The deception of instant casting, the broken GCD and melee classes underperforming

[TheTitan_KoS]

Wall of text incomming - you have been warned.

 

First of all before you guys start to troll me for requesting nerfs – that’s not the purpose of this thread. Its just a discussion of what I believe is currently broken in the game regarding skills. Notice that nowhere in my post I’ll request for any skill to have their dmg or extra perks reduced it’s the amount of skills that some classes can cast that I believe is the problem.

 

And I do believe that is causing a huge imbalance between the classes atm.

 

 

Lets start with the basics the game has a feature called Global Cool Down (GCD) it’s a 1.5 sec timer that prevents ppl from casting most of their abilities. The timer is started when you start casting the skill. What does that mean for the different types of skills:

 

Instant cast skill – you cast the skill and the timer starts since its instant skill the GCD prevents you from doing any other skill for 1.5 sec – All classes have such skills and I do agree that this is needed and I’m fine with that.

 

Skills with activation time – the GCD starts as soon as you start casting the skill so for example a skill that has 1.5 sec cast time will allow you to immediately use another skill when its finished because the GCD will be cooled at the same time the skill is cast. This effectively means that you can use the same amount of 1.5 cast time skills as instant cast skills in a given time frame (for example 10 skills for 15 seconds). Some of the melee classes don’t have such skills, they are generally more powerful because of their activation time (I guess). It also should be noted that these skills take out the resource (force, energy, heat - whatever) after the skill is cast. So in a situation where the caster is free to cast as many skills as they want they will do more dmg because they can cast the same amount of skills but they have bigger dmg and range. In case the caster is interrupted (or he moves) he will lose nothing as the resource is taken after the skill is cast.

 

Channeled skills – the GCD starts cooling as soon as you start casting by the 1.5sec mark the GCD is cooled so you can either choose to channel more (if the skill has longer than 1.5 sec channel) or interrupt the channel and do another skill. The problem with this is that all channel skills do dmg every second. So a good player that knows what he is doing will wait for those full sec marks before he interrupts his channel. For example you can interrupt the channel after 2 seconds to cast another skill that way you basically gain an attack that took you 0.5 seconds to cast) and the versatility to choose what skill to use in that exact situation - I’ll write more about this later on. Unlike skills with activation time the channeled skills take resource at the start which is good because you loose something for interrupting your channel.

 

The Normal Cool down of skills: On top of the GCD some of the most powerful skills in the game have their own cool down that prevents players from using that skill over and over. The major difference between the 2 cool downs is that the normal cd is triggered after the skill is cast.

 

So why the deception of instant casting – when you see instant casting vs skills with activation time most ppl assume (at least I did) that you’ll be able to perform more skills in a given time frame which would compensate for the significantly lower range of the melee classes and the extra steps they need to perform in order to get to the target and keep on it while casting. That is also supposed to compensate for the generally lower dmg of those instant cast skills compared to similar skills with activation time.

 

Unfortunately in SWTOR that’s not the case the difference between the 2 is when the dmg is dealt ( at the start of the 1.5 sec timer instead of the end of it) which has absolutely no effect in longer fights – bosses, or healed/guarded players ( basically all the fights that matter)

 

Because of this mechanic of the game some classes are seriously underperforming compared to others. The problem gets even bigger when the skills have additional benefits like reduce the targets armor or increase your own dmg.

I’ll give some examples now of how the above breaks the game (I’ll use the republic names)

 

Lets take a Sentinel for example:

In a 15 sec time frame that gives him the time to use 10 skills he has to build up focus and then spend it on his better skills in most cases out of those 10 skills 6-7 will be focus builders and the rest will be actually good useful skills. Depending on the spec he may need to spend some focus on overload saber. The class has no way to build focus before the fight or during the fight except using skills that take out of his 10 casts.

 

Every single other class starts with full resource or has the means to quickly get half of it up (in some cases both).

 

Lets review few other classes (I’m not claiming these are the best rotations dmg or resource wise I’m just comparing amount of skills cast for that time frame)

 

A Sage can cast 10 times Disturbance or he can simply do 10 instant cast skills. If he goes for Disturbance that will cost him half his resource but he’ll also gain a lot of it back because of the passive regen that they have that is not influenced by how much force you have the amount regained is even higher if they have Concentration and they can save a lot of that force if they have Inner strength or Telekinetic Effusion. Or he can even cast some channels or a combination of those that would boost him (but we’ll get bk to this later). At end of that 15 sec time frame the sage has enough resource to do as many more such cycles as he chooses.

 

A Commando can cast 7 (I believe) grav rounds using his recharge cells maybe 8 with reserve and then he has to go to the fillers ( obviously a good commando wont do it as that will reduce the amount of ammo he regens) But in the situation of comparing skills cast per 15 seconds he can do 8 good skills +2 fillers. At the end of the cycle the char will be drained and cant repeat another similar cycle unless he uses less good skills and more fillers.

 

A gunslinger can cast 8 charged burst (with cool head) before he has to use fillers (obviously there are better ways to deal dmg and you can benefit from using diff skills more but once again I’m just comparing amount of good skills cast). At the end of the cycle the char will be drained and cant repeat another similar cycle unless he uses less good skills and more fillers.

 

So to sum it up for those 15 seconds:

 

The Sentinel can cast 10 skills and 3 max 4 of them will be good the rest are fillers he will be able to do as many cycles as he wants.

 

The Sage can cast 10 good skills and he’ll still have most of his resource. And the ability to repeat those dmg cycles as many times as he wants to.

 

The Commando can cast 8 good skills before he has to go for fillers after that he’ll be drained and unable to repeat the same cycle he can go for the lower dmg similar to the sentinel of 4/5 good skills out of 10 that would allow him to repeat as many cycles as he wants.

 

The Gunslinger can cast 8 good skills before he has to go for fillers after that he’ll be drained and unable to repeat the same cycle he can go for the lower dmg similar to the sentinel of 4/5 good skills out of 10 that would allow him to repeat as many cycles as he wants.

 

I do realize the examples are extreme and will never happen in a real fight because there are other skills that give other significant benefits but those are the facts unfortunately regardless of the actual skills used:

 

The sage has virtually unlimited amount of good skills casted before he has to go for the fillers (and ohh my his fillers are insane but later on that).

 

The commando and the gunslinger are able to cast similar amount of good skills compared to the melee classes if they want to conserve resource but they have the ability to dbl the amount of good skills if they need the extra dmg. However because of the activation times and the fact that those skills do more dmg that similar amount of good skills usually deal more dmg and/or have extra effects that boost other skills.

 

The melee classes (especially the sentinel) are fked up when it comes to amount of good skills they can use in a given time frame because of the way the GCD and the resource systems work. Add to that the insane amount of pushes, pulls, slows and stuns and the ability of all classes to get away from a fight and those melee classes won’t ever cast those 10 skills.

 

Now before I take a look at the ultimate filler skill I’d like to remind you that I’m in no way requesting any of the skills to be changed regarding their dmg or other perks but rather for the amount of skills that those classes can cast to be limited slightly.

 

So lets not forget channel skills. And the skill of all skills Telekinetic Throw (the little nasty pebbles that the sages like to throw left and right and of course their brother sorcs with their lightning).

 

I have to admit I didn’t realize how broken cast times are until my own sage was high enough to do the stuff I’ll describe below. And yes I admit I’m loving every second I throw pebbles at the poor melee classes that are trying to get to me.

 

As I mentioned earlier channel skills deal dmg every second, also the GCD triggered by them is cooled by the 1.5 sec mark after you start channeling there is no penalty for stopping your channel except some resource lost.

 

When talented this skill has the following perks:

1. Decent dmg

2. Slows enemy by 50%

3. Generates force

4. Heals you up

5. Ability to instant cast activated skills.

6. Uninterrupted dmg every second ( because of no cool down you can deal dmg every second there is no other class that can continuously deal dmg every second you stop only if you choose to use a higher dmg skills, or some utility skill or if you or your target is dead)

7. And range 30.

 

As I mentioned earlier the ability to interrupt the channel skill gives you an attack that has 0.5 sec cast time because you can wait 0.5 sec after the GCD is cooled to get the second tick of throw.

 

Because of presence of mind talent every skill the sage has is speeded up to the 1 attack per 1.5 sec cycle. That gives them the chance to cast skills that should have longer activation time and to bring them down in line to their uninterrupted speed casting. You can activate instantly skills like telekinetic wave if you want aoe, mind crush if you are fighting a single target or even disturbance if you want to deal good dmg while boosting your force regen. The DPS sage can stand there casting those 15 sec time frames that we looked at earlier for as many cycles as he wants while all the other classes will be completely drained from the first one or would be forced not to use good skills if the fight is longer than 15 sec. The only thing he has to do to achieve that is to use his insane filler.

 

For all other classes these fillers usually have lower dmg and have no extra benefits. The sage has all of the stuff listed above regens health, regens force, makes long activation skills instant, slows enemy, range 30 + if he so chooses he can wait for 0.5 sec for that extra DMG tick that actually makes his filler a good dmg skills.

 

I know I’ll get trolled regardless of how many times I repeat this but here we go for the 3rd time I’m fine with all of the above I don’t think any of the dmg on the mentioned skills or their extra perks should be removed or lowered but I do believe the GCD has to be fixed.

 

So the solution: I believe several things should be changed to balance those skills

 

1st the GCD has to be moved AFTER the skill is cast (just like the normal skill cool down is atm). That way players that choose to use activation or channel skills should wait for one GCD before they can use another skill. (Reminder the activation skills deal more dmg and all classes have instant cast skills if they choose to speed cast.)

 

2nd A GCD has to be triggered if a skill casting is interrupted, regardless if its by the players own choice or by skills used by his target. As soon as you stop channeling a skill or as soon as you cancel activating a skill a GCD has to be triggered.

 

3rd The activated skills should take resource as soon as you start the activation process not when the skill is finished (just like channeling skills)

 

4th The dmg and other extra benefits of channel skills should be done every 1.5 sec not every second (of course still doing the same amount of total dmg)

 

What are these changes going to achieve:

 

Reduction of the amount of good skills some classes can use while leaving them the opportunity to use instant cast skills in cases that they want to use more skills. (All classes have plenty of nice instant cast skills they are just ignored atm because of how the GCD works)

 

Probably slight increase in the amount of skills some classes have to use in their normal rotation (as they’ll now need to include instant cast skills and have a mix of their old skills)

 

Reduction of the dmg of some classes (if they refuse to change their rotations). But it’ll also fix some of the problems ppl are crying about so loudly.

 

Reduced amount of tracer/grav spam (while allowing them to cast it longer as they’ll regen more resource)

 

Removal of the uninterruptable dmg of sages/sorcs they’ll now have to pause for 1.5 sec like all other classes. Removal of the extra tick if they wait 0.5 sec with their channel as the dmg will be dealt every 1.5 sec and not every sec. The change may also encourage some ppl to abandon the hybrid builds and go all the way up to Sever Force to get an extra instant cast.

 

Slight reduction of the dmg and frequency of charged Force Sweeps Guardians and Sentinels can do because Stasis will now give 2 singularity and not 3. No change for force exhaustion as that will be changed from 6 ticks to 4 and 4 is the max u can stack anyway.

Also now they'll have to wait one GCD after stasis before sweeping.

 

Reduction in heals specifically for Sages that mostly spam Deliverance and Benevolence, and less for the other classes that have better instant casts. Now I know a lot of you are not going to like this but I do believe it will improve both pve and pvp because it will be harder to survive and thus more fun. If thats a big issue the ammount healed can be increased or the activation times tweeked.

 

I hope this thread could start an interesting and healthy discussion although I fully expect to see the don’t nerf us crowd appear as soon as I post it.

 

TLDR : sorry i'm not going to make it easy just read it or ignore it.

Edited March 4, 2012 by TheTitan_KoS

[TyHeaton]

This belongs in the PVP forums.

[TheTitan_KoS]

Why? it affects both PVP and PVE not only pvp situations

 

p.s. i'm sure a mod can move it if there is a better section for it. But i do believe this is the right place as the ammount of skills casted has impact on both pvp and the longer pve fights - everything that doesnt die in 2-3 casts.

Edited March 4, 2012 by TheTitan_KoS

[terminova]

So the solution: I believe several things should be changed to balance those skills

 

1st the GCD has to be moved AFTER the skill is cast (just like the normal skill cool down is atm). That way players that choose to use activation or channel skills should wait for one GCD before they can use another skill. (Reminder the activation skills deal more dmg and all classes have instant cast skills if they choose to speed cast.)

 

Remember, they do more damage because they take longer to cast, and would totally screw over some classes, like the Bounty Hunter. Most of my Bounty Hunter's skills that are actually used 80% of the time are NOT instant cast, they have cast times involved and would cause several problems including taking longer to kill mobs, some of which are Elites (the ones with the star) which means I take more damage which means I stand a higher chance of not surviving.

 

Furthermore, that would make healing harder, especially for mercs. Even as a DPS merc, I can pull out a tanking companion, use the Combat Support Cylinders and keep them up. With this change I can no longer do that, and my companion will get squashed like a bug.

 

2nd A GCD has to be triggered if a skill casting is interrupted, regardless if its by the players own choice or by skills used by his target. As soon as you stop channeling a skill or as soon as you cancel activating a skill a GCD has to be triggered.

 

Once again, you end up screwing over those who have a lot of channeled/non-instant cast abilities.

 

3rd The activated skills should take resource as soon as you start the activation process not when the skill is finished (just like channeling skills)

 

Why? The ability never finished casting. I can understand channeled abilities because you start getting results from the ability, but with cast abilities you get no results until the cast is complete meaning there is no reason to take the resources unless the cast successfully completes. Plus, with the limited resources you have, it can really be a hindrance depending on the situation.

 

4th The dmg and other extra benefits of channel skills should be done every 1.5 sec not every second (of course still doing the same amount of total dmg)

 

There's no need to change the channel system from every 1 second to every 1.5 seconds.

 

 

TLDR : sorry i'm not going to make it easy just read it or ignore it.

 

If you're going to post a wall of text, you should be considerate and post a quick synopsis of the post for people.

Edited March 4, 2012 by terminova

[Zannis]

I actually sat and read this wall.

 

I don't really feel like it makes any sort of compelling argument.

[TheTitan_KoS]

Remember, they do more damage because they take longer to cast, and would totally screw over some classes, like the Bounty Hunter. Most of my Bounty Hunter's skills that are actually used 80% of the time are NOT instant cast, they have cast times involved and would cause several problems including taking longer to kill mobs, some of which are Elites (the ones with the star) which means I take more damage which means I stand a higher chance of not surviving.

 

Thats the exact reason i made this post they dont take longer to cast ( atleast the 1.5sec activation skills) they take the exact same time. The only difference is when the dmg is applied at the start of the cooldown or at the end. As explained above in a 15 sec time frame both instant cast and activation skills (1.5sec) will deal dmg 10 times.

Yes in your example solo versus elite mob you may need to cast 1 or 2 more skills to kill them and it may be harder for you to survive but you will still be able to kill the same mob faster than any melee class

 

 

Furthermore, that would make healing harder, especially for mercs. Even as a DPS merc, I can pull out a tanking companion, use the Combat Support Cylinders and keep them up. With this change I can no longer do that, and my companion will get squashed like a bug.

 

Yes i admit it will hinder healing i even wrote about it above. If its an issue healing skills could be improved to compansate.

 

Once again, you end up screwing over those who have a lot of channeled/non-instant cast abilities.

 

All of the classes have more instant cast skills than activated/channeld you choose not to use them because they are inferior. The melee classes dont have skills with activation time. So they dont have your choice.

 

You will have the choice to use inferiour skills but more of them or use the better skills but having to wait 1.5 sec between each skill.

 

 

Why? The ability never finished casting. I can understand channeled abilities because you start getting results from the ability, but with cast abilities you get no results until the cast is complete meaning there is no reason to take the resources unless the cast successfully completes. Plus, with the limited resources you have, it can really be a hindrance depending on the situation.

 

Because activation and channel skills are superior you have to be aware of the situation you use them in. You should not use such skills if a melee char is pounding on you. You should be penalized for using it in a bad situation. You have plenty of skills to help you get away from that spot and allow you to resume casting your superior skills when you are safe.

 

There's no need to change the channel system from every 1 second to every 1.5 seconds.

 

Yes there is because of the extra dmg that 0.5 sec channel can give you and the ammount of buffs/debuffs those skills provide every time they deal dmg.

 

All other skills deal dmg every 1.5 sec i dont see a reason why channeld skills should deal dmg every sec. ( again the total dmg will be the same as the ticks will be higher)

[killmaimburn]

Yea I didn't understand the whole argument.

 

This game hates melee. Look at AOE dmg on bosses. Melees crowd up and then get wasted together. My raid group has 1 marauder and 1 powertech dps. Trying to convince those guys to go range to get away from headaches associated with that.

 

You want to complain about melees having it bad. I have a rakata'd out juggernaut in immort spec. I have done about the same damage since lvl 40.

 

Melee is kind of stupid for anything besides a tank. Especially in pvp. Know why marauders get ate up so fast in Civil War and Void Star? FORCELEAP. People have a habit of attacking the closest thing to them. Melee is good for 1v1 ganking, and huttball, that's about it.

 

So to sum up what I'm saying. Melee is a bad decision as you will always feel its unfair.

[TheTitan_KoS]

So to sum up what I'm saying. Melee is a bad decision as you will always feel its unfair.

 

Why should they be worse tho and why should we accept that its a bad descision to choose melee. In most games melee chars either deal more dmg (when they get in range) or attack faster.

 

In SWTOR melee chars currently have the exact same (or even lower in some cases) ammount of attacks while having lower dmg per attack. And on top of that have to get to the target.

 

The moving of the GCD after the skill is cast will balance that out. Ranged chars will be able to choose to do the same amount of inferior skills as the melee or do the slower to cast better skills.

[Niil]

I didn't bother reading the details of the latter half of your post where you make suggestions, though I did skim it.

 

Ultimately, your entire premise is flawed. You ignore the benefit of instant casts. You say instant casts inherently deal less damage than cast time abilities when that's not true, they deal variable damage based on the resource cost in most cases, all of the highest damage single hits are instant that I'm aware of, though snipers and their pub counterparts may have cast time abilities that deal more than instant. Either way that's potentially 1 of 8 advanced classes that function that way. You talk about about filler abilities and ignore the little details that make your analysis completely flawed from the get go regarding how many "good" abilities the spec's are able to use.

 

Ultimately this comes off as a "nerf ranged, buff melee!" post when melee do not need buffed. They are weak in pvp before getting good gear and nigh unstoppable after if played well, in general. Healers and guard are an entirely different issue.

[Fizbanic]

Actually the way it is now.

 

DPS wise all dps are around the same, regardless of long cast times, damage per tick on a channeled or even long cast times. This has been true with most past MMO's and I did some testing and it is the same here. There is no major difference in dps to make one more desirable.

[Koalachan]

Thats the exact reason i made this post they dont take longer to cast ( atleast the 1.5sec activation skills) they take the exact same time. The only difference is when the dmg is applied at the start of the cooldown or at the end. As explained above in a 15 sec time frame both instant cast and activation skills (1.5sec) will deal dmg 10 times.

 

This is the biggest flaw in your argument, and you keep repeating it so you obviously don't play caster classes. If something has a cast time, it is 90% of the time longer than 1.5sec, the GCD. They are usually 2sec, 2.5sec, and 3sec cast times. Much longer than the GCD by comparison. We can lower the time with haste, but it scales badly, and with a lot of it will usually get and ability from 2 sec to around 1.62 with a lot. Now SOME abilities do indeed have less cast times, such as 1.5, which is about the fastest base cast possible, else it might as well be instant, but those abilities also come with their own CD, so you can not spam them.

[killmaimburn]

I'm saying melee makes you a target in pvp. A visible target that is always within range of the opposing faction. In that respect, yes its dumb. Should you be able to force leap/jump to someone 2 shot them and think you're going to survive? No. Melee are support characters just like my mercenary is with its tracer spam. This honestly is the first time I've seen a post about underpowered melee. Which I kind of agree with for PvE. If melee are going to have that much more of a headache dodging boss aoe's they should at least get more survivability or dmg to offset the considerable effort they're putting out. However, changing GCD as it is. HELL no.

[Neollama]

That is one very long very poorly disguised rant about tracer missile. And it seems to me you are playing your sent wrong if ranged are outdamaging your bigger attacks which should be hitting for 4k+ instant cast.

[Morthis]

1st the GCD has to be moved AFTER the skill is cast (just like the normal skill cool down is atm). That way players that choose to use activation or channel skills should wait for one GCD before they can use another skill. (Reminder the activation skills deal more dmg and all classes have instant cast skills if they choose to speed cast.)

 

This would ruin the flow of combat to such an extreme degree that the only way you could ever even consider mentioning it is because you have absolutely no experience with any class that primarily uses skills with activation timers.

 

2nd A GCD has to be triggered if a skill casting is interrupted, regardless if its by the players own choice or by skills used by his target. As soon as you stop channeling a skill or as soon as you cancel activating a skill a GCD has to be triggered.

 

This wouldn't matter much one way or the other. If you have to move halfway through a skill cast, odds are the movement will take longer than the ~0.8 or so seconds left on the GCD.

 

3rd The activated skills should take resource as soon as you start the activation process not when the skill is finished (just like channeling skills)

 

Sure, just as soon as your skills take resources if you hit them while out of range/facing wrong way. Sounds absurd? Yeah so does this one.

 

4th The dmg and other extra benefits of channel skills should be done every 1.5 sec not every second (of course still doing the same amount of total dmg)

 

Impossible. If channeled skills are going to scale with alacrity, they need to tick based on an interval determined by alacrity.

 

Reduction of the amount of good skills some classes can use while leaving them the opportunity to use instant cast skills in cases that they want to use more skills. (All classes have plenty of nice instant cast skills they are just ignored atm because of how the GCD works)

 

The advantage of instant casts is the ability to use them on the move. Why on earth would people bother with skills with activation (which are more limited in nature) if you're just gonna make instants more powerful, it makes no sense at all.

[TheTitan_KoS]

This is the biggest flaw in your argument, and you keep repeating it so you obviously don't play caster classes. If something has a cast time, it is 90% of the time longer than 1.5sec, the GCD. They are usually 2sec, 2.5sec, and 3sec cast times. Much longer than the GCD by comparison. We can lower the time with haste, but it scales badly, and with a lot of it will usually get and ability from 2 sec to around 1.62 with a lot. Now SOME abilities do indeed have less cast times, such as 1.5, which is about the fastest base cast possible, else it might as well be instant, but those abilities also come with their own CD, so you can not spam them.

 

Make a list of them and their activation times and how often you use each of them and you'll see that thats not true.

 

I have a lvl 50 fully rakata /and mostly Bm melee char i also have a lvl 40 sage and lower lvl gunslinger and trooper ( all alts have maxed valor for their lvl)

 

I also have legacy lvl 35 i guess thats the only viable way to show that i have played longer than 1 char to lvl 50.

 

I also wrote that it was only after i got my sage to high enough lvl that i realised how big of a problem this is. Can you say the same do you have both melee and a ranged char at similar lvls to make that comparison.

 

That is one very long very poorly disguised rant about tracer missile. And it seems to me you are playing your sent wrong if ranged are outdamaging your bigger attacks which should be hitting for 4k+ instant cast.

 

I have no problems with the dmg of the tracer missles (grav rounds) or their debuff i know that if i die to that its my own fault but i do have a problem of how many times you can cast it in a given time frame.

 

Yes some of my skills hit over 4k dmg however they have their own cooldowns that limit their use ( tracer missiles dont have that) or can be used only when the target is on very low health.

 

Again this is not about the dmg of the skills but the amount of skills that you can cast.

 

This would ruin the flow of combat to such an extreme degree that the only way you could ever even consider mentioning it is because you have absolutely no experience with any class that primarily uses skills with activation timers.

 

I actually believe it will improve the flow of combat as it will allow ranged chars that rely on casted skills to move between casts. As i said earlier i love playing my lil sage and i do have the experience of owning badly melee chars with its hybrid build. I also love doing the same with my gunslinger and my trooper.

 

I have seen both sides of the coin so to speak.

 

This wouldn't matter much one way or the other. If you have to move halfway through a skill cast, odds are the movement will take longer than the ~0.8 or so seconds left on the GCD.

 

Sure, just as soon as your skills take resources if you hit them while out of range/facing wrong way. Sounds absurd? Yeah so does this one.

 

 

If you have to move while casting a skill it means you were in the wrong place when you started casting it.

 

The advantage of instant casts is the ability to use them on the move. Why on earth would people bother with skills with activation (which are more limited in nature) if you're just gonna make instants more powerful, it makes no sense at all.

 

I would agree with you if that mobility allowed a melee char to keep up with a ranged char at all times and be able to circle behind them or move to an obstacle during their activation time. Unfortunately thats not good enough in game atm to balance the classes because of the ammount of slows, stuns pushes and pulls but thats a different topic. .

Edited March 4, 2012 by TheTitan_KoS

[Ansultares]

So to sum up what I'm saying. Melee is a bad decision as you will always feel its unfair.

They're especially weak here, or maybe it's just particularly noticeable.

[demonskies]

my annihilation marauder seems to fair well. sorry every boss mechanic doesnt let you just stand there an attack. for example with a group of equally geared dps on duel of fates doing their "rotation" i normally finish 5-10 seconds earlier. Usefullness in a fight will always be a per boss mechanic. Some fights ranged will be ridiculously OP dps and some fights melee will be OP dps. Same goes for healing. my BH can not aoe heal nowhere as near our sorc healer, but i will out single target heal him like no other. Everyone has their own perks and thats the fun of being able to try different classes. I wouldn't want my marauder to feel like my bounty hunter or i would have just rolled 8 bounty hunters on my server.

[scootshoot]

I'm saying melee makes you a target in pvp. .

 

Yah you on the Front lines. You are there to take the brunt of the punishment in the hopes the opposition leaves your healer alone in the rear ranks to do his thang.

[Niil]

Make a list of them and their activation times and how often you use each of them and you'll see that thats not true.

 

I have a lvl 50 fully rakata /and mostly Bm melee char i also have a lvl 40 sage and lower lvl gunslinger and trooper ( all alts have maxed valor for their lvl)

 

I also have legacy lvl 35 i guess thats the only viable way to show that i have played longer than 1 char to lvl 50.

 

I also wrote that it was only after i got my sage to high enough lvl that i realised how big of a problem this is. Can you say the same do you have both melee and a ranged char at similar lvls to make that comparison.

 

 

 

I have no problems with the dmg of the tracer missles (grav rounds) or their debuff i know that if i die to that its my own fault but i do have a problem of how many times you can cast it in a given time frame.

 

Yes some of my skills hit over 4k dmg however they have their own cooldowns that limit their use ( tracer missiles dont have that) or can be used only when the target is on very low health.

 

Again this is not about the dmg of the skills but the amount of skills that you can cast.

 

 

 

I actually believe it will improve the flow of combat as it will allow ranged chars that rely on casted skills to move between casts. As i said earlier i love playing my lil sage and i do have the experience of owning badly melee chars with its hybrid build. I also love doing the same with my gunslinger and my trooper.

 

I have seen both sides of the coin so to speak.

 

 

 

 

If you have to move while casting a skill it means you were in the wrong place when you started casting it.

 

 

 

I would agree with you if that mobility allowed a melee char to keep up with a ranged char at all times and be able to circle behind them or move to an obstacle during their activation time. Unfortunately thats not good enough in game atm to balance the classes because of the ammount of slows, stuns pushes and pulls but thats a different topic. .

 

Your ideas break ranged classes by gimping their damage. Tracer has a 1.5 second cast time. To incur a global after tracer would require that the damage of tracer missile is doubled to maintain the same level of damage output. I'd be perfectly fine with that because it means more heat regen between tracers and tracers packing a double punch. Obviously you have no clue what the repercussions of changes like you suggest would be. Otherwise, you're just parading for a nerf to the damage of ranged classes. But you're not doing that, right? heh

[Morthis]

I actually believe it will improve the flow of combat as it will allow ranged chars that rely on casted skills to move between casts. As i said earlier i love playing my lil sage and i do have the experience of owning badly melee chars with its hybrid build. I also love doing the same with my gunslinger and my trooper.

 

And how does this fit into PvE?

[Koalachan]

Make a list of them and their activation times and how often you use each of them and you'll see that thats not true.

 

Rapid scan. 1.78 cast (after alacrity). No CD.

Healing scan. 1.33 cast, 8s CD (base 11sec)

Emergency scan. Instant. 18s CD (base 21).

Kolto Missile. Instant. 6s CD.

 

Do you not see how invoking a 1.5sec GCD AFTER casting my one and only spammable heal is a bad idea.

 

Tracer Missile. 1.5sec cast. no CD. Need to spam for everything else.

Fusion Missile. 1.5 sec cast, 30sec CD

Unload 3sec channel, 15sec CD

Power shot. 1.5sec cast, no CD. Crap damage.

Heatseeker Missile. Instant. 15sec CD.

 

Pretty much the only thing in this list that fits in your comlpaining is Tracer missile, which the 1.5GCD would gimp too much, and you yourself agreed to this.

 

 

I also have legacy lvl 35 i guess thats the only viable way to show that i have played longer than 1 char to lvl 50.

 

This actually doesn't prove anything. You can get that off 1 50, if you only play that toon.

 

I also wrote that it was only after i got my sage to high enough lvl that i realised how big of a problem this is. Can you say the same do you have both melee and a ranged char at similar lvls to make that comparison.

 

yes, I tank, I heal, i range dps. I don't melee dps, not because of anything you complain about, but because I hate having to constantly move to follow tanks kiting things around. Granted, its not as bad in this game as a certain other one, but I think I fill enough roles as it is. I just don't like melee dps. I don't try to blame it on mechanics and tell devs they need to nerf range so I can be happy.

 

I have no problems with the dmg of the tracer missles (grav rounds) or their debuff i know that if i die to that its my own fault but i do have a problem of how many times you can cast it in a given time frame.

 

Until you overheat.

 

snip

 

More jibba jabba.

[TheTitan_KoS]

my annihilation marauder seems to fair well. sorry every boss mechanic doesnt let you just stand there an attack. for example with a group of equally geared dps on duel of fates doing their "rotation" i normally finish 5-10 seconds earlier. Usefullness in a fight will always be a per boss mechanic. Some fights ranged will be ridiculously OP dps and some fights melee will be OP dps. Same goes for healing. my BH can not aoe heal nowhere as near our sorc healer, but i will out single target heal him like no other. Everyone has their own perks and thats the fun of being able to try different classes. I wouldn't want my marauder to feel like my bounty hunter or i would have just rolled 8 bounty hunters on my server.

 

Yes i agree every boss fight is different but i do believe that the duel of the fates is a bad way to compare dps performance because of the unique fight all chars take dmg and are being interrupted that gives slight advantage to melee classes i cant recall any other situation in the game were all players in an ops group are taking dmg all the time and are being interrupted.

 

If there was no knockback on the bosses there would have been no way for me to outdmg ranged dps in that fight even if they put me in my own grp to allow me to use zen and inspiration.

 

 

Your ideas break ranged classes by gimping their damage. Tracer has a 1.5 second cast time. To incur a global after tracer would require that the damage of tracer missile is doubled to maintain the same level of damage output. I'd be perfectly fine with that because it means more heat regen between tracers and tracers packing a double punch. Obviously you have no clue what the repercussions of changes like you suggest would be. Otherwise, you're just parading for a nerf to the damage of ranged classes. But you're not doing that, right? heh

 

You said it yourself you will be able to cast that same skills a lot longer because you'll have less resource problems. You dont need to dbl its dmg compared to the other classes you'll still be doing similar dmg or even higher if you use other skills and take full advantage of the debuffs the skill gives. It just means you will need to use other skills as well - is that bad ?

 

And how does this fit into PvE?

 

It will balance a bit the huge disadvantage the different dps chars have.

 

Rapid scan. 1.78 cast (after alacrity). No CD.

Healing scan. 1.33 cast, 8s CD (base 11sec)

Emergency scan. Instant. 18s CD (base 21).

Kolto Missile. Instant. 6s CD.

 

Do you not see how invoking a 1.5sec GCD AFTER casting my one and only spammable heal is a bad idea.

 

Again (for the 3rd time) it will reduce healing and that could either be a good thing ( its such an easy game come on) or if the hit on the healers is too serious and game breaking it can be adressed further by improving the heals.

 

Tracer Missile. 1.5sec cast. no CD. Need to spam for everything else.

Fusion Missile. 1.5 sec cast, 30sec CD

Unload 3sec channel, 15sec CD

Power shot. 1.5sec cast, no CD. Crap damage.

Heatseeker Missile. Instant. 15sec CD.

 

Pretty much the only thing in this list that fits in your comlpaining is Tracer missile, which the 1.5GCD would gimp too much, and you yourself agreed to this.

 

You also have your base BH skills:

 

Rail shot that is instant cast and is improved by your tracer missiles

Rocket shot if the target is in melee range again instant cast

Explosive dart instant cast

Missle blast again instant cast

Flame Thrower channel cone aoe but can work quite well vs single target also

 

for pve you also have shoulder slam again instant cast

 

and you have the skill thats suppoused to be your filler - rapid shots

 

You also have power surge the skill that allows you to instant cast one of you activation skills. I'm sorry i dont have a Mercenary char so maybe i'm missing some skills but you definetely have more than the 5 skills you listed.

 

When you compare the dmg of certain skills i believe its better to compare it to the same tier of skills other classes have for example its a bad idea to compare rapid shots with tracer missile ( a skill you gain thru your skill tree if you choose to go for that path) but you should instead compare it to for example with Assault for SWs or Rifle Shot of imperial agents.

 

The reason you choose to ignore these skills is because all instant cast skills are inferior or they require a specific situation to be used in so you have to be pro-active when casting and know when and what to cast instead of spamming one button.

 

Can we agree on the fact that instant cast skills are currently inferior ?

 

 

This actually doesn't prove anything. You can get that off 1 50, if you only play that toon.

 

True but lol thats a lot of dailies farmed i think its quite a good indicator of more than one char played.

 

 

yes, I tank, I heal, i range dps. I don't melee dps, not because of anything you complain about, but because I hate having to constantly move to follow tanks kiting things around. Granted, its not as bad in this game as a certain other one, but I think I fill enough roles as it is. I just don't like melee dps. I don't try to blame it on mechanics and tell devs they need to nerf range so I can be happy.

 

I'm quite happy atm thanks, i dont "need" these changes but yes i do believe they are needed to improve the game. I also think we need more discussion how to balance the different classes that are not only based on nerfing direct dmg of a skill ( quite a big portion of the threads on the forum). As i dont think those changes solve anything because the problems are in different places not the direct dmg of the skills.

 

What class and lvl is your tank ? Do you have other dps chars - a sorc for example thats high enough lvl to have Wrath?

 

 

Until you overheat.

 

You'll overheat way slower if u have a GCD between each skill.

 

More jibba jabba.

 

 

 

I'd like to hear the opinion of other classes as well not only Merceneries so post on

[Niil]

You said it yourself you will be able to cast that same skills a lot longer because you'll have less resource problems. You dont need to dbl its dmg compared to the other classes you'll still be doing similar dmg or even higher if you use other skills and take full advantage of the debuffs the skill gives. It just means you will need to use other skills as well - is that bad ?

 

Either you lost the genetics lottery or you're trolling. I'm going to presume it's the latter.

[Abanoth]

TLDR : sorry i'm not going to make it easy just read it or ignore it.

 

/ignore

[cerberus_oz]

Utterly pointless discussion without DPS meters.