Luk mage avoidability buff

I don't have any particularly strong opinions about the proposed luk mage buff (I think its a somewhat inelegant solution to a non-problem, but I see where you are coming from), but I would like to clean up a couple of the points about HH mules.

In the case of HH mules, it actually takes 0 nx to make a 30k hp paladin, which meant that there was essentially no gate to making an HH mule aside from training it up to level 139. Still even with that in mind, HH mules did not catch on very quickly. My initial post which proved the efficacy of HH mules was made in june 2019(https://forum.maplelegends.com/inde...achieving-significantly-more-dpm.22552/page-2), but it was not until half a year later (https://forum.maplelegends.com/index.php?threads/skill-changes-21-12-2019.27328/#post-196096) that the staff issued in the HH nerf.

I think it might be too hasty to jump to the conclusion that this type of muling does not have any impact on the larger population. Right now there are for sure less than 10 players than have ever brought an HH mule into HT, and probably only ~5 that do it on a regular basis. There are probably less than 15 players with completed dex buccs, and less than 10 that regularly bring them into HT regularly. Yet it is clear that HH mules and dex buccs have a massive impact on the game(not necessarily for the worse I would argue, but thats for a different argument). The availability of these mules in most serious HT groups makes some classes more desirable, and others less desirable. For example the former utility having shadowers be an indestructible sed mule is someone redundant in the current meta, as any dex bucc or luk HH mule can easily do the same job. It is also harder to justify putting a bucc on HT squads now, since there is a pretty decent chance someone on the team already has a dex bucc. Meanwhile all 3 warriors moved up the HT tier list due to the omnipresence of SI via dex buccs.
Now you could make the argument that most of the players do not actually participate in HT runs, and thus these type of shananegins should not really affect the bulk playerbase. But since HT is the gold standard for endgame content, the culture of the server is highly influenced by the events in the cave. For example the fact that buccs are mediocre in HT will dissuade a good amount of players from picking that class as their main. On the warrior side, the knowledge that SI will be available for warriors almost all the time causes warriors to lean towards 2H swords over 1H swords. Another more general effect is the reduction in the consumption of atk pots in HT (since its not needed anymore a lot of times), which no doubt contributed to the deflation of apple prices.

Now I'm not necessarily saying this luk mage change will be abused in the same way as HH mules or dex buccs, but rather than this type of muling among the elite does actually have a pretty big impact on the entire game. If the numbers are not tweaked carefully and there was a way to make a 999 avoid bishop mule, this would be a non-trivial problem.

 

What would be a reasonable amount of avoid for a LUK bishop mule? We could work backwards based on equipment and projected stats and calculate how much avoid each point of LUK can give.

 

Let me first clarify the point I was tring to make in the second paragraph. I was trying to make 2 separate points in my first paragraph. Firstly that relative to the entire player base, there are very few people who use HH mules and dex buccs(which we seem to agree with). Secondly, that it does not take many of these people for there to be a dex bucc/HH mule on most HT runs. To be more specific about this 2nd point, I think that these few "serious groups" who use mules produce most of the books on the server and more or less control HT. Because this is the case, everyone else is largely affected by the muling ability of these few squads. For example, do you think book prices would be the same if boss multiclienting was banned?

It seems like in your experience HT hosts are of the more casual type, but I'm not sure this is representative of most of the HT runs that occur. I might argue that you are also subject to some sort of selection bias, where you never had the chance to to interact with most of the "serious" groups. I suppose this is more of a my word vs your word situation.

I'm not entirely sure this is the case. I started out as a noob too, starting my days in disastrous 2 party runs that moved at a snail pace and forced me to pot maniacally with my 6k hp. I have been HTing for a long time and with many different people. During this time I have been pretty in tune with the people who run HT on a regular basis. I have seen how the meta has evolved from clueless confusion of 2018 to the the ruthless efficiency of the modern age. Of course this doesn't mean I am the ultimate authority on all things HT related, but I'm not sure I would agree that my viewpoint is so narrowminded.

 

Given that all three of my mages are LUK mages and they're all level 85, I think I should report my experiences to this thread because I've got a lot of low-level experience. I hate grinding, but I do love quests, party quests, and collecting Monster Cards (which is a form of grinding, I know, but it's not for me...it's weird).

My Priest and my F/P have been a very frustrating classes to play. My Cleric can't mob anywhere but undead maps, and my F/P can't mob until third job - and Fire Arrow barely does more damage than Magic Claw until it's almost maxed, and even then it depends on the mobs you're attacking. A lot of quests for the Cleric and F/P end up requiring a lot of Magic Claw attacks. Due to the LUK factor, there are a lot of at-level quests that I just simply cannot do because the amount of damage I'm doing compared to the damage I'm taking is ridiculously lopsided. I often question how in the world these quests could possibly be done at my level, but LUKless mages do them all the time. I agree with Nicholas that it's not fair to expect players to know that they need to go LUKless - which means that all mage gear that requires LUK is automatically obsolete garbage. This seems counter-intuitive to the design of the game - and there's nothing more disappointing to me than having gear be obsolete and still in the game. At third job, both the Priest and F/P Mage have mob skills that can make the QoL issues get resolved, but I'm still frustrated at the damage differential between my character and a LUKless one. I think a damage boost - not necessarily to the extent of a LUKless mage - should definitely be considered. The damage boost should be such that any LUK mage can successfully attack mobs in quests that are open for their level at a sufficiently decent rate that the quests are not seen as unreasonable (or to be done 10 to 20 levels later after you've unlocked them).

My I/L is a different story. A universal mob skill at 2nd Job makes this a much easier class to play, but the damage issue remains.

 

As a causal and fresh LUK mage player with no funding (re-live the maple experience while stuck at home during covid). Just want to share some of my experience, especially everyone here is debating on HT or exploting by the very top end.

I am not going to reach HT. Balance base on the "final boss" make sense for the hardcore players, but most players are not close anywhere close to that. This slight avoidability buff doesn't improve the general gaming experience for most of the LUK mage players from level 8 to Level 1xx (I have no idea what level a mage can HT). Maybe slightly less pots used along the way, which is as insignificant as a buff can get.

I got an inspiration from someone mentions about all the mage equip are basically useless since everyone goes bathrobe and stuffs. Why not buff the LUK mage equips's stats, double it maybe. This is just a random suggestions. But really, the improvement should be felt by a player along all the levels.

 

Really? I thought INT and LUK provided the same amount of magic accuracy... imma see if i can find the magic accuracy formula anywhere.

 

Found this on Ayumilove:



Seems that INT and LUK provide the same amount of magic accuracy. That said, there’s a F/P guide here that suggests that adding LUK for accuracy is better for 2nd job F/P because it’s cheaper to get LUK gear as compared to INT gear, and magic attack doesn’t quite matter if you’re training with Poison Breath.

 

Dunno if I commented on this before but I'm in favor of this buff, however I think a buff to the magic attack on LUK staffs equal to 10% of their LUK requirement should be considered alongside this suggestion.

EDIT: 15-20% would even be fine.

 

My Str/Luk wizard nods furiously in agreement.

On a serious note, the hardcore, serious folks who want excellent damage can still go down the LUKless path. The LUK mages, on the other hand, should be able to grind a little more easily with better avoidability.

 

Yeah that's kind of the point I was trying to make a few pages ago, though you make it more clearly. The OP basically was saying it would save money on pots or could save you, but the same thing goes for scrolling for weapon def. It would certainly be a nice buff, but LUK mages absolutely require a buff to their magic attack to be worthwhile for anything other than a mule or a novelty.

EDIT: Nvm, I think it was a different thread
EDIT 2: Also weirdly, though it's an interesting idea, it's only really useful for Bishops since they bring loads to a party aside from their damage. No elemental mage could get away with sacrificing a large amount of damage in order to save money on pots. Might as well add fresh AP to HP instead.

 

What I take from this is that adding more Avoid to the LUK stat is not the answer in fixing LUK mages. I'd still like people to brainstorm - and think outside of the box - about what novel and useful, but not overpowering, aspect a LUK mage can bring to a party.

 

Careful buffs could make it a superior option to LUKless but only in cases where the player has min-maxed their character around the build at a very high level, or alternatively, could make a better option but only at low levels, which would make it useful and rewarding to those who only wanted to play for nostalgia and quit before reaching endgame. The latter type of players arguably don't need any custom buffs, though.

 

Make the lv163 staff cost require much LUK as the lv103 staff or slightly more.
The lv163 staff requires 165 LUK to equip which is just a hell lot compared to other end game equip like stonetooth's 120 dex. It is way too much to be offset effectively by +all stats equip (helm, htp, mbr, event rings).

It is really more suitable to buff the magic attack through equips or other means and not just throw in something totally new. Which would invade other class identify or just be useless after all.