Health & Stamina, failed design?

[Infinitron]

 

 

It goes against the design of those characters.

 

Says who

Some classes like the ranger are designed at the moment to not be front liners, and classes like the fighter are only useful in the front. 

 

 

I realize that. I just think there's a distance between "designed to be on the front line" and "can be relied upon to single-handedly hold the front line indefinitely with no regard to preservation of health".

[Hiro Protagonist II]

 

It goes against the design of those characters.

 

Says who

 

Josh? You now have to move your Ranger into melee to soak up damage even though your fighter is doing okay, because if you don't you're going to have to rest after the encounter for your half dead fighter? So you move your ranger into melee to soak up damage, encounter has ended and now you have your Ranger at half health but that's okay, you can now continue instead of resting. Bad design is bad design and moving ranged characters in to tank is not solving the problem.

Edited September 6, 2014 by Hiro Protagonist II

[Namutree]

 

 

I realize that. I just think there's a distance between "designed to be on the front line" and "can be relied upon to single-handedly hold the front line indefinitely with no regard to preservation of health".

 

That isn't what anyone has suggested as far as I know.

[Infinitron]

 

 You now have to move your Ranger into melee to soak up damage because your fighter is taking too much damage? 

 

 

*shrug* Sounds like typical low-level Infinity Engine gameplay to me. One of my fighters would get hit with a crit or something while I was crawling a dungeon and I'd have to be more careful with him and let my other melee guys pick up the slack for the rest of the journey.

 

And yes, at the end of the day, you might have 3 or 4 busted up melee characters while your ranged characters are still at full health. Not a tragedy. It's simply a matter of how long that day is.

Edited September 6, 2014 by Infinitron

[Sensuki]

Josh? You now have to move your Ranger into melee to soak up damage

No, Ranger and Animal Companion share Health, so Ranger is tanking whenever the animal companion gets hit.

[Hiro Protagonist II]

 

Josh? You now have to move your Ranger into melee to soak up damage

No, Ranger and Animal Companion share Health, so Ranger is tanking whenever the animal companion gets hit.

 

 

Okay. Well if you build a ranged character like an AoE Wizard instead of a melee Wizard, you then have to send him in to tank. So really we need melee builds to help tank to spread the damage with the Fighter. Again, bad design.

Edited September 6, 2014 by Hiro Protagonist II

[Infinitron]

Why do you insist on acting like Fighters are the only melee-capable class in this game

[Zansatsu]

Any spell caster wearing heavy armor is going to have to wait 9 seconds after every spell before they can do anything again, seems like they aren't meant to be up there because they are designed to help the party with their spells. 

[Hiro Protagonist II]

Why do you insist on acting like Fighters are the only melee-capable class in this game

 

Why do you insist that ranged builds need to go into melee and tank and spread the damage?

[Namutree]

 

 

 You now have to move your Ranger into melee to soak up damage because your fighter is taking too much damage? 

 

 

*shrug* Sounds like typical low-level Infinity Engine gameplay to me. One of my fighters would get hit with a crit or something while I was crawling a dungeon and I'd have to be more careful with him and let my other melee guys pick up the slack.

 

And yes, at the end of the day, you might have 3 or 4 busted up melee characters while your ranged characters are still at full health. Not a tragedy. It's simply a matter of how long that day is.

 

A) We aren't low level in the beta. We are mid level. 

 

B) Trash mobs are pathetic against a mid level fighter in the IE games. Much less a mid level party.

 

C) In the IE games only the battle at hand was a major issue since we could heal for free afterwards. Now every two or three battles a rest is mandatory. 

 

We either need more health or weaker trash mobs; if nothing changes this health/stamina divide will be a drag.

[Sensuki]

Any spell caster wearing heavy armor is going to have to wait 9 seconds after every spell before they can do anything again, seems like they aren't meant to be up there because they are designed to help the party with their spells.

This is bad design to me.

[Infinitron]

 

Why do you insist on acting like Fighters are the only melee-capable class in this game

 

Why do you insist that ranged builds need to go into melee and tank and spread the damage?

 

 

I don't. I'm telling you to use your Barbarians, Paladins and Priests. Just like in the IE games.

 

(As an side, there's nothing inherently wrong about trying to develop a character from a ranged class in a more melee direction. It'll be an interesting challenge for a gimmick playthrough to play with a party of them. Who says Eternity doesn't support those?)

Edited September 6, 2014 by Infinitron

[Zansatsu]

 

Any spell caster wearing heavy armor is going to have to wait 9 seconds after every spell before they can do anything again, seems like they aren't meant to be up there because they are designed to help the party with their spells.

This is bad design to me.

 

I agree but it is obviously meant to balance Spell casters against Mele. Which makes sense.

[Sensuki]

The DPS reduction is relative to the cast time, the penalty for spellcasting in armor is pretty massive.

[Hiro Protagonist II]

I don't. I'm telling you to use your Barbarians, Paladins and Priests. Just like in the IE games.

 

(As an side, there's nothing inherently wrong about trying to develop a character from a ranged class in a more melee direction. It'll be an interesting challenge for a gimmick playthrough. Who says Eternity doesn't support those?)

 

 

And if you built a party that has two melee and four ranged, you're going to be in a world of hurt and will have to rest quite a bit for those two melee characters. So now you're advocating more melee type parties? Say 4 melee, 2 ranged to spread the damage over your melee characters? That's not a solution to the healing problem. Poor design shouldn't dictate what party you make.

Edited September 6, 2014 by Hiro Protagonist II

[Zansatsu]

 

The DPS reduction is relative to the cast time, the penalty for spellcasting in armor is pretty massive.

 

 

No argument there, just stating that there is an obvious motivation by the designers to have ranged classes as ranged. So the argument to just send them up front doesn't really fly atm because they would be useless. Just punching bags.

Edited September 6, 2014 by Zansatsu

[Infinitron]

The DPS reduction is relative to the cast time, the penalty for spellcasting in armor is pretty massive.

 

So heavily armored mages should have high Might so that each cast they get off counts. Makes sense.

 

You might argue that the exact numbers are too punitive (personally I'm not sure) but the principle is solid.

[Hiro Protagonist II]

No argument there, just stating that there is an obvious motivation by the designers to have ranged classes as ranged. So the argument to just send them up front doesn't really fly atm because they would be useless. Just punching bags.

 

But hey, you're spreading the damage around. That's the solution for now.

[Infinitron]

Poor design shouldn't dictate what party you make.

 

I hope you're not preaching a return to AD&D as a solution to the problem of overly strict party composition!

 

 

 

So now you're advocating more melee type parties?

 

I'd say that's one strategy you might need to pursue if you aren't able to keep the heat off of a smaller number of melee characters. Like, if you aren't effective enough at using crowd control spells and such.

Edited September 6, 2014 by Infinitron

[Sensuki]

So heavily armored mages should have high Might so that each cast they get off counts. Makes sense.

 

You might argue that the exact numbers are too punitive (personally I'm not sure) but the principle is solid.

I don't care about the principles, I care about the balance. I don't think the "you should bump Might then" argument is valid because the same character is just much better wearing no armor at all, the DPS decrease from wearing armor does not justify the protection it gives, especially when you're far at the back slinging long range spells.

[Infinitron]

I don't care about the principles, I care about the balance. I don't think the "you should bump Might then" argument is valid because the same character is just much better wearing no armor at all, the DPS decrease from wearing armor does not justify the protection it gives, especially when you're far at the back slinging long range spells.

 

Wait, ranged? I thought we were talking about wizards in close range/melee.

Edited September 6, 2014 by Infinitron

[Hiro Protagonist II]

 

I hope you're not preaching a return to AD&D as a solution to the problem of overly strict party composition!

 

Why would I be preaching a return to AD&D? I didn't realise healing spells and potions were the domain of AD&D and no other non-AD&D crpg used them.

 

 

 

I'd say that's one strategy you might need to pursue if you aren't able to keep the heat off of a smaller number of melee characters. Like, if you aren't effective enough at using crowd control spells and such.

 

LOL. So it's my gameplay that's at fault, not the bad design of PoE. Nice one Infinitron.

[Zansatsu]

 

I don't care about the principles, I care about the balance. I don't think the "you should bump Might then" argument is valid because the same character is just much better wearing no armor at all, the DPS decrease from wearing armor does not justify the protection it gives, especially when you're far at the back slinging long range spells.

 

Wait, ranged? I thought we were talking about wizards in close range/melee.

 

That was me talking about it. But again why have a mage in the back in heavy armor at all?

[Infinitron]

That was me talking about it. But again why have a mage in the back in heavy armor at all?

 

Maybe there is no reason. Is that a problem? Armor isn't a permanent character building choice, after all.

 

(I realize that it might be cool to more fully support some sort of "armored mage" archetype, but according to many this game has already strayed too far from classical archetypes as it is. Besides, there's also a serious danger of them becoming too overpowered.)

Edited September 6, 2014 by Infinitron

[Sensuki]

Wait, ranged? I thought we were talking about wizards in close range/melee.

Not to my knowledge. Armor is valuable in close range because you're constantly getting hit. Perhaps the DT to Attack Speed penalties are not right yet but for ranged it's just pointless atm.

 

It's going to be a tough nut to crack, and may never be changed, I don't know.

 

And yeah I think allowing for more character archetypes to be viable is a reason to try and figure it out.

Edited September 6, 2014 by Sensuki