Class Thread; Finalized classes.

[Murgos]

I checked out the ranger a bit last night.  Coming from the perspective of playing an Assassin up to about 30 the Ranger seems to have been designed by Aradune.

Stealth attacks AND dual wield swords AND medium armor AND traps?  Why wouldn't I just play a ranger instead of Barb or Assassin, what's the point to the other rogue classes if the Ranger does all the same things but better?

[photek]

http://www.vimeo.com/1157337

Video of 60 Bear Shaman VS 74 Tempest of Set. Beware, the ToS is a bad player, but fun to watch nontheless.

[Brogarn]

Damn that makes me want to PvP.

[schild]

Why wouldn't I just play a ranger instead of Barb or Assassin, what's the point to the other rogue classes if the Ranger does all the same things but better?

This is why Assasssins and Barbs need better armor.

[Draegan]

Why wouldn't I just play a ranger instead of Barb or Assassin, what's the point to the other rogue classes if the Ranger does all the same things but better?

This is why Assasssins and Barbs need better armor.

Assassin armor is fine, I guess, if we get better evasion.  We already get +13% from feats, plus gear, plus 5% base. Also, I'd like faster combos, large cone of effectiveness with my daggers and my stamina sprint mechanics to work.

Oh and a lot of other things.

[schild]

When balancing a character, you can't just assume that every single assassin will take the same feets. And 13% evasion is dogshit when every sort of attack hits you for max damage. Sprint management needs work and faster combos are a must.

That said, Assassins are supposed to have light armor. Like, supposed to. I'm not just making that up.

[Brogarn]

Yes, but the concept of an assassin in silk armor is just so cool. I'd rather see them make it work than slap light armor on them and call it a day.

[schild]

Yes, but the concept of an assassin in silk armor is just so cool. I'd rather see them make it work than slap light armor on them and call it a day.

I agree. Silk armor that drops should automatically have +evasion/+avoidance or some shit. It would be much cooler. But light armor was in the design. Cloth armor was a fuckup bug.

[Brogarn]

I agree. Silk armor that drops should automatically have +evasion/+avoidance or some shit. It would be much cooler. But light armor was in the design. Cloth armor was a fuckup bug.

Gotcha. And thinking further on it, absorption has always been greater than avoidance in these games, especially when dealing with higher level mobs (or players if that's your thing) who have a better chance to hit you. Not that light armor is full plate, but I can see where even that small bit of absorption would be helpful.

Still... the assassin in whisper quiet silk... Bah. I'm going all RP on something that should be mechanical.

[schild]

Trust me, I agree on the sexiness of high level silk gear.

Unfortunately, it'll never work.

[Slayerik]

IIRC, Rogues in WoW relied upon avoidance (dodge) because they had weak medium armor. It seemed to work out fine, especially in combination with high cooldown abilities like Evasion.

If they give enough base evasion (dodge/parry) it can work. Would be a fine line between overpowered and paper tiger though. Would be a little more reliant upon luck, sometimes you could smoke a conquerer if you had a few key dodges, the next time he owns your face. Higher armor/less evasion is a more predictable form of mitigation - but I do not see why having both sides is a bad thing necessarily.

[Typhon]

I'd rather see them give assasin's (and to a lesser extent Barbs) and enhance evasion boost from the double-tap (left of right) - simulating that the assasin is an agile, shifty mofo.  Course, if the TankX class gets the assasin trapped in a place where he can't leap left/right, then the assasin gets CREAMED (as he should).  Yes, I know that currently you don't have to have enough room to leap to get the buff from double-tapping, I'm just saying that I'd like to see a system that doesn't have three people surrounding an assasin, and all of them missing, because the assasin has magical fucking pajamas.  If he doesn't have room to maneuver, he should be fucked.

[Murgos]

I'm just saying that I'd like to see a system that doesn't have three people surrounding an assasin, and all of them missing, because the assasin has magical fucking pajamas.  If he doesn't have room to maneuver, he should be fucked.

You should check out the Ninja Gaiden II demo.  You can kill 10 opponents without ever touching the ground.

Also, Magical fucking pajamas?  My GF needs a pair! 

[Murgos]

If they give enough base evasion (dodge/parry) it can work. Would be a fine line between overpowered and paper tiger though.

The EQ2 Monk class went back and forth on this repeatedly.  Some mit with lots of avoidance can become extremely uber in ways that are hard to foresee.

[Draegan]

When balancing a character, you can't just assume that every single assassin will take the same feets. And 13% evasion is dogshit when every sort of attack hits you for max damage. Sprint management needs work and faster combos are a must.

That said, Assassins are supposed to have light armor. Like, supposed to. I'm not just making that up.

I agree it's dogshit, but we need better evasion, like I said.

[Miasma]

From what I've been reading there is some question as to whether or not even the defensive stats are working.  Some people have compared nude to armour and there is no difference.  The only reason a guardian can lost longer is because they have so many more hitpoints.  Only the plus mana/health/stam and regen do anything...

So maybe giving assassins light armour wouldn't do anything.  I'm gong to have my toon put on his birthday suit and see if he gets killed any faster.

[Murgos]

From what I've been reading there is some question as to whether or not even the defensive stats are working.  Some people have compared nude to armour and there is no difference.  The only reason a guardian can lost longer is because they have so many more hitpoints.  Only the plus mana/health/stam and regen do anything...

So maybe giving assassins light armour wouldn't do anything.  I'm gong to have my toon put on his birthday suit and see if he gets killed any faster.

I did some experiments.

LVL 28 Assassin.

First stripped nude and went and antagonized some lvl 22 scorps.  They hit me for 40 or 41.  Not on average, 40 or 41 only.  Put on store bought cloth lvl 20 armor defense 109, every slot no other enhancements.  Damage taken dropped to 10.  Put on the best armor I had quested for and found, noticed that defense was 107, same scorpion, got hit for 16 each hit.

So it seems like there is some calculation going on there.

Next I found a lvl 26 Scorpion and let it hit me while butt naked.  I was hit for 66-68.  Put on 109 defense store armor and got hit for 65 or 66.  Put on 107 quested armor and was hit for 65 or 66.

It looks to me that it's a contested formula for damage but any mob near your levels attack value is so high that they are mostly ignoring your armor and doing max or close to max damage on every hit.  The lower level info seems to suggest that a few points of defense could make a big difference though.  This also suggests that there should be armor tiers every 5 levels (or two to three) rather than every 10.

I bet if someone were careful and collected a lot of data you could figure out exactly what the maximum useful armor value was for each level mob.

So, I think light armor might be helpful but only right at the beginning of a new tier and only against mobs of a lower level.

Edit:
More info.  Using a lvl 14 Dark Templar with medium armor, again, anything near my level was at max damage regardless of the armor worn, anything far enough below though saw large gains in protection going from naked to medium armor.

[Slayerik]

Thanks for that Murgos, I'll stick to AoEing slightly lower level mobs for sure.

[Murgos]

You're welcome, I would like to see some of the higher level heavy armor wearers do a couple of quick tests to verify this as well.

I'm also interested to see if weapons really make any difference, the stat bonuses don't, obviously, but what about the +1 piercing and etc...?

Anyway, I think I'm done with AoC for 5 or 6 months.  I'll come back when major systems like armor and items are working.

[schild]

Anyway, I think I'm done with AoC for 5 or 6 months.  I'll come back when major systems like armor and items are working.

So you'll test it on monday and then again when they actually fix it on Thursday. ^_^

I'm pretty sure at this point that major systems all would've been complete with a 3 month delay on the game, but after putting out marketing materials, that's something you just can't really CHANGE.

[Venkman]

Anyway, I think I'm done with AoC for 5 or 6 months.  I'll come back when major systems like armor and items are working.

So you'll test it on monday and then again when they actually fix it on Thursday. ^_^

Heh, yea no doubt. If that other thread is to be believed, stats beyond the current few are going to, like, matter! That alone would make things pretty different I'd think.

[Xanthippe]

Bear shaman - 34
PoM - 28