SOTA's Target Audience is too broad.

What you've been saying is.. PvP is broke because look at this lag. Least that's how it sounds.

You can't expect lag not to be a problem with turn based elements... but you can streamline performance.. which you'd have to do first anyway.

 

Well, to be fair, it is an effective system. The trinity is fundamental enough that you can add different elements to it to keep it interesting. Giving each class a set of moves that are unique to the game would be an example of this.

The trinity was designed for cooperative play. It effectively gives each player a job. In the case of a 1v1 pvp fight, its not really necessary. However, when a group of players try to take down a dragon, it becomes quite effective.

I think part of the issue is that Shroud's pvp right now is just 1v1 dueling (unless there is a side to pvp that I don't know about). We have yet to see it play out in teamfights.

I agree, we have gotten way off topic.

 

I'm of the belief it shouldn't be balanced to make everyone able to be good at everything. I don't think a mage should be able to stand toe to toe with warrior and trade blows. I don't think a warrior should be able to be lit on fire and continue unabated. There are tradeoffs that should come from abilities that make it somewhat fair if not 100% balanced. Balanced makes everyone generic with differing graphics.

 

There is a difference between "balanced" where everyone is the same and "balanced" where everyone has different moves, but one is not superior to the other. Ideally, you want the latter.

 

That all depends on how you define balance. What you're comparing is two different approaches to balance. One is relative.. the other is very literal but both are 'balanced'.. That said.. the latter is definitely not the way to go.

 

I want balance like this:

A level 30 mage (pure) vs a level 30 fighter (pure).

I expect the mage to get slaughtered toe to toe.

I expect the fighter to get slaughtered if he remains out of martial range.

I expect the mage to be able to use abilities that slow, stun, and hold the fighter (we have some now).
I also expect he has CoProtection or magic shields to reduce/mitigate damage, and abilities like blink, rope trick or clone to obfuscate/confuse the fighter so he can escape.

I expect the fighter to be able to use abilities that hamper/bleed, stun and knockdown the mage (we have some now).
I also expect he has great armor to reduce/mitigate damage, and abilities like dirt in your eye, feint, or taunt to force interruptions of spells or escape.

I think everyone can agree, we have some of these, others missing so far, but all and all, a balance of "abilities".

Given that, it will never be balanced.

Forget the lag.
Forget the jumping and skipping like a jack "donkey".

The first problem you have is someone will (HAS) complaining about why I cant wear super duper armor like a fighter.
Then why is my stuff XYZ costly over ABC cost of that other stuff.

Sadly, traditional roles, while "undefined" here are still emerging because of how it is currently "balanced/tweaked".

NOW throw back in lag. I don't think it will ever BE balanced because of the imbalance of connection/latency, and because we can all hybrid build -- which everyone will do (outside of roleplay) to be a prevailer @ whatever metagame they expect to 'win'.

 

I don't like it because you are implying that anyone can beat anyone. That will never balance and people will just wine about it until the end of time. I would propose something like this.

Assuming the same player is playing bother characters.

Mage burns through fighter's armor and kills him easily at range.
Archer stuns mage and picks him off quite easily.
Fighter slaughters archer up close, because archers arrows bounce off plate.

And so on.

Rock - Paper - Scissors

 

I really dislike the rock-paper-scissors approach. You can use realistic examples to justify it but at the end of the day you're building in artificial mechanics to make it work and it places the outcome more squarely in the hands of mechanics.

It's like saying.. if A chooses to be a fighter and B chooses to be archer.. A always wins because fighters beat archers.

Where as the reality is.. archer uses a powerful bow with the right ammo and has a chance to punch through armor.. if the fighter can't get close the fighter is toast.. if they can get close the archer has to either get away or melee.

Fighter closes in on a mage is the mage toast? Or do they have touch based spells?

There will always be situations where someone can gain an advantage.. but a r-p-s approach goes out of the way to set things in stone and promotes a class based system.

Under the right circumstances and with the proper application of skill.. anyone should be able to beat anyone.

 

I played a rogue in wow for a long time. I absolutely despised all the whiners claiming balance problems because rogues do burst damage. Those whiners never played a rogue and never realized the extreme negatives of the class. All they know is their button would not work for a few seconds as half their life was taken. But most of the time is was a 1 chance fight, sometimes 2 depending on cool downs. Anyway, those whiners completely ruined the class. Hence I have pretty strong feelings against the idea of absolute balance and even more so against whiners.

 

Whiner's gonna whine. That's their problem.. but how many more would their be in a system that's designed for it to be near impossible for one build to win against certain others?

 

Exactly. I have argued this in countless MMO forums. Constantly gimping classes to 'make them equal' to other classes has ruined more than one MMO. People will never be happy. Too many opinions. Too many demands. I do not believe class balance should ever be a goal. Obviously you need classes to be competitive but that's a very different element.

In regards to SotA, I am an RPer as well as a competitive PvPer. I know thousands like myself. I disagree with the statement that so called 'twitch players' are not interested in RPing, the role play aspects of the game, or the storyline. To me, the two go hand in hand.

 

I have a theory that if no two classes are equal, then there should be less whiners, and for those that do whine, the answer is "they are not supposed to be equal, ever played pokemon?"

 

You know, when people complain about spells like Root in the game not being fun, I think of Pokemon and abilities like stun, sing, confuse, bind, etc. that put your pokemon asleep or otherwise disable them. You often have to wait for your pokemon to wake up. Nobody playing Pokemon considers this a problem with the game design, though.

 

Depends on how you define equal. Much like balance I'm left with the distinct impression that our definitions in this context may be at opposite ends of the spectrum.

 

I am ok with that

 

100% agree.

 

Mass Effect 2/3 had some really great FPS combat systems (although I hated ME3 multiplayer but that's because I didn't want to put in the time to be good) and a really great story (well the ending is controversial but no spoilers). I also assume you've never heard of successful games like Diablo, Divinity, and multiple other hack-and-slash games?

I don't know if you liked them but they've sold well, have had great receptions in general, and are among the many examples of games that match action-oriented gameplay and roleplaying.

I don't think anyone plays Planetside to RP (because it's not really built for that) but to suggest that FPS games (or FPS-like games) and roleplaying games are mutually exclusive is ignoring thousands of great games.

SOTA, at least in PVE, is far from a twitchy game. If anything, the combat is very slow.

 

I don't know if this is off topic or not... but I wouldn't say Diablo has much role-playing in it at all. A point-and-click story and a stat system isn't role-playing.

 

I think all PVP situations should be resolved with dance-offs.

 

We haven't been on topic since page 2.