Ranged Attack Speed and Kiting

[Coldin]

I believe this has been suggested quite a few times before, but I feel it deserves bringing back up again. Ranged attack speed is so low, that unless a character is specialized in that style it is largely unfun and uneffective compared to melee. This is especially true at lower levels, but it plays the entire level range. The only archery items this largely doesn't apply to are Repeating Crossbows, but for the purposes of this post, let's assume we are talking merely about standard bows.

From a dev perspective, I believe one of the key reasons that Ranged attack speed is as slow as it is because of a fear of eternal kiting. Normally in PnP this wouldn't happen, because anyone making a double move action or a charge could quickly close on an archer that was only making a single move action.

Unfortunately in DDO, attack and movement rates stay the same when moving and firing, so the devs balance purely from that perspective. NPC archers move rather infrequently, but have much higher rates of fire than PCs.

So, I see two ways of rectifying this. The devs could use either way, or even both. In fact, I would recommend both ways, merely to give room to increase ranged attack speed across the board.

1. Decrease in Attack Speed while moving. In fact, this is already present in melee combat. This gives a noticable advantage in staying put, as one will be getting more attacks per second then if they are trying to move and run away from what they might be attacking.

2. Decrease in movement speed while attacking. Basically, during the reloading phase of shooting an arrow, movement speed is reduced by a certain amount, maybe even up to 50%. This keeps extended kiting out of the picture. There can be some movement, but it's significantly less than if the player was trying to simply run away.

I should make a quick note about the Shot on the Run feat as well. If these changes were implemented, it would seem logical that this feat would reduce the penalties. Not completely, but to a small to moderate degree. It would increase the value of this feat to archer characters by quite a bit.

Of course, these changes shouldn't even be considered unless they came with a large increase of ranged rate of fire across all levels. Otherwise it would just be a needless nerf.

[Bogenbroom]

Well reasoned and conveyed. I think your take on the fear of kiting is spot on, but some measures taken to improve ranged usefulness while still mitigating kiting would be great.

[ryingar]

Well said.

/signed

[Thanimal]

Well thought out proposal. I gave you some rep. (Use it wisely. )

[Angelus_dead]

2. Decrease in movement speed while attacking.

Lol, that's how DDO originally worked, up until after mod 2. They changed it because it sucked.

[Lymnus]

Lol, that's how DDO originally worked, up until after mod 2. They changed it because it sucked.

Oh dear, you made me have a flashback.
Well, there's always Shot on the Run. Again. =P

[Damionic]

I would only consider the "Nerfs" if somehow turbine would fix the "moving target" issue.

A mob running towards you is easy to hit but, a mob running accross your line of sight is quite safe when it comes to ranged.

[Samadhi]

I like the general idea. Maybe instead of penalizing those that move, we could see the positive reinforcement style instead, a la a ranged % increase to shooting speed while stationary.

[Fetchi]

Lol, that's how DDO originally worked, up until after mod 2. They changed it because it sucked.

QFT

I agree with A_D here. This is how it used to be early in the game and it was horrible. Ranged was even less effective than it is now.

I see a lot of people posting about kiting and how many people use it. Kiting is NOT an effective way to kill anything. Your party will agree that this is a poor strategy for killing mobs. I also see many people using "the ranger is far away from mobs so they shouldn't do as much dps as a melee standing near the mob" argument. This is completely false thinking. There are very few instances where this is true, and the mob typically can reach you before you kill it due to your poor dps and their inflated hps. I've played a ranger since launch. I have tried every strategy on every mob. It is simply in your best interest to not run around. Let the tanks grab aggro first then engage or engage first drawing them into the tanks or the crowd control.

The problem with ranged is low rate of fire and low dps. Increase the rate of fire progressively as you level before we start talking about changing anything else.

[vainangel]

I would be happy for many shot to be more useful. The cool down is insane and does not work for an archer in a place with mob waves and no spot to perch!

Sure you could change to melee but my arcane has a bane or something to hurt most everything not to mention the endless supply of Force arrows... just want a more useful attack rate.

[Angelus_dead]

Kiting is NOT an effective way to kill anything. Your party will agree that this is a poor strategy for killing mobs.

Yes, but sometimes it's an effective way to avoid being damaged. That depends on the monster in question.

I also see many people using "the ranger is far away from mobs so they shouldn't do as much dps as a melee standing near the mob" argument. This is completely false thinking.

Not "completely" false. There are times when it works, and times that it doesn't. If you focus on high-level quests then it doesn't, because devils don't respect spatial distances.

The problem with ranged is low rate of fire and low dps. Increase the rate of fire progressively as you level before we start talking about changing anything else.[/COLOR]

To do that would not solve the underlying problem, which is that range and melee don't stack. First the kiting situation would have to be resolved so that both melee and ranged can contribute to a typical combat. Once that's done, a developer could look at improving ranged DPS to get it to be balanced.

To increase the DPS at this time would just amplify an existing problem:
A party should be fighting with either all melee or all ranged, but not both.

Currently, if a melee guy joins a ranged group he doesn't contribute much, because the mobs are being kited and he can't catch up. Or if a ranged guy joins a melee group he also hardly contributes, because his DPS is low and he provides no other benefit. What should happen is that a melee/ranged guy can join a group using the other style and not look foolish by not switching to their technique.

[Coldin]

Lol, that's how DDO originally worked, up until after mod 2. They changed it because it sucked.

As I remember it A_D, it was not a decrease in RoF, but a complete inability to reload while moving. An archer got one shot while on the move, and then had to stand completely still to draw another arrow. The Shot on the Run feat changed this to allow reloading while moving. Past Mod 2, they changed this to how it works now.

To re-clarify, I wouldn't want these changes implemented unless they came with an overall base RoF increase. Otherwise all these would be is a pointless nerf.

[Monkey_Archer]

Issue # 1: Kiting. Kiting = Terrible. I completley ignore mobs that are being kited by some stubborn ranged ranger that refuses to stand still for 2 seconds, or pull out a melee weapon. It doesnt make much sense either.... even though the old system might have been bad, at least it made sense that you couldnt reload or shoot as fast while moving.

Issue # 2: Ranged DPS. Ranged DPS = Terrible. Hence, the reason for kiting in the first place. A problem with this is many shot though... they cant increase ranged (bow) dps by too much or manyshot will become extremely overpowered.


A possible solution: Implement a new ranged bow feat in the form of a stance. Similar to the defender stances that can be toggled:
-Increase ranged attack speed by maybe 50%? and decrease movement speed to, maybe 25% of normal.
-Manyshot ends the stance (just like casting a spell does combat expertise)
-Shot on the run would lessen the penalty to movement.

Maybe go even further and call it Ranged Weapon Fighting (RWF)... which of course unlocks IRWF and GRFW

[redoubt]

This does nothing to address the "whole party using one style" concept that AD brings up, however, I think this would be a, relatively speaking, easier adjustment to make to help ranged along.

Enhancements and feats to adjust manyshot. (May or may not translate to other ranged weapons.)

Improved manyshot I: +10 seconds duration (total 30 seconds)
Improved manyshot II: +20 seconds duration (total 40 seconds)
Improved manyshot III:+30 seconds duration (total 50 seconds)
Improved manyshot IV:+40 seconds duration (total 60 seconds)

Imp manyshot cooldown I: -10 seconds (total timer 110 seconds)
Imp manyshot cooldown II: -20 seconds (total timer 100 seconds)
Imp manyshot cooldown III:-30 seconds (total timer 90 seconds)
Imp manyshot cooldwon IV:-40 seconds (total timer 80 seconds)

For 20 AP you have a 60 second manyshot, then wait 20 seconds and manyshot again.
For a more reasonable 12 AP you have a 50 second manyshot, then wait 40 seconds and manyshot again.

This gets pretty powerful, its true. Some prereqs would help I think. But, prereqs that are free for the ranger class would be the wrong ones I think. My initial though would be to use imp crit: ranged as a prereq for the 3rd tier. The cooldown enhancements require the duration enhancement similar to halfling cunning and guile.

I like the idea of feats as prereqs because that is where you really have to choose which way you build. The enhancements can be spread more thinly, but feats are still precious.

Thoughts?

[Velexia]

1. Decrease in Attack Speed while moving. In fact, this is already present in melee combat. This gives a noticable advantage in staying put, as one will be getting more attacks per second then if they are trying to move and run away from what they might be attacking.

If we are to assume that the decreased attack speed would be equal to the current attack speed, sure.

2. Decrease in movement speed while attacking. Basically, during the reloading phase of shooting an arrow, movement speed is reduced by a certain amount, maybe even up to 50%. This keeps extended kiting out of the picture. There can be some movement, but it's significantly less than if the player was trying to simply run away.

Hell no. I would rather kite with my slow rate of fire than take a movement debuff while firing. If DA has taught me anything, it has taught me that putting unnecessary movement debuffs in the game sucks. Besides, running backwards is slower already (not that one is always running backwards while kiting).

I agree that ranged combat should be much more viable, and I agree with a decreased rate of fire if we can get an overall increase, but movement debuffs are terrible.

[Borror0]

From a dev perspective, I believe one of the key reasons that Ranged attack speed is as slow as it is because of a fear of eternal kiting.

While it probably was the reason that the rate of fire was lowered, it's probably not the reason that ranged combat has not been improved in any significant way for years. As Codog pointed out in an old post, the reason that they let the rate rate be so low is that they did not want to run into the situation where performance was the limiting factor. Notice that, now that we the cap is 20, they have increased the pure rangers' rate of fire by 25%!

Putting the technological issues aside, there are two game balance issues regarding ranged combat:

1. Stackability
2. Kiting

Your OP addresses kiting but does not address the other one.

Stackability is probably the most important problem to correct and what really prevents game designers to improve ranged combat into a playstyle worthy of mention. The problem, here, is that you have to allow ranged and melee character to coexist in the same party without one detracting from the other's effectiveness.

As it stands, if melee does more DPS than ranged, then it makes no sense for ranged to be used over melee. A melee character will grab aggro and the supposed additional protection of ranged combat will go to waste because the melee character will be taking the damage. However, if the situation was to change and ranged characters suddenly dealt more damage then there would be no reasons to play a melee character as everyone would be shooting from afar, bouncing the aggro.

There is simply no just middle ground and that is the problem: were the developers to improve ranged, it would either eclipse melee combat or still remain underpowered and possibly more annoying due to the increased chance to steal aggro.

A good aggro system should make ranged characters less prone to steal aggro since it's incredibly frustrating when a range character gains aggro and then proceeding to kite the monster around. Even more so when the said monster is a boss. It prevents the melee characters from contributing, which is not fun and is the indication that there is a poor stackability. At the same time, the aggro system should not allow ranged characters to be able to avoid dangers so easily.

To achieve such a system, I would suggest a few tweaks.

Currently, either you have aggro or you don't. What I would suggest is to give each NPC skill an aggro threshold (melee attack, fireballs, Hold Person, etc.) and weight different particular types of damage for the purpose of aggro generation. This way, ranged damage could be changed to easily trigger a monster's spells or powerful ranged attacks but would be less likely to trigger a monster's melee attacks. It also means that it's possible for multiple players to share aggro: one could be targeted by spells and, while the spells are on their cooldown, the NPC would switch to melee attacks.

This would accomplish the previously stated goal: making it possible for ranged to suffer retribution while avoiding to disrupt the gameplay of melee characters by forcing the players to run around in circles to catch on the monster and, hopefully, get the aggro back from the kiting ranger.

Once implemented, ranged DPS should be increased to the level of TWF or maybe a tad higher.

If this ever ends up making ranged far more powerful than melee ("Why should I bother with melee when ranged is much safer and deals as good DPS?") then additional mechanism could be added to make taking damage more disruptive to ranged DPS. For example, there could be a Concentration check when taking damage. If failed, the player would be unable to fire back for a very small amount of time or has his latest action interrupted.

As for kiting, our solutions are similar.

Kiting is a problem for two reasons:

1. If kiting is too good, melee characters can't contribute in a ranged party
2. If kiting is too easy, ranged combat can be used to trivialize some fights

To fix both, you suggest:

1. Decrease in Attack Speed while moving. In fact, this is already present in melee combat. This gives a noticable advantage in staying put, as one will be getting more attacks per second then if they are trying to move and run away from what they might be attacking.

2. Decrease in movement speed while attacking. Basically, during the reloading phase of shooting an arrow, movement speed is reduced by a certain amount, maybe even up to 50%. This keeps extended kiting out of the picture. There can be some movement, but it's significantly less than if the player was trying to simply run away.

The first one is clearly effective. By dropping the rate of attack low enough, you make players want to stop kiting because, by allowing melee to damage the mob, you deal with the encounter much quicker and time is invaluable in a video game.

As for the second, it's effective but not necessarily fun.

The current implementation is more fun for the players because they feel like they have some control over their character and that they are simply skilled enough to never caught up on, whether true or not. By simply changing it to a "they will eventually caught up on you", you reduce kiting to a much more frustrating and less enjoyable gameplay.

So, while I agree the speed should be decrease to allow monsters to catch up on the player, I think that stopping there would be a mistake.

Infinite kiting, itself, is not bad. The problem is how unchallenging an instance can become due to kiting. So, the ideal way to fix the problem, in my eyes, is to slow down the players but also to give them interesting engagement tools to play with. That is, giving the ranged characters abilities that, if used properly, will allow them to kite ad infinitum... but it won' be any easy.

[FluffyCalico]

1. Decrease in Attack Speed while moving. In fact, this is already present in melee combat. .

And here I thought many of the melee were moving to speed up their attacks

[Coldin]

Thanks for all the responses. A bit too much to respond to all in one post, so I'll just make a few general observations.

First, this thread and the initial post was intended to only address issues regarding RoF and Kiting. Manyshot and other things are indeed important issues, and have been discussed many times before. I was planning on making a second thread about Manyshot, though Aesop has already written extensively on that subject.

Perhaps all that is needed is the mere reduction in attack speed while moving..and not the movement speed decrease as well. I agree the second option isn't nearly quite as fun, and accidental attack while moving could be frustrating if unintentional.

As for the idea of a RoF decrease while moving, yes, I would prefer that whatever increase and decreases implemented would equal out to what we currently have on live.

A quick note regarding manyshot...that is another reason RoF with bows can't be increased greatly. My, and others, suggestion has been to turn Manyshot into a togglable stance, with appropriate penalties to attack while in that stance. That would be -8 when firing 3 additional arrows. If the devs could manage it...building in an ability to choose the number of arrows would be very nice. (Firing just 2 arrows at once would almost be akin to having TWF for bows).

That's all my thoughts for now.

(Btw Borror, while they did add a +25% RoF increase, that is for pure-class Rangers only, and does not help archery as a whole. Though, it does prove that sheer technical issues in regards to lag and server load must be no longer an issue.)

[Turial]

...
(Btw Borror, while they did add a +25% RoF increase, that is for pure-class Rangers only, and does not help archery as a whole. Though, it does prove that sheer technical issues in regards to lag and server load must be no longer an issue.)

That capstone + haste still leaves ranger class specific ranged combat below the number of attacks made by an unhasted melee character using one weapon at BAB 0.

[FluffyCalico]

That capstone + haste still leaves ranger class specific ranged combat below the number of attacks made by an unhasted melee character using one weapon at BAB 0.

Do you want monsters to fire back 5 times as fast too? How about a hasted orger with multishot at a 200% ranged correction speed boost? If we get it so should they. Personally I don't want to see mobs shooting 10 arrows per second at me.