Mages on recoded balance

[Targun]

Kiara

By this, I mean that if a fighter wants to stand toe-to-toe with a mage, both of them wearing the same gear and having the same size and health, and simply employing their attacks against one another as the only tactic, the mage does more damage and will win.

In other words. Yes, Kiara, you're right, but hem... but the mage wins! Scissors cut paper, paper covers rock, rock crashes scissors, and as it has always been - mage evaporizes all. How can't you not get it... duh, you stupido. Can't you see the brilliance and logic behind beautifully built statement? Oh, you don't... hmm... me neither. So at least you're not alone in being a dumbass. One day you will learn that if one class wins 10 out of 10 encounters vs another it doesn't mean it's inequality or it's more powerful... it just means... hm... it's balanced in a different, more equal way... See? Wasn't that hard to grasp the idea. You just need to learn that what it means does not mean what it means, it means what you are told it means. Much, much easier this way! Just don't make a false assumption that The balance is a situation in which every party has unique abilities and only on the usage of these abilities - available at similar effort / cost - the outcome depends. This is wro... wrong approach. Keep that in mind.


Gorboth

Inn your post you state what you believe are facts without any sources to back them up. This is hardly following any rules of logic or reasoning. In fact, one of the fundamental rules of logic, known as far as in ancient Greece says that 'from a false statement you can prove anything'. Not that the the thesis- on which you seemed to built the whole concept- that if something used to be in a certain way in the past makes it right and true is a valid argument (there used to be slavery in USA, and statistically - if you're black, you still get much better chance for an electric chair). But bending to the convention:

1. None of the successful MMORPG games to which you often seem to relate to implemented the magic vs physical system of rapid vs sustained demage in a way bearing the most insignificat resemblance to what you describe. None of these limited the 'burst' style only to magic users. At best - if ultraoffensive clothed caster meets a melee he dies in nanoseconds- that indeed has been true for most of the system past last 30 years. And definetely none combined - insane demage with crowd control - you want damage - you give up CC, you get cc - you give up demage.

1.2 Not only that -the assumptions you make - that it has been a rule - has no reflection in these systems. Backing up as far as to D&D - such systems had not been common at all - for a simple reason- they do not make sense. E.g. You could play a monk or barbarian who would dish out insane amounts of demage. If you wanted to play ultraoffensive caster you needed to stay back, or you'd die from 1-2 hits of your opponent.

1.3 Moreover, in these games you've go the right to select melee/ranged/magic classes freely and often shift between specializations to adapt to a specific kind of playstyle. This is also true for single player games. The dmg output - to a very reasonable point - is comparable.

2. If you make a statement 'a guild is fairly balanced'- then every player in the game should have a right to test it himself/ herslef as it is with the most guilds in the game. Instaed you a are limiting it to the chosen few.

2.1. How come you often give a lot of details regarding the melee guilds, even in your notes on board, but refuse to give the same amount of information about a caster guild? Don't you think it's sort of breaking the rules? "Pigs being more equal?"

3. There was probably more effort put into recoding one mage guild - for just few players- who have for many years had tight connections to wizardhood / had wizard chars themselves than into all of the combat guilds combined. Talk about equality and fair treatment...

4. 99% of the dmg in game is physical. You require players to be carrying a separate set of items (non-existing in the game as of current moment), just in case they encounter limited few, who have been getting special treatment for 20 years and continue to, wheras the limited few can happily cleave through the game?

I could go on like that for a long time. And to be honest I would not mind if guild A or B was OP. But why you people are so compelled to hipocracy? This I could never understand. It's really the only thing that made me write this note. Whom are you lying to? Why don't you jsut say - we think mage guilds should be considerably more powerful than other guilds, to give the flavor to the game, keep guys who praise us happy, and because we want to. Period. How hard is that?

Do you honestly think anybody believes that post? I have the most vague idea of how the game currently looks like and I would have had no opinion on the topic - just a bunch of people arguing, until I read your post. And I knew right away, that nothing has changed it the core values the game has built upon.

Finally, a little bit OOT- a general, non person specific comment. A bit out of curiosity. What's happening to american english? For the past 10 years, I observed that native americans almost completely lost the ability to formulate their own sentences. Everyone is using fixed frazes, and just replaces the slogans repeated by politicians and media (terrorirts, terrorirts, terrorirsts, safety, safety, terrorirts, education, terrorits, terrorirts, safety, terrorirts, healthcare, terrorists, invigilation, terrorists, invigilation, safety, feel safe, you're being invigilated for your own good, terrorists, the guy who revealed a scheme Orwell or Nabokov didn't even dream about is a traitor, terrorirts, feel safe, invigilation is for your own good and safety, traitor, terrorists) with something else they have on agenda.

Sentences without a meaning, a lot of words - a facade - without any meaning. You take out a few random nouns you blindly picked in a dictionary and replace those you had in those sentences and they still sound perfectly fine- 'cept there is just vast emptiness behind those pretty sentences.

The moment I see this corpo-politic style incorporated in everyday speech, written content whatever, I know the person is lying. If you're making a lie, at least be creative. It's impossible to read and I'm really not sure if the society got brainwashed to that point, but if you listen to the propaganda style of Soviet Union you sort of feel at home.

Personally, I feel offended by anyone starting to use this style. False, enforced, political correctness. Really, it's terrible. I don't mind people being assholes. In fact, I tend to like them. I just can't stay this communication style. Please stop it. It's awful. So I beg you - native american people - please stop using the style. You are probably the second society in the modern history (after the North Korea), who actually believes the propaganda, and me, as a polish citizen, in 15 years time I just swapped from being invigilated by Soviet Union, to being invigilated by your country, so at least save me the style.

[Habiki]

On the armor issue, it seems to me that armor capacity would more logically be determined by race rather than guild-type. Changing armor capability would be too difficult to code, in general. The most logical solution is to use the systems we already have in place - specifically defense and parry skills. I don't know, but I would assume that magic guilds have lower defensive skills. If their defense is still deemed too strong, the simplest solution would be to just lower the max skill levels, and the problem and therefore solved.

Yes, armors are very important, but stats should determine armor capability. A newbie can't wear heavy armors because they're too encumbered since they don't have the strength. Encumbrance increases damage taken and decreases damage dealt. If magic users have the stats to wear heavy armor, they should logically be able to do so. Again, the simple solution would be to lower defense and parry skill. Furthermore, I think if the MMs are rolling around using two shields, they therefore can't parry or do much of any melee damage. That being said, I can see how this would buy time to cast spells and weaken opponents, then wield a weapon to finish someone off. Defense skill reduction also fixes this buying time problem.

Targun, it is off-topic, so I'll keep it short and simple. As an American, I can say that half the people see through the deceptive propaganda and mind games, while the other half buy into it. It depends a lot on the geographical distribution and ages of the American population. Also, I don't see this factoring into how people act on Genesis.

Cheers!

[OgreToyBoy]

Can't see you do anything but blocking hits if using two tower shields.

[Celephias]

Can't see you do anything but blocking hits if using two tower shields.

I can assure you I take a good bit of damage with MBP and 2 tower shields. As you can imagine my defensive fighting skills are not very good

[Windemere]

Perhaps a new topic should be started.

One where we can discuss PvP and Game Balance without detracting from the conversation surrounding the Mages Recode. I think we are entering into a much larger debate and it would be useful to have that conversation without diluting what has already been discussed here in respect to the topic.

This topic deserves its own thread.

On that note I just want to say that MMORPGs also provide skill trees, and have for a long time, that allow for customization of a character based on play style and would allow for a player to reset (to a degree) this skill tree and try something else.

Genesis allows for that as well. Through Death (to respec stats) and through Guild changes. It takes longer but has a similar result. What I would be concerned about, and would hate to see, is balance that takes us to the exact same guilds with different descriptions and slightly different skill sets.

Personally I think without seeing the numbers I can't really judge how balanced things really are. I bet that Petros has a secret room where he can create any guild and fight it against any other guild many times to see the results in various situations and with various types of eq/strategies. So I bet he has a pretty good idea on who can do what when. Maybe some creative people should suggest things he hasn't thought of and see if they can shift the balance. Personally I'd love to watch a test in that room!

Windemere

[gorboth]

Yikes, Targun! I can see my note really pushed your buttons. I'll do my best to respond, but bear in mind that there is extreme danger that I will lapse into pure propaganda, risking an explosion to everything that sits above your shoulders (apparently.)

one of the fundamental rules of logic, known as far as in ancient Greece says that 'from a false statement you can prove anything'.

Hey, I like that quote! Let's see if I can put it to good use ...

1. None of the successful MMORPG games to which you often seem to relate to implemented the magic vs physical system of rapid vs sustained demage in a way bearing the most insignificat resemblance to what you describe. None of these limited the 'burst' style only to magic users. At best - if ultraoffensive clothed caster meets a melee he dies in nanoseconds- that indeed has been true for most of the system past last 30 years. And definetely none combined - insane demage with crowd control - you want damage - you give up CC, you get cc - you give up demage.

Wow ... lots of hyperbole here. I wonder if that might actually translate into these being some false statements. I wonder what they've proven? "None" of the games are "bearing the most insignificant resemblance" to what I've described? Gosh. Maybe the games you've been playing are actually farming simulators, or perhaps something about cooking? I'd figure otherwise they might bear at least some minor resemblance to the archetypes I described where mages do more damage with their attacks. Maybe a fishing game? Err ... poker?

1.2 Not only that -the assumptions you make - that it has been a rule - has no reflection in these systems. Backing up as far as to D&D - such systems had not been common at all - for a simple reason- they do not make sense. E.g. You could play a monk or barbarian who would dish out insane amounts of demage. If you wanted to play ultraoffensive caster you needed to stay back, or you'd die from 1-2 hits of your opponent.

Did I make assumptions? Assertions, perhaps, but lets move on. This is a good point. I hate the way shields work in Genesis. In fact, just yesterday Cotillion was showing me this new analysis tool that he has been developing to assess the way damage is reduced by various armour types, and we were in complete agreement about how a shield creates an advantage that doesn't work well in our system. But this advantage isn't simply limited to Mages, it just affects them (or monks) more if they choose to use two at once. Here's the thing, Targun. Certain people are basing their testimonies on encounters with specific Mages who also happen to be some of the biggest players in the game, and their constitutions will allow them to last above and beyond what a mage who is not an ultra-myth would endure. For example, a Mage who is Veteran-Legend size might indeed suffer if they wanted to try to simply stand and take hits. In fact, if they didn't we would have a foolish build. Any myth in the game can take hits for a while, especially if well-armoured. Now, back to shields. I'd love to see them nerfed.

1.3 Moreover, in these games you've go the right to select melee/ranged/magic classes freely and often shift between specializations to adapt to a specific kind of playstyle. This is also true for single player games. The dmg output - to a very reasonable point - is comparable.

Hmmm ... I think the above statement deserves to be subjected to a quote you made earlier in your own post:

Inn your post you state what you believe are facts without any sources to back them up.

Sources? Please list them alphabetically and be sure to use complete citations.

2. If you make a statement 'a guild is fairly balanced'- then every player in the game should have a right to test it himself/ herslef as it is with the most guilds in the game. Instaed you a are limiting it to the chosen few.

Did I make the statement that the guild was fairly balanced? I believe I've announced that the recode is complete. Assessing balance is something organic that we achieve by observing the guild in action over time in various situations. We do our best in alpha/beta, but now that the guild is in the mix with pvp encounters, etc, we can really start seeing how it plays out. I very much do not believe we can make a statement that the guild is fairly balanced yet, so don't quote me on something I haven't said, please! As for your next statement, I don't get it. Every player in the game should have a right to test out every guild to see if it is balanced? I'll just go ahead and say I think that is such a dumb idea that I doubt you believe it yourself. (Hey, you don't want political jargon! Here's some unfiltered funstuff! *cheer*)

2.1. How come you often give a lot of details regarding the melee guilds, even in your notes on board, but refuse to give the same amount of information about a caster guild? Don't you think it's sort of breaking the rules? "Pigs being more equal?"

Hmmm ... I think this might be fair criticism, but I'm not exactly sure what you're referring to. Perhaps you are referring to posts such as when we introduced global block to the game, and announced that since the Knighthood has historically had this feature within their guild, that they will be the one guild that can train it to high levels? Or, that move-behind is an ability originated in the Calian Warriors guild, so we don't want it to be used in other guilds? I'm not sure what you mean otherwise. I don't recall any posts where I've outlined the specific powers of newly recoded melee guilds. It might be the case that I've done this to some degree in the two guilds I myself have coded (ogres and mercenaries) in which case I'd justify it by the fact that I made both guilds free to join without any council approval or waiting process - thus there is absolutely no mystery to preserve. If you can point out instances where I'm being unfair to melee guilds in this regard, I would be very appreciative, because I do not want to do what you've accused me of having done. Oh, and by the way, this is another example of you making statements that are not backed up by factual references - something you seem to not like to see in my posts.

3. There was probably more effort put into recoding one mage guild - for just few players- who have for many years had tight connections to wizardhood / had wizard chars themselves than into all of the combat guilds combined. Talk about equality and fair treatment...

This is an ugly one, Targun. You should be above such paranoid swill. The recodes of the Knighthood, Calians and Dragonarmies were very involved, and took months. The recodes of guilds such as the Angmarim and Gladiators were much simpler and did not take long because they only involved implementing new code for damage formulae for the most part. They were not done swiftly or carelessly or with less loving attention than the Mages, as your note suggests. Not at all. I think you know the reason that the Mages took much longer. Firstly, the Morgul Mage recode has been the Mt. Everest of the recode todo-list from the beginning. Thinking about how to do it properly without ruining the guild was staggeringly difficult. Secondly, the wizard resources that were in place when we took on the melee recodes was about 5x more than what we have struggled with in the past three years. If not for the heroic efforts of Eowul, the Mages would remain on that todo list even now. Thirdly, the guild sat unworked-on for about 2 years, perhaps giving the illusion that they were slowly being worked on. In reality, Eowul worked amazingly fast on this recode, getting it done in just a matter of months, much like happened with the melee guilds listed above. I really hate seeing this kind of negative, paranoid, polarizing accusation, Targun, and I hope you will not continue to feel the way you do on this issue.

4. 99% of the dmg in game is physical. You require players to be carrying a separate set of items (non-existing in the game as of current moment), just in case they encounter limited few, who have been getting special treatment for 20 years and continue to, wheras the limited few can happily cleave through the game?

I'm not sure what you're after with this one. Do you wish that the game were made entirely physical in damage, and that we didn't try to have magic damage be part of pvp? This statement, like the one above, has language that I consider toxic and paranoid, in that it accuses the wizards of favoritism. I also don't even understand what you are saying, as it doesn't make any sense. The way I see things, being able to "happily cleave through the game" is exactly what a powerful melee player can do. Log in, grab gear from chest, zoom over to favored grind zone, cleave-cleave-cleave-cleave-cleave. A mage has all sorts of crazy and difficult non-cleaving that they have to do before they begin the process of earning their exp which, by the way, is not a matter of cleaving at all, but of casting a variety of combinations that require thought, careful management of resources, and inevitable and necessary periods of waiting in-between. Happy cleaving? Let me revise your statement in a way that I believe is accurate: "... whereas the limited few can determinedly manage their resources carefully such that they can scrape together a system that waxes and wanes in exp-gaining efficiency, but with patience can sometimes pay off in the end."

I could go on like that for a long time. And to be honest I would not mind if guild A or B was OP. But why you people are so compelled to hipocracy? This I could never understand. It's really the only thing that made me write this note. Whom are you lying to? Why don't you jsut say - we think mage guilds should be considerably more powerful than other guilds, to give the flavor to the game, keep guys who praise us happy, and because we want to. Period. How hard is that?

Not only is it not hard, but it's what I've been doing, I believe? I've always maintained that mage guilds should and will be more powerful in the short term, with the drawback that they are more difficult to manage and impossible to sustain.

Do you honestly think anybody believes that post? I have the most vague idea of how the game currently looks like and I would have had no opinion on the topic - just a bunch of people arguing, until I read your post. And I knew right away, that nothing has changed it the core values the game has built upon.

This reads to me as non-specific angry dislike. I can tell that you don't like something about what I've been representing, but you don't state what it is. So ... I regret to inform you that I remain unable to respond to your disappointment because I have no idea what you believe is awry. Core values? Game has been built upon? Huh? I guess you seem to refer to dishonesty and being a hypocrite? Well, being in charge of things you always get accused of things like this I guess, but it helps when there is something specific rather than vague blanket statements to consider.

Finally, a little bit OOT- a general, non person specific comment. A bit out of curiosity. What's happening to american english? For the past 10 years, I observed that native americans almost completely lost the ability to formulate their own sentences. Everyone is using fixed frazes, and just replaces the slogans repeated by politicians and media (terrorirts, terrorirts, terrorirsts, safety, safety, terrorirts, education, terrorits, terrorirts, safety, terrorirts, healthcare, terrorists, invigilation, terrorists, invigilation, safety, feel safe, you're being invigilated for your own good, terrorists, the guy who revealed a scheme Orwell or Nabokov didn't even dream about is a traitor, terrorirts, feel safe, invigilation is for your own good and safety, traitor, terrorists) with something else they have on agenda.

Sentences without a meaning, a lot of words - a facade - without any meaning. You take out a few random nouns you blindly picked in a dictionary and replace those you had in those sentences and they still sound perfectly fine- 'cept there is just vast emptiness behind those pretty sentences.

The moment I see this corpo-politic style incorporated in everyday speech, written content whatever, I know the person is lying. If you're making a lie, at least be creative. It's impossible to read and I'm really not sure if the society got brainwashed to that point, but if you listen to the propaganda style of Soviet Union you sort of feel at home.

Okay, I actually do think I know what you're referring to here. Sometimes I think I slip into a type of "admin" persona when I write notes or responses to things. When I first became Admin, I don't think I did this much, and it probably grew on me after numerous years of being in the position. Being in the position is the key phrase here. While I don't really like it, what I think happens to you is that after about the 20th time of having to deal with an unhappy person for a particular issue, you resort to a "standard response" which you've begun to develop in the repetition of having to deal with it over and over. It is sort of like how a doctor, after the 100th time, develops a bedside manner that becomes very matter-of-fact when telling someone something tragic. Now, it is true that the very best doctors or Admin never lose their personal touch. I'm aware of this problem, and I often try to combat it with humor or "goofing off" tone where I try to deal with an unpleasant topic with some silly language or lighter tone that at least lets me have a bit of fun in my post or response. Sometimes, though, I just don't have the energy to do that, and default to the "admin" persona. While I can see how it probably feels very cardboard and doesn't give you any real sense of me as a person, I hope that you can get do a different place than feeling that it immediately connotes a lie, falsehood, or agenda at work. Seriously ... this is almost always just me not having the energy to do a better job.

Personally, I feel offended by anyone starting to use this style. False, enforced, political correctness. Really, it's terrible. I don't mind people being assholes. In fact, I tend to like them. I just can't stay this communication style. Please stop it. It's awful. So I beg you - native american people - please stop using the style. You are probably the second society in the modern history (after the North Korea), who actually believes the propaganda, and me, as a polish citizen, in 15 years time I just swapped from being invigilated by Soviet Union, to being invigilated by your country, so at least save me the style.

Well, in this note I'm not sure if I've gone full-"asshole" on your to the point that you'll like me any better. I've at least tried to rise higher than the default-"admin" behavior that I tried to explain above. I will very much agree with you that the style isn't enjoyable, and doesn't foster much in the way of wanting to listen to what is being said. Oh, wait ... that sounded a bit too Admin. Let's see ... different mode ... *transformer noise* Dude, please. You're the one with baggage on this issue, so don't put it on me. *transformer noise* Ugh! Did I just say that? Must be the full moon.

Targun, your note had a lot in it that I didn't like, but underneath it all, I sense a love of the game that hates to see things go a direction you fear is ruining things. You called me out for a lot of stuff, so I've responded in kind. Take it for what it is worth.

G.

[Kas]

Can't see you do anything but blocking hits if using two tower shields.

I can assure you I take a good bit of damage with MBP and 2 tower shields. As you can imagine my defensive fighting skills are not very good

We have defensive skills? Damn, I must hurry and train them.

[Draugor]

Can't see you do anything but blocking hits if using two tower shields.

I can assure you I take a good bit of damage with MBP and 2 tower shields. As you can imagine my defensive fighting skills are not very good

We have defensive skills? Damn, I must hurry and train them.

Unmaxxed Nazzie... REMOVE HIS RING! So bad

[Manglor]

In other words. Yes, Kiara, you're right, but hem... but the mage wins! Scissors cut paper, paper covers rock, rock crashes scissors, and as it has always been - mage evaporizes all. How can't you not get it...

There's so much about your ... post (angry drunk ramblings?) that is ripe for the picking apart, I'll just comment on this. In the situation that fueled this thread, Ilrahil was killed by a much larger opponent but managed to get the Mage in question to very hurt. Despite being much smaller (champion vs. large myth). Sounds about right. Irk the Neidar killed Ydred the legend Knight in a matter of seconds. Size matters. Guild abilities help, but with the magic system overhaul your stats are much more important than ever before. I will not go into detail about MM specifics, but there is a huge change from before regarding your mental stats.

As a titan Mage, I was killed by a legend Ranger in under 20 seconds. Did I cry on the forums? Did I scream bloody murder? No. I had no reason to complain because I was unprepared for the fight I should have been expecting.

This may be surprising for everyone to hear, and may give away very secret MM info, but, do you want to know why Mages traditionally win in pvp? Is it their ridiculous abilities? Maybe. Is it their vastly disproportionate size? Perhaps. Or maybe failure in PVP as a Mage is so harshly punished that...*gasp*...you don't go into a fight you cannot win.

Mind=blown

[Celephias]

As a titan Mage, I was killed by a legend Ranger in under 20 seconds. Did I cry on the forums? Did I scream bloody murder? No. I had no reason to complain because I was unprepared for the fight I should have been expecting.

Can you imagine the uproar if it was a legend mage who killed a titan Ranger?