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Post by fallenwizard on Jul 9, 2014 15:12:32 GMT
My opinion is that the pre-ll tags should be challenging for a noob and be fairly easy for a vet that has a bank of items to work with, not challenging for a vet and extremely difficult for a noob. Ok, that sounds like a valid goal.
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Post by chirality on Jul 9, 2014 16:17:08 GMT
My opinion is that the pre-ll tags should be challenging for a noob as someone who only plays hardcore now since randomization came in, every new toon is a noob not sure if srs... Yeah, such noobs: longtime vets with BUR subraces and multibox capability, and hoards of gear stashed at various levels, good knowledge of cheesing the lowbie mod, tight network of friends to help eachother out, skilled nerd capability proven by (in your case) beating the entire game many times over. Many/most -HC- players are indeed "nubs" by standards of "pros" but you're unique in being not one of them And those who are indeed nubs are certainly not new players Lol no toon you ever make is a "noob", this is silly and you know it This is completely incorrect and backwards. You honestly think your -HC- toons are in any way relevant* to what a new player faces? Get real -HC- or not, your new BUR sub toons assisted by dualbox buddy and 3-5 friends and driven by knowledge/skill of one of HG's most famous and legendary pros ever, is quite hilarious to imagine as a "noob". (sorry to be such a troll but ... that literally made me laugh out loud when I read it bro ) *ok, 1 way it's relevant is facing the same stats from lowbie mobs. But other than that...
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Post by KnightErrant on Jul 9, 2014 16:54:01 GMT
The main problem I see is how do you make them a "worthy opponent" for a solo newbie open race sub melee toon with a unbuffed +1 to +3 sword and not utter fodder for a arcane with a stack of GS and bbod scrolls or a buffed summoned creature...not to mention a stack of Thunderclap scrolls for even faster evisceration...
Would actually love to see a bunch of the achievement bosses killable by a new melee player instead of nearly invincible to melee but complete fodder to IGMS and similar spells.
.02 KE.
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Post by kingcamaro on Jul 9, 2014 19:03:50 GMT
The main problem I see is how do you make them a "worthy opponent" for a solo newbie open race sub melee toon with a unbuffed +1 to +3 sword and not utter fodder for a arcane with a stack of GS and bbod scrolls or a buffed summoned creature...not to mention a stack of Thunderclap scrolls for even faster evisceration... Would actually love to see a bunch of the achievement bosses killable by a new melee player instead of nearly invincible to melee but complete fodder to IGMS and similar spells. .02 KE. Im adjusting their AC as if a 3/4 ab open toon was up against them SR is pretty linear to scale throughout the levels conceal will see some action too each boss will have atleast 1 element they are weak against (not to be confused with vulnerable) the above is true with phys and/or exotic as a tag boss, I feel they shouldnt be cheesed by hoping they roll a 1 and die to some insta death spell I may experiment with one or two of them to teach about kickback and healing types on a small scale Much of the tags pre-20 wont see too much change because it will be tough on quasiclasses otherwise.
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Post by chirality on Jul 9, 2014 19:13:15 GMT
The main problem I see is how do you make them a "worthy opponent" for a solo newbie open race sub melee toon with a unbuffed +1 to +3 sword and not utter fodder for a arcane with a stack of GS and bbod scrolls or a buffed summoned creature...not to mention a stack of Thunderclap scrolls for even faster evisceration... Would actually love to see a bunch of the achievement bosses killable by a new melee player instead of nearly invincible to melee but complete fodder to IGMS and similar spells. .02 KE. Any such boss would surely be complained as too weak and useless, and requiring of a buff Like Half-Orc Bandit Chief or Hive Mother Beetle or Kard (tbh I can't really think of many others that actually can be defeated easily by buffless tanks played by clueless newbie?) Of course the impetus for "X zone/creature is too easy, make it harder" seems always to be more about making the game harder/more fun for vets, not clueless newbies, e.g. "make hells harder"; and likewise there's complete lack of pity or mercy for buffless tanks, despite dozens of attempts to improve tank QOL (always met with some negative/impassive attitude on the pokerface<-->contempt spectrum, like my comments @ last round of "tanks are useless rants Since, after all, as vets we're expected to ensure teaching newbies that such toons are bad and useless and only cores are worth playing, until the point where a newbie is transmuted into a vet with the gear, friends, consumables, subraces and demi/reincs to allow "pulling off" a useless tank, since--after all--the game revolves around casters, and tanks are bad and useless unless they can adequately dish out enough damage to help beat tough randoms/boss fights and simultaneously draw dangerous attention from the casters/being solid enough tanks that their presence doesn't gimp a party) trolo (not that I intend to indicate or admit any change of heart, although I will as always decry the fact that casters who can already solo masterfully, received tank help of their own, due to supposed difficulty in party formation and lessened playerbase making soloing more popular/too hard, while tanks never receive similar auto-initiated help of their own, that they rely on casters for (namely, in the form of various proposed changes to weapon buff mechanics) ... I think the base situation of casters being magical powerhouses but tanks being just guys with swords and shields is justified as a D&D game, but given that casters got tanks, why shouldn't tanks gave gotten casters...I don't think tanks should approach the speed and efficiency for soloing as casters, but they should at least be a bit more self-reliant, such as the case in most similar games...after all in PnP you have leadership feat so a player could choose a useless tank to play but then have a wizard henchman to craft magical armor/weapons for him or research portal keys or whatever other caster-inherent function, just as a wizard player could have tank henchmen to comprise a sword-n-board army of meatshield bodygaurds or marauding troops, which is direct translation of "improved summons") Maybe it's time for fresh round of "improve tank self-sufficiency in light of casters, especially arcanes, having been repeatedly rewarded with even more self-sufficiency than they inherently enjoy by virtue of basic game mechanics" Im adjusting their AC as if a 3/4 ab open toon was up against them SR is pretty linear to scale throughout the levels conceal will see some action too each boss will have atleast 1 element they are weak against (not to be confused with vulnerable) the above is true with phys and/or exotic as a tag boss, I feel they shouldnt be cheesed by hoping they roll a 1 and die to some insta death spell I may experiment with one or two of them to teach about kickback and healing types on a small scale Much of the tags pre-20 wont see too much change because it will be tough on quasiclasses otherwise. That sounds great and I still agree just as discussed Although I still have to say that the instakill thing is a bit fluffed-up and shouldn't be a concern, since as I mentioned previously, it's really no more of a loophole or exploit or potential advantage than pure dmg-based cheese make all tag bosses immune to evards and soups and have the "wall disintegrator" attribute of endgame tough mobs, then we'd be onto something in fact just change evards to respect SR and spell-level imm, and change non-herald clouds to likewise respect spell level imm no more vortex cheese But anyway, yeah, glad you're taking this task/project to heart with pride and doing the job right kc for prez!
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Post by KnightErrant on Jul 9, 2014 20:01:56 GMT
I guess at this point we need to go thru the green new player approved builds like this highergroundpoa.proboards.com/thread/21129 and put big disclaimer notices "THIS BUILD WILL NOT BE ABLE TO SOLO the PRELL Accomplishment Tags ! "So don't play them if you don't have people to play with... "if you must play a stupid non buffing tank, level it as a mage and then reincarnate before doing the Immortal run". Seems like the wrong message to send to new players but it's what works in the current environment...making the tag givers even less melee friendly would seem to warrant a warning sign at the docks when you log in... ****"You CANNOT solo the accomplishment tag givers if you cant cast spells !"**** You have been warned ! KE.
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Post by kingcamaro on Jul 9, 2014 20:56:47 GMT
I dont understand where you are getting the idea they will be less melee friendly. If anything some need to be more melee friendly and more caster resistant. to clarify, the sort of melee toon im thinking of would be something like a rogue, a 3/4 bab build going up against these tags, not some uber buffed paladin that can buff themselves
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Post by desocupado on Jul 9, 2014 21:57:33 GMT
Given the last ideas I'd recommend:
1 - Remove a few areas from tag list, and use them explicitly for tutorial about healing, immunity, stat checks and other elements judged worthy. The tutorial areas could reward with a secret subrace book usable at 40, giving new players a tangible goal. The chasing npc at the docks could hand out the lore/quest to these areas/mechanics to characters with open subraces.
2 - Make henchman really good, but one sided. So a tank could employ a necromancer wizard (with IGMS for damage) or a druid with soup spells. This would allow the completion of tags by compensating their weaknesses. Tanks henchman could include a battletide prayer battle cleric and a monk-rogue-dexter type. If Solo players could employ 2 it would balance out even a bard or a dwarf warchanter.
3 - Avoid physical resistances, but use % immunity (dexters need love at low levels) - specially on ALL bosses. If you really want to teach tanks about weapon swapping, make a enemy take 25% of all elements but +150% (netting 10x more damage) from weakness, making it much less frustrating than 100% immunity or high resistances - grim looking at many tags/enemies.
4 - Bosses with lower AC but some concealment. ---
The lack of love for (some) tanks could be adressed on another topic. Propositions usually revolve around either easier multiclassing, npc buffers and more abilities overlapping with casters.
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Post by chirality on Jul 9, 2014 22:42:18 GMT
I dont understand where you are getting the idea they will be less melee friendly. If anything some need to be more melee friendly and more caster resistant. to clarify, the sort of melee toon im thinking of would be something like a rogue, a 3/4 bab build going up against these tags, not some uber buffed paladin that can buff themselves Well, probably that idea is coming from any buff to stats, period Making a given boss overall harder but "weak" to a given element doesn't really do much for tanks. That would still require good weapons and likely a weapon buff of the given type. For example if Kard gets overall buffs to hp, AC, various attributes, but is weak to elec, that doesn't help anyone that doesn't have a weapon dealing decent amount of elec damage, which is kind of asking a lot (it's not like there's some easily-found 1-20range equivalent to L50/LL "megadamage" weaps [and even with random 50 weaps, you could randomize 5 or more without getting one with the type you want on it]). The shop megadamage weapons are exorbitantly pricey (around 2 mill each iirc, 1.8+ iirc for the 1st set and the 2nd ones @ 27 are like 2.2ish iirc) and aren't useable until 20s+. Meanwhile the lowbie rare weaps only are dealing 2dice of any given element type which isn't really much without buffs (and level 5 weaps have one stat, 1d6 ele type. It's a bit odd that there's such a wide gap in level range for rare weaps; 5 but then not another till 20...meh...everything else in between is shop weaps, which are totally idiosyncratic, weird static drops of totally idiosyncratic nature). Currently the 20+ rareweaps are useful for the exotic types vs. the infamous hard-to-kill bosses that only take exo, but even then it's a bit ridiculous (not like everyone has a pariah or pal/bg for that buff). Of course what I've gathered is that you intend to remove this entirely...which is a good thing... I'm think KE is voicing an understandable wariness of what these changes might produce. As an example...the 1st lowbie boss that's really almost impossible to kill without lucky nice weapons (L20 rare/randomly applicable shop weaps) or weapon buffs is Corpse Lord and you can hammer away at him forever with a weapon doing 10 or less pts of penetration of various type(s) and still not beat his regen, or barely beat it...course couple that with EV and it's even more annoying (and good luck trying to wait out those buffs till they expire...respawns come first...and not like anything except holy sword or a mord scroll is gonna dispel it...for that matter even some of the "minion" mobs on that "run" can be virtually impossible/extremely time-consuming to kill with unbuffed weapons without proper type...) I guess the point is any increase in difficulty is, no matter how you cut it, an increase in difficulty...really KE summed it up when he said the concern is how to make a thing into a worthy opponent and not so vulnerable to cheesy caster tactics (which as far as I can tell is the main motivation in the first place for making things more difficult), yet still doable by newbie with newbie gear... After initial excitement has passed I'm starting to get curious...is each boss going to be vulnerable to all 3 phys types? (otherwise must a tank carry a different un-focused backup weapon of different type just to damage it?) What about soak? What's your take on soak? Some already very low level tags like Rat King already have some soak that's hard to beat without weapon buffs or a build that happens to focus in a weap that the shops happen to sell a version of useable for you with decent stats...for instance if you look back at summons complaints threads you can see how annoyed people were that their new "improved" summons were dealing 0 phys damage to virtually anything with soak unless the summons got +enh added...and as I pointed out over a year ago, summons now tend to have "free" weapons that are already more powerful and meaningful at low levels than what a newbie tank without selfbuff capability or caster partymate could be reasonably expected to carry around...ever tried to take a nonselfbuffer with normal shop weap vs. bandits? good luck...they're only level 16 and pack some quite intense soak/resists...vulnerability to a couple types (which they do have) doesn't really cut it...and yes despite whining to the contrary I don't think they're too powerful for level 16 toons *with the proper tools* but both the "proper tools" issue and the 16-->20 cap issue are 2 different stories... now better weapons availability and diversity for lowbies is something that's been long-advocated...as well as *coff* sources of weap buffs for lowbies as per NPC in town or consumables or something, or just hugely improved weapon stats + nerf to weap buffs...but obviously no one is holding their breath on this being attended to since it gets shot down or ignored every time it comes up...and now we have a new loot expert eager to apply his experience from other games into coordinating a massive lowbie loot overhaul...but the "lowbie loot master" guy doesn't seem to have any understanding or concern for gritty issues like this...instead he's wandering off in philosophy-land about planning everything to be themed and rigidly conceived to some guidelines based from his take on dachy and bp loot my fear is that regardless what specific numbers and tweaks you're planning, KC, something *must* be done to address lowbie tank viability...otherwise it's all for naught in terms of newbie friendliness...casters are pretty intimidating to newbie players, and I find that in general they must be actively pestered/goaded into even trying casters for a long time...tanks, especially bad tanks that can't selfbuff and/or crappy classes like the rogue you mention as benchmark, tend to be the most popular for new players...it generally doesn't take long for them to realize that what they thought was an easy and comfortable and forgiving choice turned out to be quite the opposite...and even more distress caused after quest xp nerf...(hopefully once you get your hands on mob xp values that will cease to be an issue ) and this grief over extreme hassle of playing solo tanks as lowbie is *before* any "lowbie mob upgrade" goes in... as for quasiclasses, actually i find these aren't really any issue at all for lowbie tags, or at least not till the higher-level (30/35+) range that I understand will be fixed to be more friendly and compatible for any class or player experience level?...since quasis can selfbuff and even use scrolls and wands...and most feedback on forums tends to agree that quasis are fine at ultralowbie levels, even quite nice ("i played a BK to level 29 and it was great" etc etc)...i'm not sure what you mean by making lowbie tags more quasi friendly...as of now, low ACs on mobs make them decently friendly...seems like this would only be an issue once the mobs get upgraded stats
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Post by chirality on Jul 9, 2014 22:58:28 GMT
If you really want to teach tanks about weapon swapping, make a enemy take 25% of all elements but +150% (netting 10x more damage) from weakness, making it much less frustrating than 100% immunity or high resistances - grim looking at many tags/enemies. Ingame we agreed that some sort of VERY EASY brief taste/tutorial for lategame mechanics would be nice...but lol weapon swapping...most vets still don't even understand this concept and if they do they simply refuse to bother or are just too lazy...if i had a DB weap for every time i saw disturbing pre-hellrun party chat about "all buffs x2 plz" or watching guy use stygian razor throughout entire stygia (no, not you Rose, no worries i mean people who know better )... However I actually am surprisingly pleased with your idea; that sounds very reasonable and friendly enough without being unfriendly or punishing...nice, nice...allow even "bad" types to still "work" but show that "right" type is highly rewarded...that's a great idea since it's still a pale version of how brutal endgame is but after all this should be fun lowbie stuff "with some teaching thrown in if possible" Anyway, I really like that! As for healing, if this could/should/would be done too (kc mentioned it and altho i like it, it might simply be overkill) I'd simply limit it to some certain mobs that already are 100% immune to the given type, and let them heal say 1 pt of dmg, but show heal animation...so it's visually useful but doesn't result in uber overhealed mobs like what tends to happen in endgame...and it might be actually productive in lowbie zones where there's way less "going on" (i think one reason why even vets are clueless about heals, other than obvious factors of "too much effort/too much work to learn/etc etc) is that sometimes it's just plain hard to notice unless you're avid/obsessive combatlog watcher like me, or running HGX I would propose something like, well, tbh since we ARE talking about redoing lowbie mobs anyway...1st off undeadish mobs should stop being vulnerable to neg dmg...this is silly...make all undead-ish mobs actually undead instead of constructs or whatever like some of them actually are...even many vets still never learned that a lot of things that seem quite obviously undead are *surprise* not really undead...make these 100% neg immune and heal full x1 to neg dmg (as per gaobin vampyrs?, and as vanilla mechanics suggest anyway, so that's easiest thing in the world to understand)...fire elementals in lava king could be "fire heal"...but for these NOT anything like LL+ mobs that do full 1x or 10x dmg heal...just simply some superlow number, like single-digit, coupled with obvious impossible-to-miss visual animation...really there shouldn't be very many and the ones that do should be totally a matter of common sense and not of idiosyncratic "vet knowledge" (like some "undead seeming mobs that aren't really undead" but you can only learn this after trial and error or a protip)... i can't think of any other examples really atm actually hehe...kc and i discussed water beetles vs fire beetles but i think that's a bit too early on to be realistic (also they're just beetles...)...mobs that could be 100% imm/baby healers should at least be extraordinary and magical creatures like undead and elementals (altho I can't think of any other elementals except the fire eles in lava king and the earth eles in prometheus pass...the other thing we agreed was perhaps dragons could be viable for this but that could be arguable...still it should be extremely obvious and as I discussed with Rose ingame not long ago, one thing that luckily does remain pretty constant throughout HG is concept of opposing elements on draconic creatures...lowbie tags thru abishai thru consorts...shouldn't be too unfriendly or difficult to understand...or if this is all too complicated and unfriendly then simply use deso's suggestion as universal rule... 4 - Bosses with lower AC but some concealment. omgz! Please no. Conceal is (imo) the single worst and most broken-ly black-white/one-sided mechanic of NWN engine that I wish had simply been totally removed/ignored from the start on this mod (and in HG's hi-powered environment it has only created endless problems due to endless attempts to utilize it as a balancer and then clean up the aftermath). I understand the idea to teach about how all-important conceal is in hells but this sounds just plain pain-inducing. Unless of course by "some" conceal you mean like...10%...but the "mage" bosses already have conceal to teach this anyway (corpse lord, raz for example) anyway all this teaches is that tanks without Listen suck (and that orbs suck, right trolo)...yep it's a great lesson that's well-grounded in endgame reality, but like endgame reality, it doesn't have any aspect of fun to it...especially since at low levels Listen isn't very high, if present in a meaningful skill+ at all, and BF is quite overpowered...so that could easily create a dynamic reminiscent of extreme value of Listen classes/LSA Listen in endgame ("open sub build edit 07-28-14: well, due to lowbie mob upgrade placing conceal on tag bosses X Y and Z, we now recommend that you simply skip Listen until post-immo reinc and just take BF instead, otherwise you won't have much fun tagging)...again, a great lesson, but not a fun one...and conceal-dropping abilities aren't really existent @ lowbie levels...
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Post by desocupado on Jul 10, 2014 1:13:21 GMT
True, pre-LL can't fight concealment, but it's night impossible for most tanks to get magic BAB bonus, thus creating an AB gap of over 5-15 points between a tank with or without buffs like: magic weapon + tenser + song.
Concealment can accomplish the same defense level regardless of AB buffs, if low enough (50% or less).
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Post by khaine on Jul 10, 2014 1:15:11 GMT
desocupado - Earlier you mentioned better pre-LL shops. I think using the uncommon tier of random loot to supply unrandomisable gear from level 1-40 would adress the issue (as per my initial suggestion), and respect the three issues you raised then.
- I'm split on Dres vs Dimm - on player gear I think Dres is better at low levels because a low value of Dres is better than a low Dimm. If we want to have creatures with extreme vunerability/defence against elements, perhaps Dimm is better for that. Using both is where things can get difficult to deal with.
- Regarding concealment: I think it's appropriate not with low AC, but with almost no AC. Conceal can be a great way to control hit rate, but when both ac and concealment are in play it becomes very difficult to hit (just like Dres & Dimm). This could result in 'conceal-bosses' being hard to kill without either Listen or buffs.
fallenwizard- First, I would like to mention the Random Shop idea I put in my first post. I think this would give a ramp of good gear scaling over all levels, and make the shop loot less idiosyncratic. Also, level requirement *can* be changed directly, despite the default nwn item value scripts (At least, I asked Funky about it), although most items weren't built with that option. I don't think nwn default loot is that important for gold purposes - gold for kills is new and helps out there, and could be buffed. However, the gold situation is part of a much bigger problem that's been around forever. Better minds than mine have failed to provide a perfect solution there. That nwn default loot *can* be useful sometimes though, you're right. Boots of Speed and the like are used as static loot in some parts of the map, and all standard shop loot is default loot. Removing nwn default loot would mean removing those containers which drop the 'random' default loot, but not the default loot that's intentionally included.
- You also talk about is the value of +AC vs level. I'm not sure exactly where the boundries are. The first 5 loot tiers (up to 20-25) each have two [Armour] of protections, one common and one uncommon, so the 20-25 range has +9 & +10 armor. This fits with default item value by the way. If the Rare tier also has +1AC, then it might be each tier past 5 adds +1AC to max AC bonus, not +2.The +X's that double over the first tiers run out before Tier 8, but I don't know how the +X's that only usually have one item per tier reach +10. If anyone knows how it all breaks down, I'd be interested to learn (would save me a lot of time).
chirality - I'm glad you mention the gap between level 5 and 20 weapons. I too think that it seems odd, and think that perhaps this weapon set should be buffed slightly and moved up a rarity tier. Tthis might make them more common since there are a lot more areas in that loot range and players spend more time in that level range. It would also be neater.
- Heheh, as much as I like the title "lowbie loot master", I am not planning a massive loot overhaul. My suggestions have been modest and easily achievable - I haven't even suggested adding or changing anything. While you may take what I've done as philosophizing I remind you that I have a very clear list of practical steps I want to take. You go as far as saying I'm planning "everything to be themed and rigidly conceived to some guidelines" with my philosophizing. Now the only rigid thing about those set loot guidelines is that nothing should be added (including things conforming to the guideline) without first taking some other stuff away, and even that isn't absolute. They also quite clearly downplay the importance of 'themes' as 'lore' value. Nor do they suggest that all set loot should be of the sort discussed in those guidelines. So I don't think "everything to be themed and ridigly conceived" is at all accurate.
- As far as having no concern for this issue? Apart from the level 5 weapon thing which I've already been looking into, my suggestions already affect this issue. The set chests that could spawn from random weapon lists can easily help improve weapon availability, while the swap shops for weapons (both those probably restricted to proficiency) would help improve diversity. However, I'm not sure if those are watertight ideas - I do like my weapons random and that's why I haven't pushed further into those ideas on this topic. Still, it's all there in my first post. The set loot guidelines you claim I'm philosophizing about instead of problems like this are applicable here, though I suppose I shouldn't be suprised that you don't see that.
- We can use Sissy, Myco, Uro, PoM, Elysium and Aboleth weapons as examples of weapon sets which conform to the ideas laid out in those guidelines and address this issue. They have enhancement bonuses that make them good without GMW (or equivalent), while random (or lacking +Enh) weapons are still better otherwise. Those areas only have a few types of weapons each, but cover the full range together. I suggest that that split is done by proficiency at low levels: it's easier to learn. Introducing set loot like this would increase weapon availability and diversity as well as tackling the issue of weapon buffs, but since all the weapons share properties and all drop from the same list it would be easy to make the weapons. Another way to adress weapon buffs is with the random-only consumables I suggest drop in Pre-LLs. Please tell me again how those ideas are pure philosophising, or how I have no concern for or understanding of those problems.
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Post by desocupado on Jul 10, 2014 2:13:05 GMT
Random lowbie weapons are very, very frustrating, due how specific are weapon feats work.
People need to choose a weapon as decision, not as sheer luck of having dropped one at correct level.
Thinking about it... Some weapons can have IC or even weapon focus.
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Post by condude on Jul 10, 2014 3:00:36 GMT
Lol no toon you ever make is a "noob", this is silly and you know it This is completely incorrect and backwards. You honestly think your -HC- toons are in any way relevant* to what a new player faces? Get real I, for one, don't have any banks in HC until immo. I play with storebought/found gear the entire way up. The advantages my new toons have is a) subby, and b) experience, and those are both powerful. It's much closer to being a noob than anything non-HC.
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Post by chirality on Jul 10, 2014 3:44:06 GMT
We can use Sissy, Myco, Uro, PoM, Elysium and Aboleth weapons as examples of weapon sets which conform to the ideas laid out in those guidelines and address this issue. They have enhancement bonuses that make them good without GMW (or equivalent) First let me say that I regretted being so caustic earlier (and would have gone back to edit/delete the sarcastically-mean parts if I had enjoyed the hindsight soon enough that it might not have been noticed); I'm thankful that you're willing to continue a conversation after what I said, and I apologize and intend to do my best at actually backing up the trolling. Anyway, I believe the above quote indicates a bit of what I view as you lacking some grounding with the realities at play here. There's a few points I'll attempt to make: a) These weapons really aren't very useful without GMW, because their +enh is too low to penetrate anything in LLs let alone past that. Do I have proof via numbers, no, but I can tell you that Sissy, Myco, and Uro weapons tend to be used in LLs/Hells+ only with a few conditions: 1) a GMW source of 13 or higher is placed on the weapon; 2) for attacking mobs which don't take physical damage in the first place and are thus useful for the elemental type; even then, generally only by tanks that can't buff themselves, or for advantageously-large ele dice when buffed by appropriate dmg buff; 3) when lacking a better weapon at all. For instance a non-selffbuff tank in desert can use a sissy weap to bash sands to some effect; and can employ a coldweap-buffed Uro weap to decent effect vs something like a PF. However, in the presence of multiple buffs, these are virtually unused and worthless when compared to a DB weapon. To be completely honest I'm not sure if at some point in the past these weapons' +enh was actually effective enough to be utilized without GMW in Hells, but what I do know is that even in an early LL run like Desert, 11 or 12 doesn't cut it, and a L50 weapon with +13 vs. a +14 GMW weap shows a marked difference in log phys dmg for a Str tank on later LLs such as Uro; meanwhile it's commonly-known (?) that 14 is the "minimum" for beating Hells+ trash mob soak. b) I don't really see how you can group those weapons together for comparison, because there really aren't many similarities except that they all are part of the "special weapons" drops from "LL runs". Uro, Myco, PoM, and Sissy, sure, all follow very similar stats (with +enh changing, and with various other differences like PoM vamp regen, but overall "1 ele + 1 exo" as a rule. However Abo weaps are a quite different story. First of all, even within "Abo weaps" there's a difference--"abo weaps", which are themselves unique amongst other "LL weaps" as being comprised not of 1ele+1exo type (but rather 2ele+1exo, which seem to fit "abo" flavor decently well but fail completely by comparison with more favorable weapons in nearly any application due to only 4 dice each); and then the qstaff, which is quite unique again, and in that way is more of a "unique case" with the 2 Rona weapons (similar to eachother but otherwise quite unique) + the Ely gloves. I must again mention here that Abo weaps tend to be pretty useless, or at least viewed as such by the players capable of actually farming them, and I've never once seen or heard of anyone wielding or asking for buffs on one of the "other" abo weaps (weak 12 gmw, weird types, uncraftable, it's just a lame weapon). In fact, when I started here, there was still quite some mention of Order's Wrath, but I haven't heard much if anything about it in a very long time, and since multiple edits to monks, PLs, and Weap Spec, I can only imagine that it's not really very favorable these days, not that anyone except old aborunners from "back then" even has it anyway. Second of all, other than the monk gloves, Ely weaps are extremely similar to Hive weaps, as both are son megadmg weaps but a tradeoff of div vs. mag, but regardless, I've never really heard of anyone asking for clang + div weap on an Ely weap either (nor hive weaps tbh, since there aren't many examples of mobs which it's worth using a sonic megadmg weap on in place of a crafted DB/dis; the best weapon to come from Hive is the ranger bow). c) Well, I don't understand how these weapons conform to any universal guidelines at all, or what about them you view as useful for developing new lowbie weapons. Again, +enh of 11 or 12 is quite pathetic and useless, and it's really no better than complete lack of +enh at all, so you're simply wrong that their inherent GMW makes them good. However, that's only the minor sticking point; the main issue is that I fail to recognize what issue these varied weapons address or what guidelines they conform to (other than flavor, which surely is laudable, but nothing impressive for numbergamers, and choosing flavor over practice is failworthy for players concerned about being as effective as possible) while random (or lacking +Enh) weapons are still better otherwise. Those areas only have a few types of weapons each, but cover the full range together. Firstly, what do you mean by " "random" (or lacking +enh) " weapons? There is no universal definition that's easily-visible for this phrase. The only weapons I can think of (other than obviously, the ultralowbie silly shop weaps with stuff like +5 hide/+2 fire dmg or something like that) lacking +enh fall into 2 categories, and only 1 of those categories could be labelled "random"--the level 5 and level 20 weapons, which are only "random" by nature of being technically "random rare drops"; the level 29 and 35 rare weaps (technically random) do include +enh bonus, and the level 50 UR weaps also enjoy a +13 enh that can often make them more favorable vs LL "megadmg" weaps, as a tradeoff of crucial +1 soak penetration at the loss of 1 dice ele dmg. The second category of weapons lacking +enh would be DB weaps, but of course these fail in any way to meet definition of "random" loot; not only are they "set loot" requiring boss tag, dropping as boss loot, but in fact the exact same number (3) drop each time without fail. The only thing random about DB weaps is which 3 drop, so considering that you can only be referring to either DB weaps or L5/20 rares, I'm not sure what you mean with the abovequoted statement. I'm honestly not trying to pick apart words or play semantics just for the sake of argument; I just don't get what you mean, and along with other similar claims I've seen in your posts, I just am concerned that you're seeing some laws and guidelines that simply don't exist. Again, I must repeat that the sub-performing GMW on LL megadmg weaps is a) weaker and less effective than L50 URs, and b) actually doesn't really add any value whatsoever to them, except perhaps for a nonbuff solo tank in a low LL run who lacks the AB to hit mobs otherwise due to not previously meeting magical AB cap, and/or simply lacks any better option (yes, they're surely preferable to trying to use unbuffed L35 rare in the desert, but obviously that's beside any worthwhile point at hand here). Now as a final note, which is rather offtopic but which you may find interesting, I would have to mention @ the 2nd abovequoted sentence that I find the varied and seemingly-senseless nature of LL/hells special weap scatterings to be quite lame and silly. I take it from that sentence that you believe it's a good thing that each area only provides a few weapon types, but I think it's quite horrid. It seems to have no rhyme or reason (other than to ensure, as you say, a toon can at least rely on having SOME run drop his weap), but it's absolute crap for a few reasons: 1) it enjoys no guiding principle or system, so newbies are completely confused and must rely on referencing charts/sheets/wiki page to discover what weap type comes from what run, or ask vets, and I find even vets tend to almost universally lack knowledge of what drops where, or at least complete knowledge of it. 2) it has the semblance of balance but I believe it fails to achieve anything useful; all it does is promote certain weapon types as "good" (X weapon has A run megadmg version, that's a point in it's favor!") or "not so good (Y weapon doesn't have A run megadmg version, that's a point against it!"). Overall I find the system to be just plain ridiculous and bad, and I've long hoped it could be fixed 3) The run difficulties (time investment/skill level/class composition required) vary widely and the "good-ness" of the weapons in no way line up with the difficulties. All in all it comes off as what I can only imagine it was: the game evolving and stuff being added as best it could. 4) Finally, the uncraftable nature of these weapons means that they're unfavorable in any circumstance with a healer present, and as a result this is one of the primary reasons that they aren't used often in Hells/Abyss (I think?); it's simply not worth the tank's misses to swap or the caster's time/slots to buff yet one extra weapon when compared to a DB (or Dis I suppose, although those also have largely fallen out of favor for a long time now). Anyway, I notice you only mentioned a few of the LL megadmg weaps (you missed Dulv + Loca), and again related Abos weaps to the rest which is a bit misleading, so I'm not sure if I'm being a dick about an oversight or if you actually intended to say that "those runs" only had weapons you approved of, but Dulv/Loca weaps lack meeting the goals you applauded--I'll assume it's not the latter, and I'm just being picky, but again I can't be sure since you place quite some emphasis on these guidelines which you continue referencing but which, despite reading several thousand words' worth of your explanations, I *still* don't understand the definition of or the merit of, or how it will be applied to your lowbie changes. Ideally I'd certainly have *absolutely* no system for lowbie weapons which resembles LL megadamage weaps; it's horrendous and hard to grasp and annoying. The only change necessary at lowbie weapons level is as discussed previously: make them easier to obtain, add in 1 or 2 new "tiers" of random Rare weaps (@10 and 15, or 10 and 16, or whatever maybe), and add "fairly-easily-available" non-PC source of weap buffs available to lowbie tanks. I guess I did miss your mention in previous posts about addressing the weap buff issue; my apologies for both that omission as well as again apologizing for the rather malicious sarcasm earlier. On a closing note, I don't understand what you meant with either reference to the "proficiencies"...both with the "splitting" comment in the 3rd bullet/paragraph or the swap comment in the 2nd bullet/paragraph. Do you mean that (for the former; and taken together with the reference to using LL megadmg as a template) you intend to create lowbie "megadmg" weaps based on LL weaps, but dropping as entire proficiency lists at a time (or, I don't know...I'm totally confused here)..and for the swapping thing, do you mean that you intend to allow random rare weapons to be swapped within the same proficiencies (I assume on a 1:1 basis? again, not sure what you're getting at precisely), or do you mean that you intend to allow the "new" lowbie megadmg weaps to be swapped within the same proficiencies? Or both? Ninja edit to replace new doublepost, since I don't like having trollderail as 1st post on a new page! I, for one, don't have any banks in HC until immo. I play with storebought/found gear the entire way up. The advantages my new toons have is a) subby, and b) experience, and those are both powerful. It's much closer to being a noob than anything non-HC. Since it's been so long, I'll eagerly snap up the bait. Mmm, tasty! I *specifically* referred to KC (and explicitly addressed the entire post to him), so unless it wasn't obvious enough, allow me to clarify: I wasn't talking to you, or about you, and don't care what you do, and there's really no need to justify how hardcore you are to me. Since you mention it though, and since despite multiple instances of intentionally bickering with me in the past (regardless of admin displeasure) you yet again felt the need to derail/troll me, I'll gladly offer a response: Ironically, the advantages you mention (and which you can't help but brag as being "powerful") in fact line up precisely with the point I was making (despite your concluding sentence). You've got it backwards: "powerful subraces" (congrats btw, we're all proud of you!) and "powerful experience" ( jury's still out on this one ) don't make you close AT ALL to being a noob, let alone CLOSER to being a noob than "anything non-HC". They are 2 of the *primary differences* between a vet and a new player, and without question, experience regardless of gear/subraces is exactly what defines the difference. Nub =/= noob, and we all know the difference, and the endless self-praise by a few -HC- players is something else which we all know for what it is. In one single post you manage to simultaneously diss normal mode players as being distanced from new players; flatter yourself and yearn for flattery from others (which, after years of RIP shouts and "wow congratz!" kudos from normal mode players, you learned was easily-available for anyone with -HC- label); and you claim to be relevant to new players. Triple fail. Feel free to try again with the trollbait in another few months, but that's surely enough interaction between us to last for quite a while
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