Combat Feedback for Update 5.

[totmacher]

it seems like 20 ftr kensai or any kensai based build is getting hit really hard from his. i mean you've given tempest 3 a third better proc rate than any kensai 3 at the top tier...

[xTethx]

So a year ago you guys introduce Dungeon Alert to get rid of lag, that evidentally didnt work at all. What makes you think this change is gonna fix lag? Its ok if you just come out and say lag will never get fixed, atleast you'll be right about one thing.

[Razcar]

Changed my mind

[tihocan]

Many Paladins are likely to want to TWF as well. Anyone that has bonus "on-hit" effects, whether it be sneak attack or actual effects.

I thought most "on-hit" effects could also proc on glancing blows, but not sneak attack. But I'm unsure which ones can and which cannot exactly, I haven't done any test on that. Assuming they can, it seems overall THF is still competitive with TWF for "on-hit" effects thanks to being able to hit multiple targets at the same time.

[Gercho]

No, the additional attacks will not trigger additional additional attacks. That path leads to a one in a million chance of complete madness.


Many Paladins are likely to want to TWF as well. Anyone that has bonus "on-hit" effects, whether it be sneak attack or actual effects.

First of all, i find really bad that you are mixing a lag fix with a rebalancing at the same time, if you want only to fix lag, dont rebalance, and after the lag is fixed, you can think about rebalancing... now a lot of people will support the idea, cause it doesnt affects their chars and supposedly will help with lag.

This is an effective nerf of as much as 25% of dps for some classes, the paladins are the most nerfed of all... Paladins twf are close to top dps only against evil outsiders, now you nerf them 25% against all creatures...

[Daehawk]

I want to see both "instinctive feedback" as well as actual gameplay feedback once it his Lamannia. I can't say when Lamannia will be going live with these changes (that's beyond my control), but I figured better to get this out early.


Correct.

Hehe alright.

One more thing, right now a paladin with GTWF can get a Double Smite one with each hand. You answered for Coldin that the double strikes for Main hand can produce a Smite, All off hand procs if it was based off a smite attack should produce a smite as well correct? So a TWF Paladin in U5 could theoretically get 3 Smites from 1 smite. 1 for MH, 1 for Double Strike, and 1 for Off-hand Strike?

Seems interesing if it is going to work that way. Also will be interesting for those THF Epic SoS paladins that get Double Strike Exalted Smites with the SoS.

[yams]

I think cutting the physics checks in half is a novel solution to reducing lag, but the proposed implementation will upset players. I don't feel that it's entirely fair to those who have spent many many hours planning, leveling, and gearing up their characters to cut their DPS so drastically.

What's wrong with having the offhand attack proc off of every main hand attack?

Will the double-strike chance be implemented for monsters as well? Bosses?

[Eladrin]

You may want to clarify that in the OP. i.e. you write "Monk Air stances now grant a +5%/+10%/+15%/+20% insight bonus to the chance to proc off-hand attacks instead of a bonus to attack speed."

Change to: instead of an insight bonus to attack speed (enhancement bonus remains).

Done.

Also if you are taking out the speed capstones for TWF are you changing those similar enhancements to THF or just leaving them the same, at least for now? (ie - if my L20 ftr picks up a Greataxe or goes S&B does he still get the 10% but if he picks up two weapons he does not?)

Fighter Alacrity is a simple "You have a +10% bonus to double strike" under this proposal. You'll have a 10% chance to double attack with your greatsword, or your main hand weapon when fighting S&B or TWF.

[tihocan]

Sounds like a pretty small change overall - currently full twitch THF hasted 20 BAB toons get 140 attacks in a minute, whereas TWF get 220. Post changes, I assume the TWF gets 140 * (100% + 55%) = 231 (if I read it all correctly).

I'm not sure what's your reasoning here, but if TWF currently gets 220, then it means 110 swings, so post change it would be 110 * 155% = 170.5.

[Coldin]

It's one of the reasons we're talking about this now. There are major impacts to it.

I hope you can get this out to Lamannia soon then

When it hits Lamannia, we'll be watching things. I can probably be convinced to experiment with making TWF, ITWF, and GTWF all grant a 15% bonus if things go well.

I would prefer that. Especially if all off-hand attacks still have to roll their own attack rolls.

It does. Staff using monks may be better suited in Sun stance with these changes, if they're hasted. (Wind still grants the enhancement bonus to attack speed.)

Ok. So windstance will still grant the enhancement bonus (which does not stack with haste), just not the insight bonus? I guess I can accept that.

It should still be treated as a smite. It has to roll to hit separately from the original attack.

Ok, that's pretty cool. I assume the same would be for things like Trip, Divine Sacrifice, and the Monk elemental strikes?

All attack hooks have their own unique to-hit and damage rolls.

*nod* Then I would like to see these off-hand procs getting closer to 100% when a character has GTWF and any other bonuses that would help.

[Dwarfo]

i don't really like this idea about reducing attack speeds..
i like seeing my lvl 15 tempest attacking with his whirling blades much faster than my lvl 3 fighter and lvl 4 sorc...
but it looks like this idea will make lvl 15 attack speeds equivelent to lvl 4 attacks...

just my thinking.

[totmacher]

actually TBH now that I've thought about this a little longer, I'm just not for these rules because they overcomplicate and overengineer what the d20 core rules DDO has cropped up around has proposed to be

this seems to be the trend, especially with things like "glancing blows", "enhancements". i'm not a purist or anything but the farther these rules deviate, the further we will get to any real balance from a DND perspective

[Eladrin]

One more thing, right now a paladin with GTWF can get a Double Smite one with each hand. You answered for Coldin that the double strikes for Main hand can produce a Smite, All off hand procs if it was based off a smite attack should produce a smite as well correct? So a TWF Paladin in U5 could theoretically get 3 Smites from 1 smite. 1 for MH, 1 for Double Strike, and 1 for Off-hand Strike?

That is correct.

So a year ago you guys introduce Dungeon Alert to get rid of lag, that evidentally didnt work at all.

Dungeon Alert was meant to control one particular source of lag. (Specifically, pathing and perception systems of large numbers of monsters in a small area, since that's an n^2 problem.) It was never expected to banish all of it. Likewise, these changes are not expected to banish all forms of lag, but should help some of them.

[Daehawk]

This feels like Dungeon Alert all over again.

Why is it that dps lag seems to be worse on some days than others? Could it be that server load is as much an issue as is the number of attacks?

Maybe invest in hardware rather than butcher the combat system?

At the very least address one issue at a time. Do not couple performance adjustments with balancing TWF.

The dps lag is interesting. Was in a shroud earlier this morning and I didn't experience any lag. We 1 rounded Harry on P4 and didn't see lag till he died as we walked to the chests. At least for me anyway.

That character didn't complete /deathed at the end when Harry died in P5. But there wasn't any lag there either. 2 hours later when I did shroud again with a different ground took 2 rounds to kill Harry and the lag was pretty bad. The first one was around 8am EST second one I think around 10am EST.

[krud]

hmmm.. let's see what it does to my two twf

13rog/4ftr/2pal - main 100%, offhand 55% (currently 100%,100%)

12ftr/6pal/2rog - main 100%, offhand 55% (currently 100%, 100%)

They'd both get the worst possible outcome for the twf line. So much for building a little out of the box.

[Gnorbert]

I think the clear split of people supporting and against this change is a good indication you are on the right track.

In my book, anything that makes the different styles of combat more equal is a good thing. I think you'll make some people's heads explode because for their world to make sense there needs to be one clear and absolute best so they can be "teh Uberz".


I look forward to trying this out.

Bravo.

[Eladrin]

Ok, that's pretty cool. I assume the same would be for things like Trip, Divine Sacrifice, and the Monk elemental strikes?

That is correct.

[mourne]

My gut tells me: I Like double Strike. I DO NOT like the %to hit for offhand attacks. The way it reads, you effectively must have ALL TWF feats to be viable. Characters that multiclass often elect to forgo Gtr TWF. I think it will be a serious nerf (read that as rebuild) for a great many of unique characters. One of the wonderful and appealing aspects of this game is the ability to be creative with mixing classes. I think this will not play well at all with many of us who have been around since beta. TWF is a play style that is popular and fun to play. I think many of us will not be very happy when we find out our TR multi-class with a bunch of gear has just been nerfed....I would seriously reconsider this approach.


good luck

[Quikster]

With the addition of FB pre and the introduction of the ESoS I think THF has been brought back up to par with twf. If DPS is reduced for twf with this proposed fix im not for it, unless another way can be introduced to boost twf dps.

TWF requires a hardier investment than thf. With the need to have a high base dex, and the necessity of two weapons, it literally costs more to be a twf then a thf. The only bonus left would be the flexibility of having different stats on two weapons (for example, a monk splash ac ranger having +2 wis on one min II and +4 insight on the other)

With fighter/paly hate seeming broken, its already a large hill to climb to be able to do enough dps and have enough ac, AND enough hitpoints to be able to hold agro in a raid like ToD (a raid where lag is atrocious), by lowering twf dps this makes it that much more difficult for a twf fighter to do this. This is just one example, however with the cost involved going twf I think it should do more single target dps then thf, but less AoE dps then THF.

Obviously these are simply my opinions on the matter, but I think by reducing dps on twf you have taken away the last reason to go twf (similar dps to thf in most cases) and we will see mostly thf running around (this bodes bad for my pure paly who will have more competition for the ESoS )

If the issues is # of calcs/second, what about streamlining the additional weapon procs done by greensteel? Maybe instead of 1dX damage on a tier, it becomes X damage every hit.

How about adding more chances per attack? Instead of a % chance every attack as you propose, what about a guaranteed attack & a % chance (much less then 90% prolly) So, if you have all the twf you get X number of xtra attacks guaranteed, as well as X% chance to proc another attack per offhand, or main hand swing.


Im not a math wiz, and others can do it much more reliably than I can, but it seems we should be able to come up with some combination that gives similar or slightly buffed dps, while reducing lag at the same time.



EDIT:::Big props for attempting this. Many have seen this as a game breaking problem for a long time (the only times i think about canceling for 2 years now is when extremely lagged out). While most understand its not a simple fix, it is still fresh to see someone trying to fix it, instead of "Hey we fixed lag, heres Dungeon Alert"

[Yazston_the_Invoker]

While I understand why this is being looked into, I think this is a bad idea. You are taking an already difficult-to learn system (compared to other MMOs) and then making changes that would make them even more difficult to understand for newbies. At least the current system has some basis in PnP, so someone coming over from PnP would have some understanding. With this, not at all.

Plus, to those of us that are just getting used to builds and how class abilities work together, changes like this are highly unwelcome. This is not a simple nerf, you are proposing making sweeping changes to the whole attack system. Simply put, I do not like this.

I don't mean to tell you what to do, but would it not make sense to take some of the revenue you got from the influx of players and/or the WB buyout, and make some necessary hardware upgrades? I work on PC/Server/Network hardware, and I understand that it is not simple, but I think it would be more simple than changing the way attacks work across the board. Plus, you said it yourself, that there changes would not make that big of an impact with DPS lag, but I would bet an investment in some processor/router/memory upgrades WOULD make an impact, if only slightly. Probably similar to or better than the proposed changes you presented.

Anyway, that's my 2cp...