Combat Feedback for Update 5.

[Aesop]

One major issue there. It will encourage more THF builds, but 95% of them will be 20 barb or 20 fighter due to how the mechanics are set up. Hardly a lot of variety there. It will on the flip side kill a ton of multiclass builds and twf builds for things like bards. Not sure if smite will proc on an offhand hook, if it does some twf pali's will remain for sure though.

Eladrin stated that the Smites could proc on any hit attached to the main strike. Thus if you DS and OH at the same time you could triple Smite... and your head may explode

Aesop

[Aesop]

i've experienced it too, but there has to be something in between. my monk with madstone and wind IV looks like a sugerhigh child in fast forward. at least adjusting the animation time is adjustable and leaves current / adjust current combat intact. when a better server solution appears the can always tweak up the speed.

even making static elemental/allignment damage would help. (ex. holy 7dmg, fire 3, force 5. instead of x rolls)

simple. Nerf Madstone... Its broken anyway

[Aspenor]

simple. Nerf Madstone... Its broken anyway

Um, what? Can you elaborate on that?

[Ollathir]

Eladrin stated that the Smites could proc on any hit attached to the main strike. Thus if you DS and OH at the same time you could triple Smite... and your head may explode

Aesop

shortly thereafter followed by a severe lag spike

[Aesop]

Um, what? Can you elaborate on that?

Unless I missed it... which is completely possible as I don't always pay attention.

Last I heard Madstone was still kicking out 20+% (maybe 25%) RoA increase even after haste was reduced to 15%. Thus Broken (imo).

Its bad enough that the Madstone Rage stacks with other Rage why should it be the superior form of haste as well

Aesop

[Aesop]

shortly thereafter followed by a severe lag spike

nah you only calculate th Collision once for that. its not the DPS itself that causes lag its the Collision Detection. hence the change.


The nerf is to try to bring balance to the force... er system

Aesop

[Angelus_dead]

Um, what? Can you elaborate on that?

The problem with Madstone Rage is that it was originally given a 20% enhancement bonus to attack speed, at a time when Haste was a 25% enhancement bonus to attack speed. That functioned as a minor convenience for times you didn't happen to have Haste, which hardly ever happened during an important fight.

Then there was a combat adjustment and Haste was reduced to a 15% bonus, while all melee attacks were made 10% faster so they'd be the same overall. But Madstone Rage was not changed, so it went from being worse than Haste to being better.

Since Madstone Rage prohibits spellcasting, that indirect Madstone buff was unfair to melee characters that need to cast spells frequently, primarily Paladins and Monks of Harmonious Balance.

[Ollathir]

nah you only calculate th Collision once for that. its not the DPS itself that causes lag its the Collision Detection. hence the change.


The nerf is to try to bring balance to the force... er system

Aesop

Yeah..I know, irony lost

[Gercho]

The problem with Madstone Rage is that it was originally given a 20% enhancement bonus to attack speed, at a time when Haste was a 25% enhancement bonus to attack speed. That functioned as a minor convenience for times you didn't happen to have Haste, which hardly ever happened during an important fight.

Then there was a combat adjustment and Haste was reduced to a 15% bonus, while all melee attacks were made 10% faster so they'd be the same overall. But Madstone Rage was not changed, so it went from being worse than Haste to being better.

Since Madstone Rage prohibits spellcasting, that indirect Madstone buff was unfair to melee characters that need to cast spells frequently, primarily Paladins and Monks of Harmonious Balance.

hey, my paladin doesnt complains about madstone rage :P you can allways unequip the boots when you have 2 mins left on zeal and divine favor, recast, and then reequip...
Madstone boots speed boost is nice when you are soloing mostly (in boss fights the con bonus is more important imho), so i dont think its a big deal, maybe drop them to haste levels, but not lower than that...

[Drfirewater79]

We're considering modifications to the bonuses the feats grant, and possibly even bringing back STWF.

While i dont want to discourage any feat that will allow me to continue to enjoy my fighter rather then convince everyone in the world to go tempest for dual weilding ...

if everyone takes stwf will that not just make the same lag?

so you take the swing % down but then add a feat to make it even again (feat or enhancement line ... and really its stupid that rangers have higher to hit % then a fighter with melee weapons ... dont care if its a pre or not ... cause if that was the issue then it should be added to kensai too)

once everyone respecs out there stunning blow for superior two weapon wont that just generate the same amount of numbers and calculations leading to roughly the same amount of lag?

i mean fixing shroud and other massive dps lag seems like hard work (and i know it is) but something about all this makes no sense to me ...

I dont know anything about game programing and i wont pretend to .... but if you can just get 100% anyway by taking an extra feat or by following an enhancement line then why have the % at all ... what does it fix?

since you cannot stun a raid boss many will opt out of some feats that are not as useful as others for 100% off hand.....

it seems like there is a big flaw in the thinking that came up with this fix?

and if everyone decides to go tempest then you have bigger issues ... cause the attack speed and exploiter type builds with 100% off hand will swing faster and cause more faster calculations rather then the fighters slower attack speed causing less calculations per round.

Also

I might have missed it but doesnt this really screw over the guy who has two lighting strike II's?

like well .. .me

now my off hand will proc less so i spent all the large ingredients and then you lower my proc rate?

and then you tell me OH BUT YOU COULD HAVE TWO DIFFERENT EFFECTS .... come off it man ... the whole reason someone creates a two weapon fighter is to use two weapons ... the biggest DPS is done by people with two of the same weapon ... two min II's Two Lightning strikes ...

why the hell would i want as a fighter to have a radience weapon ... its not gonna help my dps against raid bosses who cannot be blinded or damaged by fire ... so am i just screwed and too bad or will proc chances stack with eachother on the new double strike (making an effective 3% chance of lighting strike be closer to its double hit chance of 3%+3% chance ---not 6% but very close too ---) other wise its a big kick in the wringllies for us dwarven fighters who dumped a ton of ingredients into weapons that have half there usefulness due to fixing lag?

at least you could let people destroy the weapon and get all the ingredients back (even if you had to make the base weapon again and got stuck with crafted ingredients you could at least then send them to other characters)

I would really like to know how two weapon procing will change for two same type weapons and if they will not stack anymore ... what is being done to allow people to recover after changes you guys forced on us ....

cause it wouldnt be very fair if you allow us to craft something and for reasons that are not gamebreaking remove it at our cost.

[Rameses]

So after reading this or at least what I could fathom...
This change to the combat system will be similar to what happened to StarWars Galaxies years ago...

There will be those that scream nerf and there will be those that like the change.
I'm gonna wait and see before I render my final judgement on the change.
However atm without seeing it other than on paper, I'm really not liking it.

I am, Rameses!

[Cetus]

With regards to the fighter dps discussion, fighters havent received any love throughout the 4+ years of playing this game until PrE and capstones were released.

Even then since the games inception, when people thought of a massive damage dealer, everyone thought barbs.

I was able to prove that a fighter can at the very least out "burst" dps a barbarian while maintaining defenses at least to or even higher than that of.

Now, its been tested that barbs contain the fighter capstone as a hidden effect in their own, their TOD set bonus grants them dps and even hp up the wazoo, while the fighter one grants +5 to hit. Although useful against epic mobs at first, the installment of the epic sos rendered it unnecessary.

Barbs even get an extra +4str/con from their past life onto their rages now.

If this proposal gets installed, glancing blows while twitching will be eliminated, thus the need for GTHF. Barbs get to increase in their defenses by changing it with a toughness feat, fighters cant get anything.

The alacrity bonus now changes to a doublestrike chance. So fighters get a 10% to doublestrike with every hit right off the bat, barbs should have zero- instead they have it hidden in their capstone as proven by various testing.

And fighter haste boost, granting that 30% speed boost now is translated into a 30% chance to proc a doublestrike. So the benefit now is 40% unique to fighters alone for 20 seconds to hit more than once per hit...this point I have no comment on, I'd have to test it.

I think its about time fighters get some love as THF for a change, instead of this STWF bull****.

[Ollathir]

While i dont want to discourage any feat that will allow me to continue to enjoy my fighter rather then convince everyone in the world to go tempest for dual weilding ...

if everyone takes stwf will that not just make the same lag? Any lag fix from the loss of physics detection check may be minimal and stwf was just a bone.

so you take the swing % down but then add a feat to make it even again (feat or enhancement line ... and really its stupid that rangers have higher to hit % then a fighter with melee weapons ... dont care if its a pre or not ... cause if that was the issue then it should be added to kensai too)

once everyone respecs out there stunning blow for superior two weapon wont that just generate the same amount of numbers and calculations leading to roughly the same amount of lag?

i mean fixing shroud and other massive dps lag seems like hard work (and i know it is) but something about all this makes no sense to me ...

I dont know anything about game programing and i wont pretend to .... but if you can just get 100% anyway by taking an extra feat or by following an enhancement line then why have the % at all ... what does it fix?

since you cannot stun a raid boss many will opt out of some feats that are not as useful as others for 100% off hand.....

it seems like there is a big flaw in the thinking that came up with this fix? It's a TWF nerf.

and if everyone decides to go tempest then you have bigger issues ... cause the attack speed and exploiter type builds with 100% off hand will swing faster and cause more faster calculations rather then the fighters slower attack speed causing less calculations per round.

Also

I might have missed it but doesnt this really screw over the guy who has two lighting strike II's?

like well .. .me

now my off hand will proc less so i spent all the large ingredients and then you lower my proc rate?

and then you tell me OH BUT YOU COULD HAVE TWO DIFFERENT EFFECTS .... come off it man ... the whole reason someone creates a two weapon fighter is to use two weapons ... the biggest DPS is done by people with two of the same weapon ... two min II's Two Lightning strikes ... Yes

why the hell would i want as a fighter to have a radience weapon ... its not gonna help my dps against raid bosses who cannot be blinded or damaged by fire ... so am i just screwed and too bad or will proc chances stack with eachother on the new double strike (making an effective 3% chance of lighting strike be closer to its double hit chance of 3%+3% chance ---not 6% but very close too ---) other wise its a big kick in the wringllies for us dwarven fighters who dumped a ton of ingredients into weapons that have half there usefulness due to fixing lag?

at least you could let people destroy the weapon and get all the ingredients back (even if you had to make the base weapon again and got stuck with crafted ingredients you could at least then send them to other characters)

I would really like to know how two weapon procing will change for two same type weapons and if they will not stack anymore ... what is being done to allow people to recover after changes you guys forced on us .... nothing. Still just feelin the waters I believe, not set in stone.

cause it wouldnt be very fair if you allow us to craft something and for reasons that are not gamebreaking remove it at our cost.

actually

1) Casters used to DPS so they have monsters 100X the hp and made greensteel weapons.
2) People use to run past trash mobs so they gave us DA
3) People used to make AC toons so they gave us Glancing blows
4) People used to love min 2 so they nerfed it
5) Casters use to debuff and finger of death stuff so they gave everything that matters blanket immunities
6) People used to use w/p so they broke it
7) People used to take the 2hf feats so they are breaking them now
8) People used to make 2wf so they are nerfing them

Did I miss anything?

[Ollathir]

/snip

Barb capstone will get fixed... eventually. Not really somethin I'd factor in.

[Cetus]

Barb capstone will get fixed... eventually. Not really somethin I'd factor in.

Oh im not factoring it in, just saying that from the observational standpoint, whether bugs or not, fighters never got any love. Even a dang bug favors the barb. Its just funny

[Zistra]

Which is to say ALMOST EVERYTHING. We know nothing (best I can tell) about the sources of lag or what the Devs are considering to address them except for what the OP has mentioned. So how can we intelligently debate whether the proposed change(s) will fix the problem(s)? Here are the things I can think of from the mushroom-like place wherein I dwell.

1. Is lag a math-based problem? If so, the proposed change to the physics check has a decent chance to improve it. Heck, if that check is being made on every swing, clearly that is a programming problem to begin with.. swing frequency increases over time MUCH faster than movement speed does. A target in range and hittable is far less likely to not be by the next swing when the swings are closer together. Tie the physics check to time passage, rather than swings and you will reduce its frequency considerably in higher-level content. Probably more than just by turfing the one for the offhand attack. Determine once per interval which target(s) are hittable and which are not. This leaves open the ability for a TWFer to hit different targets with main and offhand; the OP does not seem to clearly indicate whether removing the 2nd physics check for the offhand will.

2. Is lag a communications problem? Is it about propagating too much information to/from each client? If so, pick a point at which to aggregate said information but potentially allow after-the-fact access to the detailed combat log for those addicted to dissecting the play-by-play post-mortem {hmm.. possible bad choice of term }

3. Is lag a programming issue? Is there some piece of code that requires optimization, and in what respect? Can the worst cause(s) be somehow offloaded to dedicated hardware?

4. Is lag a purely load-based issue? Would throwing more hardware at it make a difference? If so, what kind of hardware? Could you somehow instance the few quests that trigger the issue onto a dedicated server? How many such would be required to make the problem go away? I'd live with a waiting list to start a run cause all the dedicated servers were in use...(within reason, of course).

5. Is lag truly only a problem in certain quests? Can those quests simply be rewritten to avoid it?

************************************************** ********
Strong opinion follows... not all argument provided due to space constraints:

I am categorically opposed to any change that many are willing to state forces over 50% of players (80% maybe?) to reroll or respec their toons completely and invalidates all the effort they put into customizing gear. This is a game-breaker. Our entertainment is not supposed to frustrate us to this extent. I am unlikely to be able to continue to play this game myself, and I hear others with similar opinions. Refunding our VIP monies is the least they should do for those of us driven away by such a sweeping change, forget about allowing free TR's or Greensteel rebuilds for those who stay. This changes the product I bought into something virtually unrecognizable. Not fair to do that to any product AFTER purchase. Nerfing is ALWAYS A BAD IDEA. Maybe power creep is a problem, but the solution is to not release power upgrades until they are completely sure they will never be reconsidered, not to rewrite half the combat system after several years in business.

I vote no to the TWF nerf. If you want our input into how to resolve the lag problem, provide us with more information on that problem, not on your proposed 'solution', which looks far too unrelated from here.

[Halock]

Eladrin stated that the Smites could proc on any hit attached to the main strike. Thus if you DS and OH at the same time you could triple Smite... and your head may explode

Aesop

Now - 100% chance when pressing smite on a TWF build to get a double smite
Changes - 80% chance to get a double smite, 20% chance ( 1 out of every 5 ) to get 1 and something like less than 5% chance to get a triple.


It is the most frustrating ting in the world to hope for procs, especially on limited use items, or items with lengthy cooldowns ( smites etc arnt all that lengthy though ). These changes seem unfun to me.

[Ollathir]

Oh im not factoring it in, just saying that from the observational standpoint, whether bugs or not, fighters never got any love. Even a dang bug favors the barb. Its just funny

agreed, though Im so far behind the times with mt TWF Barb, didnt take the capstone.

[Halock]

One major issue there. It will encourage more THF builds, but 95% of them will be 20 barb or 20 fighter due to how the mechanics are set up. Hardly a lot of variety there. It will on the flip side kill a ton of multiclass builds and twf builds for things like bards. Not sure if smite will proc on an offhand hook, if it does some twf pali's will remain for sure though.

++

This change wont make it attractive for people to build THF rogues monks and rangers, it'll just make those classes less effective than they are now, which is already behind THF barbs and fighters.

[Natashaelle]

@Eladrin

First of all, +1 rep for the clarity of your post

My comments are also given in the light of my support to increase DPS of S&B and THF vs. TWF. I love the TWF fighting style (hell, even my cleric is getting it :P), but I feel for those wanting to do other fighting styles.

I'm a little surprised that so little is said about the new THF S&B in U5, I think many people still don't realise exactly how much of a boost it will be for S&B in general. Although, OK, the false mantra of "AC is useless in the end game" hasn't been at all helpful towards S&B

1) Removal of the Physics check on off-hand attacks

This makes a great deal of sense, and I personally would support tthis change. This change would not affect characters in any significant in my opinion, even if the main hand attack specifies a missed swing and thus the off hand attack is automatically a miss when it could of hit, its given back evenly when in the space of 0.15 seconds an offhand attack could of missed where the main hand attack hit.

This is not exactly true, one deep design issue in the new proposal, which can be taken both pro et contra btw, I'm not just dissing the proposal, is that it seems that the ability of 2WF toons to attack multiple targets simultaneously will be quite significantly diminished, given that off-hand attacks will now be made exclusively against the same target of one's main-hand attacks. The effects of this will be either positive, neutral, or negative -- depending on people's individual fighting styles for their individual toons.

Considered from the binary point of view, one toon/one mob, the changes to physics detection will be of minor incidence ; this is not necessarily the case though, in cases of one toon/multiple mobs.

One mechanical consequence of this change is that combat will inevitably be slower in the new system, because dual-wielding vorps or other insta-kill or similar will mechanically become less effective than previously when fighting against groups of mobs.

2) Implementation of the Double-Strike main-hand attack instead of certain speed increases

I have no problem with this, personally.

ditto

3) Implemetation of the Proc chance for Off-hand attacks.

My gut reaction to this was an emphatic 'No', changing all my pre-determined 'definite' attacks into a percentage based chance to seem my attacks happen... eurrghh...

Then I took off my TWF-Rulez hat and put on my I-Hate-Lag hat and can understand the idea, see the programming behind the idea and see the lightbulb-flashing-in-the-bath moment that happened when you come up with the idea.

With the standard 80% Proc Chance for all classes available (assuming GTWF), a net reduction of 20% of Off-hand DPS output is good for lag.

Personally, I think that this is a perfectly acceptable rebalancing of 2WF versus the other fighting styles.

4) Implementation of the STWF Feat / Tempest 1/2/3 Changes

I see no need for introducing Superior Two Weapon Fighting as seperate, choosable feat. At All. Adding another feat to all everyone to get 100% Off hand chance is playing into the hands of those classes and builds with feats to spare, while those builds that have managed to squeeze in the three TWF feats but have no space for others will be left behind.

I disagree, I think that providing this (v expensive) option to people who absolutely want to be 2WF specialists is a good thing. It will encourage people to think about the level of 2WF that they want, which levels of sacrifices they are willing to make, and it will provide a boost for Fighters and Rangers, including some of the deeper multiclassed toons, in this domain versus people who were just jumping on the Ranger 6 Tempest band wagon as a cheap and easy solution for more DPS.

If (when?) the game moves into Epic levels, then it could be possible to introduce the Perfect Two Weapon fighting feat. This would be as the currently suggested STWF, granting another +20% Proc rate chance.

Keep the playing field level on this one.

*Yoda Voice* For Rangers though, different take, suggest I would.

Change the Ranger Off-hand bonus proc chance for Tempest 1/2/3 to 5/5/10% cumulative, so at Tempest 3 they have a full 100% Off-hand attack rate.

The current 10% improvement at level 6 has always been too huge of a bonus in my opinion, and the prestige enhancement needs balancing out to be top end heavy like some others (KotC 3, for example).

Despite the seeming boost to Rangers, they would still lose that 5th Attack overall compared to a current 18th Level Ranger, and thus contribute to the lessening of DPS lag while still offering something unique over a lvl 20 TWF Kensai Fighter.

Perfect Two Weapon Fighting for a Tempest Ranger would be the same - a 20% bonus to offhand attacks - however, as this would be a total 120%, this could be simply be implemented as a 5th Off-hand attack on the final 4th swing. In this way, the feat stays the same for all classes and non-tempest Rangers, but pushes the Tempest ranger up that one final notch - they are the exemplary Two Weapon Fighters, and this in my opinion would reflect it.

Much of the design work in the D&D Epic Level Handbook is of fairly poor quality, and I'm not at all certain that the devs should do any more than use it as a source of ideas ; instead of trying to adhere religiously to its contents.

In my experience, if you decide to make a push past 18th/20th level in D&D, you need to make some quite fundamental balance decisions concerning the game as you intend to implement it in your house campaign and your house rules.

You mention a level playing field, but there's a need for caution here -- too much of a level playing field leads off in the direction of D&D 4E, where the defining differences between the character classes can be replaced with a very boring homogeneity.

I would far prefer the various fighting styles available, unarmed, single 1H weapon, S&B, 2HF, 2WF each to be defined with some pro et contra characteristics and possibilities that you can choose between, for the purpose of your character concept.

Concerning the Epic levels again, it seems quite clear to me that the proper balance needs to be found between these various styles before the next level cap increase ; balance simply means that no single style must be seen as being inherently superior to any of the others, except insofar as the Turbine devs wish to impart a certain type of design/GM style to DDO