SubClass Balance Issues in release 226

Locrian wrote:

in which I have to get each and every kill myself, rather than relying on AI

Therein lies the problem. A lazy MM can just let his monsters do all the fighting for him and still get a tidy XP, while a lazy WM/AM will get nothing.

Similarly, if an MM plays his hardest, he will only add an extra 1 or 2k onto his score, compared to AM/WM who can get outscore a hardworking MM if they play hard. I don't know if you remember but we played the Hall of Anubis map from start to finish with Nutrition and (I think) KKNocturne where I finished with ~3k XP while you finished with ~6.5k XP as you were "proving a point that anyone can score big with an overpowered class", so it is not just once you have scored big alongside me.
MMs draw unhealthy attention to themselves as they are purely unaimed and multiple your presence 400% so appear to the untrained eye to killhog, but none of this means they are overpowered, just unfortunate in nature.
I never made used the fact that Desert Wrath beats me to back up my point, I used the fact that he beats Cribbage.

I'm sure if Szlat played the game a little he'd be be slightly more in tune, rather than relying on the apple polishing of wannabe admins.

The fact remains that you dominated every map you played until I started playing EAM, which I still maintain is an overpowered class and should be nerfed before the next build. How many other AM/WM players have outscored you and scored big - i.e., breached 6k XP? And of these players, how many were Beserkers, EAM's, or Godlike players like Elite, Ryoxei, etc.?

The point is not to nerf Monsters, it's to balance them. You can't tell me with a straight face that it's already balanced just because it's outscored by an overpowered class, the EAM, given that said class has outscored everything else and hence why I've been pushing so hard to get it toned down. I'm not sure what you are insinuating by "apple polishing"; I'm just doing what Szlat has asked high level players like you to do for a long time: play a subclass, and report on how it compares to the base class for balancing. You can bet if my medic character wasn't reset by that hacker, I'd be doing the same for Extreme Monsters.

And remember: it's just a game. No need for personal attacks over a simple disagreement.

Saying I dominated every map before you used EAM is a bit of a blanket statement, I don't remember thrashing any hardworking similar level AM or WM who's played alongside me. I don't really keep track of what high levelled players have beaten me (how many high level players still play regularly nowadays anyway?), but it has been more than a few, and how would I know what specific subclass they were using (or if merely base class)? The idea of base classes scoring 6k+ XP or being equal to extremes seemed ludicrous to me simply because lvl 200+ MM base class is so underpowered. It's a once in a blue moon occurrence that extreme monsters even scores that much as there's only one or two maps that are so perfectly tailored to skaarj that scoring so high is possible. Plus do you really think Szlat will advocate nerfing something aimed like EAM to the point at which it no longer outscores extreme monsters, when it does so spectacularly now?

On the subject of personal attacks, you are wrong to suggest I was making one, I was merely making a (not unshared) observation, maybe you don't but I always like feedback.

Plus I find it amusing that you take the high ground when you put hardcore on to spite me, whilst taking it off the moment I leave and allowing other medics to healing blast you in the face every 30 seconds.

Ok, this post is getting too personal. Let's cease the personal attacks right now. Any more personal attacks will cause this post to be locked.

Dead_Freddo wrote:

The idea of base classes scoring 6k+ XP or being equal to extremes seemed ludicrous to me simply because lvl 200+ MM base class is so underpowered.

Ah, now I see where our disagreements stem from: perspective. Assuming you mean the MM base class is underpowered relative to Extreme Monsters or Extreme Medic, I have two quick questions:

1. Since when are we using the newly-introduced subclasses, which are still being refined and balanced, as benchmarks for performance by which the established base classes, which have been around far longer, are judged?

2. Is it a stretch of the imagination to construe the statement, "The base class is underpowered relative to the Extreme class," as, alternatively but equivalently, "The Extreme class is overpowered relative to the base class"?

Eh, I think I've given slightly more reasoning for my points other than "MM is underpowered".

Either way, you assume wrong. Forget "newly-introduced" (were around years before you got here but heyho) Extreme Monsters, I make the judgement based on XP I score playing my hardest with high level MM base class compared to XP I get playing lower level alternate classes and the scores of similar level alternate classes around me. For example, I tested it alongside Desert Wrath yesterday and got nearly half of his XP, on a map which is much more suited to MM than it is to WM. He might be a huge level, but we are both maxed out on the important things and he says he completely maxed out at level 300-something anyway, so his (underpowered according to Szlat’s ensuing changes) WM should not be beating my MM base class so comfortably if they were both equal.

Ok so I've been doing some thinking regarding the Extreme Monsters subclass. And according to the next build the monsters damage is to decrease a certain percentage. Some people think it is underpowered while others think it is overpowered, and they either argue against it or for it. I am not disagreeing that it isn't overpowered, I just think the nerf is attacking the wrong skill. For example when the next build comes, the skaarj combo, which is a red skaarj and 2 fire skaarj, will still be able to be summoned just with slightly less damage. Although their damage is lowered their accuracy is not.
So on to the suggestions, why not make the extreme monsters subclass more of a pet oriented class and less of a player oriented one? I was thinking leaving the damage of the monsters the way it is, no change, but remove regeneration, and remove advanced damage reduction. Although some people might get bad thoughts at this moment just wait and hear me out. Replace the regeneration and advanced damage reduction with a specific regeneration and ADB just for pets. Therefore the only thing being nerfed is the player. The same way an Extreme medic is meant to heal and not kill, likewise the extreme monsters subclass should let the pets kill. If this change goes into effect, the subclass will become more passive due to the danger of being killed, instead of its dominant manner at the moment. The subclass will act more like an engineer and less like a WM. And if this is still not enough, then the damage the subclass deals should also be reduced the way the extreme medic is, but lets take it slowly one change at a time. I just want to say, if there are any changes to be done to this specific subclass let it go to the player and not the pets, after all it is an Extreme monsters subclass.
And please do not respond to the post with personal debate, just respond if you agree or disagree and provide a valid argument.

Subclasses were opened up last year, and it was in build 226 that they were released to players under level 200, and no significant balance changes have taken effect yet. So yes, they are newly introduced relative to the base classes. I don't think there's any point in me continuing this conversation, Freddo, when you've once more missed my point completely. Again, you're comparing the MM base class to an Extreme class, in this case a Berserker, which still needs to be balanced IMO. And you're not recognizing the the huge difference in your scoring between the base class and Extreme Monsters, which you've admitted to this morning, as being an indication of imbalance. Even Elite was trying to get the same point across to you during our match on Dismemberment. So I'm not going to continue wasting my time here. Let's agree to disagree.

As for Elite's suggestion, I got the impression from this thread that the main complaint against Extreme Monsters was that the monsters were too powerful and doing too much work on behalf of the player already, meaning less effort needs to be exerted in order to score well. While it does make sense from a thematic perspective to do what you're suggesting, without a new mechanism to make directing monsters more involved, I don't see how it will solve the effort/reward ratio predicament. Bear in mind I haven't played Extreme Monsters yet, so I'm by no means an expert.

Meh, I didn’t come to talk with you anyway. I just wanted to tell Szlat I wasn’t liking the future changes, and the reasons why, rather than have a long back and forth gab with his imitation mouth-piece.

Regardless of its relationship with the base class (ability to score high XP/map, as well as very little, whereas MM is always consistently average), Extreme Monsters is not overpowered compared to the other classes (impossible for me to know specifics of different base/subclasses), and the other classes will never be nerfed due to the aimed nature and laziness of some of the players, lowering the XP/min. Seeming as they are able to outscore Extreme Monsters when they play hard atm, I refer back to my first post ITT:

Dead_Freddo wrote:

I'm really not liking the idea of running round trying my hardest and struggling to make 3k XP, whilst an AM/WM can play alongside me and carry on pushing 6-7k.

Elite, I like your idea (pet health is also being nerfed FYI). Not that I agree any nerf is necessary for reasons already explained but as most of my time is spent maintaining monsters anyway yours is at least preferable to the inattentive nerf planned atm as it won't ruin the gameplay and eat into the uniqueness of the class.

Regarding Extreme Monsters... And feel free to take my opinions with a grain of salt since I rarely play on DC (and rarely have time to play anything at all these days due to other obligations).

Making the Extreme Monster subclass even more passive from the player standpoint seems like a great way to make a really boring class. I know when I play a Medic, the pet monsters I summon are kind of just there. It's nice to occasionally get a double kill or something out of them, but they don't feel connected to my game experience really, mostly because the only level of control I have over them is where I summon them.

I've looked at the controller class and it doesn't seem to be feasible to add "giving orders" to pets easily, since the FriendlyMonsterController is not a bot controller but rather a MonsterController. That's one avenue that would be nice to have but doesn't seem very viable.

I'm going to toss out a couple of other ideas that might work towards making Extreme Monsters more of an active class.

-All Monsters gain negative health regeneration (-5HP/s)
-Link Gun: All ExMon come with a special PetMedic Link Gun that links to monsters. While Linked, they heal very fast (healing increase on Pets to offset the degeneration) and do additional damage.

The idea behind this is to keep the ExMon focused on keeping his pets going. Since they suffer constant health degeneration, they need to be babysat or they will die. The Link Gun/Leash allows the ExMon to heal his pets from the degeneration effectively, and also to prioritize some amount of damage boost between pets (e.g. you can link the pet who's actually fighting vs. the one standing there posing)

Another idea:

-Reduce pet base damage a bit
-Add a "Pet Double Damage" artifact that you could run ala Triple to give your pets enhanced damage output (maybe restrict it by pets in a certain range?).

Again, the focus here is on rewarding players who try and take an active role in corralling their pet monsters instead of summoning them somewhere and then running into a dark corner. A TripleDamage-like artifact/power would give you more control over how effective your monsters in certain scenarios and reward skillful timing and resource management. (Whereas always-on damage bonus is just ... Boring and promotes passivity).

Dead_Freddo wrote:

rather than have a long back and forth gab with his imitation mouth-piece

So much for the whole "Let's cease the personal attacks right now" thing...

While I'm making suggestions, this one doesn't have anything to do with balancing the ExMon subclass in anyway, but could be nice: Display summoned monster name and health on the summoning player's HUD.
Definitely could be a nice tweak for keeping tabs on your monsters.

Looking at the first post in this thread.
The top 20 XP scores are for Extreme Medics, Berserkers, Extreme Monsters - with one score each for Extreme WM and Vehicle Specialist.
So, the Extreme AM perhaps isn't overpowered compared to other extreme classes, since it doesn't even make the list?
But perhaps all the extreme classes are a bit overpowered compared to the base classes?

Szlat wrote:

Looking at the first post in this thread.
The top 20 XP scores are for Extreme Medics, Berserkers, Extreme Monsters - with one score each for Extreme WM and Vehicle Specialist.
So, the Extreme AM perhaps isn't overpowered compared to other extreme classes, since it doesn't even make the list?
But perhaps all the extreme classes are a bit overpowered compared to the base classes?

Unfortunately a year has given players lots of time to figure out, how to once again take a few AM skills a make it seem Overpowered.this has happened too often before.
Like the Rod/Triple before another item specific nerf is probably on its way.
Players are always looking for an advantage left in the coding,this happens with every game. It is up to us as a community to discourage this behavior by not using it to our advantage,because nerfs aren't really needed if we stop using skills is ways that are not as they were intended or are un-balanced.
I love playing my AM but there have been so many tweaks/nerfs I can barely remember how to play it anymore. I basically use my MWM ,triple ,globe ,and nearly nevr use rod/bolt/beam/fireball

Szlat wrote:

Looking at the first post in this thread.
The top 20 XP scores are for Extreme Medics, Berserkers, Extreme Monsters - with one score each for Extreme WM and Vehicle Specialist.
So, the Extreme AM perhaps isn't overpowered compared to other extreme classes, since it doesn't even make the list?
But perhaps all the extreme classes are a bit overpowered compared to the base classes?

Actually, I should be on that list since I broke my previous record with EAM and got 7.5k XP, which would have put me at 20th place, and I wasn't even using beam/sphere or energy shield 3. I haven't played EAM since because I find the base class more of a challenge, and I don't like scoring big if I feel like it was the class that made it possible, rather than my own ability.

As for the question of whether all extreme classes are overpowered compared to base classes, if you were to look at the first post in this thread, you would also see that, on the list of max XP achieved regardless of level, a base class doesn't show up until 12th place. Furthermore:

Max XP for AM is 5.3k, while max for EAM is 7.4k (as listed - again, should be 7.5k, and both of these scores came from the same player.)

Max XP for WM is 4.6k, while max for EWM is 7.7k, for Berserker is 8.7k, and for Skilled Weapons is 6.3k.

Max XP for MonsterMaster is 4.9k, while max for Extreme Medic is 15k and for Extreme Monsters is 8.5k.

Max XP for Engineer is 4.5k, while max for Extreme Engineer is 5k, for Vehicle Specialist is 7.7k, for Sent Specialist is 5.8k, and for Turret Specialist is 4.4k.

So, with the exception of Turret and Sent Specialist (Extreme Engineer is getting removed in the next build anyway), I think it's safe to say that the Extremes overpower the base classes by a huge margin. While I can't say from experience that this is the case for most, I do wholeheartedly believe that is the case for EAM (more on that here.) I'll be testing the WM subclasses in a similar fashion once I get used to using ranged weapons like most sane people.