Concerns over Parry

[McKnuckleSamwich]

How effective is this new special defence going to be?

Several profs will have moderate specialization in it, with only a handful being proficient.

The issue, or concern I have is that some profs who already have a WELL established defence, will gain an unbalanced gain in defence when their defence is already established, just due to free IP.

Those who need it most:

TL4 shade, MA, keeper

TL5 shade, keeper

TL6 shade

TL7 MA, shade, possibly keeper

Those who DON'T need it:
TL4,5,6,7 Enforcer, advy

So, how maybe a good question to ask is how will the special scale?

Clearly some profs who do not need it will have access to it, and, how will their defence be augmented by the special if FC deems those profs not in need (as I have mentioned but not given evidence for).

My preliminary suggestion for this is that the special is inately stronger for specialized classes, (MA, Keeper, shade), and, the special itself checks both prof and skill AND TL for effectiveness.

While it might be tricky to code, it's important for balance.

[Gridpain]

So, how maybe a good question to ask is how will the special scale?

I fear it's too early to ask this... I bet Parry is still at the "Oh cool, we could revamp Parry and Ripost guys ! " stage.

[Pomidor]

Afaik Parry will be PERK action, which will pop to use for certain (short)peroid of time in your Action Window (?), so I belive there is no way to make it different to classes/professions. Yet, I agree with you that Enf/Adv should get lower (or evne none) adventage of this skill. Definetly imho Parry is Keeper stuff. Because Shade are so poor at low/mid TL's, I would like to see them get this in good shape (heck, I cant even roll a shade or keeper, yet I have 5 upgraded accounts... O.o)

What concerns me more then skill/actionitself its free IP's for that one Will be tricki to get it work w/o huge sacriface on low lvls, where some professions are already short in IP.

[JustinSane4]

Not sure it makes sense to rule out Advs and Enfs needing it. As they are now of course it would not be balanced, but they've taken some whacks already and we don't know how perks are going to wind up either.

[badorde]

Not Advs and enfo? lol at ma/keeper poster

[Esproc]

Any profession that goes melee should have some access to it.
Granted Shade/keeper/ma should have the strongest benefit from it as it is supposed to be a part of their supported tool-set.

But I am very interested to see how the development team plans on implementing it.

[Otansaanpas]

i've forgot what these parry changes are, so cant really comment..

[Gridpain]

TL5 advi would, indeed not realy need it... but TL1/2/3/4 could realy use some love.

[Zwelgje]

I fear it's too early to ask this... I bet Parry is still at the "Oh cool, we could revamp Parry and Ripost guys ! " stage.

Not fully sure about that: http://forums.anarchy-online.com/sho...3&postcount=20
And this was some time ago already.

Regarding the OP and in respect of the link I've just added, it looks like the scaling will be the same for all professions using a melee type of weapon.

Long ago, parry/reposte where very overpowered due to high % gained at low skill IPing. Now, I think FC will make it moderate % at fully IP skills and still not game breaking.

Mainly this will be a nice "extra" at a huge IP sink for all melee classes or professions willing to go melee because they like to try something else.

One thing I'm sure about is that we won't see FC's calculations.

[McKnuckleSamwich]

Yes. Having read that original post by FC it is clear that all melee classes will have access to it.

To be perfectly honest, as things stand, right now, enforcers can get 400-500k free IP at TL5, while still having ALL the appropriate offence and defensive abilities (I know, I have one), and, completely max both parry and riposte.

To be fair, enforcers are getting very slight nerfs, (rage, most importantly), and, keepers are getting some much needed love (dimach change, more evades, better wrath), but, I'm concerned still that some profs like advy (strongest/imbalanced), enforcer(super strong/imbalanced), will be taking advantage of this new skill which really, should be utilized first and foremost by:

Shades (superweak/imbalanced) who obviously need it most
Keepers (weak/almost imbalanced) probably moderate strength after dimach/wrath change, who should be using it
MA's (strong/balanced) who should use it especially in combination with higher nanocost heals for damage mitigation

For enforcers to be gaining a moderate strength defence vs hard hitting specials is ludicrous. Hard hitting specials are currently one of very few methods to take down enforcers. Enforcers can actually EASILY tank most TL5 profs for over 2 minutes, some even without nano usage, and, some profs they can just tank indefinitely. Remove hard hitting specials from the mix, and you're left with just 1-2 profs who can even KILL enforcers. (2minutes is important because enforcers can launch two full alpha's in that time and absolutely demolish nearly every single prof)

Advies, on the other hand, are already at the pinnacle of strength, with the second highest healing capabilities, evades, cocoon, CC resist, runspeed, armour and weapon choices for both offense and defence all in one package, add parry to that, and the single biggest problem for advies (regular, hard hitting AS's and SA's) will fall by the wayside, leaving ONLY nukers as a somewhat distant threat.

The solution for this is to increase the nano reqs on advy heals and leader of the pack, so IP expenditures on parry will be too expensive without being ableto cast top heals/buffs.

Same for enforcer. Currently advies can enjoy NR1 while using top buffs, while enforcers can get away with roughly 60-70% IP usage on main nano lines.

[crattey]

Do you ever want anybody except yourself to get -anything-?

Besides, why should keepers get even more defences? They're hardly squishy as it stands.

[Johnnykay]

More AS Pistols plx.

[Lazy]

im still waiting for the triple AS tigress

[Obtena]

Any profession that goes melee should have some access to it.
Granted Shade/keeper/ma should have the strongest benefit from it as it is supposed to be a part of their supported tool-set.

But I am very interested to see how the development team plans on implementing it.

I would make a slight clarification... any profession that uses a weapon with parry should get it. I don't get any of the logic of the OP. No one has any clue how 1) Parry will work and 2) how the various profs will perform in PVP, yet he's already advocating that certain profs don't get Parry in the re-balance based on complex, 7 degrees of separation logic. Honestly? For example, enfos shouldn't get parry because of how their IP usage breaks down in their nanos lines? I mean, how do you even try to argue against that? It's absolutely ridiculous.

The only concern anyone should have for Parry ATM is there is nothing to be concerned about; we have almost zero information about it. People should stop making up problems where they don't exist.

[Gatester]

Not Advs and enfo? lol at ma/keeper poster

Yeah I laughed at that as well, considering I know for a fact my MA has far more defense in pvp than my enforcer, shade, and MP by a mile. At tl5 whatever overpowered survival my adventurers have is gone based on the balancing docs, so this thread also seems to only be judging current profession abilities.

Parry and riposte in addition to the docs for keeper and MA just seems like total overkill at this point. Hopefully any profession that gains parry and riposte is also nerfed or boosted appropriately to prevent the ability from making the profession too strong.


Either way, there is obviously too much bias in the OP and supplemental post to consider the determination of need to be anything of merit. Even if I agree a profession is overpowered or not at some point, I never rule them out from recieving something because of past performances when a major change to their entire toolset is going to take place.

[Esproc]

I would make a slight clarification... any profession that uses a weapon with parry should get it.

Hopefully the database is checked over with it to make sure weapon that should have parry does and the ones that should be parry-able in fact are.

With it having been a dead skill for so long, I fear some of the newer stuff may have been neglected and some of the older stuff overlooked since it didn't matter.

[Lisergia]

i've forgot what these parry changes are, so cant really comment..

Then don't?

so this thread also seems to only be judging current profession abilities.

That argument is getting boring. Wanna close Balance Discussion instead for the time it takes the devs to patch the balance in place? How would you NOT judge current prof standards when all there is is some lousy preview-like nano documents?

[Obtena]

Boring or not, it's relevant.

[Gatester]

That argument is getting boring. Wanna close Balance Discussion instead for the time it takes the devs to patch the balance in place? How would you NOT judge current prof standards when all there is is some lousy preview-like nano documents?

You seem to have misunderstood the problem of only considering current abilities.

I did not say one should not consider current professions standards, I am pointing out that one should consider both current and proposed abilities, otherwise their arguments will not reflect valid reasoning.

I cannot deny local cooldowns for NTs, for instance, based on their current capabilities with LE doubles and triples. In that same regard, I cannot deny adventurers parry access because their acrobat, bio cocoon, heals, runspeed, and emergency tools work so well together currently when post-balancing they will be drastically different. That is what McKnuckle did, which is biased.

What I would say is that we should avoid reducing adventurer defenses to balanced levels with changes only to put them at the same level as they are now with parry. As long as their toolset is still balanced then adventurers would be justified in having access to parry.

Have I cleared up the misunderstanding?

[agentwolve]

parry and riposte should be able to be used by any profession wielding a weapon with them as requirements, and have its effectiveness based on skill, like offensive specials.