Bringing Melee classes back in line with casters

[gpk]

Vorpals.

Disruptors.

Smiters.

w/p weapons.

We do alright. Quit worrying about balance and worry more about that demon/devil invasion in January.

I get these for free when I level up right?

Let's see vorpal :5% (less due to confirmation roll)
Disruptor: It's great in von5, everyone had 1 in mod1 right?
Smiters: Great in Von4 and 5, still great on clay and iron golems (all 3 of em). But then there are those pesky Flesh Golems...5% for joo!

w/p weapons yep these rapiers are great, espcially on my crit rage 2 barbarian. I was so happy when I hit level 14 and these 2 were in the mail! Thanks Coin Lords!

[Kaboth]

Bringing melee's inline with casters? Well thats a first for me to read. They also want to talk about 1000's of damage per second. Ummmm do you have a screen shot of spell that does 1000's of damage as it has been mentioned? I think about the best I can do against a mob thats vunerable to a particular type of damage would at best close to 700-ish. Maybe if I tricked out for damage only I could maybe push it to 800. At best on average to non-vunerable mobs, I can a good damage with about 300 ish, and 100 ish on wall of fire. Now these is a non-crit spells that meta-magiked up the rear. Now given all this raw damage and how out of balance it is, melee's still manage to do large kill counts. Unless the mob is vunerable to a type of damage or they can be insta killed easy, my kill counts stay on par or below the melee's But then again, my sorc is also balanced with nukes, buffs, debuffs, travel and some crowd control.

So now you want to call casters overpowered because they can blow large amounts of mana to burst DPS? What about melees whos average damage per swing is close to the 50 to 70's with a one handed weapon and they get about 4 swings a second (if not more). Then you have melees with AC's that are 50+ and that have HP 300+ and here at the meger level of 14 with +30ish to hit. Lets see the best AC my sorc can hit is about 32 and he has 178 HP and his melee to hit even with Tensers Transform is about +25 hit with buffs....

IMHO just about all classes and monsters are over-inflated

[Serpent]

Yep. The player base - it needs a good swift kick to some area of the body that hurts.

Let's take Ghosts of Perdition for example. Taking 5 clerics and a caster in there is just a brute force method used to circumvent actual strategy. If something goes wrong that winds up depleting SP, they are likely to end up recalling a time or 2 just like every other group. On the other hand, if melee in the quest would realize that its probably the (acid or force based) caster or cleric's job to take down the Doomsphere, and everyone else's job to take care of themselves and each other, the quest would probably actually be completable in a single attempt.

Melee are just now waking up to the fact that they aren't essential for any quest in DDO? Please... it's been like that for a really, really long time...

I will now henceforth do it the way raithe states it should be. I will be soloing a lot because my guildmates will not join in this proposed strategy. This way all the recalling that could happen (which rarely does) will stop.

But seriously, I duoed Ghosts the other day, cleric and caster. There was no recalling, no DD, no sp pots, none of that. A lot of people can do that. It is a hard quest but as you proposed doing it would probably be near impossible. I know some people have trouble. But between optical nerve, LOTD necklace adn beholder ring, the quest is rarely not completed on the first go. Now if you are talking elite, everything is different.

[Aspenor]

Bringing melee's inline with casters? Well thats a first for me to read. They also want to talk about 1000's of damage per second. Ummmm do you have a screen shot of spell that does 1000's of damage as it has been mentioned?

(Combat): Your wall of fire hit mummy for 1,283 points of fire damage.
(Combat): Your disintegrate hit clay golem for 1,004 points of damage.
(Combat): Your cone of cold hit greater hell hound for 2,032 points of cold damage.
(Combat): Your delayed blast fireball hit greater ice mephit for 1,976 points of fire damage.

I think you can get the idea....combination of my own combat logs and a very good buddy of mine.

[Fallout]

A large crux of the problem is that people can simply recall and come back quest. Becuase of that simply no need for SP management.

[Serpent]

While I agree with the OP to a certain extent, I find it funny that all the people who, for the first year+ of DDO's existance, played in groups of 5 melees and one caster - are only now complaining about group make ups

Actually didn't like it that way either, but also we had less overall casters and magic was completely different. Also Firewall did not appear till nearly 6 months after launch. Then well things changed, at least on my server it did.

[gpk]

While I agree with the OP to a certain extent, I find it funny that all the people who, for the first year+ of DDO's existance, played in groups of 5 melees and one caster - are only now complaining about group make ups

Ya and it was a problem then, and it was addressed to a certain extend. It was bad then and the reverse is bad now.

[Oreg]

Yep. The player base - it needs a good swift kick to some area of the body that hurts.

.....

Melee are just now waking up to the fact that they aren't essential for any quest in DDO? Please... it's been like that for a really, really long time...

Not just melees. Every class in non essential for a good chunk of the content.

[Raithe]

It is a hard quest but as you proposed doing it would probably be near impossible.

I didn't actually propose a strategy, so I have no idea what you are talking about. To be more concise, I was alerting melee that the best strategy probably isn't running and swinging at the Doomsphere until you go down because the cleric is having trouble with the anti-magic field.

[Raithe]

Not just melees. Every class in non essential for a good chunk of the content.

I totally agree. Had a cleric the other day tell us that our group of 4 melee, my bard, and him wasn't "the right makeup" for doing the dragons. Went into the black dragon room and promptly took out the dragon and giant, after only one single flubbed-from-the-getgo attempt.

Without walls of fire even!! OMGZ!!!!

[Serpent]

I didn't actually propose a strategy, so I have no idea what you are talking about. To be more concise, I was alerting melee that the best strategy probably isn't running and swinging at the Doomsphere until you go down because the cleric is having trouble with the anti-magic field.

I was making a joke. The simple factor about Doomy is that you can be one hundred feet away and be in the dead zone. he doesn't hurt up close. he hurts from where ever. Also if the one cleric is ahving trouble with the anti-magical aura then how are we killing the doomsphere? One caster, two casters, another cleric?

[MondoGrunday]

Any fighter that can't keep up with the mages in an average dungeon needs a reroll.


Edit: Oh, and the melees are also WAY overpowered in equipment, damage, to-hit, and hp to PnP so saying the mages are buffed up here is kinda meaningless, everything is supercharged here.

i'm thinking if your mages allow fighters to keep up, then it is your mage that needs the reroll. casters own melee any way you want to look at it. i play capped versions of both and in no way can my fighter or barb match kills of my sorc. i would gladly back my words to any tank that thinks they can out kill a sorc in any "average" dungeon.

[gpk]

Yep. The player base - it needs a good swift kick to some area of the body that hurts.

Let's take Ghosts of Perdition for example. Taking 5 clerics and a caster in there is just a brute force method used to circumvent actual strategy. If something goes wrong that winds up depleting SP, they are likely to end up recalling a time or 2 just like every other group.

What actual strategy are we talking about here, killing the mobs? When would a group of 5 cleris and an arcane encounter a situation where something goes wrong?

On the other hand, if melee in the quest would realize that its probably the (acid or force based) caster or cleric's job to take down the Doomsphere, and everyone else's job to take care of themselves and each other, the quest would probably actually be completable in a single attempt.

Well you mention previously that "every other group recalls once or twice" and now you mention of acid or force based caster to take down the doomsphere, you've just demonstrated to us that you play with very bad casters. Clearly the casters you play with are not the ones the rest of us are talking about. If you can't complete Ghosts of Perdition on normal in a single attempt with casters and clerics in the groups then this thread is not talking about you and you won't be affected bya "nerf" one way or the other.

Melee are just now waking up to the fact that they aren't essential for any quest in DDO? Please... it's been like that for a really, really long time...

So thats a good thing?

[Dirkan]

Yeah Ghost groups are now 4-5 casters and a cleric. Thanks for making quests that makes melee obsolete.

Man there is one quest in the game that melees need a caster to get though and the sky is falling? What about the Rogue and the Ranger for past 2 years? No Character or Class should be able to power through every quest......

[gpk]

Man there is one quest in the game that melees need a caster to get though and the sky is falling?

One quest???

What about the Rogue and the Ranger for past 2 years? No Character or Class should be able to power through every quest......

Noone is arguing Rogues or Rangers don't deserve some love, lets not deviate from the topic at hand. Any "love" the melees get compared to casters also affects Rogues and Rangers.

[Agarwaen]

IMHO just about all classes and monsters are over-inflated

I agree, but it is worse in regards to casters. It is creating an imbalance issue which is impacting the fun for non-caster/clerics in the late game content. In the early and mid game, things are fairly balanced and having a good variety of classes in a party is highly desirable. That's perfect. When characters are capped, however, and you are only interested in running elite late-game content, it really sucks being anything other than a caster or a cleric. If you aren't, then on many quests your services are neither required nor desired. That isn't a good direction for the game to go in terms of balance or fun. If this trend isn't turned around, in fact, I think it will be dangerous to the longevity of DDO.

The problem is, I haven't seen any solution proposed that I think would bring things back into balance.

[MysticTheurge]

I find it funny that all the people who, for the first year+ of DDO's existance, played in groups of 5 melees and one caster - are only now complaining about group make ups

Oddly enough, I complained that casters were underpowered for the first year+ of DDO's existence. Now I'm arguing the opposite.

[Raithe]

I was making a joke. The simple factor about Doomy is that you can be one hundred feet away and be in the dead zone. he doesn't hurt up close. he hurts from where ever. Also if the one cleric is ahving trouble with the anti-magical aura then how are we killing the doomsphere? One caster, two casters, another cleric?

Ya, but if you're swinging at the Doomsphere, you aren't doing anything to keep yourself or someone else alive, are you? There are such things as lesser restoration pots. There is such a thing as protecting the casters from skelly archers and flensors. For a group that isn't relying completely on brute force, the Doomsphere is an endurance test. Melee can strafe the beholder when things look good, but they should primarily be looking out for the other members of the group.

Just like the caster and cleric are. Just like they should have been doing in every quest after Goodblade's.

[Dirkan]

I just don't see melees being under powered and soon you'll have a 5th attack. I think many people think Palladins and Fighters are for DPS, neither should be able to out DPS a Barbarian THF or a Ranger or a Rogue TWF (Especially if they are STR based).

[gpk]

Ya, but if you're swinging at the Doomsphere, you aren't doing anything to keep yourself or someone else alive, are you? There are such things as lesser restoration pots. There is such a thing as protecting the casters from skelly archers and flensors. For a group that isn't relying completely on brute force, the Doomsphere is an endurance test. Melee can strafe the beholder when things look good, but they should primarily be looking out for the other members of the group.

Just like the caster and cleric are. Just like they should have been doing in every quest after Goodblade's.

You know what protects ppl from skelly archers and flensers? Firewall.

Honestly I think you're running with different players than the ones that are being discussed here. I never thought I'd suggest this, but try pugging with a lot of different people (assuming you're not a melee class). You really don't seem to be playign with very good casters at all, and those are in the minority these days.