Rift: Planes of Telara

[trias_e]

You can have interdependence and individual flexibility at the same time.  As long as encounters take multiple people to take on, does it really matter that people can switch roles on the fly?  WoW moved towards that with dual specs, not to mention leveling is fast enough that people have multiple 80s anyways.

Cabalist looked like a ton of fun to me looking at youtube videos and checking out spec pathsl. I'd probably try either justicar/cabalist to be a beefy ae tank of doom, or cabalist/purifier for hybrid ae damage/healer

[Sky]

Don't these games rely on interdependence at their core to maintain a need for the social structure that provides long-term subs?

I'm wondering how far you can innovate away from the needs of particular playstyles and class roles while maintaining a subscriber model.

Having each calling able to handle each role doesn't take away from that. It just (in theory) removes the exclusionary aspect of that. Making things more inclusive is a good thing. If my EQ2 SK could've switched into a better tank role for dungeons, he would've grouped more, instead of "Sorry, no room for an SK, we need a real tank". Also gets rid of sitting around waiting for a healer/tank/whatever. If you've got five warm bodies with enough of a clue to build their roles properly, you can tackle any group content in the game.

And some will always be better than others, so player skill is definitely still a primary factor. You're just less limited by your own preference for certain callings or whichever solo class you enjoy.

I disagree with what you said, MA.

[shiznitz]

Another note about switching builds on the fly. Your builds do not need to be the same three souls. You can have like say a Warlock, Necro, Stormcaller for dps then swap to a Chloro, Archon, Dominator spec on the fly for support or whatever.

Does that mean if I fight Donjon Son today and he is a paladin/x/y and I meet him tomorrow he might be a rogue/a/b?  Will he look the same?

[Modern Angel]

I disagree with what you said, MA.

Which part, the tanking part? My thrust is that you probably don't want one metaclass that can do all three (four if you count support) the best. I'm absolutely not advocating that cleric tanks suck. I'm just saying that you don't want to be in a position where the only thing out in the world is clerics and it's damned close to that right now.

[shiznitz]

If clerics are the hardest to kill by a significant margin and still capable of decent dps, then why roll anything else?  PvPers will avoid clerics in favore of other builds so anyone not a cleric will get ganked by half the server who are clerics, get frustrated and roll a cleric.

[Threash]

If clerics are the hardest to kill by a significant margin and still capable of decent dps, then why roll anything else?  PvPers will avoid clerics in favore of other builds so anyone not a cleric will get ganked by half the server who are clerics, get frustrated and roll a cleric.

Because they are very easy to kill by someone who specifically specs for it, like a void knight or whatever the rogue class is that has 8s silence which i can't remember atm.

[Threash]

Another note about switching builds on the fly. Your builds do not need to be the same three souls. You can have like say a Warlock, Necro, Stormcaller for dps then swap to a Chloro, Archon, Dominator spec on the fly for support or whatever.

Does that mean if I fight Donjon Son today and he is a paladin/x/y and I meet him tomorrow he might be a rogue/a/b?  Will he look the same?

You can't switch between base classes, if he's a paladin he will be a different flavor of warrior.

[Sky]

My thrust is that you probably don't want one metaclass that can do all three (four if you count support) the best. I'm absolutely not advocating that cleric tanks suck. I'm just saying that you don't want to be in a position where the only thing out in the world is clerics and it's damned close to that right now.

Cleric can't do all three at once. I'm saying that right now the best cleric dps is not in the same league with the other callings. Cleric tanks are behind rogue tanks which aren't in the same class as warriors.

If all four callings were structured so you had a mechanic to achieve all the group archetypes, each with it's own flavor, then it's innovative. Obviously a cleric archetype should have more options for healing (as they do), warriors more options for tanking, rogues dps, etc. But each should be interchangable, or it's fail. If my cleric can't show up and tank for a level 50 dungeon (for raids, maybe I can see needing the uber build for tanks, but I don't understand raids), it's a lost opportunity. Sure, maybe you get my one flavor of cleric tank vs a warrior who can tank in three ways, but you allow friends to play with each other without someone getting stuck in a role they hate (at least permanently), people can switch up (I'll tank this boss, you tank the next), and you do away with "Level 50 group seeks tank, have healers and dps and ready to go!" kind of (should be) obsolete mechanisms...without throwing out the synergy of said mechanism.

I'm pretty much calling it a missed opportunity, they don't have time to implement it properly now without a major slip.

[Ard]

I'm pretty much calling it a missed opportunity, they don't have time to implement it properly now without a major slip.

It's a missed opportunity for launch, for sure, but that doesn't mean they can't fix it post launch.  It seems like it'd be pretty trivial to add new souls, the way the system works.  The hard part would be making it so they don't all feel samey, and yet still keep them at least moderately balanced.  The PVP souls show that the system has a fair amount of flexibility, and that they aren't even slaved to it necessarily needing to be full 51 point souls to fix this.

[Sky]

EQ2 never really recovered from it's launch, though. Turned into (imo) the best fantasy diku mmo on the market, but not many people knew that.

[Draegan]

Not adding tank souls at launch is not something that decimates a game that is has to recover from that.  No need to be so dramatic.

[shiznitz]

The concept of tanking is awful (in the sense that it is a highly critical role only a limited number of people need to fill) although I think we all understand why it is there.  Still, fighting lots of monsters is more fun that fighting one (CoH pre-purple patch, for example) but the concept of boss fights is so ingrained...

[Modern Angel]

I'm saying that right now the best cleric dps is not in the same league with the other callings.

From everything I've seen and heard this is absolutely false. Cabalist was easily on par with most of the mage specs except maybe pyromancer. I'd like to see someone play shaman extensively and report back some parses but with quick glance napkin math they look like they're completely in the mainline, as well.

[Ghambit]

It's more proper to say "clerics dont have the same burst dps that say a mage or rogue can have."  As time goes on in a fight though, they'll probably catch up.
Also, where is it written that a cleric cant tank?  There's nothing stopping them from doing-so aside from some arbitrary personal rule against it.  Obviously, speccing and gearing to tank helps (which is easy enough in this system), but even then... until you actually fight a boss that needs proper uber-warrior tanking one cant say clerics cant tank.

For all we know they'll balance the bosses to be tankable via cleric and anything above that is gravy.  Or, maybe they wont and you can tank with a cleric and a rogue, or a cleric and another cleric, or a cleric and a beefy mage, or or or or....

[Threash]

We actually know jack shit about how each class is going to actually perform, all we can do is guess based on looking at the talent trees and root abilities.

[palmer_eldritch]

My thrust is that you probably don't want one metaclass that can do all three (four if you count support) the best. I'm absolutely not advocating that cleric tanks suck. I'm just saying that you don't want to be in a position where the only thing out in the world is clerics and it's damned close to that right now.

Cleric can't do all three at once. I'm saying that right now the best cleric dps is not in the same league with the other callings. Cleric tanks are behind rogue tanks which aren't in the same class as warriors.

If all four callings were structured so you had a mechanic to achieve all the group archetypes, each with it's own flavor, then it's innovative. Obviously a cleric archetype should have more options for healing (as they do), warriors more options for tanking, rogues dps, etc. But each should be interchangable, or it's fail. If my cleric can't show up and tank for a level 50 dungeon (for raids, maybe I can see needing the uber build for tanks, but I don't understand raids), it's a lost opportunity. Sure, maybe you get my one flavor of cleric tank vs a warrior who can tank in three ways, but you allow friends to play with each other without someone getting stuck in a role they hate (at least permanently), people can switch up (I'll tank this boss, you tank the next), and you do away with "Level 50 group seeks tank, have healers and dps and ready to go!" kind of (should be) obsolete mechanisms...without throwing out the synergy of said mechanism.

I'm pretty much calling it a missed opportunity, they don't have time to implement it properly now without a major slip.

Rift is still a Diku with a traditional class system, even if the classes have a lot more flexibility than in other games. You choose between tank, cleric, mage and scout/rogue when you make your character. What you're asking for is a different type of game.

[Modern Angel]

We actually know jack shit about how each class is going to actually perform, all we can do is guess based on looking at the talent trees and root abilities.

Nope, there's a log parser. And I'm also absolutely convinced now that Ghambit hasn't gotten past level six in this game.

[Threash]

From low level parses?

[Pennilenko]

The slap fight is intense in here. Neck hair is getting everywhere.

[Ratman_tf]

I just filled out the beta survey. I was not gentle. 

[WindupAtheist]

All this talk of who can or can't tank just killed any interest I had in this game. Yet another game where everything requires three jobs, two of which nobody wants to do.

[Rasix]

So the phrase "WoW clone" said 500 times previous in the thread didn't clue you in?

[Modern Angel]

From low level parses?

It's easy enough to extrapolate outward if you feel like doing the math. I'm just pointing out that there are hard numbers to be gained and training dummies to hit. Nothing's a mystery as far as theoretical limits. Someone else can do the actual grunt work though; I'm old.

I'm convinced that Ghambit hasn't played the game because he doesn't think there's a cleric soul which has mage style burst damage which is absurd. Don't need a parser or anything approaching theorycrafting to know that.

[veredus]

I'm saying that right now the best cleric dps is not in the same league with the other callings.

From everything I've seen and heard this is absolutely false. Cabalist was easily on par with most of the mage specs except maybe pyromancer. I'd like to see someone play shaman extensively and report back some parses but with quick glance napkin math they look like they're completely in the mainline, as well.

From playing both a cabalist and stormcaller cab was good but not even close. Multiple mobs it was a lot closer but single mobs it wasn't close. It was good enough for soloing and great for rifting but still didn't come close to my stormcaller.

[WindupAtheist]

So the phrase "WoW clone" said 500 times previous in the thread didn't clue you in?

Oh I always pretty much knew it. It's just so sickening to actually hear.

[Ghambit]

From low level parses?

It's easy enough to extrapolate outward if you feel like doing the math. I'm just pointing out that there are hard numbers to be gained and training dummies to hit. Nothing's a mystery as far as theoretical limits. Someone else can do the actual grunt work though; I'm old.

I'm convinced that Ghambit hasn't played the game because he doesn't think there's a cleric soul which has mage style burst damage which is absurd. Don't need a parser or anything approaching theorycrafting to know that.

I've played the game plenty.  Have I played every single rendition of every combination of every soul??? Hell no.   And neither one of us is making any kind of blanket statement (shrug).  But wait, did I actually even SAY clerics couldnt provide burst like a mage can??  I just said what it would've been more proper to guess at.  I'm sure there's some combo of cleric that'll stand up to some mages, but then of course there's probably some combo of mage(s) that NO cleric can stand up to burst dps-wise either (at range).  We can do this dance all night.

And like others have said, kinda tough to speculate to only lvl 20, especially when all the low-lvl skills are generally vanilla across all soul trees.  Parse or no parse.  Btw, wasnt Justicar/Shaman nerfed to shit in one beta?  Or clerics as a whole?  This is what Sky was referring to, as me and him both were running through beta 1/2.  I got tired of hearing his cleric nerf-bat moaning. 

[Sky]

inq/sent/justicar synergy got nerfed and I was running with a shaman/justicar/sentinel in beta 2. It's a decent build, some survivability and acceptable dps. Nothing that will be accepted into dungeon groups, and mediocre in pvp (my success there was more me being a sneaky evil bastard).

[Spiff]

One of the real missed opportunities with their soul system to me is that group-play doesn't necessitate much of the flexibility it gives (at least not the parts I've seen so far).
It's not just about the pure dps clerics (for instance) could deliver, one of their advantages in solo-play is they can combine for more survivability whilst still killing with some speed. That doesn't seem to matter outside of solo-play though where the trinity roles are as simple and disconnected from one another as ever, in part 'cause keeping aggro is easy as s***.

Solo'ing it was a lot of fun trying to be different things, in group-play however anything except "max dps if you're a dps, max healing if you're a healer, etc." felt pointless.

If I pick it up I'll probably have fun fooling around and hybridizing for solo and PvP, group-play mostly eliminates my joy out of the soul-system though (so basically other people suck unless I'm killing 'em ... yep, MMO never changes  )

[Modern Angel]

If Cleric dps is acceptable but not ideal then that gives a little symmetry overall, right? Rogues (tank/dps/offheal), Warriors (tank/dps/no heal), Cleric (tank/heal/offdps), Mage (dps/heal/no tank). Which doesn't strike me as a bad place to be. If Cabalist damage has been nerfed but still packs heavy AE there's absolutely still a place in them for groups.

[Maledict]

Other than the fact that "Off-tanks" and "Off-dps" is a horrble concept that simply will not fly in the modern game. People are now used to "off-specs" being viable for the main role, and understandably. Druids can tank, rpiests can dps, etc. The idea that you can only do a job in a limited way just doesn't work anymore. (And when raiding starts, you can guarantee unless it's extremely easily tuned peopel won't be taking clerics to DPS and rogues to tank if they are only "offpsec" roles).

There's a reason WoW got rid of those distinctions a while back, and it will shock people coming into this game if they then find the same isn't true here. That shold be one of the strengths of the game - let every archtype fulfill two main group roles, spread a CC / debuff role into all the trees, and then balance equally from there on. We shouldn't be chatting about "off-specs" and whether rogues can tank as well as warriors. Rogues should tank as well as warriors and warriors should dps as well as rogues.

[Modern Angel]

All of that's contingent on Cleric dps being lower across the board than the other classes, which I'm still not convinced is going to be the case. These distinctions are also turned on their heads when you toss in purely support souls. WoW has nothing like that and never will. Sorry, the Warlord isn't going to do as much damage as the Pyromancer.

[Threash]

Specs are going to be so all over the place that i doubt things like dps are going to come down to base class.

[Modern Angel]

I think it's going to end up being a more than reasonable assumption that 31 is going to be required in any given tree to make it competitive. Except *maybe* tanking.

[Threash]

You'd think so, but there is a reason wow had to force people to spend 31 points in one tree before they could branch out.

[Modern Angel]

Hence the "to make it competitive" clause. I have no doubt that there are going to be plenty of people picking up as many passive modifiers as they can with 22 points in each tree and then autoattack their way to victory.

It's not design your own class. It's flexible and fun to toy with but it's WoW's talent tree system with more flexibility and movable parts.