Seperation of melee and magic weapons.

[Drazson]

You might not be saying it's not super-imbalanced but as apparent in my previous comment I disagree.

I assume that if AoB thought there -was- something there to fix they could do a <dmg *= 2> somewhere at the end of the jab calculations for example as a bandaid; surely more easy to fix than most bugs. Hell, easier than typos possibly

And yeah I know someone with a test character tried that out and found they do equally well with /thornlin than with /lock somehow despite players recording plentiful real-game data have seen otherwise. So I save you some time here too!

By the way, I'm not like pressuring you to act or anything, races took decades and it's fine. Didn't threaten to quit over it or anything dramatic, decency holds


Edit: I think we're derailing this though. I do think balance would make the distinction in item usage much more obvious and make things more unique instead of thinking about it the other way around, but a discussion on how much balanced or not something is is probably not useful here.

[Snowrose]

Hey some people do enjoy not having to swap to a wand everytime we heal, is this really hurting your game play personally? I think the system is fine the way it is.

[Rache]

Hey some people do enjoy not having to swap to a wand everytime we heal, is this really hurting your game play personally? I think the system is fine the way it is.

The system may not be perfect, but this is not the burning issue.

[Targun]

Quantum:

I think monks just have it worse than other guilds in this department as their specials cannot fire during casting (or at least that used to be the case) and they need to use "held" enhancers to not lose def bonus for wielding staves/weapons.

Separating weapon enhancers / melee from casting:

Just my opinion, but for me the straight forward solutions proposed here will not work, as they introduce more problems than they solve. If you separate casting and melee specials (and required enhancers e.g. wands/grimoires etc.), you'd need have to recalculate caid for... well... everything.

Even worse, you'd probably need to heavily modify all guilds that combine 2 or 3 slots in them (WoHS, MM, Vamps, SC, PoT)... and modify in this case would mean nerf.

Overall, damage-oriented melee laymans - with few exceptions - just feel too weak right now and lack variety. Sure - caster guilds consume money, time, ingredients, typically have higher tax, and perhaps require you to spread your stats less optimally. This probably should be rewarded, but(!), it shouldn't mean melee laymans are so one-dimensional.

I'd really like to see some melee-type laymans that e.g.:

• do AoE dmg,
• reduce AC/resists on the enemy,
• maybe give move behind/rescue on top of a special,
• do increased dmg from frontline/backline
• have several options to choose from for better fit

Similarly to magic laymans - they cannot use all their effects at once, or some spells are significantly weaker when you have upkeep effects on, but they have some flexibility. Don't think if - at least some - spells have their melee equivalents, it would break the game.

[TaranGoatWalker]

Magic laymans are versatile. They have everything. Fighter laymans aren't.
Versatility is king.

[Drazson]

I'm sorry but having a lot of stuff is not versatility, it's having a lot of stuff.

If you had an ability that only works against strong melees and an ability that only works against strong casters, you are versatile, you can reasonably face both situations. In either case you have 1 good ability to use.
If you have just 2 strong abilities that can apply to both then you just have 2 good abilities to use in both cases. You just have a lot of stuff.

Thornlin is versatile. Give it BOTH dodge and jab, it has a lot of stuff (in comparison with its current state).
Hell, Minstrels are versatile, probably more versatile rather than having a lot of stuff than people might think.
Other magic laymans... haven't seen them all but it's looking like they have a lot of stuff.

[zizuph]

Quantum:

I think monks just have it worse than other guilds in this department as their specials cannot fire during casting (or at least that used to be the case) and they need to use "held" enhancers to not lose def bonus for wielding staves/weapons.

I updated all the spells months ago, so they should not interfere at all with your monk specials (or any melee special for that matter). If you find that to be the case, please reach out to the AOB team in game.