Berserk is a status effect that is intrinsically tied to Warrior’s Helmets; almost every single Helm in the game has the effect alongside a secondary effect. The effect that you gain from Gjallarhorn and the Axe also uses this effect, which means that for Warrior, this combination is completely invalid, whereas with Paladin it’s absurdly strong both in solo play and in groups without Berserk.
Hell, someone ran the numbers, and a solo buffed Paladin with Dalvar, Gjallarhorn and WC tops beats a solo buffed Paladin with Colo and WC tops until 186 Defense because of the Berserk. Dalvar isn’t even that strong of a Sword, doing comparable damage to Acclaim. (I think it needs a minor Damage nerf, but it’s not as big of a deal, hence why I didn’t mention it specifically.)
With a Dexterity boost, though it won’t be as overall powerful, it would allow it to have equal use on every Sword class. Hell, if you really wanted to keep the Berserk, the effect could only give you Berserk if you use the shield instead, as that would make it an option exclusively for Knight, the class it’s made for. It wouldn’t be stealing any niche either, as no other shield gives you a status effect.
(I’m just pretending Crystal Shield doesn’t exist don’t mind me.)
I can agree to an extent. My point was that the nordic st gear (and by extent, the berserk gained from the proc) is better for solo play, because you’re allowed to deal more damage. It may seem overpowered, but even then, just one pally and warrior together in a dungeon can deal more dps than just a pally with berserk. I understand that the double buff is really strong in solo play, but in group play (which is the current meta, with raiding servers being prevalent and the such), this is completely useless, since you already have warriors in the first place. Compare this to giving a dex buff: while this would balance the dps in solo play, this be EXTREMELY broken in group play, since this would allow for the pally to reach insane amounts of dps because of the free dex boost. I think we all have seen how strong effusions and even tincs can be in group play, and a dex buff like this is essentially a free 500+ dps boost to pally whose getting buffs from a warrior…
I can agree that a proc like this should’ve stayed on the shield, as this proc was meant for the st set, and really shouldn’t have put on the sword since its a bit too strong on pally and is straight up useless on warrior, but saying that a dex boost would fix this issue just isn’t true since it would be abused in group play.
This game, at its original state, was little more than an intriguing concept that happened to get popular after its little digital art competition. It was trying to break as many of the original rpg rules as it could at the time, and hodge-podged a lot of features over time.
I daresay that most of Dreamless’ assessments are correct; this game continues to attempt being a jack of all trades, but ends up being a master of none. With that, I believe that it takes a special kind of player to enjoy this ancient system vs. other game options available right now. Rotmg is among the most ambitious Flash game designs I’ve seen up until Flash itself was discontinued!
Nowadays, I’m more intrigued about where the game is going than where it is now. There’s some passionate players who’ve joined DECA, and I understand that they have some grand ideas to implement in the future… whatever that’ll do to the game. I’m curious to see where Realm will be in a DECAde+ from now (if it lasts that long), but I agree that in its current state, now is a bad time to come into/back into the game. There’s a reason I don’t really recommend it to people I know at this time, and I think DECA is wise to hold their peace in trying to attract new players en masse yet. Obtaining a bunch of new players that see how Rotmg is now could shoot it in the foot early.
I suppose, as a conclusive thought, I personally don’t know how much I’d actually want the basic design, in all of its glaring flaws, to change much or not. I could be very wrong in saying this, but I feel that if this game pushes to act more like, say, a rogue-like, rpg, true bullet heck etc., it might kill the game, because so many better options exist in each of those genres. People stick with this because it’s so unique in all its brokenness or they’re addicted and can’t leave, intrigued by the features no other game offers in the way this one does.
Part of the original charm - at least for me - was that even though it was a bullet hell and had a lot of interesting phases, at its core, it was still a very simple game and had understandable mechanics that could be pushed a bit without necessarily becoming too exaggerated.
However, with the push that DECA has been making to make it much more complex, not only does it lose the original value that it had in that regard, it’s now making them have to live up to completely different standards and as such, what was once completely fine is now boring and stale in comparison, which is the 2nd biggest issue that I still find with the game in its current state. All of the new stuff is super complicated while the rest, outside of things they’ve changed for the wrong reasons like Doku, is left in the past and generally too simple. They failed to achieve the fine balance between simple and complex designs together.
I highly doubt that they’d want to ditch a lot of their wacky designs because that would defeat the purpose of a lot of marketing towards “look at all of this stuff we achieved on Exalt that wasn’t possible in Flash!”, but they can’t continue to be both overly complex and overly simple. It’s too stark of a contrast for people to really find palatable in the long run.
I also think think that they just need to completely stop doing Admin Arenas, or do them substantially less. Not a single person I’ve talked to regarding them has found it positively, especially among veteran players, and the only thing it does to keep people around is make them come to expect these arenas that give them such an ungodly amount of free stuff that generally you’d have to work for.
In my mind, I would nerf Horn… +120 HP, +4 Def and the +6 Dex when you are shooting above 90% HP.
Let me try this… reduce its damage to 70-90 damage but keep its firerate?
Possible Glad Guard nerf: +20 Def and +5 Dex/Attack/Speed. Could that work?
For every 5 MP used on an ability, increase Attack boost by 1. Using a Tablet for example would net +24 Attack boost for 5 seconds.
Each portal deal 150 armor piercing damage in every 0.4 seconds for 4 seconds. Deals 6k damage in total if all portals focused on one target.
Decrease Centaur’s DPS stats to +5 Attack/Dex but gives +40 HP as a bonus.
Reactive Proc: Gladiator Blow. When the wearer is under Healing status effect, grant +3 Dex/Attack for 4.5 seconds with a downtime of 1.5 seconds.
Hm how about this…
Reactive Proc (Chief’s Encouragement): Upon using an ability, grants +20 Attack, strip off its damaging wave. Duration + cooldown remain the same.
For Scripture…
Upon ability use, summons a Chaos Beam on your cursor, dealing 1000-1500 armor piercing damage in a 2 square radius. Party Heal by 100 HP (unaffected by Wismod) and unaffected by Split Heal.
Reactive Proc (Royal Assault): Upon ability activation, summons 2 Royal Guardian that deals 60 Armor Piercing damage and 5 projectiles each. Attack in every 1 seconds for 4 seconds. 2 seconds downtime.
Magical Lodestone: +5 Dex/Attack/Speed/Def and +40 HP
That would be a bit too identical to Bergenia…
For Omni: Reactive Proc (Channeling of the Light). When one of the stat HP/MP is lower, 2x the natural regeneration (effectively equal to 4x Wis/Vit regeneration when OoC).
Unholy Sacrifice: 130-140 damage per projectile, 50% firerate.
Ritual Robe: +20 Wis, +3 Attack, +50 MP +12 Def
I would take the 1st option.
Ok let me try… Poison Burst: Deal 800 damage (200 damage per second) in total and lasting 4 seconds. Cooldown: 5 seconds and timer only goes down when the respective weapon is equipped.
For Tablet, I would try… Effect (King’s Wisdom): Upon using the ability, grants +20 Wisdom for 4 seconds. Cooldown remain the same.
Spelling Spell: I would go for 10-80 damage if that would work.
Sporous: Deadly Mushroom, 800 damage for every 1 seconds lasting total of 4 seconds.
I got this… Effect (Lightning’s Vengance): When all shots hit, Armor Breaks the target for 4 seconds. Costing 100 MP.
Tome of the Mushroom Tribe: On ability use, creates a healing Mushroom and heals 100 HP.
Crystal Shield… Don’t know your idea for that rebalancing…
Cave Dweller… Um I would say 400 damage per tick (which is 1 second) and the Sentry lasts 4 seconds. Maybe that could work?
Here are the numbers for Concertina…
Fighting Parrots: 450 damage within 2 squares every 1 second. (900 maximum total) Ignore Defence of the target.
Reactive Proc Feather Frenzy: 5% chance upon shooting for a fighting parrot to protect you for 3 seconds.
Cooldown on effect and Proc: 5 seconds (which means 1 second of downtime).
Alright…
Scientist’s Expertise : On ability use, discount 15% MP on ability use, but caps the reduction to 7 Mana cost when casting an ability.
I don’t agree but ok…
On equip: +17 DEF, +150 MP, +10 WIS
On equip: +140 HP, +6 Wis/Vit
I don’t know man but ok…
Subtotal of Bonuses: +80 HP, +60 MP, +7 ATT, +7 DEF, +7 DEX, +6 SPD
Corrosion: Deals 1,000 total poison burst that lasts 4 seconds.
Dark Matter: Armor Breaks targets in 2 square radius for 3 seconds.
Power: Paralyzes within 2.5 square radius for 3 seconds.
Warp: Decoy for 4 seconds.
I… don’t get it.
MP cost for Ancient Spell: 100.
Let me try… 0.3 tiles amplitude/frequency?
Ahh… How about this… Berserk and Speedy is unaffected by Wismod but each time you trigger the ability, launches Cannon Cluster that deals the current damage.
Reactive Proc (Absorption of the Void): On ability use, release a nova of projectile that deals 200 damage, 12 shots.
Yeah that’s what I said, give it +15 Dex instead of Berserk.
Rate of fire: 125%.
Damage: 110-120 damage per Harp note.
Hm… this is a hard one… I might as well give Reikoku +5 Def to compensate Tenne’s Defence loss (pst, I once wore Tenne with UBDef instead).
Now THIS one I strongly disagree. Pre-nerfed Armored with WC top Warrior can give 118 Defence, that may be a bit too much.
Post-nerfed Armored would give around 88 Defence with the same setup. To maximize Jugg’s effectiveness to pre-nerfed state, you will have to aim for maximum Defence build (which in exchange you are sacrificing your DPS):
And judging from your wording, it tells me that you are assuming that you are farming on GLand (dungeons). But once you move on to endgame content, you’ll be In Combat regardless of Armored or not, but the damage mitigation can still make a difference between life or death.
This one… I will have to give your idea a hard pass.
Let me see… for each 1 damage you take, E.Y.E would deal 5 damage. Maybe that work.
Damage: 50 damage. Could that work?
Damage: 70-80 but increase its firerate to 80%. Could that work?
It’s fine you don’t want to say the h-word. I would think “bullet storm” would be better to describe it without being in the swearing situation.
+8 works fine, as it requires being above a certain HP value.
Something more like 80-95.
4 Attack/Dexterity and 5 Speed would probably be around the best value to keep it from going unused.
Yeah, something like that. Maybe just make it start 20 MP or so, so lower tier abilities can’t give a lot of it.
That’s definitely more reasonable. Could probably get away with 160-165 or so damage(not a damage range, just somewhere in that area for static damage).
To make sure that the Proc is still worth using, both the passive stats and Proc could give 4 Attack and 4 Dexterity each. Also, just to keep it a bit more… up to par with some of the other leathers defensively - due to requiring Healing to get full DPS - boosting the Defense to 11 would be fine. Leviathan does give a lot of both Defense and Dexterity.
I’m not sure that reverting the Wis Mod on the Tome is the best idea, but the Chaos Beam portion is good like that. Requires aiming and the MP Cost makes it generally strong but not extreme.
I don’t even mean as a Proc, I just mean passively. If it were a Proc that damage would be a little okay, but would need a tad less damage due to armor pierce; if it were passive, the projectile count would work better if it were, say, 4 and had the reduced damage.
A damage range more around 270-290 would allow it to keep up with T14 while not invalidating it, though the Amplitude and Frequency are good.
Lodestone here is ideal.
For Void, if it had pierce and armor pierce but the lowest (non-true) range, it would be a nice parallel to Bergenia having the longest range and no pierce. Both would be more diverse in how they’re used because of that, even if both possess armor pierce.
As for Omni, 2x is a bit too much with high Vit builds or characters. Or, at the very least, the other stat’s regeneration should be halved. Ideally, though, somewhere around 50% would be noticeable without being absurd.
A cooldown of 3 seconds works fine if the weapon has to be equipped.
Naming effects like extra Wisdom isn’t really necessary, but I get the gist.
Spelling Spell having 10-80 would work fine, even if I’m personally more gunning for around 10-70.
As for Sporous, 750 damage with the lowered attack cooldown and duration would be perfect. That’d total to 3k.
Since each Mushroom heals 3 times, somewhere more around 75 would be best.
Cave Dweller would work just fine with 1600 total damage given the lack of hitting other targets but still being cheap.
But Crystal Shield… I’m going to be entirely honest. I am completely and utterly dissatisfied that the item even exists, given just how absurdly broken it is unless there’s an entity that has Quiet shots, which isn’t very much; and Silenced isn’t the same either, because it only helps the damn thing since you can only use the When Key Held effect and not have to worry about firing the shot by mistake. There’s no fixing this without neutering it entirely, or just making it Oreo 2; the only thing left would be to rework it entirely, which I’m not trying to really do here.
Works.
Works.
Mana is a tricky stat overall to work with, but in the grand scheme of things, it allows you to save up a lot of mana for more repeated uses of an ability, and adding a ton of Wisdom is just negating the existence of Mana on the item entirely. You could do something similar to Lab Robe where it reduces MP Cost for Heavy Armor classes and instead use the Proc to make the cost reduction go away for a bit, so it resembles its old Proc while still being updated with the new one, but still.
Yep. The other two would need stat reductions as well, of course, but we don’t need to mention those too much.
The stats are a bit more fair for sure. As for the Procs, the main reason they’d need to be lowered is due to the fact that all the other cores only have one and Locked Reactor has its own, but Entropy Reactor has all of them, and they all have independent cooldowns and chances. Unless you want to combine all of them into a single cooldown, reducing their effectiveness in exchange for the ability to use all of them would be the best way to go about it.
I mean the Mana heal that you get when getting hit in Combat.
Yep.
0.35 at worst, but yeah, that would be good.
The Wis Mod could instead be lowered to around 0.75 instead of 1, as to make it always less effective. Either of these work.
Something like that would work, yeah.
Don’t worry, I was just agreeing with you.
If it’s a bit hard to hit still, something more around 135% would be fine, but it all depends on the difficulty to hit things.
This works.
This would work wonders overall. Hell, it’d give Reikoku a bit of use for the stats as well.
The main issue here is less of the immense Defense, and more of the immense Defense in comparison to other items that give Armored. 90 MP on Jugg vs 150 MP on Prot is not a minor difference, and both of them have Wis Mod now that will generally net them similar durations if they play into Wisdom.
If there’s no added Cooldown, at the very least, adding a bit more of an MP Cost (105 or so) would suffice. I won’t talk much about Marble Seal since that one is a tough case through and through.
That’s a lot better.
50 with a bit less damage per Wisdom would work.
Honestly, just making the damage 80-110 would be good enough. Not enough to make it not worth using, but still enough to not make it replace endgame stuff.
Horn existing is already a nerf, and there’s really no need to nerf it. Wait wait wait, are you stupid, bruh, I… ITS 10 DEX! TEN DEX! Ok… yeah… and it’s on borrowed time. Horn is literally an exa HP with 5 extra def. That’s… absolutely fucking pathetic for something that drops from O3 himself. A fucking burger king crown is better than… whatever that is. The 10 dex really is not something that you will have all the time, which is why horn is not counted as 1/4 in many servers, and I myself don’t see horn as 1/4… because it isn’t. It’s shit. How many players can actually keep above 90% of their HP for, like, the whole ass dungeon, of say, void, or o3? Well… you can’t. And then you lose the 10 dex because you can’t dodge, and the Horn is just an exa hp with benefits. Horn doesn’t need a nerf, like, at all. If anything, it needs a buff. It’s dogshit.
Again, no. Lumiare is completely fine as is. WHA – NO IT’S NOT! Have you SEEN the thing??? Yes. I have. If you plug Lumi in on a DPS calculator, it completely shits on every other wand in the game, and that is to be expected. It drops from Osanc, a dungeon that is difficult to play, and difficult to access, for most normal casual players at least. But at the same time, the disparity between Lumi and, say, Fallen or Retri, is too big. Lumi is not only a clear cut winner, but a complete fucking alpha, and I understand where your concerns come from, but I want to ask you this: how confident are you in your aim? Because even if you got a computer AI to use the Lumi, I would guarantee you that the accuracy will not be 100%. Lumi’s shots are not easy to aim, and you will not be hitting every single shot, so the advertised DPS is actually way higher than in practice. You might actually get more mileage off of Fallen since you’re going to land more than half the shots you fire with it.
Mercy’s bane on sale in shop for 199 realm gold! Get lucky and it’s yours, mate! Glad guard on sale in shop for 199 realm gold – wait, something’s wrong, I can feel it. Mercy is an ST and so is Zaarvox’s heart (which nobody uses btw). And Glad guard is the armor of the exalted god himself, the corrupted sinner of a divine presence that is Oryx himself. You can’t compare an ST to an endgame UT, because, well, you can literally buy mercy’s bane. But no matter how much money you have, you can’t buy Glad Guard. If you aren’t skilled enough to beat an o3, you won’t get it no matter how much stonks you trade. Glad Guard is an amazing piece of equipment that gives decent defense and offense capabilities to the sword class. It’s an amazing reward for the great heroes of the realm who made the arduous battle in the Sanctuary. It’s not that I don’t agree with the nerf, but seven and five speed… the difference is literally microseconds. The difference is so negligible, that it doesn’t even have to be nerfed.
Vesture, Genesis, Shielding
I know not of a single player who would use a low MP spell just to trigger the proc of Vestment. Not only are they wasting MP, but they could have just used an actual spell and gotten the proc. Why the fuck would anyone use a fire spray spell when they can use a Burning Retribution or SSS or whatever? They’re wasting DPS, being a liability to the party, and just all around look like an absolute pepega.
Now, your suggested rework of the Vesture surprises me so, because you complained about the Mad God’s horn giving 10 dex, and now you want to add 24 ATT on a wizard for pressing spacebar. No, 24 ATT is literally almost 1/3 of the Wizard’s base ATT cap, this won’t be a rework, it will be a massacre. And not only will Tablet wizards massacre every mob in their face, Vestment will also massacre Diplo, who’s proc requires you to get shot for 50 damage… and, well, Vestment will just always be used instead.
Genesis does not need a nerf. Bu… WHAT ARE YOU CRAZY IT DOES TEN THOUSAND – Yeah YEAH I know Genesis does 10K damage. First of all, Genesis does 10K damage. If all portals hit one target and have 100% uptime. Genesis… is really only effective for stationary targets who don’t go invul for long periods of time. You’re probably gonna get more milage with Para spell or Tablet than Genesis most of the time, and most players actually consider Para spell to be the superior spell, so, there you have it, Genesis is NOT OP and does NOT need a nerf.
This is the same argument I have with Glad Guard. You can literally buy a Tenne from the shop. Also, Shielding is not even that OP. You need a priest/pally/ballistic star/lotus, which is not always available for the proc to actually work. Second, the ATT is only there for 3 short seconds. God forbid if it procs during the boss’s invul phase. Whatever am I supposed to do? Yeah no. 12 ATT for 3 seconds with a 6 second cooldown isn’t broken. As a matter of fact, I actually prefer the 100% uptime of tenne’s 16 DPS stats rather than the shaky proc of Shielding. I also think that Shielding has a god awful sprite and it looks like somebody threw up all over some T1 leather armor.
Banner, Pblast
Banner 100% does not need a nerf. Banner is actually not even that good. It’s on equip stats, I actually scoffed at it the first time I saw it, and the proc, I, again, scoffed. Yes, the banner gives damaging. Yes, the banner does damage. No, this is not broken, and no, Paladins are not killed by this item because Banner cannot replace a paladin, and can never. The damaging aura of the banner only works if your banner is placed close enough to an enemy, and if the enemy moves, then that’s pretty much GG. The banner also only gives damaging for players who are close to it, and this only lasts for four seconds, which a max Wis pally with a ZSeal can do the exact same thing. Also the difference between a T7 and T6 seal’s HP buff is literally 10 HP. You can get as much milage from a Gcookie as you can an Invocation. Also, 120/130 extra HP, especially as a side-buff, is always welcome; it’s literally a fucking ParaHP.
Again, your suggested rework suprises me. So if you slap your reworked Vesture and this on a Tablet wizard with 5/5 ATT, they would have 75+5+24+20+5= A WHOPPING 129 ATT. This wizard with these equips and 5/5 DEX will have 75+5+4 = 84 DEX. For a player like yourself, who understands stats and how they work, I find your suggested reworks to be… very surprising.
No. You are both out of your minds. Wizard is already the most damaging character in the entire fucking game. Have you seen the 55 second O3 world record? Yeah. Exalted EP wizards sitting on O3. Now we look at Armor Broken. Who can actually access armor broken? Knights and Assassins, with Ogmur and Pogmur, respectively. Not only are both whites unforgable, but they are also incredibly incredibly rare and on two classes with arguably the worst DPS. And we look at Pblast. A fucking white that is AVAILIBLE IN THE FORGE BY DEFAULT, and, i’m not done, get this, it takes a measly 90 Gold to forge! I know, INSANE! Imagine if wizards had access to armor broken! That would not only break armor, but also the balance of the entire game! Assassins are already USELESS, and pogmur is the ONE thing keeping the class afloat for high level gameplay. Knights are already in a bad spot with more and more things being immune to stun, and access to AB is also something that they hold high above our heads. But oh wait, look at this wizard, he has access to AB, and not only AB, but ON DEMAND INSTANT AB ON CURSOR. AND IT PIERCES TO MULTIPLE TARGETS. Ok ok, calm down (I am), what if… we gave Pblast EXPOSED instead (wink wink). Fuck. No. Giving wizard exposed will just make samurai completely worthless as a class. Also most staves fire 2 shots, so exposed would not mean 20 extra damage, it would be 40.
So… no, there’s really no way to make Pblast good by giving it a simple solution. Spells will always have gaps between projectiles, so a penetrating spell was never a good concept (as evidently shown by the lack of people using Tablet pre buff). An easy way to “fill in the gaps” is to quite literally fill in the gaps. Whenever a main Pblast projectile hits a target, it fires shots perpendicular to it that do the same damage as the main projectile (since the shot is already weak af). The shots aren’t particularly strong, but Pblast isn’t really a damage spell, more of a clearing spell.
Yea, its kinda weird that Dreamless wants to nerf items such as centaur’s shielding and vesture that are strong in group play, yet advocating for dps stat buffs instead of status effect buffs for items like banner/nordic st gear, which would inadvertently make them stronger in group play -_-. Also I can agree that the suggeted pblast buffs would be wayyy too broken, judging how items like superior(yknow, one of the best staves in the game) thrive off low def over high def. I think the biggest issue with these proposed buffs/nerfs is that they looked at items at face value, and just assumed items were strong/weak, without realizing the downsides/upsides of that item.
also you put “Crown, Lumi, Glad Guard” instead of “Horn, Lumi, Glad Guard”
Also I don’t really get the argument behind spelling spell. For Spelling Spell, the mana to damage ratio is high, but let’s not forget that this item is completely useless for enemies with def >=20, because since the damage is so low, you’re not really gonna be doing “HeLlA dAmAgE” as your average damage is around 55, and most enemies with >=20 have health in the thousands. Even if you’re perfect spell bombing, the 260-2600 damage you will be doing will be cut down significantly because of enemy def, making the spell a complete joke for most enemies, and almost all bosses.
I agree with you and your previous post. Also yeah I wrote Crown and not Horn. I’m not very smart, if you haven’t already gathered that.
I really don’t want to say this, and I do feel kind of bad, and it sounds really rude and makes me look like a douche but I think that Dreamless is just out of touch with the game. The game that they played as a kid, and the game that it is now, are completely different. And it’s safe to say that a lot of us grew up with it and adapted to it and accepted it. I know that the game feels different and just emanates an overall different vibe than it did back then, but that’s just how far the game has gone in all that time. And I’m fine with that.
Back then, a god tier archer set was Dbow/Cbow, QoT/Elvish, Spectral Cloth, and like a UBHP or a Pyra, or for those who are lucky, Bracer or Crown. While crown is still a mainstay, everything else… is outclassed. I came from that time in the game. And I know that it was a fun time. But times change.
That really reminded me about Pixel Gun. About 7 years ago, Prototype was the meta and now… it’s about Category Spam and which weapon can OHKO the best.
Coming back to see this seriously reminds me why I never try to talk with people about the way I view things even after I’ve spent so long with the game and have seen its progress. Every time I voice my opinion on the state of things I always get this huge amount of flak, despite how much I put my reasoning into perspective, when I’ve spent a good chunk of my time around Realm crafting ideas and overall trying to contribute to the creative scene and overall giving more than just my two cents on things because I’d spent so long crafting things to be fair through all levels of play.
If people want to disagree with my takes on item balance, sure; but calling me out of touch when I’ve spent at least five years dealing with item balance doesn’t just sound rude. I wouldn’t be talking about these kinds of things if I didn’t have the experience with handling it myself to back up what I’m saying, because I’m not someone who flocks to the internet solely to complain about things I have no idea about.
If DECA wants to make a push for all of the things that they are, like making a lot of these strong items, then they’ve frankly been doing a pretty shit job at making the rest of the stuff in the game match up to the higher standards of it. Things like ROTF, while having a lot of stuff that’s absurdly broken compared to Prod, were scaled differently from the very beginning and as such, had a bit more of an excuse; whereas DECA has simply added things that are so far beyond the original design and balance of items, and has done nothing to make the rest of the items come near them. You cannot have it both ways if you want a fulfilling experience, and even after spending at least two years so far trying to perfectly craft things to be in an overall much more balanced state, I’m still fine-tuning it and quadruple checking every detail.
Also, to clarify, I’ve never stopped looking at a lot of the things that have been added or changed in this game. Since I left, I was still seeing what kinds of things were being changed, what new things were being added, and even once before checked in by playing just a bit without mentioning anything publicly; if I were even remotely interested in staying around back then I would’ve announced it again. However, I’d seen at face value that things were still not at all polished enough or even given proper thought and time for me to come back.
Rather than trying to make things fair in the early game (without relying on ridiculous proc effects) they were focused on strengthening things that came from endgame, and hell, even with the dungeon overhauls it still wasn’t enough to seriously change anything because at the end of the day the core issues weren’t really addressed: the gameplay doesn’t have enough variety. This is something that Sprite World at least adequately accomplished, so I wouldn’t say it’s farfetched that they could do the same with everything else.
And even then, they never even bothered to change Planewalker despite the fact they changed a good amount of other stuff like giving Snake Eye Ring a proc, and the fact the Invisible time is still that of Tier 6. They couldn’t even put that little smidgen of effort in when they did so with items that nobody was even thinking of in the first place? Their quality control and focus is so wildly all over the place that it personally irritates me, because I know for a fact that if they were really focused on quality, they’d take the time necessary to really tackle these issues or devise a system that would actually help in this regard. And no, it’s not too hard to make a system that would help, because someone made an entire Google Sheet by themselves in a week just for weapon balance.
If there’s one thing I can say for certain that I’ve learned from this thread, it’s that no matter how hard I try and argue a point while not just saying “this is bad” or “change this”, I’m the minority. The only real exception I’ve ever had in terms of complaints is my Farewell Thread post, and that’s only in some sections and because I was truly at my limit.
Best of luck in whatever ventures you people go through with, but I think its been made clear that even with how much perspective I have and how many points people agree with me on, I’m not all that welcome at the end of the day.
I won’t be returning again in any capacity. I’ve got things I want to apply my experience to, and if it’s not going to be taken well here, there isn’t any point.
mate I’m sorry, but that’s what’s going to happen when you have an unpopular opinion. People will try to explain why you were wrong, and that’s just normal. What we were arguing about was that the items that you said were broken weren’t really all too broken, and your arguments for why those items were broken were missing key details about those specific items that are what make the item not nearly as strong/ not nearly as weak as you thought. I can agree that items should try to be more unique is the future, but the proposed buffs and nerfs feel really tone deaf to the current meta in realm
Again, while your ideas might seem good as a way to balance items that you feel are too strong, the proposed buffs and nerfs you gave were either too strong with the current meta (like with the nordic st gear, banner and pblast), or nerfing items that never needed a nerf in the first place (like with horn and lumi). Its difficult for players who understand the meta to think you aren’t tone deaf when you want to nerf items like vesture, which are very strong in group play, but also buff nordic st gear to give a dps stat buff, which would make those items very strong in group play.
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I hope I’m not taking this stuff the wrong way, especially the last part, so please clarify if I got things wrong, but this is how I feel about your response as of now.
Most of what I mentioned when I was talking about potential changes for items weren’t the end-all-be-ball, but more of a personal suggestion for the direction they should go in, or just mentioning what the issue with the item is in some circumstances. Of course off the top of my head I’m not going to have the best sort of idea of what to do, because nothing is going to be perfected if you just go off of what you get in your head from the beginning. If you really want an example of this, check just how massively changed my original Shogun concept is from where it is now. (Posts are all on here. I don’t even want to stick around on the site but it would be rude to not say something here.) Don’t take my immediate thoughts towards changing an item at face value, because in order for things to really be fleshed out, you need to round things out over time and with careful thought.
That being said, a lot of my thoughts about some items aren’t about any sort of meta, but rather about the overall design of items and the like. I don’t care about what would be considered meta unless it’s overwhelmingly obvious that it needs to be changed or removed entirely; what I do care about is having items that you can get earlier on in the game still having some meaning, and more than just a select few like Planewalker or Scholar’s Seal for instance. When you have items that cover so many purposes like those from Sanctuary, you’re removing the need for so many items, unless you’re either collecting or are doing something like a PPE where you have to achieve things on that specific character. That’s exactly how it feels especially for things like Crystal Sword, which has so many counters, including the newer sword from Ancient Ruins, a Godlands dungeon.
Also, I’ll specifically clarify something about this:
This wasn’t to say that I’m always correct, because always being correct is just completely impossible for anyone. This was me saying when it comes to arguing my point, I usually do so for good reason and try to back up what I’m saying as much as I can. My assessment of items being either too strong or weak is the thing I’m backing up, not some of the specific changes unless it’s something that’s easy enough to justify, such as Entropy Reactor’s Procs. To reiterate: don’t take my immediate thoughts towards changing an item at face value.
I am not saying that your opinion is wrong. I do see that you want to have items that have multiple stats, but giving less bonuses (like how you wanted to rebalance Gladiator Guard) and making them equal to each other.
The issue is, nerfing items to make them equal to each other means there would be no reason to raid O3 anymore, even if you want that Life Exaltations. As I mentioned, I strongly believe buffing older UT/ST’s would be solve the endgame vs non-endgame issue.
I would buff Mercy to +12 Def and +8 Dex/Att to make a difference without nerfing its O3 cousin. Zaarvox itself is weak yes, but once you pair it with Amulet of Drakefyre, it can outstrip Glad Guard in terms of HP and a massive Speed bonus (definitely not DPS though).
I want to see it…
It’s fine that you are a minority, I am a minority in some way as well.
It’s no wonder that you said Kabam is better than Deca…
I myself had things to complain about but with reasons like you mentioned.
The general idea of how I see balance is that everything should have some reason to use it regardless, though some things more-so than others. Items that infringe on the niche of others while being strictly better in almost every way is something I have the most issue with because even if it’s an endgame vs midgame, you’re still basically just replacing an item altogether. It’s the sort of thing I see with Bone Dagger vs Stinger, though even that has a bit of leniency due to it being a case of Cyan vs White and not White vs White.
Also, with something like Gladiator Guard vs Mercy’s Bane, it’s a fairly unfair comparison due to the fact that Mercy’s Bane is generally an actually balanced item, while Gladiator Guard is just a fairly OP version of it without many - if any - drawbacks. Mercy’s works because of its massive loss of Defense in comparison to even a Dragonscale Armor, overall resulting in monstrously more damage taken in return for a decent chunk of DPS; Gladiator Guard only slightly reduces the DPS it gives in favor of removing almost any penalty in terms of Defense(outside of against T15, which drops from the same dungeon mind you) and even giving a lot of Speed.
As for Zaarvox vs Gladiator, it feels… wrong, that in order for an item to be good, it has to specifically be paired with another item, even if they happen to be STs. It’s the thing I dislike most about the way ST sets are generally designed; half of the set outright relies on other items to function well or even decently, and now with newer sets, some items are legitimately required to get full effectiveness.
I can’t exactly show every detail, as it’s for the aforementioned Private Server, but I’ll show an edited example of what it looks like.
Essentially, every factor you want to put onto an item has a different effect based on a lot of variables, such as Projectile Count, the True Range of the item, if it has a Status Effect, the Arc Gap range(Scattershot), and of course the normal stats. It shows all of the stats and how they’d react to different amounts of Defense, as well as just raw damage, and even with boosts. All of these are then taken into account with a value that compares itself to Tier 12, including Tier 13 and 14, and based on how many points it has versus Tier 12, it’ll tell you if it needs to be stronger or weaker, while having a range so there’s room for leeway.
It overall works very well, and allows for testing based on the aforementioned variables without having to put it into the game, or even into a testing server. Things will behave differently with different Attack and Dexterity values of course, but given the distribution of those stats among classes, certain things will end up being better or worse on specific classes regardless and should be taken with a grain of salt. There isn’t one for abilities, but those are too specific - especially with the things I want to do to the classes - to put into a calculator.
I can also clarify what some of the terms here mean if you’re curious about their implementation.
Absolutely. Kabam’s biggest issue was neglecting a lot of the game in most aspects and funneling pay-to-“win” into the game, while DECA’s biggest issues are either their marketing, or their complete lack of consistency when it comes to the strength of items, whether it’s endgame or not. Powercreep is normally a bit more… excusable in single player, but not only is this an MMO, it’s a co-op that also relies on luck for getting good things. Powercreep simply doesn’t work well with the game’s overall design, at least IMO.
It’s nothing against you for disagreeing on certain things like Jugg, as I didn’t clarify that one myself. A couple of other things are just hot topics for debate as well, and I’m going down with the ship on those ones either way.
