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Update 1.2 Class Balances and the Nitty Gritty Details


Coldin

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<Snip>

 

Just because you refuse to listen to audio cues, doesn't make it a bad system. But keep on thinking that because you dictate that audio cues are worthless that it obviates my argument.

 

*Hint*: It doesn't.

 

Many people, including myself use audio cues for many things; including timing and situational awareness. If you refuse to use them, that's your fault. Not mine.

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Just because you refuse to listen to audio cues, doesn't make it a bad system. But keep on thinking that because you dictate that audio cues are worthless that it obviates my argument.

 

*Hint*: It doesn't.

 

Many people, including myself use audio cues for many things; including timing and situational awareness. If you refuse to use them, that's your fault. Not mine.

 

The audio cues are nice....but it is true that if there's ever two or more scoundrel/operatives, they don't do much good. Buff icons are also so small that it's not really that feasible to look down and tell what they are at a glance.

 

Some kind of visual effect on the avatar would help a lot to knowing when certain buffs and procs are up.

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Well no.

 

Any kind of structural change we do (e.g. a skill that had 3 points now has 2 points) or if a skill changes what it does or moves to a different tier will require us to give all players in that tree a free respec. Anything else would be unfair to the player. I'm not going to start changing your character without giving you that option.

 

Game Update 1.2. contains the result of several months of feedback and data gathered from real player interactions with our servers. We're quite deliberate in our pace of making adjustments to classes, taking our time to see where classes are developing as players get into the game, watching new specs coming and going as the community develops counter measures against them. Game Update 1.2 is an opportunity for us to roll out greater changes and big picture improvements or rebalances.

 

The changes made to most classes are more evolutionary adjustments or quality of life upgrades along with balance improvements (up and down). Still, we won't be the arbiter of whether a change makes a skill worthwhile or no longer worthwhile for your build, you can make that decision for yourself, hence the free respec.

 

so you are saying that sent/maur are getting focus/rage 'buff' (/nerf) and some lame skillpoint that gives more range or less cooldown? you know we take this spec that just for the alpha stirke. I don't want to go back to dot dot choke spec :(

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so you are saying that sent/maur are getting focus/rage 'buff' (/nerf) and some lame skillpoint that gives more range or less cooldown? you know we take this spec that just for the alpha stirke. I don't want to go back to dot dot choke spec :(

 

How in the world did you manage to take that offhand generic example and turn it into something specific to Sentinels? :jawa_confused: That's incredible, that you somehow interpreted that as an actual change and somehow thought up a specific skill for it. No, Georg is not saying that at all; in fact, he didn't say anything specific to a class, just that skill points being refunded if they change the structure of skill trees.

Edited by dizzyMongoose
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http://au.pc.ign.com/articles/121/1219843p1.html

Class changes in 1.2 include new abilities for the Warrior and the Knight, a nerf for the Bounty Hunter, and more. Every class will receive changes, and all skill tree points refunded so you can look over the trees again before deciding how to rebuild your class. "Some players will be excited, some might not. That's always the case when there's tweaks to classes."
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so you are saying that sent/maur are getting focus/rage 'buff' (/nerf) and some lame skillpoint that gives more range or less cooldown? you know we take this spec that just for the alpha stirke. I don't want to go back to dot dot choke spec :(

Uh, well, no. How do I explain this?

 

I am saying exactly what I am saying in my post. Some skills in the game had structural changes. I am not mentioning any specific class. I'm giving a generic example of something that could be considered a structural change.

 

How you can turn this into something that references Marauders, Sentinels, focus and alpha strikes or DOTs is completely beyond me.

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Yes, we're totally aware of that IGN article that misconstrues and decontextualizes the facts.

 

https://twitter.com/#!/Rockjaw/status/177436594037465090

 

@demonicking08 We're not entirely sure why IGN reported on that; BH is not getting 'singled out' for changes in 1.2.
Edited by Onager
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One thing that I was really hoping would come out of the Guild Summit was more information on what class balances would be taking place in 1.2. There's been some hints here and there that changes are coming. IGN even reported that Jedi Knights will be receiving some new skills, while Bounty Hunters will be receiving a nerf. In fact, entire skill trees are changing so greatly they're actually refunding our skill points for free.

 

However we have yet to see any details about this. With 1.2 being pushed out to early April, it's becoming more difficult for me to remain patient. In particular with the reduction to damage to Scoundrel Scrapper damage, and the relative silence of Bioware to concerns about the classes effectiveness in Operations and PVP. I'm not eager to have to wait another month to find out how classes will be changing to become more balanced, and I'm sure many others are becoming impatient as well.

 

All of the other 1.2 changes and additions sound great so far, but they won't mean much to me if certain classes are still inherently better than others. Let's hear some information about what 1.2 will be doing to classes in particular, and don't skimp on the details.

Nobody outside the building has seen the patch notes for 1.2 yet. So whoever is reporting anything regarding the class changes in 1.2 is likely doing so based on second or third hand commentary from someone who might - or might not - have seen the patch notes.

 

I got asked some questions regarding individual classes by people at the Guild Summit and have answered all of them. When / if these people decide to divulge those answers is up to them.

 

In regards to comments about 'relative silence about class X': We generally do not comment on balance related plans or findings on the Forums, for any class, until we have made a firm decision to change something and the patch that does so is on the Public Test Server. Doing anything else would limit options and create unreasonable expectations.

 

We do, at rare occasions, hint at upcoming changes (e.g. in a Q&A), but these cases are exceptions.

 

Yes, you may say 'Georg, then give us the real information'. That's fair, we totally appreciate that you guys are impatient. However, giving you that information requires it to be final, and it is not. It will be final enough for initial public consumption when patch 1.2 is on PTS.

 

It's tempting to give snippets and hints about these changes here, now, to calm people down - but all that will accomplish is everyone who isn't getting their information will cry foul. It's happening already based on the article you are referencing ("Why are you nerfing X but not Y"), which is completely void of any details. On the internet, saying X means that everyone else hears 'Not Y'.

 

So:

 

Yes, I want you to have that information, but I want everyone to get it at the same time, when it is ready, and I want you to get the full picture. Thus, you will all get it with the full patch notes on PTS. Once that information is there, you can test the changes on the server and voice your feedback as usual and yes, some people will be happy, some won't.

 

If we ever reach the point where every class thinks they are completely balanced and everything is great, I'll take the red pill and unplug from the matrix.

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I cancelled with 1.2 patch as the reason.

 

Didn't like what I saw to be honest and it's going to be getting warm outside soon.

 

I have about 2 weeks and might resub depending on what everyone says about 1.2.

 

Right now it doesn't look good though and neither does the current state of the game.

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Apparently Georg said at the summit that sent/mara are too strong in a good player's hands, so we should be expecting adjustments of some sort to them.

That's odd, I've never seen them as a "problem" class, perhaps there are no good players on my server :(

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I cancelled with 1.2 patch as the reason.

 

Didn't like what I saw to be honest and it's going to be getting warm outside soon.

 

I have about 2 weeks and might resub depending on what everyone says about 1.2.

 

Right now it doesn't look good though and neither does the current state of the game.

 

Don't forget your tinfoil hat...

 

Canceling w/o actually playing or seeing for yourself is fairly ignorant. But hey, to each their own.

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Word has been leaked from the Guild Summit that the expected balance changes are much, much more extensive that what they've related to IGN.

 

Essentially, every class is going to have their talents trees re-designed and hence why everybody will have all of their talent points refunded for free upon the introduction of 1.2

 

Expect broad sweeping changes regarding all classes.

 

 

 

If this true this is very scary, update 1.2 sounds great overall, but if I have to change class after all these changes because it not the same class, and I don't mean a nerf or one skill being changed, but everything being changed all for PVP, when all I do is PVE, then I will be extremely disappointed.

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That's odd, I've never seen them as a "problem" class, perhaps there are no good players on my server :(

 

That is likely, as they are the strongest 1v1 class in the game (though I think gunslingers/snipers are a decent counter to them).

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What`s going to happen is this:

 

Smash and it`s equivalent will be gone (at least in it`s current form) and there will be a new skill which is faster to set up single target damage.

 

BH, Tropper will get a nerf on armor pen. and their dots (varying on ac tree).

 

Overall base damage (and maybe healing) will be increased, overall crit damage (and maybe healing) will be decreased. There will be no more hits (and heals) greater than 15-20% (20-25%) of a players health.

 

The placement of a lot of abilities in the ac trees will change and a lot more links will be established like the shadow technique links in the infiltration tree regarding project in an earlier patch.

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What`s going to happen is this:

 

Smash and it`s equivalent will be gone (at least in it`s current form) and there will be a new skill which is faster to set up single target damage.

 

BH, Tropper will get a nerf on armor pen. and their dots (varying on ac tree).

 

Overall base damage (and maybe healing) will be increased, overall crit damage (and maybe healing) will be decreased. There will be no more hits (and heals) greater than 15-20% (20-25%) of a players health.

 

The placement of a lot of abilities in the ac trees will change and a lot more links will be established like the shadow technique links in the infiltration tree regarding project in an earlier patch.

 

This is a fair assessment. Everyone shouldn't really be sweating nerfs or buffs. Every class is getting dramatic revamps to the point where you're not even guaranteed to be able to recognize them.

 

I have a pretty strong stomach for this kind of thing, but other people would be 'outraged' (LOL) while still others, IMO likely the majority, might actually come back to the game they unsubbed from a month ago due to the changes.

 

It's ultimately good for the game, what 1.2 will bring. Some people won't like it, but it's not for them.

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The only real balancing issues I have had on my characters has been my smuggler (GS). While the damage CAN be outright amazing, at the same time we're about as squishy as a pillow pet. My smuggler absolutely cannot take a hit, whether in cover or not. Sure, cover is great for reducing ranged damage, but not everything is ranged. Sure, we have some nice abilities whether through spec or class spells to push mobs / players away and snare / stun, but those all tend to last for a few seconds and having to use them all at once just to keep one thing off of you for a few seconds still leaves you completely defenseless to everything else. Your defensive cooldowns are somewhat of joke. The group shield is pretty awesome, assuming you yourself aren't being whacked on. On the other hand, the absorb shield is the most pathetic defensive CD in the game right now imo. I think I absorb a whopping 1.5k damage, so basically I get to reduce some the damage on the next hit. Dodge is fairly balanced, but maybe lower the CD by 10 seconds and remove the reduced CD from the DF tree. Mostly, I would just like to see the absorb maybe get a buff and bring it more up to par on the inquisitor shields. For an absorb CD with a 1 minute you would tend to think it might absord more than say, the 15 second (because of debuff) absorb that can ALSO be casted on allies. I don't really think it's all too fair that a clothie can outlast someone in medium armor and have heals / tank CDs to boot (I'm not hatin', just making a point :p). Just me ranting, but I would like to have a bit more survivability in both pve and pvp right now rather than spending the fight being intimate with the floor. Edited by Vixity
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Replace "bugs" with "customers" and I think you'll be closer to the truth. People playing horribly unbalanced classes (Operatives and Scoundrels, especially) aren't likely to stick around for an extra month in the hopes of getting a fix, especially since they haven't told us what any of the fixes will be. This isn't a single-player game where you can just mothball it for a month until a big patch comes out to fix it; we're paying monthly subscriptions here and once we stop paying, we're not coming back.

 

.

 

err agents and smugglers are OP ??

 

i have played every class in the game to at least 20 and i didn't find this but found my bounty hunter as tank or healer up there and bottom of the line is JK guardian if trying to use a tank build for PvE soloing the worst mainly because of when the ranged healer comes out.

 

maybe agents and smugglers are OP in PvP due to number of stuns but then this is why healers with the added slot can remove stuns but since most of us healer get tired of being pwned while everyone else run on to the win (the fact that we can get extra points now for healing when someone else gets a kill is a bit better but not sure if this isn't unbalancing in the other direction>

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That's odd, I've never seen them as a "problem" class, perhaps there are no good players on my server :(

 

i guess you dont bro, there are some awesome ones of swiftsure. we and our mirrors tend to burn through people. you know who the trash ones are pretty quick when you do 500k and they cant manage 150k with fewer deaths.

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i just fear that the community has put to much hope into 1.2 and if bioware doesnt live up to peoples expectations(which i doubt they could).that people will choose the unsubscribe option and not the be patient and relize that 1 patch isnt going to be solve 100 percent of the problems in the game and be like what they first thought it was gonna be

 

i mean,ive been around enough mmorpgs and been thru enough patches to know that they generally are gonna make the game better yeah.but i doubt its going to make the game as good as people are thinking its going to be

Edited by CrunkShizzle
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Apparently Georg said at the summit that sent/mara are too strong in a good player's hands, so we should be expecting adjustments of some sort to them.

 

If he said that then... I dunno... I think I lost a little faith in BioWare if that is the case. The Sentinel and the Marauder are absolute nightmares to play properly. I had to buy an $80 mouse just to do it.

 

Am I very powerful? YES.

 

Do I have to work a MILLION TIMES HARDER than other players? YES!

 

So long as BioWare requires Sentinel players to either have evolved a sixth finger or to purchase expensive peripherals to make the class work up to par with a Trooper or Bounty Hunter who can one click their way to victory then they darn sure need to remain the hands down best DPS in the game.

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That's odd, I've never seen them as a "problem" class, perhaps there are no good players on my server :(

 

They're easily the most powerful class in PVP.

 

Some Maras have made the argument that "because we have so many buttons, we should be more powerful"... but class balance doesn't really work that way. Right now they're too powerful, as they have some of the best consistency against everything, regardless of spec.

 

The general public tends to obsess over things like stuns (...this isn't Everquest Online Adventures, you're going to get stunned if you try to solo the entire enemy team - hint), tracer missile and force lightning... which is odd because overall these are not the significant issues facing skilled players.

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