2 Month report on new combat system

[elg582]

It sucks.

That is all.

[Isolani]

I'm ok with most of it really. I still think the AC change sucks though. After doing a few melee TRs since the changes, low to mid level quests are MUCH tougher for melees than they used to be.

Before U14 pretty much any build could get 35-40 AC which was good enough for most quests even on elite until L10+. Now if you run low level elites on a melee, you might as well be naked because the mob CR's are so much higher than your level, they hardly ever miss.

The TR I'm doing now had 55 AC at L10, which would make you nearly invincible to melee damage until gianthold and vale elites, now you just get raped even by the trash mobs in equal level elites.

Dodge/blur/displace/incorporeality are your only real defense now.

Anyway, the AC change may help people at higher levels, at least on normal/hard, but low-mid levels just suck now for melee. It's way worse than it used to be. People complained that AC was useless at high levels before, well now it's useless at all levels if you run elite. I don't see how that's an improvement.

[elg582]

you might as well be naked because the mob CR's are so much higher than your level, they hardly ever miss.

That's just it; everyone hardly ever misses. Armor is now useful, not so much for the AC, but for the PRR. Ability scores are just prerequisites for feats.

As for dodge, that's just a sad joke; given the way multiple sources of defense stack, each 1% dodge is actually equivalent to ~.25% mitigation, which is actually useful if you can get enough of it, but they've made that pretty much impossible, too. The cap on dodge from armor makes sense, but capping unarmored characters after they hosed our AC and made displacement self-only was just mean.

[Dandonk]

My report on it:

It's buggy as (censored). Sometimes I graze on a 2, other times I miss on a 4. On the same mob, on the same part of the combat chain.

Conceptwise, I still think it's a bad idea. It rewards characters for making no build choices (putting on the highest tier armor you can wear is not a build choice), and penalizes those who actually make build choices (high AC gets progressively worth less, so grinding/building for the last 4 AC is rather pointless).

Likewise for to hit, it makes more or less everyone able to hit fairly well... but those who build for to hit get so little out of it after the first boost that, again, grinding/building for the last 4 to hit is rather pointless.


The devs implemented a self-admitted "improvised" system without listening to any feedback (at least, anything saying something they didn't want to hear) to fix a problem that could've been fixed in other ways, without the accompanying problems this abomination of a system has.

And yes, we did propose other changes. But no, they did not listen. They did not want feedback.

[madmaxhunter]

I agree, ran "Where There's Smoke..." on elite last night with a guildie, I have a 30 AC at level 5 and was getting critted on just about every hit, misses were rare. I did have light fortification only but it was stupid, 110 hp and was having to flee for my life after two hits. We decided to recall out and craft some moderate fort items before trying it again. Called it a night instead.

[Captain_Wizbang]

Overall it's 50/50 thing.

As the concepts are sound, the application of one design element is causing havoc in others. And ruins the gaming experience.

This was supposed to be DDO grown up & evolved to the best in it's genre, I'm not seeing it.

[Ape_Man]

That's just it; everyone hardly ever misses. Armor is now useful, not so much for the AC, but for the PRR. Ability scores are just prerequisites for feats.

As for dodge, that's just a sad joke; given the way multiple sources of defense stack, each 1% dodge is actually equivalent to ~.25% mitigation, which is actually useful if you can get enough of it, but they've made that pretty much impossible, too. The cap on dodge from armor makes sense, but capping unarmored characters after they hosed our AC and made displacement self-only was just mean.

PRR is tied to BAB, it does NOTHING at low/mid levels worth a darn.

The displacement change was just dumb in hindsight as most "rich" players just crafted a bunch of clickies.

[kafrielveddicus]

I live with the new system, but I pretty much think it is junk and preferred the old system that was more rewarding to good builds!!!

[Ape_Man]

Overall it's 50/50 thing.

As the concepts are sound . . .
.

I can agree with this, though I've only seen the system in action at higher levels. I did run a level 9 in elites on lamania and it didn't seem too terrible but that's hardly a thorough test.

it's a good system but it does need some tweaks. A few things seem off to me . ..

- epic elite to-hits seem really high compared to mob CR rating. Epic hard mobs look like they have to-hit equal to twice the CR rating and EE mobs look like it's at least triple. as i can't recall even seeing more than 5% misses ate 130ish AC. This should be consistent and it's not.

- Your stats are meaningless. This is dumb. Most of your AC comes from simply being a defender fighter/pally or being a monk and whatever ED you pick. Your DEX and Wisdom (in the case of monks) are inconsequential in your total damage mitigation when this used to be paramount. There is no point in being a DEX build at all.

- "Little somethings" mean nothing - not just stats, but the small pieces of incremental gear that used to mean everything again are meaningless. basic armor, prot 5, basic shield, or just being a monk and your set. The defensive difference between somebody who didn't try and somebody who worked their tail off is inconsequential.

Can you imagine if this was the case for caster DPS or melee DPS?

- Too many builds flushed down the toilet. The cookie-cutter options are by far the best. Creative build options are one of the coolest things about DDO. Changing the rules so the cookie-cutter is by far the best is terrible for this.

[Ape_Man]

I live with the new system, but I pretty much think it is junk and preferred the old system that was more rewarding to good builds!!!

You can't have that, you can't have smart players have an edge.

[Karavek]

actually I feel it is a step in the right direction. is it perfect? nope. However it does make those who are commited to BAB classes get more out of heavy armor, which is something haters of clerics in FP have been hearing complaints of for a long time from the fighters.

It uses a diminishing returns system, which is a must have in the D20 rules with the power increases we see. It helps create a needed bridge to the gap between have not newbs and have everything vet leetists.

Yes those few who had the know how and aware of the numbers to keep viable armor class in the old way had a solid advantage. However even the general saying back in the day on advice was ignore ac its useless leading to the era of no to low defense melee glass cannons demanding nanny clerics to wipe up after their bloody mess. I myself always made AC a priority on any class and even a wiz or rogue could have meaningful ac in early game if they tried, but so few did largely because of the advice of jaded players that the Devs had to do something.

Now I myself would of used actual D20 printed material for a source of reference, like the conan D20 which made armor a pure DR, gave classes inherent dodge and parry defense values, and removed the weapon finesse feat, making it a choice you make when fighting with certain types of weapons and instead of strength based attacks trying to penetrate the armor, would actually by pass armor DR entirely with a successful attack roll.

[Ape_Man]

actually I feel it is a step in the right direction. is it perfect? nope. However it does make those who are commited to BAB classes get more out of heavy armor, which is something haters of clerics in FP have been hearing complaints of for a long time from the fighters.

Divine power gives full BAB. Clerics get full PRR. A minor point.

It uses a diminishing returns system, which is a must have in the D20 rules with the power increases we see. It helps create a needed bridge to the gap between have not newbs and have everything vet leetists.

So are we going to have ESoS and EChaos blades drop in Korthos now? We've "socialized" defense so why not offense.

Oh wait . . . we have the PDK set. nevermind

Yes those few who had the know how and aware of the numbers to keep viable armor class in the old way had a solid advantage. However even the general saying back in the day on advice was ignore ac its useless leading to the era of no to low defense melee glass cannons demanding nanny clerics to wipe up after their bloody mess. I myself always made AC a priority on any class and even a wiz or rogue could have meaningful ac in early game if they tried, but so few did largely because of the advice of jaded players that the Devs had to do something.

The people who were always "DPS at all costs" are still "DPS at all cost." nothing has changed, how many fighters or barbs have a single defensive ED twist?

Now I myself would of used actual D20 printed material for a source of reference, like the conan D20 which made armor a pure DR, gave classes inherent dodge and parry defense values, and removed the weapon finesse feat, making it a choice you make when fighting with certain types of weapons and instead of strength based attacks trying to penetrate the armor, would actually by pass armor DR entirely with a successful attack roll.

Our numbers are just too high, D20 was never intended to work with melees who have between 50-100 STR.

Again I think the formula is fine, it just needs some tweaks.

[Hafeal]

I am more in favor of the changes than against.

Quests on normal and hard are an improvement, imo.

On elite, well, it is elite, right? I have found that tactics v. zerg now are much more important. Almost more than DA, AC has now forced less than uber players to slow down and play smarter and not just faster. If not, the wack is really hard. But as the 'challenge' setting, isn't this how elite is supposed to be? And for naysayers, I find elite IS a challenge "at" level, not over-leveled, especially so if you have little twink gear.

The overall problem is the desire of people to grind XP with their streak and thus skip normal and hard most of the time. "Elite" has become the de facto lfm setting. For too many players this has evolved ONLY into a xp/min equation rather than a pure game enjoyment issue. Non-zerging on Elite and using tactics isn't a good fit for this play style which seems to have sucked up every posted lfm, on Khyber at least.

So, do players want "easy" elite for xp/min, or do they want challenge? It is a fine line to walk and I do not think you are going to make all the players happy all the time.

[Karavek]

Divine power gives full BAB. Clerics get full PRR. A minor point.



So are we going to have ESoS and EChaos blades drop in Korthos now? We've "socialized" defense so why not offense.

Oh wait . . . we have the PDK set. nevermind



The people who were always "DPS at all costs" are still "DPS at all cost." nothing has changed, how many fighters or barbs have a single defensive ED twist?



Our numbers are just too high, D20 was never intended to work with melees who have between 50-100 STR.

Again I think the formula is fine, it just needs some tweaks.

actually BESM D20 was built around taking numbers that high, then again it was the D20 built with anime style super beings in mind. Oh wait we got those in DDO with their over sized super swords.

Yeah BESM D20 could have been the best D20 to use for a MMO, however it also was a true free form character creation system and balance between players was completely out the window. Want to play an archtypical ninja or samurai go for it, want to play a gundam pilot go for it, want to be inyuasha like go for it, want to be goku go for it, want to be superman or the hulk go for it, rules made it easy to create one and develop it however you liked. Just dont expect a swordsman who didnt make any special super spiritual sword techniques to be able to kill a mech the size of a small planet. Now my swordsman he could cut a soul and leave the body intact to die from being in a vegetative state but thats just one way to go about it.

[Ape_Man]

. . .I have found that tactics v. zerg now are much more important. . . .

Blasphemy.

[Hafeal]

Blasphemy.

*hunkers down for fear of lightening strike*

[Ranncore]

PRR is infinitely more important than AC. I think if PRR was based off AC instead of BAB (whose idea was this anyways?) there would still be a point to AC and dex based characters. I understand that the idea of basing PRR off BAB was to give fighter types the edge in prr, but really, it doesn't make sense to base your defense off your attack.

anyways, even just giving a prr bonus based off ac would be a good change IMO. even doing this wouldn't solve the issue at hand tho - it would make ac important only insofar as that it aided PRR. ac is still useless by itself. 150 sounds like a big number in AC - try it in epic elite. might as well be naked.

[dragons1ayer74]

I like a bit of the way PPR works but am unhappy with the rest of the system.

1. It is a LOT more confusing (instead of the d20 show us the d1000?!? roll, show us the base dice roll plus all adjustments from stats, gear, class, enhancements, etc).
2. Hard to determine what your chance to hit really is.
3. Hard to determine how high AC needs to be to become a diffrence.
4. It nerfs good gear choices.
5. It buff poor gear choices.

[Isolani]

I am more in favor of the changes than against.

Quests on normal and hard are an improvement, imo.

On elite, well, it is elite, right? I have found that tactics v. zerg now are much more important. Almost more than DA, AC has now forced less than uber players to slow down and play smarter and not just faster. If not, the wack is really hard. But as the 'challenge' setting, isn't this how elite is supposed to be? And for naysayers, I find elite IS a challenge "at" level, not over-leveled, especially so if you have little twink gear.

The overall problem is the desire of people to grind XP with their streak and thus skip normal and hard most of the time. "Elite" has become the de facto lfm setting. For too many players this has evolved ONLY into a xp/min equation rather than a pure game enjoyment issue. Non-zerging on Elite and using tactics isn't a good fit for this play style which seems to have sucked up every posted lfm, on Khyber at least.

So, do players want "easy" elite for xp/min, or do they want challenge? It is a fine line to walk and I do not think you are going to make all the players happy all the time.

I would agree with you if the new system made elite streaking much tougher for casters also, but it doesn't, only melee. Melee were already dead weight in a lot of elite zergs before U14, even more so now.

[Ape_Man]

I would agree with you if the new system made elite streaking much tougher for casters also, but it doesn't, only melee. Melee were already dead weight in a lot of elite zergs before U14, even more so now.

And that's a huge issue, one thing a melee could do to not make him dead-weight in a TR zerg was have AC.

I guess the idea of independent melees who didn't need arcane and divines watching over them was too foreign of a concept for the WOWtards so it had to go away.