The missing piece?

[Mastablasta]

So, all this perk documentation and talk of rebalancing nanos and so on is very nice to have. But for all these discussions we're having here, we seem to be missing one rather crucial piece: The design paper for the 14 professions.

How does Funcom see the professions and what is it they're working towards? What is the end-goal for each profession when things are done? What is a Keeper supposed to be? What is the NT supposed to do? What will MP and Crat roles be?

Knowing what is being worked towards would be rather nifty to have, so instead of just shouting out the random stuff hating on this and that for not fitting into our individual view of what exactly this profession is supposed to be, we could debate the actual direction and how the changes fit into it.

[Mekh]

Agree.
That is the thing I would like to see more than anything else...

I've asked that question before though, without ever getting any response.



EDIT:
Found it.

[Questra]

Would also be nice to see some perk plans for AI and SL general perks, if they're going to change those.

Still haven't seen these fabled "lower defense checks" to compensate for some of the 500-800 AR most people will be losing with AI perks.

[Klod9002]

Still haven't seen these fabled "lower defense checks" to compensate for some of the 500-800 AR most people will be losing with AI perks.

You ain't losing anything on AI perks. That's merely a fix.

[Questra]

You ain't losing anything on AI perks. That's merely a fix.

The reason evade profs were OPed before LE was because they had so much more def than anyone had AR.

The reason evade profs weren't so OPed after LE was because people could actually hit them, and some people (people who don't have nano based attacks for example) can hit them with SOMETHING to have a chance of ODing their healing, be it Soul of Rubi, HoTs, healpet, BoL, or shade drains (with the exception of crats).

Balance has fallen into place around a system where a lot of people are used to be able to land AI perks on evade profs in DoF downtime. Changing that overnight, to the tune of over 500 AR, is quite a sharp drop.

Nerfed AS and slower perks and nerfed alphas are going to make evade profs very strong already. We don't need them being automatically immune to AI perks too. You just got something like 1 to 2k more AR with your perks that check vs NR, so don't go hating on everyone else. If an MP can perk people but a soldier can't, this game is truly screwed.

[Klod9002]

If an MP can perk people but a soldier can't, this game is truly screwed.

If a MP can perk people with nano skill checking perks and soldier can't, no, this game is not getting screwed in that case. On the contrary, it's actually getting better.

And anyways, heals are getting nerfed, so are specials, I understand. But regular hits will make a difference and you land them pretty often and fast enough to make it matters.

[Questra]

If a MP can perk people with nano skill checking perks and soldier can't, no, this game is not getting screwed in that case. On the contrary, it's actually getting better.

And anyways, heals are getting nerfed, so are specials, I understand. But regular hits will make a difference and you land them pretty often and fast enough to make it matters.

Lets say this in a different way.

If an MP can get 1 to 2k more AR with nano damage perks, and a soldier has 800 less AR with weapon perks....

...i.e. if an MP can land nano perks but a soldier can't land weapon perks...

...i.e. if an MP can perk people but soldiers can't.

Do I think an MP should be able to perk people with perks that check vs NR? Sure.

Do you think that nobody else should land perks on people unless they share your profession? It seems so.

Things getting alot better for you doesn't mean you have to ask for others to get nerfed. Some of those Starfall perks are looking pretty damn fearsome...

[Klod9002]

Lets say this in a different way.

If an MP can get 1 to 2k more AR with nano damage perks, and a soldier has 800 less AR with weapon perks....

...i.e. if an MP can land nano perks but a soldier can't land weapon perks...

Yes, MPs will now land perks on evaders and you won't. Now suck it up and go perk MPs. Working as intended.

[Herkulease]

This is exactly the problem though. It is virtually impossible for Funcom to balance the professions, and give them a set "role" to fill at the same time.

With a set "role" you will only end up with everyone being unhappy.

- Doctors can only heal.

- Fixers can only run fast.

- Enforcers can only keep aggro.

- Soldier only do damage, then die.


Everyone gets mad about not being able to PvM or PvP as well as "that guy", or about how they are not useful in a given situation. So Funcom has to balance things out. And you end up with something completly different from where you started.

- Doctors that can heal, and do damage.

- Fixers that can heal, and do damage.

- Enforcers that can heal, and do damage.

- Soldiers that can heal, and do damage.

Everyone rolls a profession cause the picture looks pretty. But when they start playing it, the stuff everyone else has looks nice too.

Not to sound cynical or sarcastic but, I would love to hear "enfo's are supposed to be tanks." and then have it really be that way.

It's just as soon as you make us what we are supposed to be. All the support professions will cry about not being able to kill us. And all the enforcers will cry about not being able to wtfpwn the support professions.

Balance just means we all get the same thing, with a different wrapper. I am not trying to complain about it. I am just saying I don't expect much of a meaningful response on the horizon. Or at least, not one that you cant poke holes in.

"You said enforcer's were tanks, but they still kill me."

"You said doctor's are healers, but I just died to one."

8/

For the record though, I wouldn't mind seeing a response on this either. I just don't expect it to hold water/meaning. 8p

/long post end

[Kinkst44h]

The classes are 14 different types of combatant.

Hybrids are better in the end. Noone likes feeling like they cant do **** to someone else, or defend against someone else.

Making the game "role based" would be horriffic for enjoyment.
Winning or losing because you are Class X vs Class Y, or Role A vs Role B is mega fail.

[Mastablasta]

Which still doesn't change that it would be nice to know what we're working towards

[Mekh]

The classes are 14 different types of combatant.

Hybrids are better in the end. Noone likes feeling like they cant do **** to someone else, or defend against someone else.

Making the game "role based" would be horriffic for enjoyment.
Winning or losing because you are Class X vs Class Y, or Role A vs Role B is mega fail.

This... and exactly why that crap "nemesis" concept is mega fail as well.

Might as well roll a dice then, except that depending on the prof you meet, you also know the outcome even without rolling the dice.

Which still doesn't change that it would be nice to know what we're working towards

Agree...

[Eskarin]

Balance just means we all get the same thing, with a different wrapper. I am not trying to complain about it. I am just saying I don't expect much of a meaningful response on the horizon. Or at least, not one that you cant poke holes in.

"You said enforcer's were tanks, but they still kill me."

"You said doctor's are healers, but I just died to one."

Just excellent point.

[Dancingrage]

I see MPs as the caster version of an Advy. Do things a little differently but should have the same result. Should be capable of filling the same roles, and a lot is being done to make that happen, with perk heals greatly improving as well as new ones being added. More damage is being given to the pets, but their AR is still in the crapper and TL5 advies can pop on an SSOS while I'm still staring at craptastic Biazu with the abilities to cast Mortificant and below, and could pop a Zhok with some effort.

As it sits right now we're buffing and debuffing totems with lower damage than advies at equivalent level, lower healing (not counting CH), and much worse AR for both master AND pet. We can get really screaming high nanoskills and have zero reason for doing so, viability in pvp has been reduced to turtling behind a shield for survival (this isn't so bad, since it's a tradeoff for weapon and special damage, but our pets stink). We're equal roughly in pvm terms but for wildly different reasons, while in pvp we're creeping towards the low end of the totem pole mainly because of pet problems, while other builds of MP are basically falling shorter due to lack of defense from perks.

In terms of how to rebalance, FC is on the right track in some areas: Improving Ancient Knowledge so it's a worthy perkline, giving us more perk heals and improving the one we have, improving our pet damage. Trauma's theory is nice, since every build of MP has nukes, we'll just work off of those, but it flops somewhat in execution on paper since 6 seconds isn't very long for bigger nukes, and the other 2 perk actions aren't too hot. Also since MPs have 30 points already allocated for Channel Rage/Soothing SPirits and Starfall, it's going to be tough to justify another prof perkline without useful benefits like a defensive perk action instead of the DoT (which would pop in at 150, which is a notorious low point in MP pvp) and an improved attack perk for the last perk. Many suggest trimming it to 7 points because of Theoretical Research 3, a common perk action to train for MPs to give more crowd control capacity.

The big picture here is that MPs are a pet prof, so we won't be able to really get an idea of what our bigger picture is going to be unless we can see what is in store for our nanos down the line. All our pets are based off of nanos, all our creation weapons bar the 2hb quest sticks are cast from nanos, and ALL of them bar the quest sticks are direly in need of an update. We have 2 shield lines no MP ever uses, and one 2hb line no MP ever uses. Our pets are very much out of date and out of line with casting ability of the modern MP. Will we get the cold nuke snare that we'd been asking for for ages? How about pet taunt tools we can cast since that seems to be something in line for us soon (and badly needed, MP soloing is less pet tanking and more a funky game of pinball aggro). Will the healpet get that percentage heal we've requested so we can actually start to heal our pet's 55k HP or be able to be useful in raids when there's no doc?

Lots of questions which really can't be answered yet because it's not the time for that particular question. We're very nano-dependent so while our perks are nice, we won't find out if what we're asking for will be addressed until it's time for the nano part of the prof rebalancing. However, keeping in mind the first sentence of this wall of text, "I see the MP as the caster version of an Advy.", this should give some idea of what we as a profession are looking at/forward to.

[zartosht]

lol @ thread hijack by MPs...

OP rightfully asked FC's future vision of the professions and all we get back is the usual troll squad of MPs explaining what they should be...

[Klod9002]

lol @ thread hijack by MPs...

OP rightfully asked FC's future vision of the professions and all we get back is the usual troll squad of MPs explaining what they should be...

And now we got ourselves one engie troll as well. GJ

[sultryvoltron]

lol @ thread hijack by MPs...

OP rightfully asked FC's future vision of the professions and all we get back is the usual troll squad of MPs explaining what they should be...

People aren't entitled to an opinion about what their profession should be? The people on these forums leveled their toons to 220. Their opinion on their profession is valid. I honestly doubt the FC team has leveled every single profession, so asking for other's expertise on the matter is the wise course.

[Dancingrage]

@SultryVoltron: For the record, I'm currently 172. Of course, I rerolled from 220 cos Nanomage was getting sexier by the day vs Soli for MP, but that's just my choice.

As this seemed to me to be Masta asking for various professions and those who play them to come forth and give some idea of what their profession currently is about and what they THINK it should be about, it seemed only natural that I come in with my 2 cents. I get the impression that if someone wanted to come and give an idea of what they think an Engineer should be, they should feel free to come and do so.

I also agree that FC should probably update what a (insert profession here) should be. The info on the startup screens is valid, sorta, but very old.

[Mekh]

So, all this perk documentation and talk of rebalancing nanos and so on is very nice to have. But for all these discussions we're having here, we seem to be missing one rather crucial piece: The design paper for the 14 professions.

How does Funcom see the professions and what is it they're working towards?
...snip...

This thread is about FC's view on professions, not how players view their professions... There's plenty of threads about that already.



Hence the:

lol @ thread hijack by MPs...

OP rightfully asked FC's future vision of the professions and all we get back is the usual troll squad of MPs explaining what they should be...