Why do MMOs get casters wrong so often?

In the early MMOs the deal was that because of the lower armor the casters would have tons of fire power. The problem was casters became over powered and so later MMOs saught to balance this. Only now they have gone to the other side of the spectrum. I keep seeing more and more MMOs where Melee characters are quickly becoming king. When you have almost equal damage, speed buffs, and more armor it does tend to unblance things.

Guilds Wars can be an example of this. Warriors tend to be some of the best damage in the game, but they also have the best armor in the game. They also have stances to catch up to Kiters. Now Guild Wars isn't nearly as bad at this compared to a few other games I have played, but I am just currious why this is? It just seems like the early days of MMOs have scared the crap out of programers to the point that they continue to get the idea of the caster completely wrong. If you lose armor you should make up for it in damage yet it is almost never the case.

I don't know, but when was a warrior able to do 119 points of damage to all monsters in one area with one shot.

Triple chop!

In theory, yes you'd think high armor low damage, low armor high damage.

However, this really doesn't work in reality. Casters, frankly, are NOT damage dealers. (Aside from eles, but even they don't make effective damage dealers imo)

Instead casters have a wide array of spells that have more subtle effects. Mainly buffs, hexes, and various other types of spells. When used correctly, these can be much more effective at destroying an enemy then raw damage.

Melee's really are the backbone to most games. The warrior class, above all else, is a good foundation for any team. This is less true in guild wars, but definately can be seen in other games.

The Warrior has high armour and high dps because they have to be in the front line to deal their damage. This way, they are easily shut down by kiting, cripple, blind, snares, body blocking etc. 1v1 terms a Mesmer is much more powerful than a Warrior due to degen, snares, blind and hexes that stop dps in its tracks. And this is only the offensive shutdown for a warrior. You've got enchantments like Aegis, guardian, rof and wards for snaring as well as evasion.

Give a caster equal or better DPS to a warrior and they would be overpowered. You don't need to be in their face, you can sit there and happily throw fireballs at your enemy without being in range of harm.

You do realise that a direct smiting monk can take out warriors and assassins one vs one? Not something you would expect I would say. You don't even have to move.

It's not just damage and armour.

It's damage, armour and energy.

Why do you call the way casters are portrayed "wrong"? Are you simply basing it on some early MMO's? Who's to say those games were right?
Guild Wars has created a nice role for casters in my opinion. It would seem that alot of people start playing an elementalist and think they are going to be able to nuke everything on the map without giving it a second thought. Casters can do alot of damage, you just have to be smart about it. Just ask anyone who runs obsidian spike or fast cast air spike.

Melee may have the best damage and armor...or so it seems to you...but that does not mean it's going to win a fight against casters.

Melee is only good for doing high spike damage. While caster's damage is constant. Both warrior and assassin have spike dmg that can kill in 5 seconds (with no healing)

On the other hand, damage and hp is not the only 2 numbers that determines the result of the game.

Think D&D. A first level wizard, will have much more efficiency when casting sleep to disable, than casting burning hand to do damage.

Actually, in Guild Wars, Warriors have the highest DPS while casters are better for spike damage.

This isn't D&D so the 'point' is void.

Every game has it's own take on how the different classes work.

Yes ofcourse, cuz in reality a meteor shower would give only minor burns.
Oh and so does burning....

In reality a warrior wouldnt be able to get close to a "dmg dealing" caster...
Not like the gws eles anyway...

But, this is a game afterall, and we just have to hope that eles (mainly for me anyways) will get thier glory days back. Umm, are they the only truely nerfed casters btw?

Every class has its stregnths and weaknesses. melee gets higher armor because its ment to be on the frontlines fighting. most of your casters are ment to be your midline/backup support for your melee characters, with most monks and rits in backline supporting the team.

Oooh...please don't let this turn into another "elementalists do no damage" debate. There are so many arguments about this. Whoever said that you just need to know how to run your character is absolutely right...If your character is not effective you're not playing it the way it is designed be played. I use air magic with my elementalist and I move from one enemy to another spiking the crap outta them...works fine for me.

The game defines what is right or wrong, not your preconcieved notions. Casters do deal plenty of damage in GW, just not as directly as melee. AoE smiters, Tainted necros, these archetypes can create a lot of damage.

What caster doesn't have a way to shutdown warriors, or at least stop their dps/spike?

Mesmer: Plenty of hexes, distortion.
Ele: Flash, snares.
Necro: Curses
Rit: Shadowsong, defensive spirits.
Monk: Protection...

What do warriors have to shutdown casters?
A few interrupts, of which only distracting blow gets frequent use,
and knockdowns, which while definately a good shutdown, requires either a lot of skills to chain, or can provide only very temporary shutdown.

There are more factors than armor and damage. I'd lump the others into "range" and "utility". Typically range lowers armor and utility lowers damage, but they all interact in rather interesting ways. As for your statements about casters doing little damage, I don't exactly have the time right now to write out and explain what I mean, but a game where elementalists are a more viable damage threat than warriors is not a fun game.

A melee centric game is far more interesting and has many more layers of depth than teams of casters playing dodgeball with each other (it gets really retarded when using no-LoS skills). I admit this is more in context of GW as I have not really played other online games of the sort.

@OP

Out of Content of GuildWars.

I think with mmo's in general there is a shift to make things a bit easier or shorter quests due to the way people want to play.

The vein of thought is I'll make a war and just go kill things with my high damage, high armor, and high health easier to attract more people (and to a degree less skill). This also appeals to the pre-teen ppl who like to *pwn* and call people *noobs* because there so *leet*. Again this is a general not specific to GW.

I'm not saying it doesn't take skill to play a war, it's just a bit easier then the other jobs depending on the build.


In regards to GW - I do see your point about how easier it is to play a war vs other jobs and how newer games tend to have a tank like easy to play and there high power but in regards to Gw, they do a great job of making all the jobs have advantages / disadvantages and there tend to be on par with the war.

Why is this thread still open, again? Far more constructive ones have been locked on sight.

I quite like the point the person made. That person with the crying girl in his avatar. Yeah, that was a good point