Balance: the dirty little word that game developers both dread, and strive for. In competitive multiplayer games even more so. Some of the most intense and heated arguments arise over that one little word. From the guy who is convinced that his class is permanently overpowered, to the times where an entire community comes together to complain about a specific ability, and every other crazy scenario in between, everyone has an opinion on the matter.

 

That opinion is precisely what I am looking for. This thread is going to focus on The Old Republic’s current balance situation, and I would be sorely remiss if we didn’t reach out to you, my fellow players. Stop by and feel free to discuss some balancing issues...

This should be some balancing compendium with open discussion, so go for it!

Healing BH are way UP. Especially in PvE

DPS Operatives are totally UP in PvE

 

There needs to be an increased ability to both Operative and BH AoE healing (increase the number of targets healed) to make ops more of a "bring the player not the class". Sorcerer AoE heals make things much easier for ops raids, especially 16's. They can make sorcerer healing more powerful to give them an AoE advantage, but the advantage should not be as overwhelming as it is now.

 

Merc BH need a slight buff for PvE and need lots of help in PvP (utility/stuns/etc)

Assassin DPS in PvE needs a slight buff

 

I can't think of much else at the moment, however, I am not as plugged in to some of the other class needs as I could be.

First off I've never played an MMO before WoW where every single class just had to be totally balanced....

 

IMO balancing is where every class has the ability to be competitive, I believe that Bioware has achieved this

First off I've never played an MMO before WoW where every single class just had to be totally balanced....

 

IMO balancing is where every class has the ability to be competitive, I believe that Bioware has achieved this

 

in my opinion that depends whether you think about pve or pvp

Some DDs are way better than others in PvE and that's a bit of a lack of balancing...

 

whereas healing in both isn't that balanced

Most of the imbalance issues are due to the dev's addressing balance issues with a sledgehammer. Instead of minor tweaking and then re-evaluation, for the most part, they way overcompensate.

 

IE:

1.2 BH Heals

1.1 and 1.2 DPS Operatives

1.3 Assassin tanks.

 

Examples of minor tweaking that were more in line with needed changes were:

1.2 Sorc Healer

1.2 Operative Healers

 

The other issue seems to be that efforts to balance PvP have thrown PvE out of wack.

IE:

Operative DPS in every patch

Assassin tanks (although they were slightly OP in PvE pre 1.3)

Mercs (arsenal) 1.2

 

While balancing PvP and PvP is probably impossible for every spec. It seems like the changes are not well thought out. It is almost like when changing the cooldown on Backstab to Operatives in 1.2 they didn't take into consideration the affects on Acid Blade... oops. They adjusted backstab damage, obviously in an attempt to keep the change dps neutral in PvE. However, the spillover affect to acidblade made operative PvE dps extremely underwhelming to the point that DPS Operatives are often not wanted on raids.

 

I use this example only because I am unaware of some of the intricacies of how nerfs affect other classes, however, I am sure there are other examples.

 

Full disclosure: I mainly play a Healing operative and have only been buffed by patches. I almost never play DPS operative and have no interest in DPS'ing as an operative except if dual spec comes out. I also play a lvl 28 Merc.

Edited July 12, 2012 by Tobradex

or tweaking sorc/sage damage

or deception

 

but yeah, good point, pve and pvp balancing is hard to get (would be possible with some pvp only buffs along the tree, or debuffs...)

heres my opinion, 1v1 the classes are balanced very well infact. I am not saying there are no " strong classes" right now but a good player playing what is considered to be an UP class can usually overcome and adapt.

 

That being said, its the nature of the Warzones that give the illusion of some classes being OP and some being UP. Its really just some classes perform better in large scale / objective based situations.

 

 

Perfect example... a madness sorceror... not really the most popular class in 50 pvp, especially not in rated because while they do great damage they do it too slowly... and in team pvp you dont always have the time or ability to Kite your opponents until they die. COmbined with poor defensive cooldowns, makes them very unpopular for group pvp....

 

but 1 on 1 ? they are pretty strong IMO.

 

there are a lot of classes like that have similar issues...

Deception/madness sins

Dps ops

Dps mercs

 

etc etc

Balance has a ways to go, especially within the context of competitive PvP. One of the biggest issues right now is that every advanced class has a spec that is considered "strong" for rated Warzones with the exception of BH Mercs. Here is what I mean (these are the imp versions of the classes).

 

Marks Snipers

Operative Heals

DPS Pwr Techs

Carnage Marauders

Jugg Tanks

Sorcs DPS or healing

Assassin Tank

 

While some of these are stronger than others, I haven't seen a single competitive team roll with a Mercenary in their lineup. The bodyguard spec can throw out some big heals, and is great for raiding, but is easy to burn down/ lock down due to lack of effective defensive cool downs, and the comparative weakness of HOT heals compared to the other two classes. The same is essentially true of both the Merc DPS trees, the lack of a root, interrupt, or effective defensive cooldown makes them an easy target for other equally geared DPS classes. Arsenal is particularly bad due to the reliance on channeled and cast time abilities, and neither do enough damage to make up for the lack of utility.

 

I think the devs had the reasonable fear that giving a ranged Heavy Armor class utility would be too imbalanced, but since there is only about a 5% difference in damage reduction between Heavy and Medium armor classes the result is an entire Advanced Class that is under-powered. I re-rolled for this reason, and am hoping that an upcoming patch will help us get back into the realm of competitive pvp. I think giving DPS mercs an interrupt and an improved defensive CD, while giving bodyguard Mercs improved defensive CD's and a Root effect would be a big step in the right direction. Thanks for reading.

Yup, I can agree, only problem, imo, the wide variation of dps builds over all classes... while some are awesome, others are mediocre or even worse :/. Which is an issue in PvE

It might be that a good solution for balancing PvP and PvE is to have one spec for each class be devoted to PvP with the other 2 devoted to PvE. This could be used to balance DPS at least if not heals.

 

That is essentially what many did in the other game which shall not be named.

However, this would only work if there is a dual spec ability.

Edited July 14, 2012 by Tobradex