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Mages, Lag And Why the Hell Did I Bother?

Discussion in 'Release 12 Feedback' started by E n v y, Nov 30, 2014.

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  1. E n v y

    E n v y Avatar

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    Pretty much says it all in the title.

    Like a fool and despite knowing what mages were like in Release 11 and pretty much guessing what they are like in this release.......I thought I'd give my Level 50 Char a go.

    I moved from duel wield bludgeon to an Archer Mage. I stocked up on all the resist stuff in the skill tree, I had some decent crafted armour.

    ....... Oh wait, I die in 3 hits.


    So when someone can hit you for over 80 damage in a single hit, why does someone somewhere think its appropriate that a Healing Ray will heal you for around 25-30, fizzles if you move and takes an age to cast??

    Healing Touch? why even bother, you will heal between 10 and 20 (high end if your lucky), the cooldown is just pathetic.

    Death Touch is 'ok'.......and it is only 'ok' because you can do some damage with it. As a 'first' spell in a skill tree, it is so much better compared to Heal Touch.

    Damage output? where is it? I get a guy with plate who can hit me for 80 in a basic swing....Do I have to wait to stack 5 spells together to even come close to that?....................Oh wait, I can't.....i'm already dead or my deck is stacked full of heal spells just to survive!

    So after Release 11, it was mentioned that mages would get some love.......i'm sure someone somewhere 'tweaked' a number in the code..........at the same time newly crafted armour was introduced that gave mages more defence and at the same time gave plate wearers even more defence.......oh and someone somewhere put the decimal point in the wrong place for weapon damage output allowing melee damage of 200 (admittedly it was fixed).....point is, there has been no real love for mages for this release.

    The lag! omg it is so bad it's actually driving me onto single player. Lag also tends to have a bigger impact on mages more than dexers................please please please look to fix it. If there's so much lag you can't even test to see what the combat balance is truly like.

    Rant over......now for my to go and try some archery.
     
  2. E n v y

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    16 Damage to a Wolf Spider with Lightning......16 Dmg to a tiny spider!................It cost me 60 gold to cast it!!!!!!!

    Just closed the game because it too broken.......will go back to melee later

    ARGHHHHHHHHH!
     
  3. Aetrion

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    One piece of advice I can give is that apparently you can cast spells without the reagents right now, which may be a bug, but should be a feature.

    But yea, being a mage right now is terrible. It's all balanced as though you should never take a hit and can kite every enemy you fight forever while playing match the glyph at the same time.
     
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  4. Sunswords

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    @Duke Invidia(Envy)

    I just discovered that charging a Glyph (to max level) increases it's overall damage range and minimum damage dealt. Try charging to level 5 before releasing a spell!
     
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  5. E n v y

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    I wouldn't say it is balanced to anything at all to be perfectly honest.
     
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  6. E n v y

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    I assume you mean stacking the glyphs as they appear up to level 5..........I know all about that and that is yet another reason why it is so unbalanced. You need to wait and wait and wait and hope that the next glyph is one you need to stack before you can come close to doing damage similar to melee.
     
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  7. Sunswords

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    That is true, it's quite unfair for Mages / Magic Users right now. It's tough love having to work for victory other than auto-swinging your way through :eek:
     
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  8. Net

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    Being level 50 mage is nothing, try to be low level mage, about anything kills you before you can kill it:p Well, even at level 50 it is hard to progress as an archer mage. It is even harder for pure mage.

    Anyway basic rules for archers/mages in PvP

    Use 5 spells/abilities with 5 glyphs, so you have higher chance to stack spells

    Usually 1-2 Heals, 1-2 Slows and 1-2 Offensive spells

    Typically Root, Disabling Shot, as they allow you to keep melee at distance. Then Healing Ray or Healing Touch. And perhaps Fire Arrow and Death Ray (death ray can be used as heal orr to create combo with fire arrow and provide extra dot).


    If the game does not lag and you play 100% perfectly, you can win against melee this way. If he manages to catch up with you, chaces are 50:50 he kills you before you manages to get out of his way.

    Oh and fights against NPC archers and mages are quite terrible for mages. They do a lot of damage and interrupts all your ranged spells.
     
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  9. E n v y

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    If that is the only way mages can win, then there needs to be a complete re-think.

    I miss mages

     
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  10. NRaas

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    Good to see someone else has come to that conclusion as well.

    I *was* playing a mage with a meat-shield assistant for the first week of the game, but found their damage potential so insignificant as to be completely worthless.

    ----

    Eventually just retrained as a Healer, that at least *feels* reasonably useful, though with my meat-shield wearing full plate they don't tend to actually take much damage anyways.

    Plenty of balancing to be done. :)
     
  11. Jordizzle

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    I can't say anything Bout the mage part since I never play mage simply because I don't like it..but I haven't experienced any lag at all. Could the lag be a problem with your system?
     
  12. Drocis the Devious

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    You guys do realize that if the only thing the devs do is increase mage "damage" that just makes anyone that's not a mage worse, right?

    i.e. that's not the answer here.
     
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  13. E n v y

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    Don't lag at all in single player.

    My connection is below:
    [​IMG]

    In saying that, I am based in the UK.........I am a little concerned.

    Admittedly I probably do need a new machine because the one I have is several years old and is 'average'.
     
  14. E n v y

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    So the thing I really liked about UO was that if you had two players, one with 100 Wrestle and Mage and another with 100 Swords and Tactics.......they would miss each other the same amount on average......when the swordsman hit, he would hit with decent damage. When the mage hit, he would hit with pretty much 0 damage (he is a wrestler)....when the swordsman missed, the mage could cast a spell and hit the swordsman.

    This is such a basic fundamental principle for balance............where is it in shroud?
     
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  15. Drocis the Devious

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    I brought up lag during R11, here...



    Chris already responded in the comments, and again during R12 by saying that they had discovered a problem in the network code (I assume) that creates as much as a 1.5 second delay in some cases. He also said they couldn't fix it until R13 because it was too risky to just throw in on a whim. (I'm paraphrasing what he wrote from memory)

    Personally, I'm really happy they found this 1.5 second delay that impacts both PVP and PVE. But internet gaming is going to be laggy regardless. This is why I have been asking for turn-based "elements" for combat that would prevent some of the internet exploitation we see in all games. Either you have a bad connection that gives you an advantage or you have a great connection that gives you an advantage.

    I happen to have a very good computer and a very good connection, but you can see the results of that in the video above.
     
  16. Drocis the Devious

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    I don't really like the example you gave, but I agree that there's nothing like that in SOTA. We need the ability to block and have counter moves.
     
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  17. E n v y

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    I mentioned that because it was the foundation of PvP in UO which they then built things like parry, anatomy, magic resist, eval int etc etc....they put in wrestle stun and disarm.......seriously where is my disarm move in Shroud?

    In Shroud, how does a pure mage defend himself?..... as you say where is the counter move against dexers?

    Shroud is supposed to be classless........how can it be classless when everything except a warrior in plate is not viable.
     
  18. Drocis the Devious

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    The "counter" argument people are going to use is that "all the systems are not in yet". The devs use this, the fanboys use this....it's not a good argument.

    If we look at the design documents the devs released, or the additional skills that are currently planned for episode I, there's nothing else in those skill trees that will change anything for combat or magic. It's just more of the same thing...damage and cool downs.

    The idea behind the design of combat and magic is that Damage minus Damage Reduction at a rate of Attack Speed is somehow going to create compelling combat. I believe that's a flawed concept.

    The problem the devs are having though, is that if they tighten up the game so that you can't move around everywhere, or you can't just spam attacks for damage...the devs don't believe the result will be "fun". And I can't argue with that because I've never seen it happen in any game.

    If you ask the average gamer what kind of combat system they want...they'll describe a system where they have total control of their character and can spam attacks all over the place. But if they play that system they'll tell you it's not balanced and the devs need to tweak the damage for this class or that class. It's really a mess, and I wish the devs would just start thinking outside of the box on this, bite the bullet and slow combat down to something that is both manageable (not spammy or twitchy) and requires more thought (and not best builds).
     
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  19. Borg

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    This combat/skill system is more like Age of Conan system but worse because its auto attack based , I see more and more evidences every day... so we are not getting the great combat skill system UO has sadly :(.
    12 years playing UO is hard to forget, epic PVP duels and fights, its old game but still combat system is the best.
     
  20. E n v y

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    In fact ignore everything I said...............Just don't bother with anything unless you wear full plate.
     
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