Combat Style Ideas

[Grailhawk]

TLDR: Some mook play arm chair developer about THF/TWF/SWF styles

IMO the different combat styles should play and feel different from each other, but be able to produce the same DPS over an extended time period.

3e D&D tries to do this by making THF a hard hitting but slow attacking style where as TWF is a soft hitting but fast attacking style. They pull this off at low levels but it breaks down at higher levels this is true in DDO as well. An example of how D&D achieves this balance can be seen with a Level 1 Fighter with and 18 Strength Score using non-magic weapons:
Greatsword: 1 Attack Roll for 2d6 +6 damage
Dual Wield Short Swords: 2 Attack Rolls 1 for 1d6 +4 damage the other for 1d6 +2 damage total of 2d6 +6 damage
Notice what happened both styles do the same damage but they play different. I'm aware that this breaks down in both D&D and DDO but it is my belief that this is how the designers of 3e wanted things balanced, they just let the numbers get away from them.

TWF attacks more often where THF hits harder IMO this should be the goal of any combat style rework. This is not how the two combat style are balanced leading to much of the problem with combat style currently

To achieve this I propose the following:

• Ensure that the swing rate of the different animations are the same
  • Start with the current one-handed swing rate and adjust up or down from there after the other changes have been made.
  • This should be 25-50% faster then ranged shot rates.
  • Swing/Shot rate is not the same as Attack Rate each swing can produce more than one attack.
• Two Weapon Fighting (TWF)
  • Remove off-hand damage penalty
  • Remove off-hand doublestrike stat form the game
    • Replace all enhancements, feats, item effects and anything else that grants off-hand doublestrike with normal double strike at ½ current value.
  • Off-hand Attacks now doublestrike at the same rate as Main-hand Attacks.
  • Change Perfect Two Weapon Fighting Destiny Feat to grant off-hand proc chance
  • Change Dual Perfection Tempest Tier 5 enhancement. IMO make it a dex trance.
• Two Handed Fighting (THF)
  • Remove the inherent glancing blow procs.
  • Remove the inherent 1.5 stat damage increase
  • Add and inherent THF Damage Bonus of 20% to all damage done while Two-Handed Fighting to replace the 1.5 stat increase.
    • This MUST be computed after all other damage effects and must increase critical hit damage, all weapon proc effects, and any other damage done by a Two-Handed Weapon.
  • Change the Two-Handed Fighting Feats to increase the THF Damage Bonus by 20% each
  • Change the Perfect Two Weapon Fighting Destiny Feat to increase the THF Damage Bonus (by the same amount that the PTWF feat increases off-hand proc chance)
• Single Weapon Fighting (SWF)
  • Single Weapon Fighting is not a D&D thing however it is a DPS style in DDO so we would like for it to play different from TWF and THF but do similar damage the current implementation of SWF tries to put it somewhere in between TWF and THF for crowd vs single target damage it largely succeeds at this however given the proposed changes to TWF and THF this is no longer a valid way to balance SWF. I propose that we change SWF to a Spike Damage style this will play different from TWF (fast attacking) and THF (constant hard hitting) but allow us to maintain DPS balance over an extended time period.
  • Change Single Weapon Fighting Feat to: While Single Weapon Fighting you have a 20% chance to make a Piercing Strike. A Piercing Strike increase damage by 200%, this is computed after all other damage increases and applies to critical damage and all proc effects.
  • Change the Improved and Grater SWF feats to increase Piercing Strike damage by 100% each
  • Change Perfect Single Weapon Fighting Destiny Feat to increase Piercing Strike damage or Chance this will be dictated by the value that PTWF increases off-hand proc chance. (e.g. if PTWF increase off-hand proc chance by 20% then PSWF can increase Piercing Strike Damage by 100% or Piercing Strike Chance by 5%)
• Weapon & Shield Fighting (WSF)
  • Remove Secondary Shield Bash (the mechanics)
  • Remove the Secondary Shield Bash from the Improved Shield Bash Feat
  • Remove Shield Mastery Feat
  • Remove Improved Shield Mastery Feat
  • Add Weapon and Shield Fighting Feat: When using a shield you gain +5% combat style bonus to melee alacrity, +3% AC, +5 PRR, and MRR, +5% dodge and dodge cap, and increases the maximum dexterity bonus permitted by armor and tower shields by 5.
  • Add Improved Weapon and Shield Fighting Feat: When using a shield you gain +5% combat style bonus to melee alacrity, +3% AC, +5 PRR, and MRR, +5% dodge and dodge cap, and increases the maximum dexterity bonus permitted by armor and tower shields by 5. Requires Weapon & Shield
  • Add Grater Weapon and Shield Fighting Feat: When using a shield you gain +5% combat style bonus to melee alacrity, +3% AC, +10 PRR, and MRR, +5% dodge and dodge cap, and +5 maximum dexterity bonus. Requires Improved Weapon & Shields
  • Add Perfect Weapon and Shield Fighting Feat: When using a shield you gain +5% combat style bonus to melee alacrity, +3% AC, +10 PRR, and MRR, +10% dodge and dodge cap, and +10 maximum dexterity bonus. Requires Weapon & Shield
  • Change any other Feat, Item, Enhancement, or Effect that increased Secondary Shield Bash should increase combat style bonus to Doublestrike (not alacrity), PRR, MRR, dodge, dodge cap, and mdb by an amount of min(1, ssbIncrease/10). Replace the name Shield Bash with Shield Mastery.
• Insure that no two combat styles can be active at the same time if needed add stances to each of the first feasts in the chance that auto turn on when the appropriate weapon/weapon combo is equipped.
• New Melee AOE Feat
  • Glancing Blows: Your melee Attacks have a 25% chance to proc a Glancing Blow. A Glancing Blow proc does 20% of weapon damage to all targets in range. Glancing Blows do not proc weapon damage effects, and are not proced on a gracing hit.
  • Any Feat, Enhancement, or Item that increased the old THF Glancing Blows chance to cause weapon effects now increase the percentage of damage done on a Glancing Blow.
  • Glancing Blows can trigert for any fighting style
• Hand-and-a-Half Weapons
  • Dwarven Axes and Bastard Swords have inherent Glancing Blows they have a 25% chance to proc a Glancing Blow for 20% damage. This stacks with the Glancing Blow Feat.
    • e.g. A Fighter using a Dual Wielding Bastard Swords with the Glancing Blow feat and the Full TWF feat Chain will have a 50% chance to do 40% damage to all targets in range on each attack he makes.
  • It would be nice to add Quarterstaffs to this list such that they can benefit from TWF or THF styles (not SWF).
• Ranged Combat Styles
  • The Ranged Combat styles should be reworked in a way to make them similar to the melee styles the Ranged Defensive addvantage should be counter by at 25-50% melee alacrity bonus built in to the animation swing/shot rates.
  • The Throwing Ranged Combat Style should be analogies to the TWF Melee Combat Style
  • The Archery (bows) Ranged Combat Style should be analogies to the THF Melee Combat Style
  • The Marksmanship (crossbows) Ranged Combat Style should be analogies to the SWF Melee Fighting style.
  • Improved Precise Shot is analogies to Glancing Blows with no change.
  • Repeaters should be reworked such that they do not benefit from any feat but have a built in effect that is similar to throwing.

[Ballrus]

Hello.

Weapon and shield fighting:

Removing the shield bash effect, you simply make vanguard tree useless, since vanguard add the shield damage to total damage. (weapon+shield dmg).
Your changes dont apply the shield damage. Only increase the speed of main weapon.

These changes are good for s&b tanks, not for s&b dps. The vanguard tree already add 20 atk speed in cores.

The situation on s&b is the following:

At vanguard release (update 23 iirc), devs added the 1 sec cooldown to auto shield bash.
To compensate this nerf, they allowed the core 6 (on vanguard tree) to proc at 50% (description was 5%).

A few months ago, they "fixed" this bug, and increased the proc chance to 10%, BUT dind't removed the internal cooldown.

10% proc chance with 1 sec internal cooldown is useless.

To correct it is simple: remove the internal cooldown on auto shield bash.

Edit. The g blows and hand and half changes are cool.

[Grailhawk]

Hello.

Weapon and shield fighting:

Removing the shield bash effect, you simply make vanguard tree useless, since vanguard add the shield damage to total damage. (weapon+shield dmg).
Your changes dont apply the shield damage. Only increase the speed of main weapon.

These changes are good for s&b tanks, not for s&b dps. The vanguard tree already add 20 atk speed in cores.

The situation on s&b is the following:

At vanguard release (update 23 iirc), devs added the 1 sec cooldown to auto shield bash.
To compensate this nerf, they allowed the core 6 (on vanguard tree) to proc at 50% (description was 5%).

A few months ago, they "fixed" this bug, and increased the proc chance to 10%, BUT dind't removed the internal cooldown.

10% proc chance with 1 sec internal cooldown is useless.

To correct it is simple: remove the internal cooldown on auto shield bash.

Edit. The g blows and hand and half changes are cool.

I do not see Weapon & Shield to be a primary DPS style it should not be balanced to be as good as THF, TWF, or SWF. That said it gets a lot closer then I like on a Vangaurd I don't spell this out (and can see the confusion base on the combat style type) but my expectation is that Vangaurd Alacrity should stack with the one from the feat. This gets you to 40% alacrity.

If we assume the base swing rate is 2 per second. That put WSF at 2.8 swings with 100% double strike that's 5.6 attacks per second. TWF is at 6 attacks per second assuming 100% off-hand proc rate and 100% doublestrike. Assuming every thing else is equal between the WSF and TWF that should only be a 40% difference in DPS which is about where it should be given the defensive advantage of a Shield.

[Ballrus]

I do not see Weapon & Shield to be a primary DPS style it should not be balanced to be as good as THF, TWF, or SWF.

Why not? Isn't this the goal of vanguard?

[Grailhawk]

Why not? Isn't this the goal of vanguard?

If you have the full defensive power of a shield and the same offensive power of the other styles then there is no point in the other styles. Shield and Weapon will always be better because its just as good offensively and always better defensively, that's not balanced or good design.

Even if its not the full defensive power of a shield some one with a shield (aka more defense) should not have the same offensive power as some one with a different style.

[Ballrus]

If you have the full defensive power of a shield...

Full defensive power...

Holding a shield in off hand do not mean full defensive power.
What a shield add to defenses, 25 prr/mrr?

And vanguard tree have nothing defensive (check it).
What you propose in s&b changes, is (indirectly) delete vanguard, the only dps s&b tree in this game.

Rangers, monks and rogues can reach similar defenses, plus dodge. >>>> So, these three classes having same or more defenses than a s&b class means that they must be deleted too?

[Grailhawk]

Full defensive power...

Holding a shield in off hand do not mean full defensive power.
What a shield add to defenses, 25 prr/mrr?

And vanguard tree have nothing defensive (check it).
What you propose in s&b changes, is (indirectly) delete vanguard, the only dps s&b tree in this game.

Rangers, monks and rogues can reach similar defenses, plus dodge. >>>> So, these three classes having same or more defenses than a s&b class means that they must be deleted too?

Did you read the suggestion? The part where the feat add a total of 12% AC, +30 PRR, and MRR, +25% dodge and dodge cap, and increases the maximum dexterity bonus permitted by armor and tower shields by 25.

Yes other class/builds need defense too. But they have to get it from sources other then a shield.

I don't think you and I will agree I see shields as a defensive item and believe that any combat style built around a shield should be more defensive than offensive.

[Ballrus]

Did you read the suggestion? The part where the feat add a total of 12% AC, +30 PRR, and MRR, +25% dodge and dodge cap, and increases the maximum dexterity bonus permitted by armor and tower shields by 25.

Yes other class/builds need defense too. But they have to get it from sources other then a shield.

I don't think you and I will agree I see shields as a defensive item and believe that any combat style built around a shield should be more defensive than offensive.

I read, and understood.

But i not agree with the remove shield bash, this is the same as delete vanguard.

One good implement will be (imo) add two lines of s&b feats, one dps and another defense:

>Protector: use your new wsf, but swap the speed for % dmg reduction, and less dodge on large/tower shields.

>Aggressor: 5, 10, 15, 20 ds/speed/mp/shield bash % (tone down the numbers). Note that improved shield bash feat is included here. Keep shield dmg on bash.

And REMOVE the internal cooldown.

[Ballrus]

I read, and understood.

But i not agree with the remove shield bash, this is the same as delete vanguard.

One good implement will be (imo) add two lines of s&b feats, one dps and another defense:

>Protector: use your new wsf, but swap the speed for % dmg reduction, and less dodge on large/tower shields. Buckler/small shields: less dr, more dodge/dodge cap - large/tower shield: less dodge, more dr.

>Aggressor: 5, 10, 15, 20 ds/speed/mp/shield bash % (tone down the numbers). Note that improved shield bash feat is included here. Keep shield dmg on bash.

And REMOVE the internal cooldown.

In red.

[Grailhawk]

I read, and understood.

But i not agree with the remove shield bash, this is the same as delete vanguard.

One good implement will be (imo) add two lines of s&b feats, one dps and another defense:

>Protector: use your new wsf, but swap the speed for % dmg reduction, and less dodge on large/tower shields. Buckler/small shields: less dr, more dodge/dodge cap - large/tower shield: less dodge, more dr.

>Aggressor: 5, 10, 15, 20 ds/speed/mp/shield bash % (tone down the numbers). Note that improved shield bash feat is included here. Keep shield dmg on bash.

And REMOVE the internal cooldown.

OK, but I like my idea better.

[DaviMOC]

Cool suggestions. I like it. We agree alot on many things. Maybe I would have done things in a different way but the purpose and objectives are the same . I also see shields as you do Grailhawk. For that I feel that vanguard trees should never existed but its offensive benefits incorporated to the defensive trees from pally and fighter trees without or minimal extra AP cost.

[Ballrus]

...but its offensive benefits incorporated to the defensive trees from pally and fighter trees without or minimal extra AP cost.

Just LOL!
Vanguard only have offensive benefits.
It's an offensive tree.
Really, have you two ever looked at the wiki>vanguard enhancement??

Edit. But if the devs want to mix stalwart def with vanguard offensive things, it will be the best of two worlds in one tree.
Better yet, throw the defensive things from stawart def in vanguard tree.

Just get rid of this stupid cooldown on auto shield bash!!!