Character Investment and Superiority
OK, my response to this issue will be very balanced, I really do have two views on this:
View One :
Trienne L50 Enforcer (retired)
Girltrooper L41 Soldier (retired)
These were both "natural" characters. They had reasonable equipment. Some of it above their level and some below. I retired both at their levels because they became unplayable. I couldn't generate enough cash in groups to keep my characters equipped. Because I didn't overequip - I couldnt complete 50% missions to raise cash. Result - dead characters.
View Two :
Debitte L15 Trader (Freshman)
Debitte has /terminated herself enough times to be level 50. It has taken a massive investment in time and understanding to even get her to the level that one would consider decently dangerous. She has 140 tokens and working on 400 before she levels to L50, and she will stay there for another 400 tokens before moving on to L100. Debitte is not complete yet, but she has L20/30 implants in every slot, wields a L44 and L16 SA Home Defender, and has an AC of 595.
I think I used one buff for an implant, and a guildie gave me a 41 pt wrangle which stacked with my deprives to equip the QL44. I plan on equipping a QL53 soon.
The difference between Trienne/Girltrooper and Debitte, is that Debitte works! She is an expression of what YOU taught me about the game! When Girltrooper was killed by a super-overequipped Enforcer 5 levels below her; it was clear how the game was DESIGNED. I learnt my lessons from my mistakes and built a character accordingly.
The solution to your problem is VERY easy:
"nanowands"
Caster classes are disadvantaged because weapon classes can overequip. Easy! Create "nanowands" that have stat requirements that 'fire' the caster's own nanoprogram. Easily coded. Problem fixed - casters can now overequip!
"balance to equal-equipped"
Secondly, reduce mob power to make them soloable by players equipped for their own levels. Uber players (highly overequipped) should blitz 50% missions-that is the reward of their significant investment in their characters.
Even with a weapon three times overequipped I couldn't possibly kill a L26 mob on a 100% mission. I think these two changes would restore game balance while still rewarding the effort of character investment.
Regards,
Debitte L15 Trader
Omni-Core
RK2
Didn't work the first time. Hope this doesn't double post.
If this is a double post i am very sorry :(
First of all. I appologize for the length of this post but I have many points to get across. I have a Trader lvl 56 and a Agt lvl 41 amoung other chars but these are my mains.
My Agt is yes twinked. But I greatly enjoy this aspect of the game. I spend lots of time trying to get the very best stuff for my agt and to have him as very over-equiped as possible. This comes as a huge time taker. Many ppl who don't spend the time would have likely been at least 2 times my lvl. I think because of this I should be rewarded with much more damge output. I spent the time. They did not. Why should I be penalized for spending more time on my char. This is something i find fun to do. It gives me pride knowing that I am much stronger then most ppl my lvl.
Now for my Trader. The main money maker for traders is Wranglers. This is also one of there main nano's. Traders have very few nano's other then Skill increase and decreasing ones. If they made Over equiping the way they talk about then Wranglers would be utterly useless. You can't count on having a Trader in your group to constantly cast Wranglers on you so your gun has decent damage. Thus making it a useless skill. No one would over equip. Not to mention a trader couldn't cast wranglers on team mates because then they would not be able to cast any other nano's that would help out the team. IE damage nano's or healing nano's. Also Traders skills would now be to low for the requirements on their gun. Making there gun completely useless. Now that their skils are lower not only would there gun do less damage, which Vektors of ql's equal to our lvl do very little damage unless they crit. Do to the fact that our skills are now lower we would VERY rarely ever crit.
Now for PvP. IE Agt lvl 40ish. Equiping ql.40ish Gripo(very high crits). Max damage with crits w/o 1/2 damage patch would be about 350-400. Not postitve but close to that maybe less. Normal damge of about 50 average. Now we have a doc lvl 40ish. Healing for max of about 275( not sure but close to that). Now I am mentioning these to professions as an example because Agt's have no healing nano's and Doc's are the best healers. Now lets say they get rid of 1/2 damage in PvP. The doc can still heal for almost the Agt's max damage with a crit. Normal damage it would take about 5 shots to counter effect a docs heal. There is no possible way that the agt could ever kill the doc. Because while the agt is doing damage the doc is also doing damage(however less damge because of the IP cost to equip weapons). Then when the doc gets to much damge they can cast a heal which agt cannot cast any heal they have to count on first aid kits alone. Heres a little story about my twinked agt at lvl 25. I was very twinked and could crit for 600 prior to the 1/2 damge patch. I ran into a lvl 30 Doc(which yes was 5 lvl's higher, I understand that). I assumed oh it's a doc, no prob right? Well much to my surprise this doc killed me and still had almost ful life. I quickly ran outta nano to root the doc all while he was healing himself even with the massive damage I was doing. He then ran up on me because he was a melee doc. He never had to use dim. He continued to beat the crap outta me and heal. I could do nothing about the damage he was inflicting on me because I had to wait till I could use first aid kit since I had recarged my nano with one. I was soon dead. He was not twinked much at all. I was. Now imagine if I would have been untiwnked what he woulda done to me.
Now a Trader in PvP. They will basically be the only ones winning any PvP battles. My lvl 56 Trader untwinked can cast deprive/ransack stacked for -160ish to another persons skills. Which inturn increases mine by 80ish. I currently have a self equipped ql.77 Vektor but could self equip better. With my deprive/ransack casted I crit for over 1000. I might mention that I don't do PvP with this char unless I get bored. With a very small IP loss I can heal for 170ish but with a little more IP spent I could heal for about 250. I can also cast roots. To start out -160 to ppls attack skills would make them not meet requirements for their weapons. Which not only makes them crit less now but with this change would make there gun do far less damage. All the while my over equipped gun which I meet the requirements for is doing extreme damage now. Crits that would almost kill someone in 1 shot w/o 1/2 damage patch. Plus I can heal myself to compensate for their now very little damage with far less chance of a crittical hit. So a 250pt heal would be great for healing any damage they might be able to do. Any melee class I could roor before thhey got close to me if I wanted to. Which would not be needed since they are doing less damage anyways and i might not want to use the extra nano it would take. I could pretty much destroy any proffesion other then other traders. Here's a little story about this. Just recently I battled a guild mate lvl 78 NT. As mentioned I am lvl 56. Due to the fact I lowered his nano skills by 160ish his DD's did far less damage since he was using very old ones. Then I crit a couple of times on him for about 450 because of the 1/2 damage. Before long he was dead and I had 1/4 life left. Which I coulda had more if I would have chosen to do another heal on myself. He was over 20 lvl's higher then me and i killed him. I also faught a Fixer 5 lvl's higher then me whom I didn't know. He appeared to be not twink much at all. I was able to kill him with very little trouble at all. And I still had ful life when done due to casting heals on my self. I didn't even crit much on him and it was still that easy with 1/2 damage. Now imagine what I would have done to him and anyone else with the new changes added. His gun woulda have been doing far less damage.
So, finally to conclude this post. If your still awake :)
I think this is a very bad idea for both PvP and PvM. Also I am very tired of all the HUGE changes that have been made to the game. It is like playing a game with a friend when your younger and he constantly keeps changing the rules on you. I have been playing for about 4 1/2- 5 months now. I have been very understanding up to this point. Over-equiping is one of my favorite aspects of the game. If this is done I will deffinately leave AO for good. As I am sure there will be many others who will do the same. I can't take anymore drastict changes like this.
Good day to you all and I will hate to have to go. I really enjoy the ppl and the aspect of the game.
please NO on the 20% stuff...
i say let peeps over equip. to me its one of the funnest aspects of the game im an MA and can obviously not over equip like some of the other proffs like traders or soldiers or agents but can and do overequip armor...using plants to get armor on..taking plants off etc, same with buffs.
however..doing this will only gimp lower lvl players and here is why: at almost lvl 150...i can near put on ql 200 armor w/out all of that. not yet but near..like by 160-170 ill be able to. well..lower lvl peeps wont have that advantage of being able to put on/take off the highest lvl stuff they can wear with buffs and plants. just my opinion but to me..it has always been part of the game
honestly...out of any player i have ever grouped with or in any of the guilds i have been in..i can think of only 1 who doest overequip armor (dont know much about guns as im MA) and the only reason why he doest is because he likes to roleplay in social cloths...well so do i..but to pvp or even pvm u really need that extra AC or that extra punch from a weapon...is it fair to NTs who have to have masteries to cast higher NFs or to MAs who cant over equip fists? not really..but thats part of the game we work around. total balance....well...would just make each toon the same..equally as strong...no advantages/disadvantages so what would be the point of playing one proff to the next..not much really.
as far as armor/social cloths see my excelent idea on the "in progress" forum.
An Idea, killing two birds with one stone
An idea I came up with today, perhaps someone will like it:
Fixers need help, People want some solution to over-equipping. Why not kill both birds with one stone?
I envision Fixers as hackers. And as hackers do, they pirate software. The first thing I propose is a way to let fixers (at some cost of course) "hack" nano crystals. Not hack them like hacker devices. But pirate them like software. Making illegal copies to distribute. This could include the need to purchase an expensive and single use-only device that would allow them to dupilicate the program in a nano crystal. They could then charge for this copy, giving them a great way to make money.
Second. A solution to their nano problems and the plight of casters against over-equippers:
Fixers should have a line of nanos that allows them to create an item for the NCU belt. This Item will "hack" the NCU so that you can cast programs that have already been uploaded without having the requirements. This would help fixers with thier dark blue skills without needing to change the color of those skills. It will be easiest for them to equip because of their strong ties to CompLit. But also, they can give this created item to casters, like a buff but an item that will require skills. That will allow NT's and other spellcasters to "over-equip" their spells by sidestepping the nano skill requirements. The stipulation that would keep this from being insanely powerful? Well, this item that's created could have a requirement that MUST be met. Like Reet form, when you zoned or lost the requirements, the Item would disappear (since it is a creation item).
I can't think of all the balance issues or things that need to be considered, and I haven't yet thought of a way that this nano "line" would be increased in power over time. The great thing about this idea is that it would make Fixers into Hackers, which is glorious for them. It would also give them an answer to their nano skill problem, and finally, would make them wanted. most dearly wanted, like the Traders of the casting classes. Their "wrangling devices" would be in high demand, allowing them to make money as well as be effective themselves.
Fixers/Content/Balance etc
senatorjesse - good post - im not sure if im big on your idea (i need to think about it more) but at least someone here understand that ADDING CONTENT is a FAR better way to help balance out overequiping.
Besides, if you just nerf the overequipers you STILL havent add a single "fun" element to the game. (and if you think being equal to everyone makes the game more "fun" for you - wake up! - this is a roleplaying game, and we are to play the role of a citizen of Rubika - and just like real life, some people work harder to get nice stuff - deal with it.)
Whats really funny is how Funcom is doging the whole need for extra content in AO by even mentioning that they might "balance" the game by reducing the efectivness of overequiping. Its much much easier to put these restrictions on players then to actually come up with creative CONTENT for AO. Funcom is taking the easy way out and making us look like fools.
Some day AO will shine - but things need to be added - not nerfed.
there is no problem with over EQ
If every body can do it, were is the problem. If a person is smart enough to over eq then so be it, Im an engineer, I cant even do a mission with every thing on the green and the main slidder in the middle. I'm not that over equiped, with out my pet then im dead, even by mob's with green bars. So were is the over equip problem, If every body does it then that should just be part of the game. Its already balanced out, even in PvP there should be no problems, It will help the lower level people from getting smacked around by higher level when there doing a mission. It will make people stop and think.