Curse

Kaon · Nov 08, 2007, 08:17 PM // 20:17

There once used to be a time where dping sins would absolutely own them as they would lack energy for their combo, I want to see those days return

.

Byron · Nov 08, 2007, 08:31 PM // 20:31

Who still uses IAS sins? At one time they caught the meta off-guard, but now they are just further limited SP sins. It takes 7 skills for them to do one thing, which is only selectively successful.

Captain Robo · Nov 08, 2007, 08:42 PM // 20:42

The problem is, that once you gimp the effectiveness of assassins, they become strictly worse than other professions at doing their job.

Assassins are, at heart, a hardcore splitting character. If they get declawed, why would I ever take an Assassin over a Ranger?

Class balance is a lot easier to perform when you actually develop a character with a fully thought-out role in mind, rather than "Hmm... let's make a character that can teleport and kill shit." Or "How about a dude who throws swords and yells to buff the party. Oh, and lets give him warrior armor, that would just be sweet."

Poorly designed characters aside, you'd need a large overhaul of many skills to define a role for the assassin that didn't limit itself to "I'm highly mobile and blow people up."

And no, nobody "hates" classes. Assassin used to be my favorite class, and I really enjoyed playing it. Then I realized exactly why the class was broken, possibly beyond repair. I saw that every idiot out there was using degenerate builds to score kills they had no business getting. The class is 100% velveeta, and really needs to be reworked.

Quote:

Who still uses IAS sins? At one time they caught the meta off-guard, but now they are just further limited SP sins. It takes 7 skills for them to do one thing, which is only selectively successful.

They're still very popular. Tiger's stance lets you get the rest of the combo off (after HotOx) by the time your opponent gets back on his feet, so your impale should kill your opponent as they regain the ability to cast spells.

Yue · Nov 08, 2007, 10:38 PM // 22:38

Quote:

Assassins are, at heart, a hardcore splitting character. If they get declawed, why would I ever take an Assassin over a Ranger?

Who would have a problem with that?

Falconer · Nov 08, 2007, 10:50 PM // 22:50

Well this threads gone way off track. It would be a good thread in it's own right to discuss the various goals and types of split characters and how a ranger/assassin/monk whatnot accomplishes these goals.

But I think something a lot of people are missing is that rangers are skirmishers. It's the only major PvP role left to them. That requires a character which is very self-sufficient and able to operate for extended periods away from the rest of the units. It also means they can extend to attack/disrupt enemy back/midlines when in the presence of support. But they tend to lack fast killing power. Rangers are all about the 'long' fight... I'll do more sustained pressure over time than you will, while outlasting/disrupting your push. Even their primary attribute is designed around the 'long' fight, a ranger doesn't empty his pool in a single fast strike.

Assassins on the other hand operate in a completely different context. They operate around the premise that they can get in, quickly kill inside of a combo then get out using their vaunted teleports and combo chains. Energywise this again leads to the old recharge, ready, go.. unload everything and unload the energy pool. (not so much w/ some of the current builds yes). Even crit strikes isn't reliable enough to be 'sure' energy for a combo but more of a way to quickcharge so you can pull off your next combo sooner.

Look at this in the context of how the units operate in a base raid. The cripshot ranger can take down an archer but it'll take him a while to degen the target while disrupting it's self-heals. It's 'slow' damage. A monk has zero problems countering it. Even a burning arrow ranger can't kill as fast as an assassin can. If you have to deal w/ a monk... your only option is to engage and kill/chase off the monk, hold the monk in position, go somewhere else....

Assassins on the other hand revolve around the quick kill. Even in the presence of a monk. If the monk prots the wrong target the assassin can still kill something else. In the presence of a bad monk it can still easily off NPC's and get back out. With the reserve ability to come back to the stand blazingly quick to give again, a narrow window of oppurtunity where you outnumber the other guy and can score a kill or two before their reinforcement comes back.

So a lot of this thread is kind of wasted. A good ranger can outlast a bad assassin, and a good assassin will easily dice and slice a bad ranger. But the outcome of ranger vs. assassin 1v1 tends to rely moreso on the players and how well they engage/strategise. So in this aspect they are fairly balanced right now, as I'd say it's the players moreso than the two classes which determine the outcome when both are used as skirmish units. The mere fact that so much revolves around 'if the ranger can do this, or if the assassin can do that' argues to this position.

IMMORTAlMITCH · Nov 08, 2007, 10:57 PM // 22:57

Quote:

Originally Posted by Falconer

Well this threads gone way off track.

Funny that you should mention that, because..

Quote:

Originally Posted by Falconer

But the outcome of ranger vs. assassin 1v1 tends to rely moreso on the players and how well they engage/strategise.

This thread was never about rangers vs sins, it was about sins being overpowered.

Captain Robo · Nov 08, 2007, 11:55 PM // 23:55

Quote:

Originally Posted by Yue

Who would have a problem with that?

For the sake of preserving class diversity, I feel that killing off the assassin would be bad for the game.

On the other hand, assassins piss me off.

Captain Robo · Nov 09, 2007, 12:06 AM // 00:06

What I really want to know is how long does it take to implement a skill balance.

Any dev who reads this forum, even on their lunch break, would get an idea on how to correctly implement a healthy metagame change. What's taking so long...

X Cytherea X · Nov 09, 2007, 02:22 AM // 02:22

i still think BLS is balanced, given the required initial investment plus the cost of the viable combos afterwards.

furthermore, ive said before, not all BLS-dependent builds use SP. dont nerf other builds just cuz BLS is awesome with SP. for example, i have one that uses siphon speed and BLS on recharge, followed by an expensive combo. yea SP is the most prevalent hex for it in gvg, but this is Gladiator's Arena, PVP skill discussion, and i was under the impression that PVP skill balances were for everyone.

funnily enough, this turned into yet another sin-hate thread while...

Quote:

Originally Posted by Izzy from official wiki 31/10/2007
I'm working on Next balance update, so I'll be checking out the forums. Here are the list of issues I'm looking into.

* Spiritway
* Dual Clums Build
* Ancestor Rage Spike
* Splinter Weapon at VoD
* Three Monk backlines
* Recall
* Bloodspike

...they arent even on the list (apart from recall). fortunately for us "narutards"... -_- please get back on track

Captain Robo · Nov 09, 2007, 03:05 AM // 03:05

Everyone who hasn't seen the updates yet should head on over there and proceed to shitting a brick.

Nightwind Of Dwayna · Nov 09, 2007, 05:47 AM // 05:47

Quote:

Originally Posted by Captain Robo

Everyone who hasn't seen the updates yet should head on over there and proceed to shitting a brick.

Plop.

My guild only got a few matches in, I was unable to tell if it was really that bad, TBH. I know this much... if the goal was to make guilds run MORE passive defense, it worked. That was the short term feel in the limited amount of time we played.

Captain Robo · Nov 09, 2007, 06:02 AM // 06:02

How else do you compensate for losing the single most efficient heal in the game?

More passive defense, more monks, beefier midline.

GG on fixing the three monk backline izzy...

more like three monk backline MINIMUM.

twicky_kid · Nov 09, 2007, 06:09 AM // 06:09

Quote:

Originally Posted by Captain Robo

How else do you compensate for losing the single most efficient heal in the game?

More scrimmage builds.

The less you have need to rely on your monk the more likely you are to survive.

Wasteland Squidget · Nov 09, 2007, 06:11 AM // 06:11

Eventually, there comes a point where you run out of passive defense, and monks aren't doing their job efficiently enough anymore. At that point, you're better off running dedicated splits or 8v8 AoE/degen pressure builds designed to blow the other guy up in 30 seconds or less.

Captain Robo · Nov 09, 2007, 06:15 AM // 06:15

Twicky, I'd love to think that. You have no idea how much I'd love to believe that the meta would magically turn into split central. Strategic splitting was my favorite part of the game.

But I don't think it will. People don't work that way. When it comes to playing competitively, you're going to capitalize on the weakness of the current monks to deal with outpouring melee pressure. You're going to push and push until their energy gives way, and they're unable to heal through the damage you're doing.

Even if you try to force a split, they just cave in on your lord. A full team can kill a lord faster than a split can.

No build will be as defensive as things used to be, of course, but it doesn't matter now that doing damage as fast as possible is the only thing that counts. A team can't fight back if they're dead.

Next update will be VoD in 5 minutes; they might as well.

On a completely different note, why is the thread in Riverside Inn filled with so many people who have no idea just how much this updated impacted the game, and are actually satisfied with it? Most of them seem like they've never even watched an observer match.

SebaZ · Nov 09, 2007, 01:09 PM // 13:09

Quote:

Originally Posted by Captain Robo

The problem is, that once you gimp the effectiveness of assassins, they become strictly worse than other professions at doing their job.

who cares, they're the plague of gvg. Just remove them already.

bungusmaximus · Nov 09, 2007, 01:20 PM // 13:20

Quote:

Originally Posted by SebaZ

who cares, they're the plague of gvg. Just remove them already.

Not only of GvG, they're a plague anyway, in PvE they die all the times and in PvP they kill everyone, me confused...mooooooo.

I can miss them like toothache as well, why on earth aNet doesn't want to tone down IAS and teleports for these guys is beyond me. I didn't pvp too much as of late because too much lameness spoils the fun for me a bit.

-Pluto- · Nov 09, 2007, 01:41 PM // 13:41

Quote:

Originally Posted by bungusmaximus

Not only of GvG, they're a plague anyway, in PvE they die all the times and in PvP they kill everyone, me confused...mooooooo.

I lol'd irl.

anyway:

* Spiritway
Nerf to lod? Sounds like a buff to Spiritway
* Dual Clums Build
Needs to find new e-management, but that's about it.
* Ancestor Rage Spike
If he meant the Ride the Lightning one, I guess that worked.
* Splinter Weapon at VoD
Yeah, Splinter is still good for punishing bad positioning and still really good at vod for npcs, but isn't quite as as broken.
* Three Monk backlines
LOLOLOLOLOLOLOLOLOLOLOLOLOLOLOLOLOLOLOLOLOLOLOLOLO LOLOLOLOLOLOL
* Recall
Good solution for hero battles, and makes it harder for recall sins to collapse and wipe your stand team. Still makes them impossible to be collapsed on themselves though.
* Bloodspike
who the f@#% really cared anyway?

Bankai · Nov 09, 2007, 04:16 PM // 16:16

Quote:

Originally Posted by Captain Robo

For the sake of preserving class diversity, I feel that killing off the assassin would be bad for the game.

On the other hand, assassins piss me off.

It's not assassins that piss most people off. It's the current sin bar with 5 attacks and 2 skills that support their attack chain (shadow prison and tiger stance). Back in ye olde days, sin builds were fun since their combos were really short, since long combos weren't possible. The most often-used combo was shock>falling spider>twisting fangs, or later on siphon speed>black lotus>HotO>falling>twisting. Those are fun builds. Not the current builds.

Billiard · Nov 09, 2007, 04:49 PM // 16:49

Closing this thread. Let's try to consolidate some now that that balance update is out.