ?
Maybe you should try being one and see how you get on compared to all the other mele classes in albion.
Its a shame you were not an armsman from day 1 as you would have looked back and seen the changes that have been made, eg, loving to other classes etc. and realise that you are still on patch 1 whilst everyone is on patch 8 or whatever we are on!

Trust me, its looking bad for Albions 'used to be' main tank!

 

[Vegy]

I played armsman for a very long time, they don't need much loving. Warriors, Heros and Armsmen are being turned down for Savages(/Zerkers(lol)), Blademasters and Mercs because these classes attack faster. Everyone wants fast hard hitters these days not slow big hitters, It has nothing to do with Armsman alone.
Paladins are chosen over arms in rvr groups because you need end chant, and paladins can spec to be as defencive as armsmen.

 

[Vegy]

Also what's completely ironic about you saying 'Have you actually played armsman" is, Have you actually played a warrior or hero(not some /level 20 gimp either)?
Playing against one isnt enough.

 

[cHodAX]

Dual Wield Merc with a few lvls of duelist reflexs will do more damage in 5 seconds than a pole Armsman 90% of the time. Ok if a pole Armsman gets a reactionary off he may be back in the game but 90% the time the Merc is the overall best damage dealer. The added defense of dirty tricks and 360 degree evade helps as well. Now for Paladin, with chants and good shield spec a Pally will fuck a pole armsman up time after time. RA wise the pally can get x2 100% heals and twist those chants, unlimited endurance/heal/af/dmg. In most battles Pallys are usually last to die for a reason, extremly good defense and utility make them Albion's best plate wearing class.

 

[Coim-]

Originally posted by old.cHodAX
Dual Wield Merc with a few lvls of duelist reflexs will do more damage in 5 seconds than a pole Armsman 90% of the time. Ok if a pole Armsman gets a reactionary off he may be back in the game but 90% the time the Merc is the overall best damage dealer. The added defense of dirty tricks and 360 degree evade helps as well. Now for Paladin, with chants and good shield spec a Pally will fuck a pole armsman up time after time. RA wise the pally can get x2 100% heals and twist those chants, unlimited endurance/heal/af/dmg. In most battles Pallys are usually last to die for a reason, extremly good defense and utility make them Albion's best plate wearing class.

Correct me if I'm wrong, but I think that's what he was trying to say. It shouldn't be that way. Armsman's should be the best plate wearers in alb...

 

[freeq]

the problem with paladins is thier RA's sure they get 2 insta heals but at a cost, when you think of what an arms can get before rr5 a paladin will have less than half the abilities an armsman has.

egsample: at RR5 a paly can get purge, faith healing, and first aid 2. now thats all the good stuff for a pali at the start, the other stuff AOM etc comes later, for me anyways.
armsman on the other hand at RR5 can get purge, IP, mastery of blocking 2, mastery of parry 2, determination2 and AOM 2.

now think of the time a pali has to spend after rr5 to get higher blocking, parry and resistances, where arms get em faster cheaper making them better all round tanks all the time, takes palies a while to get good in rvr. by the time we got AOM you guys are working on MOB 4 and stuff...

the heal chant is next to useless in rvr for starters, ok sometimes it helps, but can hardly say its uber hehe. the damage chant aint much better either, thanes is better than ours ffs! nerf end chant is the only bonus a paladin has over any tank IMO.

having said all that, i like my paladin, well he is kinda gimped after switching from 2h, but i'm buggered if i'm gonna lvl another tank to 50

 

[Vegy]

In 5 Seconds armsman gets off 2 styled attacks = 500x2 (1000)
In 5 Seconds merc gets off 3 styled attacks = 200+75x3 (825)

This test has been done over and over again, due to the fact that your first attack is not affected by you swing speed then people with slower weapons will do more damage under smaller ammounts of time, and with assists the time is very small.
What I think makes duel weilders so wanted is because dw means less chance to block, pbt is less effective, interrupts more often, and holding 2 weapons is completely fotm atm.

1vs1 means fuck all, pally can probably solo anyclass in the game, paladins these days are specced defensively, which means alot of blocking, heal chant, FH etc which is why they are the last to die. You will also probably find that a defensive player usually gets picked out last because he's not a major threat like the offensive and support players.

Arms are just as good as Heros and Warriors.
IMO stag is overrated, exactly like IP. The only time they will help you alot is when you are fighting a close battle(which probably means your support is dead) or you are soloing, great...

 

[old.mattshanes]

Our guild has a few hybrid or pole armsmen, they do very good in groups if played right, though they do need some adjusting as do many classes really.High rr merc should outhit an armsman yes but armsman should frontload in my view to be most effective these days.

 

[Coim-]

Indeed, but instead of comparing them to albion's other tanks, compare them to the other realms. The whole double-speccing thing is...well...stupid. Why did they have to put double speccing in? Warrior's don't have it. Hero's don't have it. Why armsmans?

 

[cHodAX]

Originally posted by Coim-
Correct me if I'm wrong, but I think that's what he was trying to say. It shouldn't be that way. Armsman's should be the best plate wearers in alb...

Lucky I wasn't replying to the original post then, read the whole thread.

 

[Coim-]

Originally posted by old.cHodAX
read the whole thread.

Why bother?

 

[cHodAX]

Originally posted by Vegy
In 5 Seconds armsman gets off 2 styled attacks = 500x2 (1000)
In 5 Seconds merc gets off 3 styled attacks = 200+75x3 (825)

This test has been done over and over again, due to the fact that your first attack is not affected by you swing speed then people with slower weapons will do more damage under smaller ammounts of time, and with assists the time is very small.
What I think makes duel weilders so wanted is because dw means less chance to block, pbt is less effective, interrupts more often, and holding 2 weapons is completely fotm atm.

1vs1 means fuck all, pally can probably solo anyclass in the game, paladins these days are specced defensively, which means alot of blocking, heal chant, FH etc which is why they are the last to die. You will also probably find that a defensive player usually gets picked out last because he's not a major threat like the offensive and support players.

Arms are just as good as Heros and Warriors.
IMO stag is overrated, exactly like IP. The only time they will help you alot is when you are fighting a close battle(which probably means your support is dead) or you are soloing, great...

Your numbers for merc are a bit on the low side, 3 styled hits including offhand much more often than not roll in at over 1000 dmg. However the first swing damage output of a polearmsman with crit has been known to take 3/4 of a casters health so the overall difference in actuall RvR maybe be quite small. However, take into account the difference between chain and plate being marginal and then add the 360 degree evade ability, the wealth of RA's the merc can spec and dirty tricks. It makes the Merc more viable in RvR. Now the Paladin may hit for crap damage, however all his hits will be styled. He should never run out of endurance for a slam and his defensive abilitys are second to none. He is far more versatile then any Armsman spec and and brings far more to a group. That alone makes him Albion's premier plate wearer and that leaves the poor armsman as Albions 3rd best tank at best. Yet he was orginally designed to be Albions primary tank, just look at the number of active armsman now because they have basically stood still for 2 years while practially every other class has been tweaked.

 

[cHodAX]

Originally posted by Coim-
Why bother?

Well you wouldn't make posts that seem a little out of place but nevermind, it is friday night so drink a few beers and post all ya like

 

[Gladiatorrr]

Thank you Chodax.
Im pleased you feel the same way as i do. Its just a shame but i dont think anything will be done about this.
Good lad!

 

[Vegy]

The only way to consider a paladin above an arms is to look at it defensively.
Both hybrid and offence the arms beats a paladin hands down.
Same said for Merc but vice versa.

The topic here is about the arms/warrior/hero comparison, damage wise a polearmsman probably out damages both these classes.

 

[Gladiatorrr]

Actually, my post was unclear, i was talking about Albion classes! I havent a clue about wot changes the other realms have and havent.
But basically, Armsman havent got squat since day 1. !!

 

[cHodAX]

Originally posted by Vegy
The only way to consider a paladin above an arms is to look at it defensively.
Both hybrid and offence the arms beats a paladin hands down.
Same said for Merc but vice versa.

The topic here is about the arms/warrior/hero comparison, damage wise a polearmsman probably out damages both these classes.

Agreed to a certain extent, however Armsman would run out of endurance pretty quick. That means no more styled hits, no prospect of sprint. Now you say the topic is about armsman/warrior/hero comparison, however the original post is nothing to do with that. It is about Albion's 'primary' tank not actually being the realms primary tank anymore, the game has drifted hugely towards melee being about defensive tanks or hard hitting and versatile light tanks.

 

[Coim-]

Originally posted by Vegy
The only way to consider a paladin above an arms is to look at it defensively.
Both hybrid and offence the arms beats a paladin hands down.
Same said for Merc but vice versa.

The topic here is about the arms/warrior/hero comparison, damage wise a polearmsman probably out damages both these classes.

BUT a warrior can have 1h AND 2h. Slam, switch to 2h, and do great damage. Then if he needs to, switch back to 1h for the extra defense. An armsman cannot do this without lowering slash/thrust, which makes damage output unreliable to say the least...

 

[cHodAX]

Originally posted by Coim-
BUT a warrior can have 1h AND 2h. Slam, switch to 2h, and do great damage. Then if he needs to, switch back to 1h for the extra defense. An armsman cannot do this without lowering slash/thrust, which makes damage output unreliable to say the least...

Indeed, not something I had thought about but it does make them much more versatile.

 

[tonita]

Only problem with armsmen atm's double speccing fix the huge range of dmg evne with 50 50 spec and it will be fine, doing 300-700 dmg with 50 pole 50 dmgtype's plain stupid

 

[Coim-]

Originally posted by tonita
Only problem with armsmen atm's double speccing fix the huge range of dmg evne with 50 50 spec and it will be fine, doing 300-700 dmg with 50 pole 50 dmgtype's plain stupid

Exactly! Double speccing is pretty stupid anyways...but add to the fact that the damage is so...variable...well...just makes it worse.

 

[old.mattshanes]

They need to give them the choice to use any type of pole just by speccing in pole arm and getting full damage from it no variance, but the weapon spec would effect their 1h damage like it does now.

 

[Sharma]

Well, im unsure about the damage variation but some slash poler hit my zerk for a nice 1025 damage.

Studded got nasty slash penalty.

 

[Vegy]

Chodax, will you stop talking in terms of soloing?
Why would an arms run out of end exactly? All groups have a paladin these days anyway (except fucktard random groups who usually end up coming to bw forums and moan about getting owned by mid/hibs).

An arms can have 1h 2h and slam, That is exactly how my spec worked, equally specced for 1h and 2h.
What you must remember is an arms can get upto 140% max damage (believe its 140%, pin if you're reading correct me please ), while a warrior will only get 115%(same again, but it was definately lower than albs).
How exactly would 39 weapon, 50 pole, 42 shield be unreliable damage?, or 44/44/42? Always seemed fine for me, and the varience is tiny.

Finally, explain to me why arms has to be the 'primary tank' anyway?
Merc(in most cases)=Offence
Paladin=Defence
Arms=Either/Both

Blademaser=Offence
Hero=Defence(Champ could be but champs are kinda low in utility these days for groups)
Hero/Champ=Both/Either(Although champ isnt as good at defence as a hero could be, or as a paladin for that matter)

Savage/Zerk=Offence
Warrior/Thane(ish I spose)=Defence
Warrior=Both/Either

 

[Coim-]

Originally posted by Vegy
An arms can have 1h 2h and slam, That is exactly how my spec worked, equally specced for 1h and 2h.
What you must remember is an arms can get upto 140% max damage (believe its 140%, pin if you're reading correct me please ), while a warrior will only get 115%(same again, but it was definately lower than albs).
How exactly would 39 weapon, 50 pole, 42 shield be unreliable damage?, or 44/44/42? Always seemed fine for me, and the varience is tiny.

My armsman used to be pole and the variance in damage was insane. As someone said, sometimes hitting for 300(ish) other times hitting for 700 (maybe more).