PvP changes coming in GU 36

[The_Real_Ohno]

Virii@Venekor wrote:

Ibunubi wrote:

Rangers are given trouble because they have very high ranged DPS with no drawbacks except for having to stay at range.

Now, most rangers come back to say "Well, Wizards can do the same thing." Very true, but... Does a wizard have a temporary buff that increases the chance to land attacks and increase the chance to critical to almost 100%? Does a wizard have 40+% mitigation and 50+% avoidance? Does the wizard have ammo that gives a bonus to Hit %, meaning they, again, have an increased chance to hit? Does the wizard have abilities and AA's that allow him to begin attack almost 50 meters away from his target?

I think not.

All that, while being able to run as fast, if not faster, than bards and having track, evac, enhanced sprint, and significant damage while running (aka auto-attack).

Wizards have manashield which essentially gives them 11k HP, and an AA that guarentee's next hit to critical.  You miss the post i had above where wizzys killed me in 3-4 seconds? 

Secondly, we do have a drawback that no other scouts have, we can't cast while moving.   Roll a ranger, you will definitely have a change of heart, its not as easy as everyone thinks.

But still thats not the issue here.  Only thing I'm upset about is the nerf to root/snare.  I could care less about them nerfing Sniper Shot or lowering our damage.

Cant agree more Virii, for a class that has to keep some kind of range to do dps, nerfin our roots/snares is just plain wrong.  Will be very sad if this goes live with any nerf to our roots our snares.  4 sec root was long? when its usually cured anyways?  Huh?

[Luxun]

Virii@Venekor wrote:

Luxun wrote:

Orthureon wrote:

Take away HT all together, give Crusaders this instead; Uninterruptable spells, with same cast times and less power consumption. SKs losing their only skill similar to LoH (the opposite but still similar) they should get increased CA damage.

QFE I swear I don't understand why SKs get iunterrupted. We are suppose to be tanking, we are suppose to take the hits while hits interrupt us. Its not like we do so much damage per hit that if we don't get interrupted its game breaking. Wizards, warlocks summoners ect do a lot more damage then us, so the interrupts is a down side to theirs. However all the interrupts do for a SK is make us not able to tank at all ....

You also brought up a good point. So paladins get to keep their LoH that already heals more than out PT does damage untouched while we get out PT nerfed ??? what kind of a crazxy half [I cannot control my vocabulary] balancing is this.

Hehe, I'm sure most people are worried that the pallys are gonna heal them to death...

It would really unbalance the 2 classes though, I all for tunign down HT's damage if we are going to tune down all damages, however we cannot possibly leave heals the same. Now anything I do a pally can heal .....even my PT he can heal ..he might not even have to use his LoH to heal the PT depending on how much they reduncing the damage.  Though considering my PT when it crits one v one with no out of class debuff help only hits pallies for about 3.5-4k damage ....they LoH heals them far more than that already ...now to go nerf our PT without adjusting heals is insane.

[Ibunubi]

I do have a 32 ranger alt I never play, which I rolled to see why rangers complained so much. So yes, I do know how rangers work~

Did you miss when rangers can kill others just as fast, if not faster? Especially wizards... Manashield is the cliche "double-edged blade." The wizard survives longer, yes, but at the same time he's losing power to attack with spells that cost a lot of power. He is also interrupted and subject to a broken resist system.

Predator AA's are a lot better than Sorceror AA's. Why? Because no wizard has the same KoS AA. Rangers can go for the pure Agility + Intelligence lines without a second thought for poison and ranged criticals and casting reduction. For wizard lines, they have (1) Strength -- Spell criticals. Catalyst, the AA you mention that gives a guaranteed critical, costs 18% health to cast. Focus Aim > Catalyst. (2) Agility -- Casting time and recast time reduction. Casting time at rank 8 is reduced by 14%. Ranger Agility end ability > this. (3) Stamina -- Manashield. "Double-edged blade." (4) Wisdom -- 150 ward, increased damage and reduced power cost. But you lose a secondary item.

Now with that said, let's take the 4 second log of Pyriel you posted. Ward of Sages = Wisdom line. He's got that. Now, if he has Catalyst, then he doesn't have Manashield. Now if he had Catalyst and Manashield, then he has slower cast times and increased power cost.

So... Hopefully you get the picture now~

[Shinnar]

These damage nerfs are mostly for T6-7 only, so i think it is good. Unless they are lowering overall dps (weapons, CAs) i think it can (maybe) balance some things little bit....

But what i cant really get, is that new AA balancing... It will nerf higher tiers more than T2-3 where it is most needed.

So i suggest, devs, plese reconsider that 1,5*lev idea a make something more reasonable like lev 10-19 - lev*1 / lev 20-29 - lev*1,3 /

lev 30 - 39 - lev*1,5 / lev 40-49 - lev*1,8 and from level 50 lev*2....

I think this will force players to level faster to get to 50 and get the possibility to have AA maxed...

[Lilithu]

Some people just don't get it. Predators' defence - it's their damage. Take our damage away and we are helpless. It's like the glass cannon. So, basically, if our damage is nerf ed, we should get some our survival possibility bo ost. Buff our mitigation. Give us self healfs. Yes , it's against our class concept(some classess are just meant to have high dps, otherwise we will have game where everyone has the same abilities - some WoW-like carebear paradise), but we won't survive without our damage . Especially rangers now, who, looks like, got everything nerfed. Don't nerf  us, but tweak other classess.

[stryker268]

Paikis@Venekor wrote:

Harry@Venekor wrote:

Hey Paikis, I see in your sig you have a 4-1 kill ratio, you don't do so bad yourself.  Lets not forget that a ranger has to fill an AA line in order to achieve double shot, whilst quick shot is a ranger's offensive stance buff, which only has a chance to proc, not guaranteed.  Ranger-01 probably had to use his focus aim buff in order to land that crit hit the first time, and that damage comes from 'strategically' spending AA's in order to achieve those results.  Obviously you don't see any roots or snares, because ranger-01 attacked you from range, knowing his melee damage is practically nonexistant.  Of course rangers aren't going to run up and start swinging! 

On another note, if you went into combat, how exactly did you evac? Hmmm? Could it be a faction based pvp item was used? 

Not that that really matters, but if ranger-01's incombat speed is drastically reduced,  snares and roots lowered to practically nothing,  autoattack damage greatly decreased, a skilled player such as yourself will obviously be able to pawn ranger-01 from now on. 

How many ranger's do you know who DONT have that double attack AA? I'm betting not many. Why? For the same reason that zerkers and gaurdians love their buckler tree, because your Auto-attack, just like everyone elses is a huge part of your total damage. As a troubador, I have the option to get 56% double attack, but i have the penalty of having to use a round sheild to get it. The penalty for a ranger to get double-attack is...?

 Anyways, not the point. AAs were not the point. The point was that in under 2 seconds Ranger_01 put out 4200 damage, putting me into the red, and if that first hit was the first time i'd noticed him, I'd have died due to the time it'd take me to target, find and then try to do something about Ranger_01. This is not a complaint that ranger's get double attack, or a buff that increases their ranged crits, this is a complaint that a ranger can kill me in less than 3 seconds. I'm almost completely fabled with most of my gear concentrated on keeping me alive, i have 480 or so stamina, and only 200ish STR for instance. My defense is 377 and my parry is 391 self-buffed. I was looking straight at Ranger_01, yet didnt manage to dodge/avoid/parry a single shot. I know tanks who have less defense AND less parry, yet Ranger_01 landed every attack.

As for  the evac, I don't need PvP items to do that, and according to Ohnoes, those items no longer work in PvP anyways. Charming the other player makes them my pet. As such they aren't trying to kill me anymore and I get taken out of combat. At that point my evac works just fine. As soon as the charm breaks though I get put back into combat and am locked from zoning again. So unless the evac point in a zone is right next to a zoneline, it doesn't work too well. Certainly not as well as sprinting away 150% faster than your opponent can run. 

Yes, I have a 4:1 KvD ratio as a Troubador, mostly solo. I also had a lowbie swashbuckler alt, when I deleted him at level 25 he had almost 200ish kills for only 3 deaths. Suddenly 4:1 isnt looking so hot is it? I'm shocked that somehow your KvD ratio is less than half mine...

EDITED for clarity and spelling.

  This is just more whining IMO.

  Your log is showing what can happen on an optimal situation for a ranger and you could show the same thing for almost any dps class.  You had 3 procs on 3 attacks and this is far from the norm.  AND YOU GOT AWAY!!  How can you sit there and moan and groan when you didn't even die.  If your class could beat it's way out of a paper bag, once you mezzed the ranger he would have been a dead one. 

  And you sure used alot of stategy in that fight.  You had a building right there by your own admission and you couldn't even get behind it to block the auto-attacks?  Or maybe even closed the distance?  You are complaining about the ranger dps when you clearly had ways of negating it but couldn't figure out how.  Every person that goes up against rangers that is worth their salt in pvp just closes the distance and weathers the storm. Well at close range not really a storm.  More like a shower.

  And why are you only mentioning rangers?   Couldn't an Assassin do the same amount or more damage in that time?  Or a Wizard?  I've seen many, many people die to both of these classes in under 2 seconds.  Have you never seen someone fusioned at the cloud pad by a wizzie?  And I myself have been killed by a Swashbuckler in that same amount of time.

  And why didn't you just evac in the first place.  Instead you sat there and let the ranger attack you, used an ability that took you out of combat, (i'm sure most of us wish we had one of those) and THEN evaced.  Were you just not expecting him to do as much damage as possible as quickly as he could?  If that is the case it makes you sound inexperienced.

  As I said, this is just more whining IMO.

[Roald]

Raaziell wrote:

Milambers@Nagafen wrote:

Carebears 1 ---- Proper PvPers 0

When will you guys understand that all classes aren't mean to be equal?

Predators are meant to be, you guessed it, PREDATORS. Unleashing high DPS, whilst having lower mit than 50% of classes, and no form of heals.

And why nerf Mages?  The whole point is that they are meant to be high DPS with terrible surviveability to match. Because u see so many Master/Overseer mages.

Sony has fixed some nice things in this update, like  near 90% ranger speed, but overall something really didnt need to be changed. In regards to that:

ALL CLASSES ARENT MEANT TO BE EQUAL! STOP CRYING YOU CAREBEARS.

Oh please! I'd wager all your chars are on the Q side, because as a caster, having a ranger kill you in 2-3 seconds, and not even knowing what killed you untill you check your combatl log, you find that allright? Did you ever fight a ranger... no let me rephrase, have you ever been sniped to death by a ranger?

All classes are not ment to be equal? That is correct. But when a class is a bane of many other classes, it think your statement stands for [I cannot control my vocabulary]. I play a necromancer too, I have no means of protection, no magical armor that keeps me alive enough to spot a renger when he is shooting me. And by the time the pet gets to it. I am already dead. Not to mention that as a mage, I am a sitting duck, because a ranger detects invisibility, and furthermore, tracks it. An ambsh is inevitable.

On my shadowknight, a plate class, I am damaged enough before I pop the skeleton to lead me to him, the damage delt gives the ranger the advantage, and if things don't go well, he can just run - stealth - start over. You think that is right?

SOE better do something, because there are still classes there that need a good NERF. I know everyone likes to win. Hence the huge ammount of rangers and druids. Every guy who gets sick of being owned by the classes mentioned starts one. And that is ruining it for many. Since other classes find a harder time PVP-ing, and not to mention the PVE content ruined by damage healers that seem to think their rightful place is on the damage tree rather then the healing tree. Soon we'll all e rangers and druids. How's that for balance?

Lastly, define a carebear, because I can't really fit that therm into the requests posted here. Calling for a long ovedue nerf makes them that? Or moaning about a nerf that will rize the odds for orhter classes agains one class that has been picking off kills, from a safe distance, with little regard for retaliation, I think the therm in question applys to you better then me.

Infact I play a coercer, which nullifies a lot of your argument. May i recommend that, when taking the time to compose a 10 minute post, you take 20 seconds to check the person class.

Secondly i agree that rangers may need to be toned down very slightly, but i DO NOT agree that SoE must try to balance all classes the way they have. If you grouped for PvP which is where the best pvp is found, you would realize that all classes are balanced. You shouldnt cry if a predator kills you solo: thats what they are good at.

What i still think is that carebears i making the game to boring.

[Raaziell]

Virii@Venekor wrote:

Ibunubi wrote:

Rangers are given trouble because they have very high ranged DPS with no drawbacks except for having to stay at range.

Now, most rangers come back to say "Well, Wizards can do the same thing." Very true, but... Does a wizard have a temporary buff that increases the chance to land attacks and increase the chance to critical to almost 100%? Does a wizard have 40+% mitigation and 50+% avoidance? Does the wizard have ammo that gives a bonus to Hit %, meaning they, again, have an increased chance to hit? Does the wizard have abilities and AA's that allow him to begin attack almost 50 meters away from his target?

I think not.

All that, while being able to run as fast, if not faster, than bards and having track, evac, enhanced sprint, and significant damage while running (aka auto-attack).

Wizards have manashield which essentially gives them 11k HP, and an AA that guarentee's next hit to critical.  You miss the post i had above where wizzys killed me in 3-4 seconds? 

Secondly, we do have a drawback that no other scouts have, we can't cast while moving.   Roll a ranger, you will definitely have a change of heart, its not as easy as everyone thinks.

But still thats not the issue here.  Only thing I'm upset about is the nerf to root/snare.  I could care less about them nerfing Sniper Shot or lowering our damage.

How many times did a Wizard ambush you? Does a wizard have any means of detection? No, you are the one that has the advantage, you get the first shot. And unlike assasins, you get to stay far far far...away and deal your damage.

Let's assume that by some mireacle a wizard does get the drop on you. Your root gives you enough time to take some distance and vanish. Like I said, a wizard has no means of detection, you do.

[stryker268]

Captain Apple Darkberry wrote:

Virii@Venekor wrote:

Paikis@Venekor wrote:

Changed the name to protect the over-powered.

(1181397692)[Sun Jun 10 00:01:32 2007] Ranger_01 critically hits YOU for 1648 crushing damage. (1181397692)[Sun Jun 10 00:01:32 2007] Ranger_01's Quick Shot hits YOU for 223 crushing damage. (1181397692)[Sun Jun 10 00:01:32 2007] Ranger_01 hits YOU for 1200 crushing damage. (1181397693)[Sun Jun 10 00:01:33 2007] You begin to play an incapacitation song. (1181397693)[Sun Jun 10 00:01:33 2007] Ranger_01's Triple Volley critically hits YOU for 147 crushing damage. (1181397693)[Sun Jun 10 00:01:33 2007] Ranger_01's gracelessness afflicts you. (1181397693)[Sun Jun 10 00:01:33 2007] Ranger_01's Triple Volley critically hits YOU for 334 crushing damage. (1181397693)[Sun Jun 10 00:01:33 2007] Ranger_01's Triple Volley critically hits YOU for 648 crushing damage. (1181397694)[Sun Jun 10 00:01:34 2007] You have entered into combat by casting Reverie on Ranger_01. (1181397694)[Sun Jun 10 00:01:34 2007] Ranger_01 was interrupted! (1181397694)[Sun Jun 10 00:01:34 2007] An incapacitation song affects Ranger_01.

That is the log of a fight between myself and Ranger_01. That incapacitation song you see landing there is my mez, which was followed by charm and then evac, I had no chance of winning that fight.

Ranger_01 hit me for 4200 damage in the time it took me to cast my Mez (1.87 seconds) and I already had a target and was spamming the mez key so it'd go off as soon as Ranger_01 got into range. In less that 2 seconds, Ranger_01 cut me down to around 20-30%. I sit around 45% mitigation and 50% avoidance, yet Ranger_01 didnt miss once, and that DOUBLE auto attack did 2848 damage. I'm in almost full fabled and as far as I know, only one troubador on the server has better gear.

If i hadn't had track and had Ranger_01t argeted, AND had a building to hide behind, I'd have been dead before i knew what was happening. I laugh at anyone who says rangers will be useless after these nerfs. In that parse, I don't see Sniper shot, i dont see any roots or snares, all I see is Ranger_01 doing massive damage in less than 2 seconds. Now imagine if the poisons had procced as well, or whatever I interupted had landed? I'd have been dead in less than 2 seconds.

Yeah, Ranger's are going to be completely gimped after these changes /sarcasm

Rangers arn't the only class that does burst damage.  So why does everyone give them such a hard time?  Here are a few things I found going through 800 megs worth of log files.  I bet if I had more time, could even find other classes not listed below with lots of damage in short time.  Didn't put any Brigand or SK's in here because I feel bad for the changes coming up for them.

Assassin (1163565560)[Tue Nov 14 23:39:20 2006] Zoxuf's Freezing Strike hits YOU for 695 slashing damage. (1163565561)[Tue Nov 14 23:39:21 2006] Zoxuf's Jugular hits YOU for 665 slashing damage. (1163565562)[Tue Nov 14 23:39:22 2006] Zoxuf's Decapitate hits YOU for 3804 slashing damage. (1163565563)[Tue Nov 14 23:39:23 2006] Zoxuf's Killing Blade hits YOU for 1753 slashing damage. (1163565563)[Tue Nov 14 23:39:23 2006] Zoxuf has killed you.

Assassin (1178855347)[Thu May 10 23:49:07 2007] Skree's Freezing Strike hits YOU for 460 slashing damage. (117885534[Thu May 10 23:49:08 2007] Skree's Jugular hits YOU for 773 slashing damage. (1178855349)[Thu May 10 23:49:09 2007] Skree's Killing Blade hits YOU for 1316 slashing damage. (1178855351)[Thu May 10 23:49:11 2007] Skree's Decapitate hits YOU for 3038 slashing damage. (1178855351)[Thu May 10 23:49:11 2007] Skree has killed you.

Wizard (1167956884)[Thu Jan 04 19:28:04 2007] Pyriel's Ice Nova critically hits YOU for 5735 cold damage. (1167956887)[Thu Jan 04 19:28:07 2007] Pyriel's Ward of Sages absorbs 69 points of damage from being done to Pyriel. (1167956887)[Thu Jan 04 19:28:07 2007] Pyriel's Frost Ward absorbs 545 points of damage from being done to Pyriel. (1167956887)[Thu Jan 04 19:28:07 2007] YOUR Amazing Shot hits Pyriel but fails to inflict any damage. (1167956887)[Thu Jan 04 19:28:07 2007] YOU try to pierce Pyriel, but miss. (116795688[Thu Jan 04 19:28:08 2007] Pyriel's Ball of Lava hits YOU for 1564 heat damage. (116795688[Thu Jan 04 19:28:08 2007] Pyriel has killed you.

Wizard (117841117[Sat May 05 20:26:18 2007] YOU try to pierce Euphrates, but miss. (1178411179)[Sat May 05 20:26:19 2007] Euphrates' Ice Nova hits YOU for 3188 cold damage. (1178411182)[Sat May 05 20:26:22 2007] Euphrates' Ball of Lava hits YOU for 1229 heat damage. (1178411182)[Sat May 05 20:26:22 2007] Euphrates has killed you.

Wizard (1178849229)[Thu May 10 22:07:09 2007] Alam's Ball of Lava hits YOU for 1923 heat damage. (1178849233)[Thu May 10 22:07:13 2007] Alam's Ice Nova critically hits YOU for 4266 cold damage. (1178849233)[Thu May 10 22:07:13 2007] Alam has killed you.

Berzerker (1170027255)[Sun Jan 28 18:34:15 2007] YOUR Devitalizing Arrow hits Rafacus for 500 piercing damage. (1170027255)[Sun Jan 28 18:34:15 2007] YOUR Quick Shot hits Rafacus for 185 piercing damage. (1170027256)[Sun Jan 28 18:34:16 2007] YOU critically hit Rafacus for 367 piercing damage. (1170027256)[Sun Jan 28 18:34:16 2007] Rafacus' Vengeance hits YOU for 2266 divine damage. (1170027256)[Sun Jan 28 18:34:16 2007] Rafacus' Vengeance hits YOU for 2355 divine damage. (1170027256)[Sun Jan 28 18:34:16 2007] Rafacus has killed you. (1170027256)[Sun Jan 28 18:34:16 2007] Rafacus' Vengeance heals Rafacus for 1594 hit points.

Warlock (1170428159)[Fri Feb 02 09:55:59 2007] YOUR Amazing Shot hits Myrswithe for 436 piercing damage. (1170428159)[Fri Feb 02 09:55:59 2007] Myrswithe's Soul Blister hits YOU for 654 poison damage. (1170428159)[Fri Feb 02 09:55:59 2007] Myrswithe's Aura of Pain hits YOU for 450 disease damage. (1170428161)[Fri Feb 02 09:56:01 2007] YOUR Devitalizing Arrow hits Myrswithe for 579 piercing damage. (1170428163)[Fri Feb 02 09:56:03 2007] Myrswithe's Void Distortion hits YOU for 2362 poison damage. (1170428163)[Fri Feb 02 09:56:03 2007] Myrswithe's Aura of Pain hits YOU for 442 disease damage. (1170428163)[Fri Feb 02 09:56:03 2007] Myrswithe's Magi's Shielding absorbs 226 points of damage from being done to Myrswithe.

Well the Zerker used a Miracle...   ...but other than that, what you might want to realize is that you have merely proven the point...   ...all damage needed to be toned down so that fights are >4 seconds. And another thing to consider, not to toss another gnome on the fire or anything, but the fight logs you show are 4 seconds long, the one Paikis posted from the Ranger is 2 seconds long...   ...you do the math.

 

Yes, they may have been 4 sec long but each one ended with the ranger in question dead.   The original log was of a fight that the player escaped.  The math sounds perfectly fine to me.

[stryker268]

Ibunubi wrote:

Rangers are given trouble because they have very high ranged DPS with no drawbacks except for having to stay at range.

Now, most rangers come back to say "Well, Wizards can do the same thing." Very true, but... Does a wizard have a temporary buff that increases the chance to land attacks and increase the chance to critical to almost 100%? Does a wizard have 40+% mitigation and 50+% avoidance? Does the wizard have ammo that gives a bonus to Hit %, meaning they, again, have an increased chance to hit? Does the wizard have abilities and AA's that allow him to begin attack almost 50 meters away from his target?

I think not.

All that, while being able to run as fast, if not faster, than bards and having track, evac, enhanced sprint, and significant damage while running (aka auto-attack).

  Umm, I don't play a caster ( to squishy ) but don't they have abilities that protect them.  Manashield and Nullmail come to mind.  And a wizards single target damage spells hit way harder than any of the rangers attacks.

[stryker268]

Ibunubi wrote:

I do have a 32 ranger alt I never play, which I rolled to see why rangers complained so much. So yes, I do know how rangers work~

  A lvl 32 ranger and a lvl 70 ranger are two entirely different things, just as I'm sure most classes are with that wide of a lvl spread.  You really can't compare the two.

[stryker268]

Raaziell wrote:

Virii@Venekor wrote:

Ibunubi wrote:

Rangers are given trouble because they have very high ranged DPS with no drawbacks except for having to stay at range.

Now, most rangers come back to say "Well, Wizards can do the same thing." Very true, but... Does a wizard have a temporary buff that increases the chance to land attacks and increase the chance to critical to almost 100%? Does a wizard have 40+% mitigation and 50+% avoidance? Does the wizard have ammo that gives a bonus to Hit %, meaning they, again, have an increased chance to hit? Does the wizard have abilities and AA's that allow him to begin attack almost 50 meters away from his target?

I think not.

All that, while being able to run as fast, if not faster, than bards and having track, evac, enhanced sprint, and significant damage while running (aka auto-attack).

Wizards have manashield which essentially gives them 11k HP, and an AA that guarentee's next hit to critical.  You miss the post i had above where wizzys killed me in 3-4 seconds? 

Secondly, we do have a drawback that no other scouts have, we can't cast while moving.   Roll a ranger, you will definitely have a change of heart, its not as easy as everyone thinks.

But still thats not the issue here.  Only thing I'm upset about is the nerf to root/snare.  I could care less about them nerfing Sniper Shot or lowering our damage.

How many times did a Wizard ambush you? Does a wizard have any means of detection? No, you are the one that has the advantage, you get the first shot. And unlike assasins, you get to stay far far far...away and deal your damage.

Let's assume that by some mireacle a wizard does get the drop on you. Your root gives you enough time to take some distance and vanish. Like I said, a wizard has no means of detection, you do.

  Please, this is just ludicrous.  Totem of the butterfly helps you see them and Freedom of Action cancels the root.  And doesn't a wizard excel at rooting and nuking?

[Amphibia]

Milambers@Nagafen wrote:

Secondly i agree that rangers may need to be toned down very slightly, but i DO NOT agree that SoE must try to balance all classes the way they have. If you grouped for PvP which is where the best pvp is found, you would realize that all classes are balanced. You shouldnt cry if a predator kills you solo: thats what they are good at.

What i still think is that carebears i making the game to boring.

I agree with this. I'm an exile, and I've been killed by rangers God knows how many times without even knowing they were there until I saw my revive window pop up. Even though it can be annoying sometimes, there really is nothing wrong with that. They're just playing their class exactly as it was designed... kill quick and retreat.  My own class (illusionist) is much more group orientated, and I knew that when I made her. Not all classes are supposed to be equal, and some classes are better soloers than others. This is fine, do you ask me.

[Zanid]

As with most updates, I like most of the changes proposed in this one. However, there are a few issues:

1. Max AA = 1.5 times your level:

I agree that this is a HUGE problem that needs to be addressed. However, as has already been mentioned, this does nothing to help lower level PvPers. A level 16 can get 24 AA, which is pretty hard to get already. And once you hit your cap, you can only earn 1.5 AA per level (which is just a HORRIBLE progression). I like the concept, but hate the formula since it doesn't penalize low levels enough, and penalizes high levels too much. I'd suggest 2xlevel -10. Thus a level 14 could get 18 AA max (instead of 21). This smoothes out the gain of AA per level (instead of allowing you to gain a crapload in T2, and then increase it at a snail's pace beyond that. You could smooth it even more with a formula like 3x level -25. A level 10 could only have 5 AA, a level 14 could have 17 AA, and a level 20 could have 35 AA.

2. Nerfed Damage + No Nerf on Heals = INSANITY: 

Healers are already the toughest classes in the game. I agree with nerfing dmg output to lengthen fights, but fights that contain a healer are already incredibly long (and 1v1 they're just about impossible to kill). Unlike the warden's comments below, a healer should not be "very difficult to kill in a 1v1 fight" - they should be no tougher than other classes (and perhaps even a little less so since they are meant to shine in groups, which is the same reason given for why bards are weaker soloers than their predator & rogue counterparts).

3. Nerf the Dmg, not the Play Style

A few of the classes (most notably Furies and Rangers) are getting nerfed in the wrong way. For example, Rangers should be masters of dmg from range, and their mobility should be their greatest asset. Nerfing this completely ruins the class. Rather than nerfing their ability to snare, run, etc., it would be better to nerf their insane DPS. Let them keep their play style, but balance the class by nerfing dmg output instead.

4. Change the AA Respec to let us respec across trees 

This has been an issue ever since EoF first came out. Those of us with AAs in KoS that now have access to some better AA lines got screwed. This gets magnified by the AA cap. For example, I have Dirge who desperately wants the Luck End of Line ability by level 22. However, he spent his first bunch of AAs in the KoS tree (figuring he'd have plenty of AA by 22 to get 21 into the EoF tree). But now he's screwed by the new AA cap. He can have 33 AA by level 22, but with 14 already in KoS, he cannot afford the End of Line skill. Right from the start, respeccing AA should have created a single pool of AA points. The release of GU36 would be a good time to fix this.

5. Make sure the nerfs are adjusted on a tier by tier basis

Scouts do not need to be nerfed at all in T2, and very little in T3. I do not have much trouble dropping scouts in 1v1 fights using Mages, Priests or Fighters. And in groups, they usually kill themselves off on dmg shields. They're really only a bother in the lower tiers because of tracking. They get to find green targets and drop them. But in an even con fight, they don't tend to match up well at all due to a fewer number of CAs (especially interrupts). However, from what I understand, they're INSANE at higher tiers, and badly need their dmg nerfed.

[Ibunubi]

stryker268 wrote:

Ibunubi wrote:

Rangers are given trouble because they have very high ranged DPS with no drawbacks except for having to stay at range.

Now, most rangers come back to say "Well, Wizards can do the same thing." Very true, but... Does a wizard have a temporary buff that increases the chance to land attacks and increase the chance to critical to almost 100%? Does a wizard have 40+% mitigation and 50+% avoidance? Does the wizard have ammo that gives a bonus to Hit %, meaning they, again, have an increased chance to hit? Does the wizard have abilities and AA's that allow him to begin attack almost 50 meters away from his target?

I think not.

All that, while being able to run as fast, if not faster, than bards and having track, evac, enhanced sprint, and significant damage while running (aka auto-attack).

  Umm, I don't play a caster ( to squishy ) but don't they have abilities that protect them.  Manashield and Nullmail come to mind.  And a wizards single target damage spells hit way harder than any of the rangers attacks.

You just said yourself how handicapped mages are -- "Too squishy." That coming from a ranger. No, we really don't have a lot of ways to protect ourselves. Manashield I already talked about. Wizards and Warlocks both have emergency spells that trigger when below 30%. The wizard receives 1800 ward, which is easily eaten through. Warlocks have Nullmail, which gives 50% chance to dodge and 2800 mitigation and resists. But it increases avoidance only up to ~65% for 12 seconds and the warlock can still be hit. The mitigation is useless when the mage is already at 20% health.

Very true that a level 32 is not the same as a level 70, but through leveling to 32, I could see how the ranger worked and what their CA's are like. And it really is easy. But I guess that's just me because I've always played mages, so for years I've had to stand in one spot to cast.

[Eybietie]

i just wanted to mention that if dmg is reduced - the CA/ spells meant to prevent dmg ( like stoneskin, mage wards, dmg wards, manashield etc not only heals )  needs to be adjusted aswell.

[silentpsycho]

I need to chime in here on a couple things:

1) Any class that can track you down, stalk you from stealth and then unleash enough damage in under 2 seconds to kill about anyone at range and then scamper off at near 90% runspeed if things go awry is inherintly unbalanced.  That said, really fixing the problem would either turn rangers into something entirely different from what they are today.  Having played a pre combat update warlock, I don't know if this is a good thing.  While I think Assasins end up getting the short end of the nerf-bat here and are essentially relegated to PVE DPS or "generic scout" roles now, I see the change as positive to PVP overall.

2) I hear a lot of people saying that if they nerf damge they have to nerf heals.  If they do that, then we are really right back where we were before, and if your argument holds water, they shouldn't do anything at all.  Fortunately, it doesn't hold water, and these changes would bring a little more balance to the damage output of some classes to the healers ability to heal the damage.  This is a good thing.  Who cares if a healer is a little more difficult to gank while solo.  This is a MMO, right?

3) I don't get the necro or coercer nerfs.  Those classes need help, not nerfs, and the tank pet is essentially useless in PVP as it stands.

4) I don't get the whole locked AA thing either.  Having recently created a couple of lowby toons in DL woods with a friend who is brand new to the game, I can say, I do know how annoying the endless ganking can be.  I told my friend straight up, hey mate, we're going to die - a lot - until we get to 14-17, and we sucked it up and are both now destroyers with a couple of AA's under our belts.  Fact of the matter is, in T2 pvp, the biggest determining factor in success is level differential giving folks additional abilities and dramatically better gear, not AA.  It's not until you get to around 30-40 AA that it starts making a significant difference.  If there are level 14's running around with 40 AA, I can see that there might be a little bit of a problem killing that one extraordanary guy (who worked really hard to make his character).  But it's mostly the difference between level 10's in newby island gear vs the twinked out 14's with a master 2 dps spell and all the next tier master crafted gear.  Seems to me, if they wanted to fix the real problem, they would disable PVP until level 12 so people start out on the same footing, or boost up newby island gear or nerf T2 mastercrafted to limit the differential.  Heck, even disable PVP until level 20 would solve the problem better than this "entitlement" fix.  If AA's really are the problem (which they aren't, I'm pretty sure) go back to the model where you don't earn them until level 20, or put in limits of how many you can spend until T3 or something.  I think the 1.5 per level thing is going to hurt my T3-T6 chars more than anything; even with exp locked to quest and pvp with my friend when he comes over, I can't imagine ever getting more than 1x my level in AA's until much later in the game.

All in all, though, I have to say these look like generally good changes, and I'm excited to see how it plays out.

[Edavi]

Ima go and test it out on test server after my raid... im just curious.... who told the devs that monks can hit hard? trust me, i dont need my damage nerfed!  I cant kill a healer... not if my life depended on it, or an SK for that matter.... i go the other dircetion if i see one...  So... lol this should make it better!!!!! /sarcasm

[Raaziell]

stryker268 wrote:

  Please, this is just ludicrous.  Totem of the butterfly helps you see them and Freedom of Action cancels the root.  And doesn't a wizard excel at rooting and nuking?

Totems? Are we speculating on fiction? On consumables, because I could enumerate a few that make your class alot easyer to play. Let's leave the fiction aside and ask yourself, how much health does a mage have after you are done sniping him? How many SECONDS does a ranger need to take out a cloth wearing low stamina spellcaster? Nuking and rooting? A mage needs some distance to cast safely after rooting. Since when was distance your enemy? Unlike most classes, distance maks you more lethal. Oh please, THIS is ludicrous, no matter how you look at it, you are an overpowerd class, not a bunch of skilled players. Bless SOE for nerfing you.

[Eybietie]

silentpsycho wrote:

2) I hear a lot of people saying that if they nerf damge they have to nerf heals.  If they do that, then we are really right back where we were before, and if your argument holds water, they shouldn't do anything at all.  Fortunately, it doesn't hold water, and these changes would bring a little more balance to the damage output of some classes to the healers ability to heal the damage.  This is a good thing.  Who cares if a healer is a little more difficult to gank while solo.  This is a MMO, right?

a little bit more difficult? healer are very difficult to kill at present. they will be impossible to kill after that change imo. btw - if nobody cared that one class type is little more dificult to kill solo - nobody would have complained about scouts right? i fear they screw up the whole system just to make solo pvp viable and that is wrong imo.

[Microbolt]

Amphibia wrote:

Milambers@Nagafen wrote:

Secondly i agree that rangers may need to be toned down very slightly, but i DO NOT agree that SoE must try to balance all classes the way they have. If you grouped for PvP which is where the best pvp is found, you would realize that all classes are balanced. You shouldnt cry if a predator kills you solo: thats what they are good at.

What i still think is that carebears i making the game to boring.

I agree with this. I'm an exile, and I've been killed by rangers God knows how many times without even knowing they were there until I saw my revive window pop up. Even though it can be annoying sometimes, there really is nothing wrong with that. They're just playing their class exactly as it was designed... kill quick and retreat.  My own class (illusionist) is much more group orientated, and I knew that when I made her. Not all classes are supposed to be equal, and some classes are better soloers than others. This is fine, do you ask me.

I agree with this too.  I like having classes out there that I can't beat.  Druids put the fear of god in me =D.  But it makes the game fun that way.  Imagine if we all did the same damage.  Had the same defence.  Had the same chances.  This game would be boring.

Personally for instance, I like the HT line.  Nothing like the sence of danger fighting a shadowknight knowing if HT lands you die =D.  Makes it so much more fun when you actually do take one down.  Makes you feel like you accomplished something.  Wizards Ice Comet doesn't bother me either.  Just adds more dynamics to the game.  You know which classes you can eat and you know which classes are probably gonna kill you =D.

Every class has thier strong point.  IMO if the class is complaining (except for mages with resists because they are broken atm IMO) they need to learn how to play thier class a little differently, because more and likely the class was designed to have a strength your not exploiting (not that your playing the class wrong, just not to its full pontiental)

I'm looking foward to most of the changes especially some help to the mages with resists.

The only thing I'm not is the ranger one, but if you been keeping up with the posts you know my stance :)  Anyway, Please dont nerf snares/root for rangers !!! =D

[Microbolt]

Raaziell wrote:

stryker268 wrote:

  Please, this is just ludicrous.  Totem of the butterfly helps you see them and Freedom of Action cancels the root.  And doesn't a wizard excel at rooting and nuking?

Totems? Are we speculating on fiction? On consumables, because I could enumerate a few that make your class alot easyer to play. Let's leave the fiction aside and ask yourself, how much health does a mage have after you are done sniping him? How many SECONDS does a ranger need to take out a cloth wearing low stamina spellcaster? Nuking and rooting? A mage needs some distance to cast safely after rooting. Since when was distance your enemy? Unlike most classes, distance maks you more lethal. Oh please, THIS is ludicrous, no matter how you look at it, you are an overpowerd class, not a bunch of skilled players. Bless SOE for nerfing you.

In you case how does nerfing snares/roots help you?  Doesn't at all.  If you want to beat a ranger, Root him and get within Melee plain and simple.  Hate to educate my enemys but if it saves a nerf so be it.

[tiredang]

I'm surprised that no one has touched on what really makes predators/rogues unbalanced.  It's the massive DPS combined with TRACK.  They can pick every single fight, and evac away from any fight they don't want to engage in before their enemies get close.  I say let everyone keep what they have EXCEPT either take out PK track or give it to everyone.

Flame away but track as it is is completely overpowered.

[CresentBlade]

Ajjantis wrote:

I dont get the whining about Fury or Druid heals in General and noone even mentions powerfull Mystic/Defiler wards. Right now a good Swashy or Ranger destroys me in less  than 3 seconds. Yes you heard right - 3 seconds, not 4 or 5 seconds. Even a good Fusion can one shot me if timed right. Now please explain me how reducing Heals in General (not only druid heals!) are gonna help at all? Scouts DPS gets lowered BECAUSE noone can outheal that. Not even CLOSE. Now you ask for healing reduction and we end up in the same hole. Scouts own healers AGAIN without any problems. It doesnt make sense to me sorry. Yesterday i grouped with a medium well equipped 70 bruiser and we met a swashbuckler and i could not keep him alive. HELLO ???

Rangers auto attacks for 2024 dmg - after the nerf its prob arround 1.5k - i am not sure if that is low enough to stand against. And if you get your butt kicked by furys you are doing something wrong. Cause i surely cant stand 2k auto attacks followed by 2k Rain of arrows and snipershots or Insipiration + En Garde or 7k Fusions.

And just to clear up who i am. I am a 70 Fury with 100 AA points, 3 pieces of pvp gear including the chest piece. I have 50 % permanent incombat speed buff and even own the Ring of light and darkness. And guess what? Nothing of that saves me against certain classes.

You know whats funny? I see almost only Rangers complain, while Assassins take it as it is.

Ajjantis 70 Fury

Rasiel 70 Necromancer

Darkoran 42 Assassin

QFT

I agree with you.

[Broccoliswo]

Note to you, the entire point of a scout in a PvP group is to be able to know where others are and the "dangers" around them. If you would like to go out solo on your non-tracking class that is more group oriented, then that is entirely your fault. People like you want to remove every class defining ability and make this a game in which every class has the same abilities, etc. and that's completely ridiculous.

[Broccoliswo]

CresentBlade wrote:

Ajjantis wrote:

I dont get the whining about Fury or Druid heals in General and noone even mentions powerfull Mystic/Defiler wards. Right now a good Swashy or Ranger destroys me in less  than 3 seconds. Yes you heard right - 3 seconds, not 4 or 5 seconds. Even a good Fusion can one shot me if timed right. Now please explain me how reducing Heals in General (not only druid heals!) are gonna help at all? Scouts DPS gets lowered BECAUSE noone can outheal that. Not even CLOSE. Now you ask for healing reduction and we end up in the same hole. Scouts own healers AGAIN without any problems. It doesnt make sense to me sorry. Yesterday i grouped with a medium well equipped 70 bruiser and we met a swashbuckler and i could not keep him alive. HELLO ???

Rangers auto attacks for 2024 dmg - after the nerf its prob arround 1.5k - i am not sure if that is low enough to stand against. And if you get your butt kicked by furys you are doing something wrong. Cause i surely cant stand 2k auto attacks followed by 2k Rain of arrows and snipershots or Insipiration + En Garde or 7k Fusions.

And just to clear up who i am. I am a 70 Fury with 100 AA points, 3 pieces of pvp gear including the chest piece. I have 50 % permanent incombat speed buff and even own the Ring of light and darkness. And guess what? Nothing of that saves me against certain classes.

You know whats funny? I see almost only Rangers complain, while Assassins take it as it is.

Ajjantis 70 Fury

Rasiel 70 Necromancer

Darkoran 42 Assassin

QFT

I agree with you.

A good fury doesn't lose to a ranger, and knows to run when they see swash cooldowns. Fact. Maybe try to move instead of expecting to stand in one spot and heal/dps the entire time. You're not a warden.

[CresentBlade]

Broccolisword@Nagafen wrote:

Note to you, the entire point of a scout in a PvP group is to be able to know where others are and the "dangers" around them. If you would like to go out solo on your non-tracking class that is more group oriented, then that is entirely your fault. People like you want to remove every class defining ability and make this a game in which every class has the same abilities, etc. and that's completely ridiculous.

So reducing their damage should not be a problem, they are just around to scout things out not kill stuff, good point

[Rabbitoh]

Pact of the cheetah should be disabled in PvP, once engaged. Most unbalanced spell in eq2.

Every other class that can evac was nerfed, but this spell was left untouched.

Devs look at this please!!!

Molok. Ranger of Vigilante.

Thanks too Devs if this goes live. Getting range on a ranger will be almost impossible. Upgrade our in-close CA's atleast.

[CresentBlade]

There should be no in combat run speed at all if a class must have it it should be bard only.

Remove low level mounts and that will change pvp alot too.

I keep hearing all the scouts cry that the game should just have one class and everyone play the same, well thats the problem right now 75% of the characters on EQ2 are scouts.

Scouts you had your run you have been king of pvp since launch, how about passing the torch to a new class with a little less crying.

[Firam]

The root problem with this entire update is: 1) There wasn't much, if any, imbalance in the first place for GvG (group versus group) PvP. 2) The stated intention of this sweeping change was to slow down fights and encourage people to GvG and use strategy. Do you see how this whole thing just kind of leads itself into a logical corner? There were some minor changes that were needed to make 1v1 PvP more sane (swashies in particular are absolute monsters), but that's easily done by tuning a few CA's here and there.  So, instead: You have a system that is quite balanced for 6v6 PvP, with fights between skilled groups easily lasting 3-5 minutes (under pre-GU36 rules), and then you throw a big sackful of wrenches into the works and expect people to support it? The problem is not the fact that 6v6 PVP doesn't work (it works quite well); the problem is that the current rule set (concerning a variety of things other than class DPS) does not encourage people to form full 6v6 groups.  Change the basic PvP rule set to encourage grouping, don't "tune" classes that for the most part are highly balanced in group PvP. How do you do this?  To start, how about giving a bonus to token drop chance, total status earned, total faction earned, etc, etc if there are 4 or more people in the group.  This is already done with adventure exp in PVE to encourage grouping; it's not hard to program in a scaled 15-50% bonus for PVP kill rewards when in a large group.  (No bonus given for raids.)  Viola!  Right there, you've given people a great reason to go out in a full group of 6 and hunt other full groups, which seems to be the intent of the devs (and the unconscious wish of most players).  You can get creative from there with other rule set changes if you want... but sweeping DPS changes and overall class nerfs aren't going to be well received...