Maybe fix nt

[Vinkera]

I've never seen you in game, on test, or PvPing, even if I wanted to send you a /tell.

Then, you're not looking hard enough. I'm online every single day, for several hours.

Dritst is an excellent PvPer on many toons, and has a NT. If he and other long-term PvPers show up on the forums saying NT seems a little uber, you should be asking a lot of questions instead of telling him how doubles work.

Is this directed at me? Doesn't seem like it.

[McKnuckleSamwich]

Lets all back up for a minute.

I got a question for Vinkera: Who is NT's nemesis, and who actually kills NT's?

[Vinkera]

Lets all back up for a minute.

I got a question for Vinkera: Who is NT's nemesis, and who actually kills NT's?

Simple question, complex answer, but I'll keep it brief.

Technically, MP's would fall into the nemesis category. Traders *should*, but still need some work. Both have the potential, to stop an NT's offense dead, and in the case of NSD, literally no ability to defend themselves, unless something is already up. However, if you're talking defensive focus, doc's could be added in also. If they were to land UBT, a defensive focus NT would have a pretty bad time. Advy's, and possibly Zazen MA's may be tricky, also. Ironically, an offensive focus NT is a nemesis to a defensive focus NT.

However, before I go too much further, where are we going with this?

[Shooorty]

....

Trader "should"...not. Saw Vispa yesterday getting farmed by NTs in duels. The best Trader on the Server by far. MPs? No Clue, but i would like to see a Good MP dueling a Good NT. Advy's is all but a Nemesis, they are Hard to Kill for almost everyone, and nogo for most Profs. Zazen MA's? Not rly i think, just time Nukes with Perks and Alpha em. Zazen MA's dmg output to a good NT is a joke.

Where are we going with this? Well, you can imagine, NTs do not really have a Nemesis Prof. And do not tell me MP, cuz if, then MP would be Nemesis for every one. All Profs need Nanos infight, cept NR Shade....maybe

Anyway, funny to observe how you and Digital try to "defend" the NT Prof. There's obviously a reason if 90% of the ppl here complain.

Just my 2 cents.

[DigitalBath]

Trader "should"...not. Saw Vispa yesterday getting farmed by NTs in duels. The best Trader on the Server by far. MPs? No Clue, but i would like to see a Good MP dueling a Good NT. Advy's is all but a Nemesis, they are Hard to Kill for almost everyone, and nogo for most Profs. Zazen MA's? Not rly i think, just time Nukes with Perks and Alpha em. Zazen MA's dmg output to a good NT is a joke.

Where are we going with this? Well, you can imagine, NTs do not really have a Nemesis Prof. And do not tell me MP, cuz if, then MP would be Nemesis for every one. All Profs need Nanos infight, cept NR Shade....maybe

Anyway, funny to observe how you and Digital try to "defend" the NT Prof. There's obviously a reason if 90% of the ppl here complain.

Just my 2 cents.

You just ignored half of Vinkera's post (regarding the NT's current running Focus) and managed to not make sense because of it.

[McKnuckleSamwich]

Simple question, complex answer, but I'll keep it brief.

Technically, MP's would fall into the nemesis category. Traders *should*, but still need some work. Both have the potential, to stop an NT's offense dead, and in the case of NSD, literally no ability to defend themselves, unless something is already up. However, if you're talking defensive focus, doc's could be added in also. If they were to land UBT, a defensive focus NT would have a pretty bad time. Advy's, and possibly Zazen MA's may be tricky, also. Ironically, an offensive focus NT is a nemesis to a defensive focus NT.

However, before I go too much further, where are we going with this?

Hmm good question.

There was for a long time a bit of a status quo - it was generally accepted that if you met your nemesis, it'd be a pretty damn fast game over for you (i.e. soldier meets engi) no matter the status of your CD's.

Unfortunately, some of the other examples I was thinking of seem to be lost to poor memory or they just don't exist anymore.

Regardless, every toon must die. The hope is, I assume we are all speaking logically here, that you die AS MUCH AS you kill. If on any given day you log in, and go to BS, and you kill 10 toons for every 1 death, then you are obviously playing a highly overpowered toon.

Put differently, every prof, we would hope, for the sake of balance, has, in any fresh encounter, exactly 50% chance to live before killing his opponent, and, his opponent has exactly the same chance.

We all know this is impossible, since many 1 vs 1 encounters are significantly weighted to one side, which the majority of encounters are slightly less weighted so as to balance the kill ratio back to 50/50.

Assuming every opponent you meet is fresh, 100% endgame geared, and just as competitive as you are, and has all defensive/offensive actions available, the question is, which profs have a GREATER than 50% chance to beat an NT, and which profs have a LESSER than 50% chance to beat an NT.

And, the kicker, is of course when you sum the weighted probability of success, do you come out at higher than 50% to live, or lower?

My feeling, to be perfectly truthful, is that NT's come out well ahead of 50%, having significant firepower to blast through any defence before the opponent can put a significant amount of pressure on the NT.

Don't get me wrong - other profs are higher too (MP's, advy for example), but many profs are under 50% and have been for a long time (MA's for example, docs, keepers) which is often a result of being killed before getting in range, not being able to kill, or simply just not having a toolset which allows both survival AND kill power at the same time.

[DigitalBath]

Hmm good question.

There was for a long time a bit of a status quo - it was generally accepted that if you met your nemesis, it'd be a pretty damn fast game over for you (i.e. soldier meets engi) no matter the status of your CD's.

Unfortunately, some of the other examples I was thinking of seem to be lost to poor memory or they just don't exist anymore.

Regardless, every toon must die. The hope is, I assume we are all speaking logically here, that you die AS MUCH AS you kill. If on any given day you log in, and go to BS, and you kill 10 toons for every 1 death, then you are obviously playing a highly overpowered toon.

Put differently, every prof, we would hope, for the sake of balance, has, in any fresh encounter, exactly 50% chance to live before killing his opponent, and, his opponent has exactly the same chance.

We all know this is impossible, since many 1 vs 1 encounters are significantly weighted to one side, which the majority of encounters are slightly less weighted so as to balance the kill ratio back to 50/50.

Assuming every opponent you meet is fresh, 100% endgame geared, and just as competitive as you are, and has all defensive/offensive actions available, the question is, which profs have a GREATER than 50% chance to beat an NT, and which profs have a LESSER than 50% chance to beat an NT.

And, this kicker, is of course when you sum the weighted probability of success, do you come out at higher than 50% to live, or lower?

I get you very well there.

You're trying to balance group pvp scenarios (be it BS or towers) by balancing fresh 1v1 PvP. Things don't really work that way in most games, especially not AO.. That said, I stand by Vinkera's post. A good MP and a good Trader (had one of those earlier in BS, name started with a T.. Tishsomething? forget the rest.. he messed me up over and over again..) will have well over 50% chance.
Assuming a 100% fresh 1v1 encounter, those are the most likely to beat a NT. A good PvP keeper like Shuyin will also have over 50% of beating a NT.. I don't know the specifics of his setup, though..

On that note.. What do you consider to be a fully fresh encounter? is Stealth considered? If so, add Agent and Shade to the list here as well. The stun(s) and alpha will take care of NT's swiftly. The name that comes to mind here is Expert. Seen his Shade and Agent alpha down NT's (myself included) with a nearly 100% success rate.

I don't do duels, but in BS PvP 1v1 NT's don't get anywhere near a 10:1 killing ratio, btw... What happens is we IF get a kill with Aegis up (it's hardly guaranteed..).. then we have to be lucky for 35 seconds. If we're not.. we're joining our "victim" in BS. If it's a Defensive NT there's plenty of things we simply won't kill due to lack of damage/alpha.. but we make ourselves harder to kill as well.

Guess I gotta get some spare time to livestream battlestations on Twitch to try and give people who actually want to understand this a better view of things.

[McKnuckleSamwich]

I get you very well there.

You're trying to balance group pvp scenarios (be it BS or towers) by balancing fresh 1v1 PvP. Things don't really work that way in most games, especially not AO.. That said, I stand by Vinkera's post. A good MP and a good Trader (had one of those earlier in BS, name started with a T.. Tishsomething? forget the rest.. he messed me up over and over again..) will have well over 50% chance.
Assuming a 100% fresh 1v1 encounter, those are the most likely to beat a NT. A good PvP keeper like Shuyin will also have over 50% of beating a NT.. I don't know the specifics of his setup, though..

On that note.. What do you consider to be a fully fresh encounter? is Stealth considered? If so, add Agent and Shade to the list here as well. The stun(s) and alpha will take care of NT's swiftly. The name that comes to mind here is Expert. Seen his Shade and Agent alpha down NT's (myself included) with a nearly 100% success rate.

I don't do duels, but in BS PvP 1v1 NT's don't get anywhere near a 10:1 killing ratio, btw... What happens is we IF get a kill with Aegis up (it's hardly guaranteed..).. then we have to be lucky for 35 seconds. If we're not.. we're joining our "victim" in BS. If it's a Defensive NT there's plenty of things we simply won't kill due to lack of damage/alpha.. but we make ourselves harder to kill as well.

Guess I gotta get some spare time to livestream battlestations on Twitch to try and give people who actually want to understand this a better view of things.

Oh yes, I wasn't purporting that NT's were 10:1. No I think that is a bit high for any class.

So, you say:

From sneak Shade+agent have a very good chance.
From random/fresh encounter MP has a good chance, and you say trader has a good chance, however we have conflicting testimony on traders. And you also think keeper has a good chance. Vinkera things Zazen MA's do as well.

I do think that MA's in general would be close to 50%. If NT's still work like they did before, then a well timed dot remover can extend the duration to be alive for MA quite well, enough to bleed out the aegis/NS2 and do some proper damage. However, I can't be certain as I'm not really sure how fast MA can close the gap before dying to nuke spam.

That's a reasonable list. Notably, At this point in the game, I'm pretty sure (80-90%) that a shade/agent played well can dispatch almost every prof from sneak so I'm not entirely sure of the relevance of that observation regardless of how accurate it is.

What about enforcer and doctor?

I always felt doctors were naturally well suited to kill NT's and enforcers similarly, or is damage output simply too high?

[sultryvoltron]

If NT's still work like they did before, then a well timed dot remover can extend the duration to be alive for MA quite well, enough to bleed out the aegis/NS2 and do some proper damage.

They don't. NTs don't even cast SI anymore as it's not needed for Garuk anymore.

[Vinkera]

Hmm good question.

There was for a long time a bit of a status quo - it was generally accepted that if you met your nemesis, it'd be a pretty damn fast game over for you (i.e. soldier meets engi) no matter the status of your CD's.

Unfortunately, some of the other examples I was thinking of seem to be lost to poor memory or they just don't exist anymore.

Regardless, every toon must die. The hope is, I assume we are all speaking logically here, that you die AS MUCH AS you kill. If on any given day you log in, and go to BS, and you kill 10 toons for every 1 death, then you are obviously playing a highly overpowered toon.

Put differently, every prof, we would hope, for the sake of balance, has, in any fresh encounter, exactly 50% chance to live before killing his opponent, and, his opponent has exactly the same chance.

We all know this is impossible, since many 1 vs 1 encounters are significantly weighted to one side, which the majority of encounters are slightly less weighted so as to balance the kill ratio back to 50/50.

Assuming every opponent you meet is fresh, 100% endgame geared, and just as competitive as you are, and has all defensive/offensive actions available, the question is, which profs have a GREATER than 50% chance to beat an NT, and which profs have a LESSER than 50% chance to beat an NT.

And, the kicker, is of course when you sum the weighted probability of success, do you come out at higher than 50% to live, or lower?

My feeling, to be perfectly truthful, is that NT's come out well ahead of 50%, having significant firepower to blast through any defence before the opponent can put a significant amount of pressure on the NT.

Don't get me wrong - other profs are higher too (MP's, advy for example), but many profs are under 50% and have been for a long time (MA's for example, docs, keepers) which is often a result of being killed before getting in range, not being able to kill, or simply just not having a toolset which allows both survival AND kill power at the same time.

A good statement, but your assessment is again along the same lines as everyone else, no offense.

Most of the complaints I'm getting here are completely ridiculous. I mean, seriously, do most people posting here even re-read what they write before they hit "submit"? I'd say no.

Here's what I'm getting... "NT's kill people in 1 second.", "NT's are immortal.", etc. Unfortunately for the people making those complaints, I wasn't born yesterday, and realize most of what they complain about is completely impossible. Now, I'm getting similar to what you've posted. Again, no offense, but you're not going to bundle defense and offense and try to sell it to me as a combined problem. That says to me, you think there's a problem, but have no idea what it is. There's nothing wrong with that answer, actually. However, it seems other posters can't simply admit "I think, but I don't know why" is a fair answer, and try to pick apart my posts or take jabs at me or whatever makes them feel warm and fuzzy. Well, that won't get anyone very far with me.

McKnuckle, I'd like to continue this conversation, but would prefer to do so privately since your posts are rather sensible, generally. Please send me a tell in game when you can.

[McKnuckleSamwich]

err, what assessment?

Did you read my post or just assume it was an assessment exactly the same as what others were writing, and are you responding to my post or someone elses? because your response doesn't seem to be related to what you quoted.


What I said in that post (TLDR) was that game balance depends on broadly equal kill/be killed ratios. What I said without proper clarification since I didn't intend to put a number on NT's specifically was a 10 to 1 kill/be killed ratio - I didn't mean to suggest this is the NT ratio, so I'm clarifying now: I don't know or claim to know what the kill:be killed ratio is for NT's.

I would appreciate if some NT's could provide some kill ratios. How often do you get out of Decon and not make a single kill before you die?

[Psikie]

Interesting, I would like to chime in here. From a 1 on 1 duel scenerio I've observed the following.

Bow/pistol MP is most definitely a nemesis to NT's just by using nano dmg debuffs and no need for NSD. Where a shield MP has to use NSD to kill NT's faster than they can be killed.

Heal based keepers can pretty much eat NT's.

1 UBT and Doctors have the advantage in time.

Now if you are just talking about battle station ganks...NT's do have a huge advantage. Usually they are lurking behind a line of friends and gank for kills before you know what hit you.

[Vinkera]

It's getting late here... Let's try that again.

Hmm good question.

There was for a long time a bit of a status quo - it was generally accepted that if you met your nemesis, it'd be a pretty damn fast game over for you (i.e. soldier meets engi) no matter the status of your CD's.

Unfortunately, some of the other examples I was thinking of seem to be lost to poor memory or they just don't exist anymore.

Regardless, every toon must die. The hope is, I assume we are all speaking logically here, that you die AS MUCH AS you kill. If on any given day you log in, and go to BS, and you kill 10 toons for every 1 death, then you are obviously playing a highly overpowered toon.

Put differently, every prof, we would hope, for the sake of balance, has, in any fresh encounter, exactly 50% chance to live before killing his opponent, and, his opponent has exactly the same chance.

We all know this is impossible, since many 1 vs 1 encounters are significantly weighted to one side, which the majority of encounters are slightly less weighted so as to balance the kill ratio back to 50/50.

Assuming every opponent you meet is fresh, 100% endgame geared, and just as competitive as you are, and has all defensive/offensive actions available, the question is, which profs have a GREATER than 50% chance to beat an NT, and which profs have a LESSER than 50% chance to beat an NT.

This, I like. It's a good general statement.

My feeling, to be perfectly truthful, is that NT's come out well ahead of 50%, having significant firepower to blast through any defence before the opponent can put a significant amount of pressure on the NT.

Don't get me wrong - other profs are higher too (MP's, advy for example), but many profs are under 50% and have been for a long time (MA's for example, docs, keepers) which is often a result of being killed before getting in range, not being able to kill, or simply just not having a toolset which allows both survival AND kill power at the same time.

This is pretty much what I'm seeing a lot of. To me, it's saying NT's have too much defense and offense without putting your finger on which, and bundling them as a single problem. Perhaps you're still speaking generally here, but that's exactly what I'm getting from other posters, and it tells me nothing.

[sultryvoltron]

Could it be too much defense when in offensive focus and too much offense when in defensive focus?

[McKnuckleSamwich]

Vinkera thanks for clarifying, yes, I see what you're saying I'm sorry I probably needed to be more specific.

Could it be too much defense when in offensive focus and too much offense when in defensive focus?

Thank you sultry.

This is spot on. This is exactly what I was trying to say without the words to say it.

But I want to add one thing to it, that being that with such a short CD (~2 minutes CD on off/def focus) it's simply not enough time for an opponent to exploit the focus that the NT is in at any give time.

round 1: Me vs NT NT wins (I gain knowledge NT is in Off focus)
round 2: Me vs NT NT barely squeeks out a win since I knew he was in off and was using that knowledge to better my chances
round 3: Me vs NT NT wins (NT changes to def focus)
round 4: Me vs NT NT wins (swaps back to off focus, I assume he's going to be in def focus)

NT 4, Me 0 Kill ratio undefined 4:0

Again going back to my earlier post about fluidity of transfer: if you're going to be strong in off and strong in def, you need to be locked in for longer. If you want to be less strong in either but have opportunity for either, then the fluid transfer is warranted.

But as it stands, it's too much of a good thing in off, too much of a good thing in def, and too many opportunities to make use of the ..

WTF

The easy way to sort this out is for NT's in off focus to have a big RED aura and NT's in Def focus to have a big BLUE aura. bingo. Sorted.

[DigitalBath]

Vinkera thanks for clarifying, yes, I see what you're saying I'm sorry I probably needed to be more specific.



Thank you sultry.

This is spot on. This is exactly what I was trying to say without the words to say it.

But I want to add one thing to it, that being that with such a short CD (~2 minutes CD on off/def focus) it's simply not enough time for an opponent to exploit the focus that the NT is in at any give time.

round 1: Me vs NT NT wins (I gain knowledge NT is in Off focus)
round 2: Me vs NT NT barely squeeks out a win since I knew he was in off and was using that knowledge to better my chances
round 3: Me vs NT NT wins (NT changes to def focus)
round 4: Me vs NT NT wins (swaps back to off focus, I assume he's going to be in def focus)

NT 4, Me 0 Kill ratio undefined 4:0

Again going back to my earlier post about fluidity of transfer: if you're going to be strong in off and strong in def, you need to be locked in for longer. If you want to be less strong in either but have opportunity for either, then the fluid transfer is warranted.

But as it stands, it's too much of a good thing in off, too much of a good thing in def, and too many opportunities to make use of the ..

WTF

The easy way to sort this out is for NT's in off focus to have a big RED aura and NT's in Def focus to have a big BLUE aura. bingo. Sorted.

Personally I wouldn't mind either of those too much if they're well thought upon. I don't mind "announcing" I'm in OFF or DEF focus via a well visible effect.

The main issue I have with the "focus cooldown" is deciding how long is too long for a NT that wants to switch. Not sure it's known to all but the timer is reset every time we use a nano from a given focus.
This means that at the moment we have to wait two minutes from casting the last NS or Double/Delayed nuke until we are able to switch to the other Focus. That's two minutes during which we can't benefit from either Focus' benefits and have a very reduced toolset (in both def and off) to work with, which in a BS environment is a considerable enough amount of time.. not so much for dueling since most people ask for X time to wait to recharge perks and such anyway.

I don't think there's "too much of a good thing" in either off or def. It's VERY concentrated because most professions have several ways to defend themselves + at least 1 good way to have an alpha (or CC and debuffs that allows killing resilient professions). NT's in offensive focus have 1 single way to temporarily defend themselves that will destroy their nanopool either during it with enemy damage or at the end if we live. After that there's no cocoon, heals, high evades, etc.. we spent it and have to wait 35 seconds to do it again.
A defensive focus NT has decent damage but their alpha is not enough to kill most resilient professions played with proper skill. A good doc/zazen MA/adv will easily negate the NT's damage while outlasting NS2 and Aegis. Others have other ways of dealing with it through CC and Debuffing as well as simple snares and roots during Aegis (during NS2 they get that for free).

I love the "highly concentrated" NT playstyle. I have good fun with it in PvP and PvM.. though I know that for full-on ganks my Shade performs better overall.
Many people die to single NT's not because of the WTF IT CHANGED FOCUS, but because they know too little about the profession itself and can't counter it.

Why can I kill 220 NT's often enough even on my 219 fixer? Where's this supposed immortality? This is especially true for Offensive Focus NT's since NS2 + Aegis is harder - not impossible - for my fixer to get through at the moment.

In teams a NT is a very powerful asset since people tend to focus something else and then notice the NT in the back.
This doesn't always work out.. if there's a doc on the other team things immediately can get very complicated. Two docs or doc+adv and things get VERY harsh.
I had this experience with Pharexys(adv) and Drkittles(doc) recently. Did a full BS where we managed to kill Kittles a single time (two NT's and a Shade in team + a few others, no healer tho).. and then we died to the rest of the crew. All other attempts were a wipefest.

I agree Focus should be a more visible thing though. Much like an agent or adv makes it's FP or Form somewhat available to others, NT's should have their Focus visible. I'd say Zazen MA should also be visible for the same reason and any similar "stance/focus/etc" mechanics.

Gonna get some sleep, my post may lack focus and I apologize if it does. I'll pick it up tomorrow.

[Pomidor]

1 UBT and Doctors have the advantage in time.

And this is interesting, and showing what I have said - at TL6 NT is so strong, that vs good doc even with UBT is able to kill him pretty easy, or at least keep him in constant-heal mode for whole fight (eventually you find yourself without time to land UBT on NT and losing duel/fight).

[Vinkera]

The easy way to sort this out is for NT's in off focus to have a big RED aura and NT's in Def focus to have a big BLUE aura. bingo. Sorted.

I don't mind "announcing" I'm in OFF or DEF focus via a well visible effect.

I have a bit of an issue with that.

We're a profession that's VERY susceptible to lag. Visual effects of our own perks have caused problems in this area that lingered for quite a while, and some players who don't NT much STILL ask me if it's been fixed or not to this day. (I'm referring to Channeling of Notum)

If we can add a visual and avoid lag, by all means... Have Offensive Focus NT's set themselves on fire like Enf's did with rage at 18.7 release. That's a bit of sarcasm, but it would get the message across.

[Vinkera]

Could it be too much defense when in offensive focus and too much offense when in defensive focus?

Sorry about missing this earlier, but please elaborate.

Basically, I need more. That statement is easy to make, but how to even begin to consider it is difficult.

[drainbamage]

NTs in Defensive Focus should be invulnerable but completely ineffectual for 30 seconds, after which they die.
NTs in Offensive Focus should be able to kill one thing (maybe) and then immediately die.

Balance!