Trader PvP, can we discuss?

A little bored at work right now, so thought I would start a new thread (there was one going, which seems to have disappeared). Anyway, I did some Battlestation PvP this weekend on a 150 Agent and 220 Trader and, truth be told, I wish I could switch them around level-wise.

In the 150 BS there was a Trader who was absolutely rocking the place, sometimes taking on two people at once. Why? Because, as a Trader at 150, he was able to drain into using Nanite Enhanced Divest/Plunder, Nanobot Defense, Entrepreneurial Thrall, Lesser Corporate Protection, Lesser Industrial Sabotage and Improved Health Plunder. None of those are level-locked and I quickly learned to just avoid that guy... and the Keeper. Being able to land drains, cast nanos and use weapons well above and beyond your base skill levels is what's supposed to keep Traders, who lack the major offense and defense perks, competitive with other professions.

Now, into the 220 BS and it's the polar opposite. I was regularly dead to Agents in less than 2 seconds, NTs were rooting/nuking me from max range with complete impunity and MPs... hah! I died 3 times before even landing my first Divest on someone (I never landed a Plunder all game). What made the Trader in the 150 BS so great was completely moot in the 220 BS. As a matter of fact, I was still using the same root, nanobot shield and health drain as he was using in the 150 BS. Even if I did manage to land a drain or two, they weren't allowing me to use any nanos or weapons that I wouldn't normally be able to use.

So, what's the fix here? I mean, is there one or is it just that certain professions are only good at certain level brackets and that's that?

The only advice that I think is worth anything right now is make absolutely sure you're using shutdown skills and take the bait as liberally as you possibly can.

I think the most obvious problem is that NT's are just unstoppable right now, and agents have had all their perks lowered in checks so they can load a few while hitting some huge specials and still get proc damage on top of that.

If an agent is in sneak, and pops on you, I'd say you've got a 10% chance to survive - and that's generous

If an agent is attacking someone else and the first thing you do is land a SS/TTB on him, then you will probably not only live but kill him but you'll have to be fast with drains - and hell you might even stim the current target to buy time if they are holding up.

Vs NT, again, nothing to do here but SS to lead - basically you gotta buy time to get skill drains off, but even that won't stop a NT in MC AR mode, you might be able to put extra pressure on him if he NS2's right away - use BR, then stun him with vital shock, and pound him with AS/perks then just chain healdrain/haggler as long as your skill drains are up. Maybe use NM sorb to soak the first garuk's too.

Honestly, I don't think a trader will last longer than about 25s vs a decent MC AR NT. Vs a NT in NR1 I think you stand a chance, but not idea how well plunder will land... NT's have pretty decent NR to start with too.

Vs. MP gotta make sure rihwen is rooted before anything else, that you have to go in with defences up to ensure you got enough time to skill drain to get pets OE... not sure how MP's are though about that since I think I heard something about different rules for MP pets regarding OE. Not sure what nukes MP's are using at endgame but I got a feeling you won't be able to slow down their nuke barrage with drains... could be wrong though.

At 150ish traders are pretty strong. My 158 trader is one of my most favourite toons to play - not because it's overpowered by any means, hell, in 151-200 BS he gets stomped, but because the profession is actually quite adaptable at that point, and with a good setup and good skill, you can pretty much always put up a decent fight... certainly not a gank machine, and if actually very hard to get kills on, but tricky to kill as well.

So I retwinked my trader 220 to dual PDKP setup epic pvm damage.. 3704 AR, selfed, no towers,... ready for anything.... 97% duck exp weapon :D Yaay! It'd be good at pvp right?

I walk in to BS... could not perk people... with 3704 AR and 300 AAD drain... NT facerolled me, shade instagibbed me, after a few minutes I just decided not gonna bother. Most professions you walk in to BS with full alphas aI armor all the tools, you kinda can survive and atleast kill gimps easy. Not trader though, you are so vulnerable to quick death its not even funny. I had to resort to snaring people out of range and draining them fully .. and then get kiled by someone else.

Awch. And without Aimed shot? Who can I kill.. I gout out of BS without a single pvp kill. So trader for sure needs better defenses. Nanobot shielding thingy, instead of being emergency might aswell be running at all times and then have emergency on top of that.

It feels like pretty much trader needs Full evade armor to have any chance surviving in pvp enviroment. Maximizing all the evade armor possibilities. Just to compete at a low level. And when optimized who can trader reliably kill in a typical scenario, and without AS?

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Originally Posted by Cratertina

And when optimized who can trader reliably kill in a typical scenario, and without AS?

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maybe a game-changer is required.

How much conceal do you think you could get, and, if maxed and twinked out a little bit, assuming full CSS for starters, triple implanted: eye (http://auno.org/ao/db.php?id=278945), Ear (http://auno.org/ao/db.php?id=278959), feet (http://auno.org/ao/db.php?id=278969), and it's on stuff like token boards (http://auno.org/ao/db.php?id=279437)

Not sure what color IP it is, but if you maxed it, say... lets say the obvious opponents will see you: advy+fix

But advy+fix aside, that might put you in "unlikely to pop from sneak" territory... that might give you enough advantage to position yourself 1. out of melee range 2. get a root/SS on them and maybe a second or third drain before they could respond.

Using this mechanic, getting the jump on all 12 profs other than fix+advy, I think you could "reliably" kill:

crat - if drained properly pets won't attack, can easily survive crat double/quad drained, easy kill.
engi - if double skill drained, pets won't attack. will be a longer kill due to blockers, but should be able to do it once BR is out, also with crits from IS/CP will drop a bit quicker.
doctor (CH modification gives you a full 30s to knock em out and you *should* be able to OD LGE easily if they resorted to that double drained... a good doc tho, probably will get out of drains pretty quick and just sit there tanking you so probably have to make doc be a no.
enforcer - not likely, with rage cancelling drains. Enf I think will sit there bashing you and eventually will use SA and even dimach to make the kill. might be possible to tank an enf for a long time though if he's unlucky with procs (?) gunna go with no on this one
shade - MR shade no, other breeds yes should be fairly easy.
agent - i'm gunna go with no on this one, I think even if you catch agent from sneak, he's going to just have too much firepower to stop even quad drained (if you can get him quad drained).
MA - not an easy kill but I think it shouldn't be too hard if you lead with divest/CP/IS before he's in melee range, then SS as soon as MM activates. should be able to stop him from healing almost entirely if plunder lands but kinda doubt that it'll be easy. MA with instagib X1-R4/tonfa will have a lot of special AR/special damage and MA attacks that will still land too. will be a tough fight, really dependent on whether plunder lands I think. gunna go with no on this one.
soldier - if you can drain him so he can't use best TMS this should be a fairly straight forward kill, yes on this.
another trader - ya if you get the jump on him he's dead
keeper - will be tough. certainly not an easy kill by any means, but should be able to tank him for a while if all drains are up... ahh hell I don't think you're gunna kill one I just don't think you can do it without some good luck on AS's.
MP- if you started with a root on pet, and MP didn't notice him getting rooted so he didn't have chance to NSD you, maybe you can win this, but... man MP's... not easy. shield MP going to be very hard to kill. Bow MP will squish.

then you got fixer/advy and both of these simply have too much special power to chew through your defences regardless of whether you get the jump on them or not.

NT... jeez I don't think so.

:D Hehe pretty much what I always did, I placed around some small ip in concealment, was sitting around 900 concealment, so pretty good for concealing.

But I disagree.. quite a bit there.

Crat, Engi, MP. All it takes is one Tab/attack while in recharge after first nano and you are going down. You can try snaring pets... But then engi WTFPWN's you, crat init debuffs you and MP can NSD you. All pets now have really good attack rating compared to trader defs. Now if MP has no shield, maybe you can alpha it fast enough.

Doc if you really debuff it fully and remove all NANo from poor guy.. then ok maybe.

Enfo, noway like yo usaid.
Shade .. shade can geta jump on you and you are dead insta. Doable if you combine you getting a jump on him, and snares. But again Mongo rage cancels all that. But most shades are opi now.
Agent.. :D lolno yes.
MA, with SA/Dimach/FA/Brawl.. If you bypass his alpha then this is your best bet for victory so far.
Soldier, soldier has very high Burst and FA, that does not get drained. You really gotta kill him fast and drain his AMS if you want to get anywhere. SMG/AS soldier might be to tough anyhow.
Keeper, keepers are durable as hell.
Trader yes!

Then there are NT's

So with caveats you can kill Gimp MP's, unlucky traders, poor shades, slow MA's,... and maybe AFK NT's. 5 Professions then with caveats... and big buts..

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Originally Posted by Cratertina

So I retwinked my trader 220 to dual PDKP setup epic pvm damage.. 3704 AR, selfed, no towers,... ready for anything.... 97% duck exp weapon :D Yaay! It'd be good at pvp right?

I walk in to BS... could not perk people... with 3704 AR and 300 AAD drain... NT facerolled me, shade instagibbed me, after a few minutes I just decided not gonna bother. Most professions you walk in to BS with full alphas aI armor all the tools, you kinda can survive and atleast kill gimps easy. Not trader though, you are so vulnerable to quick death its not even funny. I had to resort to snaring people out of range and draining them fully .. and then get kiled by someone else.

Awch. And without Aimed shot? Who can I kill.. I gout out of BS without a single pvp kill. So trader for sure needs better defenses. Nanobot shielding thingy, instead of being emergency might aswell be running at all times and then have emergency on top of that.

It feels like pretty much trader needs Full evade armor to have any chance surviving in pvp enviroment. Maximizing all the evade armor possibilities. Just to compete at a low level. And when optimized who can trader reliably kill in a typical scenario, and without AS?

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Well, I have to say, I'm glad that it's not just me. What you wrote almost entirely duplicated my experience in the BS.

I, too, use dual PDKP and thought they would have been absolutely amazing in PvP. I mean, Fling + Burst + low attack/recharge means more weapon procs right? It's not even close to enough. I don't know what it is that Traders need to help/fix them, but I know what they don't need and that's more things to cast, especially nanos with crap skill checks. The general consensus seems to be that, "it sucks to be skill drained in the BS." Well, you know what also sucks? Not being able to land skill drains, or any drains for that matter, and dying repeatedly. I think that sucks just a bit more.

Many of McKnuckleSamwich's write ups on PvP seem to begin with "If double drained..." or "if drained properly" which, I assume, implies both drains. I think I've stated this before, but Divest at 85% NR isn't even a sure thing in PvP. I've spammed it on some people and it's taken 3-4 tries to land. Plunder is a 130% NR check. If it takes multiple tries to land the 85% NR drain, just how successful do you think the 130% NR drain is going to be? Keep in mind that while a Trader is spamming drains that may or may not be landing (mostly "not") their target is more than likely just killing them, because other classes don't rely on a series of 3-5 nanos in succession to set up a target for a chance at winning. Shutdown Skills and Take the Bait have 2 and 3-minute cooldowns for 3 and 4-second duration, so I don't think using them "liberally" is even an option.

If the lingering/long-lasting effect of Divest/Plunder is what's holding back Traders, then cut the duration to 30s on players (halving the duration, yet again), but make them NR 75% and 85% respectively. FFS, skill drains are the CORE of the class and literally all we can do in PvP and the way they're currently resisted we're nothing more than free VP at level 220.

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Originally Posted by Jovial

Many of McKnuckleSamwich's write ups on PvP seem to begin with "If double drained..." or "if drained properly" which, I assume, implies both drains.

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That's precisely the point though... my point is that EVEN WHEN you get the jump on someone, get them double drained before they react.... you're still fighting from the weeds.

Trader isn't easy in PVP. I know it, and I'm certainly not trying to say you or any other trader is doing it wrong... hell, at this point, just being a trader at 220 is extremely challenging, they need a boost, badly.

But you're fighting an uphill battle, because there have been SO many changes in game that seem to point in the direction that "all perks will land" - just looks at the changes to MA and advy for example... there's nothing in those toolsets now that indicate perks aren't supposed to be landing. Evaders? pff. The only real evaders now are fixer and crat, and crat is almost as bad right now as trader, except crat at least gets heavier offense and a brief period of respite from perk damage. trader simply is not an evade class any more despite their entire toolset indicating they are. (small heals, AR drains with AAD boosts, etc.)

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Originally Posted by McKnuckleSamwich

But you're fighting an uphill battle, because there have been SO many changes in game that seem to point in the direction that "all perks will land" - just looks at the changes to MA and advy for example... there's nothing in those toolsets now that indicate perks aren't supposed to be landing. Evaders? pff. The only real evaders now are fixer and crat, and crat is almost as bad right now as trader, except crat at least gets heavier offense and a brief period of respite from perk damage. trader simply is not an evade class any more despite their entire toolset indicating they are. (small heals, AR drains with AAD boosts, etc.)

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This is exactly what I said ages ago when the patch was still in its infancy on the test server.

The issue remains that we are in a toolset limbo in PvP. We're neither an Evade class nor a direct support class. More an odd amalgamation of the two that leaves us in the gameplay chasm between them.

Going the full Evade route seems unlikely, Michi has made it clear to me that he would rather set fire to his hands than give Acrobat/CiB to us, so really the only other option is to go the other direction and look at the more supportive aspects. If thats going to be the case we need to reassess our healing capabilites and our team benefits in an overall case.

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Originally Posted by Raggy

The issue remains that we are in a toolset limbo in PvP. We're neither an Evade class nor a direct support class. More an odd amalgamation of the two that leaves us in the gameplay chasm between them.

Going the full Evade route seems unlikely, Michi has made it clear to me that he would rather set fire to his hands than give Acrobat/CiB to us, so really the only other option is to go the other direction and look at the more supportive aspects. If thats going to be the case we need to reassess our healing capabilites and our team benefits in an overall case.

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Decent at some trades, master of none doesn't cut it in PvP... at all. You can't be somewhat of a dps class, somewhat of an evade class and somewhat of a casting class and have any sort of expectation of success in TL7 PvP. Traders do well in the lower brackets because they can drain into higher tier nanos/weapons, but that doesn't hold up in TL7. So, my first question is... is Michi accepting suggestions? I mean, can we brainstorm and come up with some potential changes? Whatever, I'm just going to throw some things out there and see what, if anything, sticks.

• Give TRADERS (only) another upgrade to the Perfected Diamondine Kick Pistol - give it Aimed Shot or a weapon proc % chance to stun or further augment the Accumulator perk (up % or drain).
• Combine Nanobot Defense (with a better exchange rate) and Grand Theft Humidity - protection using the nano of someone else seems pretty "Trader" to me.
• Lower resists on Nanite Improved Divest/Plunder, such that they actually land in PvP. Lower debuff time on Human targets to 20-30 seconds.
• Make Decision by Committee usable, somehow.
• Consolidate some debuffs, please! Put the NR debuffs in with Divest/Plunder or make CP/IS one nano.
• New, level-locked, 220 health plunder. It's a bit ridiculous when our top health drain is also cast in the 150 BS (maybe even the 100 BS).
• Modify our perks to affect more than just Umbral Wrangle. Example: Each level of Accumulator adds X% to health plunder dmg/heal.
• If we're going to remain squishy and low on damage output then change the refresh time on Shutdown Skills and Take the Bait.

Again, I'm just tossing out ideas and certainly don't expect a full-scale implementation of everything above. However, I think its safe to say that adding even a few of these certainly wouldn't make Traders the scourge of TL7 PvP such that NTs or Agents or MPs stop queuing up because they're afraid of us.

and pls: give back the old silverback so trader can use def hud again :)

I like the suggestions from Jovial, perhaps making some pvp onnly condensed nanos with lower %nano resist with the drawback or making it them less potent that the combined usual nanos to offset some balancing issues would be a good idea.
Adjust nr debuff, both in speed/recharge and how much it debuffs would be a quite welcomed fix.
Pets are just a lol factor now, partial usefull of the debuffs in a tight spot i guess, copy mp pet mechanics so we get a damage-to-pet? :D

Healthplunder sure needs upgrades as well.

I'm sure Michi listens, he's done really good work so far overall.

(What if pvp dmg was 15% capped ?)

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Originally Posted by appolonia

(What if pvp dmg was 15% capped ?)

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Shades and Agents would reroll and Doctors and Advies would become unkillable again.

Also MPs would reach a whole new level of immortality thanks to Zset and DtP

Different pvp caps for diff profs?... no forget it, let's not go there, :)

Nah nothing about different caps, and I'm quite aware how it would influence pvp as a whole (less ganking, moar healing power, back to low HP setups...). I wanted to question the only way I can think of Traders would perform well /others with our "legit" tools, since we miss the ganking power and our healing would scale better. So the brackets. I remember the sweet wars before SL came... I was so in love with my Trox then...

Then, as we're in an alphas fest, ttl6+ traders are doomed in duel situations, whatever, so these endless talks will remain endless. The only way I found my Trader enjoyable was to max conceal and play it teamed with a friend to cover me, that was fun. Solo kills ? Forget about them or farm them before ttl7.

Anyway, solutions are obvious, now there's no will to bring them, and no clear vision of what Traders might be. There won't be any hope as long the urge is felt of writing SUPPORT in any post to try to not unplease M, while Traders OBVIOUSLY have no supporting tool, and can't even support themselves for a start.

I haz ace up sleeve... Gif trader good pets.

No, really, Traders already have tools, as long as we're not left to "support". They're not powerful and reliable enough, that's all.

A Trader can perform well, if only the basic tools operate, and sadly you can't even rely on Ideprive atm. Then, Iplunder is a no-go. Solution this, and we're already in a far better shape. Taking self draining out was logical, but we needed a HUGE skills buff to compensate. Would Traders have been OP before, right, but it was not the case. Generic trolls just don't like drains, some random stupid FC guy agreed self draining was unfair, there we are.

Defense ? Well, shields isn't enough (though far better now), not because we're crying trolls, but because we have poor defense (AAD/Evades/Heal) so they are our only fixed/static def. If only evades were granting a %, but no, it's all about raw numbers, stack it or die, and we can't stack enough. We have crit resist AND aad IF we can CP/IS. LAF. Yeah, we can cast it when our enemy has already alphaed us, great. The new HoT is just an opportunity for your enemy to cap you once more, and the Cd is abusive. With 100% landing drains we'd have a better time landing CP/IS. DivDmg ? Well, one more thing to cast...

Have all them work together and we're ok. Now, shield might be a permanent reflect (once again, we borrow reflects) so we could have a mini rrfe, or mini NS, to sustain alpha OR delay it so we can use our arsenal. SS is great, but maybe too powerfulon one side, and not enough on the other. TTB is even greater. But... cast cast cast cast, all this is good on paper, but SO situationnal, and so lag/reflex depending. Playing Trader to the top requires you're at 100%, even concerning luck, that's not realistic when you have no reliable backup. Flip a coin, I would love it if heads (or tail) would guarantee a win, but it just lets you play again. And, well, this haggler we use at 120 should obviously be improved. Make NId/NIp ONE nano with 75% check, make NIhh a DB nano doubling Burger plunder, it's still depending on NR anyway...

Damage ? What we really miss are perks. Perks actually landing, that is. This, or a true AS shottie option. Couldn't we upgrade Waterfall (instead of further improving PDKP) ? Give it a little more dmg, say 50 min-max, and most of all a range increase. Soldiers and engis coud benefit from it, then give it a (tradeskill) AR, like engi pistols. Soldiers wouldn't benefit from it, engis would still lack AR, so it would look like a Trad(skill)er's weapon. We would have moar procs, we would have AR, we would use our legit weapon, we would have a solid but not OP AS/dual option. Add the better health haggler and we're ok too.

Well, it's late here, been working all day, I feel I didn't write crap, gonna check tomorrow :D

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Originally Posted by appolonia

we have poor defense (AAD/Evades/Heal) so they are our only fixed/static def.

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Traders actually have really decent evades. Like, a trader with CP up is pretty much as good as it gets for most profs prior to non-short term super boosts (a la crat DtB, or ES).

The problem is perk checks.

And this is a massive problem - because the perk checks are pretty decent for the other 13 profs fighting the other 13 profs - they aren't perfect.. but they are close.

My feeling is agent has it a bit too good, soldiers need to get a reduction on a couple of dodge debuffs, and keeper probably should get a slight reduction on check on one more perk and I think pretty much everyone is fine, but traders simply get smashed if they don't get unperkable in 1 drain - which is what I've been saying for a while.

* Add half the AAO from IS back to divest
* add the other half to plunder
* make the duration 45s on divest/plunder

And that will sort out Omni traders (note that Omni traders *should* be operating with a 90AAD +(-50AR) advantage, (assuming Omni traders have a 275 transfer tower, and clan don't have a 275 ransack tower)

But, then you got clan traders: who are operating with no AAD from a transfer tower, and at LEAST a 50 AR disadvantage.

That means that the total differential between clan and Omni trader survival is going to be close to 300 points AR vs def points (notably, that's about what you get by having a keeper or crat in team)

Now, I don't care how anyone tries to argue or justify that, but there's only 1 way to commiserate it: traders need MORE defence in order to be operating as an evades profession if you're clan, and as I said before, omnis are fine.

But, once towers change hands, again, it's going to throw balance to the wind. The only way around it is providing a BASE evasion boost of about 150-200 points which will make it possible for either side to start on approximately "unperkable" footing after one drain, while whoever is holding towers will pretty much always be unperkable.

But that's the insanely fickle nature of traders. the only other way to balance such a finicky profession is to make them non-evades dependent (notably, the changes to advy- evades? screw em, lets go HP + CH. MA? screw evades, now you got BIG ASS heals. Fixer? still evades oriented. Crat? screw em, they were OP for years. Shade? give em smoke bomb to get out of combat they don't like)

So basically we're down to 1 real evade prof - fixer and they still enjoy the no-perk situation.

All this, basically says to me:

Give traders 12k HP and a CH, OR
Give traders 150-300 AAD to put em in non-perkable territory after one drain, OR
Give traders some way to do a crapload more damage quickly (i.e. ganker), with an emergency getaway, OR
Give traders reflects or a crapton more absorbs to soak oodles more damage than they currently do

Easiest solution, I think, is to add some AAD... but unfortunately that really doesn't fix them... it'll just make half of them (whoever has towers) insanely OP, while the other half (those who don't) simply average.

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Originally Posted by Cratertina

I walk in to BS... could not perk people... with 3704 AR and 300 AAD drain... NT facerolled me, shade instagibbed me, after a few minutes I just decided not gonna bother.

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I would like to frame this quote and put it on my wall. This very statement is why I haven't played the game since February (besides the MB nonsense). When the game has gotten to the point where an effective AR of 3815 (in freaking DuckExplosives, no less) can't land perks, any solution would have to go WAY far beyond adding more random stuff to Trader defense and making a second overhaul of the game in this many months just to the defense system re: perks and specials. This is dumb.

Thanks for citation, attack and perk sequences at 220 are somewhat broken...to the point of you either have evade bypass (AS, Nukes) or you cannot kill half of targets at all.

Goes for trader, same on my soldier with 3650 or so AR, but he atleast can pop mongo rage... Anf does not die like trader does...