EZ Server

Ok, so we talked about classes DPS yesterday in /ooc and some of the information I talked about was not correct, as we have figured out today after some tests.

As some of you know, I am currently working on DPS parses for melee classes on Test Server. I should be done soon and will post the information gathered as soon as possible.

When it comes to the melee DPS I found Zerks, Rogues and Monks to be pretty close matched in terms of DPS. All three classes were around the 20-21 million sustainable dps

Then I received information about Rogues doing insane backstabs and decided to look further into it. Together with Draca we found out that the Rogue's damage is different on the Test Server, where I did my parses, compared to EZ Live Server. Backstabs do way less damage on Test Server compared to on EZ Live.

So you can forget what I said last night about Rogue's DPS. It's not around 20 million damage on Live server at all. It's actually 65 million! damage on EZ live, using best setup with SPD in mainhand and Cratos with dual NS12's in off hand. This equals the damage of 3 monks!!

So you can see how balanced this is  ;)

what am I missing that The SPD is better than the Ultimate Dagger XII?

Correct. Not just better, but more or less 3 x better.

I tested the EZ Live Rogue with SPD in main hand and Cratos with 2x NS12 in off hand and did 65 million DPS.

Using UW12 dagger in main hand and Cratos in off hand goes for 20 million DPS.

So basically the SPD gives a Rogue 3x the normal damage.

I don't mean to play the devil's advocate here, but I think we can all agree that this is unbalanced as hell compared to the other DPS classes, no matter how much we love our cloaks and daggers :)

I get that its doing more damage, but why? Aren't all the stats for the UDXII better than SPD?

Almost seems like something is broken with the SPD if we cant point at a reason for it being so much more damage.

Draca can explain this much better than me.

The issue with the UW Dagger is the backstab damage bonus is over cap, and results in either no backstab bonus, or very little. Ultimately no DPS class is supposed to be out-DPSing another by 3x, so following some upcoming changes, some tuning may be necessary for Rogues.

-Draca

Hm? I thought you wanted to adjust UW dmg so it is same level as SPD?

Well this is some very interesting stuff!

A little bonkers what you can find when you spend a little time on each class to see what they may actually be capable of if you were to devote as much time and attention to them as if they were your main character!

Another thing that's been known about for ages, it's all in the broken repair shop threads so we don't end up with umpteen different threads about broken stuff.

Post anything broken in there no need for individual posts for each broken thing.

Tank

 

That was in the absence of specific DPS figures, and the fact the the UW damage wasn't lower on purpose, it just had an over capped stat that was bugging out it's damage, which is honestly all I paid attention to at the time. There's no particular reason Rogues should be 3x the DPS of any other class, I wouldn't mind slightly superior in single target situations, losing to Berserkers in AE situations, but 65m DPS vs 16-20m for other melee DPS classes is out of whack. More to come on this in the coming weeks.

Ah ok I understand and yeah, rogues should not do 3 times the dmg of a monk. As long as I can use my hw uw or uw12 on my rogue and actually do dmg I am happy ;-)

It sucks to habe uw and cratos waiting for action and use SPD and RE instead

why we didnt add some Discs items like Orbs from T3-T4 to add some dmg on other favor classes like Monk Zerker Ranger and no clue !!! that choose can catch lightly up on ROgue dmg ?

I feel this is the wrong way to go about a "fix"

Rogue damage finally feels as though the class is present. Why nerf one class that FINALLY feels usable, but rather increase the others to follow suit?

Add some fun ways to increase others, give monk full-time innerflame, berserker full-time bla bla bla - you get where I'm going.

Nerfs at this point in the game feels very counter-productive to all the work done to push things forward

Alternatively, how about a global stat squash? We have Wizard damage that unintentionally heals the target due to exceeding the damage cap. A squish could help reset this back to more manageable levels.

EDIT: Otto, I didn't intend to blast all your points, I just know that there are others who feel the same way, so I wanted to go point by point through your post.


What about them being 3x the damage of any other DPS class, makes them feel usable? It's not a characteristic of rogues from any point in the game.




Same point as above, what about them doing more damage will inherently make them more exciting to play? Content makes stuff exciting to play, you could be hitting for 12 damage in the basement of Befallen and be having an absolute blast. While EZ certainly deals in large numbers, imbalances can't be simply ignored.



I don't disagree, that nerfs feel pretty crappy from a player perspective, I know, I was one not that long ago. While saying that, I can't simply leave something clearly imbalanced just because people like seeing obscene backstabs, which can account for over 1/3 of the maximum number of hitpoints we can use.


At this point, because of the sheer amount of interconnected things, a stat squish isn't something we can reasonably expect to happen any time soon. While it seems like you could do a blanket "reduce everything by XX%" and it should be balanced, that's not the case in practice. Even if something like that worked in a general sense, the amount of manual adjustments to balance the outliers would be incredibly high.



Ultimately my goal is to balance some of the classes who are clearly less desirable, and give people a choice in who they choose to use to tank, to DPS and heal. While warriors should be the best pure tank, they shouldn't be the only choice. Nor should rogues be the only good option for DPS because they outpace every other DPS class by three times. If someone wanted to run a SK, Cleric, Bst, Mnk, Wiz, Dru group, than I want them to be to be able to do so. It might take more work than self-healing warriors tank for auto-attacking melee classes, and paladins proc'ing monster heals to get through content, but I know some people want more than that, and want more involvement in the survival of their groups. I know that everyone is waiting for less talk, more action, but I can assure you, beyond VP there is a lot of exciting stuff coming up.

-Draca

I mostly agree with your responses, Draca - And this certainly isn't intended to say you are wrong, or doing something wrong, but rather observations and personal opinion. I feel this is important for me to state.

What I probably failed to express is that I personally (opinion) feel that we finally have a class that stands out from the pack. This is absolutely due to the dramatic difference in performance, which is the issue here.

Class and role identity is pretty washed out, but that's sorta the EZ that has existed since 2011 or 2012. (Back when T1 and T2 were Anguish, folks really just 1 or 2 boxed here)

Here's another curious component to why rogues being huge damage dealers is significant - Because it finally places them in the "Has a use other than hide/sneak and group CotH"

Classes we need in order to progress
Warrior
Paladin

Classes we don't need, but sorta do cool stuff
Necromancer (Good AoE, cool to see Death proc)
Rogue (Single target damage)
Berserker (AoE i guess. This is less relevant in the end-game.)

Classes we don't need at all, but might have a gimmick we convince ourselves we need
Shaman (Grudge)
Bard (Group DA. Can replace this need with donation items)

Classes that suck, and get dragged around so we can give them loot
Ranger
Monk (Does OK damage, but whatever. I love monks, don't hate me)
Enchanter
Cleric
Druid
Mage
Wizard
Beastlord
Shadowknight

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So what am I trying to say here?... Basically, as stated above, it would be most excellent if there was some balance. I don't have all the answers, and won't pretend to have a fix-all remedy, but most of us would love to have a tough time deciding on what to use in a 6-man group.

Looking above, it's obvious what I would NOT pick, and it's obvious now why some folks 6-man group is War / War / Rog / Rog / Rog / Pal

Maybe nerfs are the way, but puts us back into the same position as before where everyone runs War / Pal - and just drags the rest along to loot items.

Ok I'm done for now, so I can stop rambling on.... lol

That is why it is important to reduce rogue damage and/or increase monk/ranger/zerk/bard damage. If they are the same level you get more variety or more classes to choose from.

Rogues will still be awesome but Monks and other dps classes will shine too.

Only problem will be casters except necro. There is still almost no need for an ench, mage or wizard unfortunately

Btw I use shammy for kraken and champion because grudge is oberwriting howl of the hunter :/

Why does no one bring up beastlords...they are very under represented lol.  Lots of classes are screwy (most caster/hybrid classes) pets are horrible as they require too much work to be viable....and buffs on some hybrid classes (pally not having a brells line or the beastlord Ascent Essence line are a complete loss or a complete bomb) rogues (even if they didnt have a dps advantage) are worth having for SoS and a group/raid summon clickie...by far my choice for easily gettiung to Aby in ST (can't get past him though as he sees through SoS)...each class , if not strong in dps, should have something seperate but equal that brings them to the table.

i think in the setting of more powerful mobs, guardian charm not being as effective in future tiers, and greatly reduced effectiveness of riposte/dodge/parry mechanics in new tiers, the need for utility and healing increases.

Everyone complains about pets but its not all about damage. Pets can be used to apply and maintain debuffs to mobs through weapon procs.
Cleric strong single target heal I think will be a huge benefit in future tiers.
SK defensive epic 50% damage reduction will also be of great benefit.
Druid skin will become useful especially with players using UC instead of guardian/brawler and tanking 1-2 mobs at a time.
Bard songs will be useful as using them will not put the bard at risk of death to incoming mobs from a zone pull when mobs can only be pulled 1-2 at a time.

With the change in approach from zone pull everything and hit riposte to more challenging content I think we might find some classes we previously thought useless will develop a niche and be worth playing.

Shaman have buffs and let us not forget the wonderful wonderful spell Lingering Sloth

Lingering Sloth is great if we needed to use slows here. I LOVE shaman, just wish they were -more- here.

Lingering Sloth can be used, in t10. Not useful prior to T10 but I used that and druid regen buff before evry.single.pull.in .orc.camp....only way to survive back in the day before the zone was nerfed and became easy (and yes this was before UA existed)