Changes Based on Preview 2 Feedback

[palladin9479]

Any ranged toon not running Inquisitive is playing a flavor build purely for the experience. They fall into the Int based Barbarian with short swords category, fun but not taken seriously.

The high end is completely dominated by two types of, nukers and Inquisitive shooters, dev's said they would focus on casters at a later date. All ranged is OP as hell, Inqusitive just brought it to a whole new level of brokeness, so obvious that it was ruining the game and we could see that on the Hardcore server. It all boils down to being able to shoot while moving and thus maintaining that +10,000 AC advantage level 1 ranged builds have.

Right now even bow rangers deal just as much if not more damage then melee's while being able to do so at a safe distance. The worst performing of the ranged builds is better then any of the melee builds in actual game play. All they need to do is shoot and run backwards and jump around while continuing to use their firearm of choice to mow down monsters while staying at a safe distance.

And yes your game-play group is super casual if you haven't seen the horde of people getting divine lives in with Inquisitive builds.

[Kotharsjach]

Inquisitive does not work with bows, so what does this do for a ranged toon using bows again? How many of your nightmare scenario AAs are running around dual wielding bows? Just another example of you not understanding how the game works while trying to educate the rest of us on how the game works. The sad thing is, you cry louder than a lot of players on these forums, and that's an accomplishment in and of itself, and they seem to listen to you as if you do have some kind of knowledge. Reading through the comments on this thread concerning melee, it seems like you don't even really understand that part of the game, but you do like to be loud.

So here's the answer to what you've accomplished with your screaming for nerfs: A single target focused ranger running DWS with Precise Shot is going to kill mobs one at a time before you can close with them. Read through the changes to T5 DWS if you have any doubts. Or maybe don't, and just put your fingers firmly in your ears going "la la la, I can't hear you"? IF I wanted to play ranger exclusively as a bow user, this would be great. But I don't, but I also don't want to play Inquisitive, so despite your made up stories about how others outside of your "we need to learn to play" bubble, the lack of knowledge of the game lies firmly in your lap. How do I know? All the lies you have to tell us to justify how much you know about the game. It'd be funny, if it wasn't so pathetic. But hey, it goes live today. I'll be watching the forums for the "but melee is still dying too much in quests" posts that are inevitable. After all, you got your wish, right? You can now close with mobs that are going to kill you more often now, because "but all ranged is OP". I'm heading out shortly to buy lots of popcorn, it's going to be fun to brush off the "Play a lower difficulty" and "be careful what you wish for" replies I can see coming over the next few days.

to scale back all ranged they modified 1 feat, obviously this was easy for them to do. While we can wish for more comprehensive solutions to complex problems the reality is they didn't spend alot of resources on the issue. The argument that Nerf A was unjustified becuase it impacts build X doesn't carry much weight when build Z exists. This is about as convincing as a sorc saying casters are fine becuase earth savant. I can understand you don't want to be pigeon-holed into build Z, however, this is exactly the state dps casters are in right now.

If you want to say melee needs support in R10s, I can agree with that. If your saying ranged dps does that, I don't agree with that at all. Melee dps benefits from CC, heals, and a tank far more than ranged. From what I've seen Melee dps and ranged dps are like cats and dogs, two styles competing for the same function that are largely at odds in what they want. Melees want a tight ball of mobs grouped in their forward arc, not moving, ranged want a group of mobs running at them in a neat line. For the most part, ranged dictate these terms, they get first strike. It's not like like ranged and melee can't have synergy - this is much like the dynamic between a insta-killer caster and a dps one, if they pick different targets they don't trip each other up. However, I don't see this much, I mostly see everyone bursting the enemy in front of them and moving on sequentially. This has also been true of my experience in healing. In a mostly ranged party, everyone is spread out and you want powerful single target heals on a single target, and to switch targets often. In a mostly melee party you pick the person with the highest aggro and throw masses.

The notion that nerfing ranged hurts melees rings completely hollow, in my experience, this is only true if the melee is functionally piking.

[DRoark]

Any ranged toon not running Inquisitive is playing a flavor build purely for the experience. They fall into the Int based Barbarian with short swords category, fun but not taken seriously.
All ranged is OP as hell.... The worst performing of the ranged builds is better then any of the melee builds in actual game play.

Let us know when you actually play the game.

Going by this, the Longbow cleric (with no ranged feats), was out damaging the THF barbarian, because it was, you know... actual game play.

Every ranger, rxb artificer, gxb mechanic, dagger, dart, and bow cleric build on the server is a flavor build. Because Inquisitor is ranged, it MUST be the only choice.

Kobold says, "Really? Really??"

[Kotharsjach]

Let us know when you actually play the game.

Going by this, the Longbow cleric (with no ranged feats), was out damaging the THF barbarian, because it was, you know... actual game play.

Every ranger, rxb artificer, gxb mechanic, dagger, dart, and bow cleric build on the server is a flavor build. Because Inquisitor is ranged, it MUST be the only choice.

Kobold says, "Really? Really??"

If the longbow cleric had no ranged feats, he didn't have IPS, in which case U45 doesn't affect him at all.

[DRoark]

If the longbow cleric had no ranged feats, he didn't have IPS, in which case U45 doesn't affect him at all.

Wasn't referring to IPS, I was laughing at... "The worst performing of the ranged builds is better then any of the melee builds in actual game play."

I'd say that Cleric was the worst performing ranged build, but yet he couldn't out-DPS the melee for some odd reason.

[SocratesBastardSon]

Or just make it so that ranged attack aren't possible while moving.

I don't know if you were serious or being ironic when you wrote this, but check out this video. This is how I would love archery to work in DDO:

www.youtube.com/watch?v=BEG-ly9tQGk

I expect that it's staged to some extent and Anderson -- the guy who made the video -- has come under a lot of criticism from the competition archery crowd, but he sure makes it look cool and fun. Plus the attempt to provide some historical grounding is a nice bonus.

[DRoark]

I don't know if you were serious or being ironic when you wrote this, but check out this video.

No, he's actually serious, you should read some of his other stuff, lol. That archery video's cool, he's got some crazy skills.

[0ldschool]

Posted on Jan 30 in Preview 2: main balance thread...

Confirmed on Preview 2:

The Shadow Training II bonuses for to hit on sneak attack, SA die, Hide and Move Silently are still not stacking with other standard bonus types. From the new + tab...

To hit on sneak attack - this appears to be typed as Enhancement bonus, it does not stack with Deception enhancement bonuses on gear.
Sneak attack die - it does not appear to add any die. Either it is not stacking with some other common SA die source or it is just not working.
Hide / Move Silently: these are typed as Enhancement bonus as well, since they do not appear to stack with Ghostly.

This has been broken forever, it seems like a good time to fix it now.

I realize that this isn't very high on the priority list, but it's not a good feeling to post about it twice during Lam, get no response, and then see that nothing was done to fix it. If this is WAI, which would be very unusual for ED bonuses, please let us know and I'll drop it.

[Ashlayna]

Who said anything about bows? Every ranged ranger I've seen has been using Inquisitive with dual crossbows.

Hell every divine I've seen in the past six months has been running dual crossbows.

Like I said, ranged toons are John Wick, so unless they delete Dual Shooter nothing changes.

Or just make it so that ranged attack aren't possible while moving.

I have continually mentioned bows, because that's what I play, and that's what I am concerned about. Your experience in game is not representative of everyone on the forums, nor is it of any consequence when you say "they're just mad because their Inquisitive got nerfed" when we're not discussing Inquisitive at all. Reading comprehension is essential in a medium that requires reading for communication, and you're failing miserably at processing what it is some of us have been pointing out. This post is a clear demonstration of that, again, what does Inquisitive have to do with a pure FvS AA? This is a build that I constantly call back to, but your stuck on "but Inquisitive". If you don't have any feedback on what's actually being discussed, why quote someone to misrepresent what they said, or why they're posting about it?

[Ashlayna]

to scale back all ranged they modified 1 feat, obviously this was easy for them to do. While we can wish for more comprehensive solutions to complex problems the reality is they didn't spend alot of resources on the issue. The argument that Nerf A was unjustified becuase it impacts build X doesn't carry much weight when build Z exists. This is about as convincing as a sorc saying casters are fine becuase earth savant. I can understand you don't want to be pigeon-holed into build Z, however, this is exactly the state dps casters are in right now.

If you want to say melee needs support in R10s, I can agree with that. If your saying ranged dps does that, I don't agree with that at all. Melee dps benefits from CC, heals, and a tank far more than ranged. From what I've seen Melee dps and ranged dps are like cats and dogs, two styles competing for the same function that are largely at odds in what they want. Melees want a tight ball of mobs grouped in their forward arc, not moving, ranged want a group of mobs running at them in a neat line. For the most part, ranged dictate these terms, they get first strike. It's not like like ranged and melee can't have synergy - this is much like the dynamic between a insta-killer caster and a dps one, if they pick different targets they don't trip each other up. However, I don't see this much, I mostly see everyone bursting the enemy in front of them and moving on sequentially. This has also been true of my experience in healing. In a mostly ranged party, everyone is spread out and you want powerful single target heals on a single target, and to switch targets often. In a mostly melee party you pick the person with the highest aggro and throw masses.

The notion that nerfing ranged hurts melees rings completely hollow, in my experience, this is only true if the melee is functionally piking.

They could have prevented all of this by simply not releasing Inquisitive in the state they released it in. It's more than a little ironic to watch people bend over backwards justifying a nerf to an entire combat style to get one build that was overperforming though. Of course, doing that may have meant they didn't sell it a lot, so it is what it is, or was what it was, as it were. Again, since I've said this before, they could remove Inquisitive from the game, and it wouldn't even phase me. I am concerned about builds I want to play, as opposed to builds the community thinks I should be playing. I've been there, done that, and got the t-shirts and hats. So they can do whatever they want with it, but I'm not paying for it.

[capsela]

Reports from the front. On live today, Legendary Shroud top 3 kill counts were all inquisitive. 1st place was alchemist inquisitive 90 kills, 2nd place was fusilade fusion inquisitive 60 kills, 3rd place was cleric inquisitive with 50 kills. Next highest was 30.

:P

[elvesunited]

if the purpose of spring attack was to close the distance between the melee and the target then it's usage is suspect. Using it with my wolf its a run through attack that operates very similar to snowslide without the freeze. Difficult to use to close distance with the enemy as unless you use it at the exact right range you pass right through. It's actually much more useful as a means to escape from melee combat that is going badly to give yourself a few seconds to recover.

IPS nerf was probably done because some ranged weapon characters were soloing high reaper. The irony is that the nerf will have almost no effect on that. The reason that some ranged characters can solo high reaper is not because of offensive capability but defense. With a combinations of high movement speed, evasion, diplo spamming, or other CC a ranged character can play "You can't touch this" with some mobs. The nerf will only make this take 20% longer.

[DRoark]

IPS nerf was probably done because some ranged weapon characters were soloing high reaper. The irony is that the nerf will have almost no effect on that. The reason that some ranged characters can solo high reaper is not because of offensive capability but defense. With a combinations of high movement speed, evasion, diplo spamming, or other CC a ranged character can play "You can't touch this" with some mobs. The nerf will only make this take 20% longer.

The problem is two-fold. They're never going to stop Inquisitor from getting alot of "last shot" hits in due to fire rate (which also artificially inflates the kill count) making the numbers skewed,
and the the IPS nerf harmed NON-Inquisitors more than actually balanced anything. The entire problem was solely Inquisitor, even Coco in an earlier post, said the same thing. "Overperforming".

Not any other ranged, not bows, not single-crossbow. Only... Inquisitor. If the players knew this ONE DAY after the tree came out, why is this such a mystery to the designers?
Tweak INQ until it's in the "we're happy where ranged is at" place (you know who you are), and leave the rest of us alone. )

[Aeron1976]

snip.. top 3 kill counts.. snip

Awesome,lol.

Remind me again please since when kill counts were an accurate tool to measure anything!?

Let me explain: with the amount of HP mobs have in Legendary content it just shows who got the last blow/shot.

If you would play the game, you'd probably know that...

[capsela]

Awesome,lol.

Remind me again please since when kill counts were an accurate tool to measure anything!?

Let me explain: with the amount of HP mobs have in Legendary content it just shows who got the last blow/shot.

If you would play the game, you'd probably know that...

Herp derp. Yeah, means nothing.

Keep believing that.

[DRoark]

I was just looking at the Greataxe animations... a left bottom arc, left upper arc, right upper arc, and a right circular arc?

Looks pretty weird, and I'm sure nobody on the planet has 360-degree swivel joints in their arms. The old style at least looked "almost" normal, except for that reverse backswing.

It's just graphically ugly. My dwarf is just ashamed to destroy the beauty of an axe swing with that window-licking tempo.

[palladin9479]

Herp derp. Yeah, means nothing.

Keep believing that.

Absent a proper damage parser it's a pretty good estimate of the relative killing potential of the party members. Of course it needs to be understood in the context it's in and you need a large number of mobs for it to be relevant.

Last night running LoD chain heroic on my SWF KoTC paladin, was the highest kill count by more then double the next guy. They weren't scrubs by any measure, just it's a lot of corners and tunnels with mobs in tight packs, meaning I could rush in and Holy Retribution most of the pack. In the Spinners fight I was a handful of kills behind the first guy precisely because it was a big area with mobs scattered around instead of being clumped up.

This actually leads to another really big problem with IPS, it makes ranged builds want to string monsters in a conga line while kiting backwards instead of having them gathered up in a furball. Furball is preferred for melee's and casters as they can use circular or arc AoE's to damage things while ranged characters use line AoEs. Those methods are fundamentally incompatible and to make it worse, because ranged has near infinite distance, they tend to start shooting before people are within range to gather them up, effectively reducing the groups damage. Earlier that night while running Cogs, our group booted a ranged guy who didn't listen when we told them to stop kiting the mobs in a line. We got tired of chasing them around as this dude bunny hopped backwards shooting away. After their removal the quests ran so much smoother and quicker.

[Captain_Wizbang]

1st swing w/ GAxe & Gswd is really too slow. The dmge output is great, but that 1st swing really is a hindrance

[DRoark]

This actually leads to another really big problem with IPS, it makes ranged builds want to string monsters in a conga line while
kiting backwards instead of having them gathered up in a furball.

That happens without IPS too, if they have to kill one mob at a time, they're still going to kite in circles, except 10x more.

[DRoark]

1st swing w/ GAxe & Gswd is really too slow. The dmge output is great, but that 1st swing really is a hindrance

I've noticed that too, it's like you're swinging through molasses with those two weapons.