actually, that was me.. so not a real warrior. just a waynger. but i did have 7.7k life and he'd kill me in 5 seconds flat, even using pots constantly. (course my fire lag issues seemed worse post patch, so that contributed a lot) cleave was doing nothing. butcher barely touched him. unnerving shout did NOT slow him 30%, im sure of it. and i spent most of my time running after the little wuss. i cant hit him if he wont stand still.

suddenly he's like 4 times faster. casts rain of fire waaay too much and it seems to heal him at the same time, even if i stay in the circle of pain (to steal from zelda) and keep hacking at him.. the guards are gone (i loved my resurrecting guards!)

i dont mind you making him a bit harder, but when a lvl 50 and lvl 57 waynger and ranger can't even get a boss in a lvl 40-60 area down to 50%, it's too hard.

i wouldn't say way too much, this game is about slaughterin crews of monsters, not piddling along barely doing more dmg than monser regen. Anyway, I think we can all agree that this patch doesn't convinvce people to pay.

time for another board wipe!

haha. nah couple of days away yet. only a few people complaining so far. not enough for a wipe. give it a few days.

no wonder all the OLD beta testers arent around. from what i heard from a couple of them... htey just kept nerfing and nerfing with each build and ruining the fun.. and each time.. they lost a chunk of their player base

i have no doubts about NCSoft intended from the beginning "dungeon runners" to be what i would describe as: a really "FAST FUN!!!" game for all those who simply wants to beat A LOT of mobs and getting good up to superior LOOT in a SHORT time WITHOUT being challenged too much. a game for compared to other game-concepts "LAZY" players without a lot of time for a lot of different reasons. at least, thats why i am a paying member.

well, i think, with dungeon runners, NCSoft is trying to realize with the above described gameplay and the level generator an IMHO great concept. games like diablo have already proven it to be working and for dungeon runners this approach to a game will doing much more better with further game improvements, which are coming topics. the best is: they hit their goal so far, and therefor the game was outstanding compared to the tons of stupid hardcore hack&slash games, farming a spot for days or weeks. at least they did until yesterday's patch imho.



NCSoft always said, and i think thats a great attitude, they want to be open to the community. some of u wanted the game more challenging and NCSoft, holding their promise, has given people what they have seemed to miss so much.

So far, EVERYTHING is like it should be: people wanted a challenge and they got it.
And thats not all, they also got new skins for the equipment, a step im REALLY appreciating and i hope they will continue this good work.

summary: i see a company which takes care of of what people want, which is like it should be. nothing more but also nothing less and for sure NOT a implicitness.


im belonging to those who were quite comfortable with the balancing. but i can understand, that some people wanted it harder and as far as it wont change the gameplay i have no problem with a re-balancing because even the laziest player cant oversee that bosses were too easy. but im only agree up to a certain point and i think this point is BEHIND us.
some ppl say it was too much change for only one patch and im NOT AGREE whith that. its too much as a whole because it has changed the game character: instead of "more challenging" its now a complete OTHER gamefeeling. and i hope we are all agree that the gameplay before the patch was why we are playing the game, right?

i think its a communication problem. NCSoft simply didnt get what was meant and has thrown their old concept of this game overboard trying to satisfy the paying players.

but LISTEN NCSoft: u did much better with the game before the patch as u have might thought.

now, we have the communication problem again. as much as i appreciate NCsoft's open ears, but this approach of improving a game can ONLY!!! work if one talks with each other. if we dont do that, there will be always uncertainty and u (NCSoft) have to guess what the players actually mean. the last patch's balancing part is CLEAREST evidence of what misinterpretations can happen then. polls and then STEP BY STEP approaches are much better than reading forums without out any dialog.

if a game is felt to be too easy and its formulated in the suggestion section and as developer one thinks it could be a real issue, one at first has to confirm if it really is like it seems to be. one could start a poll which mustn't be a YES-NO one.

one can already include some suggestions in such a poll. one can start a discussion therad, where people submit their thoughts and suggestions which then could be after an intern pre-selection included in a poll.
because none of the players and developers know how these suggestions play out finally, one has to make it possible that changes after a balancing patch can be EASILY adjusted. if it playes out, that 100% more hp of a common mob is already too much, then one must be able to decrease it to 60% easily, maybe in 10mins.



thats the theory, now my own patch experience:

- agility is nerferd too much, as a fighter the hit rate is decreased tremendously. it was fine as it was before the patch. no reason to nerf it.
- the speed penalty is horrible, really. try as fighter to hit a shaman ork while hes running away and ur attacked by melee mobs. u cant attack the melees, because they get healed... doesnt matter if u wear light equipement for the speed. ABSOLUTELY NO FUN ANYMORE!!! (solo in HDoL) like the dungeons name says: HORRIBLE to play!!!
- the endbosses are way too hard i think..., absolutely NO FUN anymore to fight as lvl 30 against the widow spider, although im in the lvl range of the dungeon. the hp regeneration is COMPLETELY overdone, although nice, if done moderate.
- the sell price is too low, one cant efford to pot as a lvl 30 member fighter the widow spider, which is still red, although the level range of the dungeon should make it able (i know, earning money was easy, but why changing it? because it was easy and therefor never a real issue? i think reallife is hard enough for the most of us. i dont need that in a game which is supposed to be fun.)
- the connection of the skill cooldowntime to the weapon speed doesnt make any sense.
- no graphic card speed improvement seen
- NO FUN ANYMORE as lvl 30 in max. lvl 30 dungeon


what i like:
- new skins, keep it up
- mob regeneration is a nice add, but overdone with heros and endbosses
-patch works great in areas with green mobs :P


SUMMARY: NO FUN ANYMORE!!!!!!!

Edited by AlCappuccino (03/22/07 10:48 AM)

Wow, I really started a doozy! I am fairly sure that the Dev. Team will do what's right for the game, like make mythical weapons "less" non-mythical. Agility was hit bad, yes. I have 310 something Agi, and I still barely do maximum 500 atk. With a mythical weapon. With time, it will be resolved. Until then, we have to do whats necessary.

This is starting to remind me of Star Wars Galaxies.

If I so much as hear the utterance of "vocal minority" I'm gone.

Oh well. With such a small player community, you have to do what you have to do. Even if its complain until its fixed. If they ever want to grow in players in the future, nows the time to get their shat straightened out.

They need to let us redistribute points also.. Agility doesn't do nearly as much, but having a lot of hitpoints helps..

In either case, even with 16000 HP at level 100 vs. level 100 mobs for me, I find myself quaffing stacks and stacks of potions. The good thing is that they heal for a lot more than when I had 10000 HP, where they were killing me faster than the potions could heal.

I didn't try a boss because I couldn't be arsed to go through a full 7 levels of a dungeon to get to one after my waypoint to the queen was moved with the patch.

One good thing about the patch is my framerate is a hell of a lot better. Nearly double what it used to be in most areas.

My crossbow had its damage reduced but the speed also went from "normal or faster" to grandma or slothful. I think the latter is hurting me more than anything else.

The fastest xbow (mythical or purple) cannot overcome the regen rate of the mobs in HDoL. Neither can the slowest.

Rangers were made useless - which is why you now see rangers using axes.

~Muttkicker

Wow. We're looking at all your suggestions. Promise.

I'm a bit shocked of the claims that hit chance has been nerfed. We didn't touch that as far as I know. Can anyone shed some light on what you're seeing that leads you to believe that agility and hit rates are so low?

steve

when i was playing the game it was obviously that i failed mobs with a not changed atr. first i didnt realize it but then i thought, u never failed hitting a yellow mob 3times in a row and that happened with 2 or even 3 in series.

it NEVER happened before for sure. and thats why i have recognized it, because it was unusually.

I am not seeing any hit rate reduction here, Stephen.. While I think in a way it was good to make the game more difficult, I think the ranged mobs need some nerfing.. With the massive reduction in damage of my bow, everything takes 10 hits to kill and the ranged mobs are doing massive damage-- and thier range seems to be much greater now.

Some sort of tweaking at least, even if it's reduction in the maximum amount of ranged mobs per group. It might also help to have some kind of multi-elemental resistance spell also, it's impossible to keep any kind of resistance up when one group is fire, another is poison and then others are shadow.. There aren't enough slots on the bar to put them all on, while still having combat spells available.

Also I think there should be a bonus for hitting 100, like all doors to bosses permanently open, and a permanent waypoint to the queen! And maybe double the gold drops so figting regular mobs still has a purpose that replaces the XP aspect of the game.

If there was a way to revert all the combat changes and keep all the good changes (including the monster AI), I think that would be the best idea yet. The patch had A LOT of good things in it, they have all just been overshadowed by the combat "balancing".

Speaking of balancing... digging through posts I have yet to find a single post where one class was complaining they weren't as good as another class. It seemed pre-patch every class was happy with their abilities. Why was this "balance" deemed necessary? Was it to lengthen the leveling time by making the game harder? Couldn't you have just lowered xp gained or something if you wanted more of our money?

haha, agreed my friend, agreed.

mages were less powerful than warriors and rangers. and they were complaining, just wasnt many of them, and it may have all been pre wipe. it only needed a few minor adjustments for it to work

I also think my hit chance went down a bit, but likely due to increasing the difficulty of the mobs. But I definitely see "miss" come up more.

That doesn't bother me as much as my damage going down by about 2/3 (!), my weapon speed going down, my range ggoing down, AND my mythic armor becoming LESS awesome (The Hard Core-Tex Bib...where did my resists go???)

I could not make a dent in Abaddon. And his cronies were still there? I don't understand people saying he is alone? Not only were his cronies still there, but they were resurrecting every time I killed them. Abby used to only resurrect that female once then she'd stayed down.

Impossible to solo.

I want my damage back I am now pathetic. Level 48 and can't kill a boss!

thankyou. confirmed my thought that it was a bug akin to the lvl 99-100 queen bug

Oh, I would also like to add - now that I can't solo, I can't group either.

There are very few people ever online in my lvl range. I am level 48. When the servers are 90% newbies, I very rarely find someone even close my level. They are either in the 30s, or way ahead of me, 55+.

On the rare occasion I find someone near me, the next time I log on they are likely way ahead of me because they play more.

So, I can't solo, and I can't group.

How am I supposed to play your game again?

That may sound rhetorical, but I am serious. Please, suggestions welcome.

I hadn't even thought about Asterel's post. Now I'm seriously wondering where this game is going. I really like the game, but if it's unplayable, why bother?

I guess I should make it clear, because I didn't explicitly state it, I am a Ranger.

Or was.

Might have to pick up an axe.....

Was thinking again...what exactly increases when you group? Is everything about the mobs upped? HP, attack, defense, resists, regen rate? or just one or couple of those?

you know how you group? you group players higher than you. if you do the grouping, mobs will be scaled to you, not them. so it should then make life easier for you when you fight, esp as a much nerfed ranger. and i highly recommend an axe or sword. i have one, and i love it. not so sure on cleave butcher etc now