Map & Mob changes: February 19, 2021

RIP your exp quota

 

this seems like its going to be pretty awesome but we will still have the problem of low etc drop rate and spawn rate in crimson keep mobs?

 

Yes. The spawn is still bad on ToT. We have to wait for a fix

 

Where do 180-200 non mages grind now that 7F is ruined and a full community of players is displaced? This was considered ahead of time I'm sure. So where do we go now? What was the plan by the higher ups with a change like this.
-> Destroy 7F
-> Now they can all go... ?

 

These changes come nowhere close to "bringing 5-6F in line with other training locations." Nerf harder please.

 

why is the staff so bent on making 7f an un-trainable place? o.o

 

Dunno what was really the issue. With mobs jumping you can't even bring mules to the door of 5-6f to train at 7F. This i can understand, but lowering the spawn seems a bit too much? Hope Obv4 doesn't get too crowded now..

For me it was 7F for:
+ Glorious exp
+ Hard training
+ Duo incentive
- Low meso income

And Obv4 for:
+ Good exp overall
+ Relatively safe spots for mules
+ Chill training
+ Money making
- Not as good as 7f exp

We have yet to see ToT improved spawns (currently bugged), but i foresee everyone coming to Obv4 /5 to train

 

Muling in ToT is a pain i think. I think the quest to even unlock a map, is the level of the mob? So you can't keep the mules in party???

 

You do, but you can do it all in one go (i did with my main + my Bish for HS). Also, i find it fun doing it.

If you have a HS mule, or a duo, its easier to go to FM at Obv4 than 7F since we got stairs and platforms.

 

"If wet get rid of the HS spot and nuke the spawn and put fish everywhere, it will be an automatic amazing idea and go over extremely well with our dedicated 7F player base. Actually, I think this will provide an ideal situation for all parties involved. After all, it's the only place non-mages can go for reasonable exp while the mages get insane exp literally anywhere. Let's do this!" - Balance Team 2021

 

@gm

Please consider reverting HT head changes for head cleave.
The change of the hit boxes has made it harder for paladins (again) to find class identity in HT, and has inadvertently nerfed shadower cleave.

Change Effect: On the left side, hit boxes appear to be larger(?) to allow cleave damage.

Heroes and DRKs can now hit left and middle head. Because of the change, when paladins are standing on the normal middle hit platform, Blast only targets left head. Jumping up to the top platform means that whenever the head ducks, paladins just whiff air.

Change effect: On the left side, same thing as right side.

Heroes and DRKs can now hit left and middle head. Paladins can use hammer, but have to stand at a platform that consistently drops you to the bottom of the map if stance fails once (spoiler, it will), giving you the largest climb of HT which means missed DPM while lumbering back to the top.

Paladins being able to hit middle head 100% of the time is literally our only saving grace in HT. With hammer nerf, hammer's DPM isn't worth giving up middle head damage (most of the time) our class identity in HT right now is literally useless.

Final thoughts:

Cleave has always done well in HT. Heroes and DRKs bring unique buffs and have a cleave role that makes sense. By trying to make all of HT cleave friendly, we are nerfing shadower cleave, which was the only middle head cleave and made the class more marketable behind a pure sed mule, and ruining Paladin DPM.


TLDR; People will bring heroes and drks to HT regardless if they will cleave heads or not, but this change sux for paladins and nerfs shads as well

 

This is probably specific enough to put in a new thread. Might I suggest a title?

"Class balance, should paladins be viable?"

Real talk, after watching some ht runs, I dont see any reason to pick a pally over a hero or dk for ht (or cwk). Back to scar/nt

 

To give a bit of context.

Pre-patch. A paladin would stay at the 2nd top left small block. If left head cancels the paladin is still able to hit mid head 100% of the time. When mh cancels the paladin moves down one platform to hit left head with the only downtime happening when left head ducks.

Post-patch. Staying on that 2nd top left platform means paladin blast will hit left head over mid head unless left head ducks. If left head cancels, to hit mid head the paladin will have to jump up to the top small block on the left. Problem, when mid head ducks all blast hits miss. Likewise if mid head cancels, paladin goes down 1 platform to hit left head and suffers the same problem with left head duck. Effectively now paladin cannot hit mid head 100% of the time. The conclusion? If any head decides to cancel, the paladin loses out in dmg because whatever head the paladin then moves on to avoid the wep cancel will literally be fcked whenever the head ducks. No other ranged dps class has this issue, and now cleave doesn't have this issue cause they can cleave.

Don't even mention the only cleave skill, ACB. The hitbox change was only half-assed done that stab and downward swing animations don't actually hit the left head and only upward swing does. You can't even cleave as a paladin on the left hand side.

Buff the crying heroes in HT only to totally destroy an entire class in Horntail. Nice.

 

Not that I disagree with your concerns, but I'm pretty sure this exact issue happens to bucc's demo before patch.

Speaking of which, how are bucc's doing at HT now with the meta change? Curious cuz bucc's basically do the same thing as pallys in HT + SI/TL

 

Why is the solution to nerf cleave once more rather than buff poorly performing classes? Especially when the only thing DKs have going for them is HT/CWKPQ and being an HB mule

 

difference is when heads duck, demo has a long enough cast time that the head will be back up by the time you use your next skill (same with barrage ds)

blast does not have that luxury. Heads duck and you’re actually waiting and losing time.

Edit: Honestly the easiest way to fix this is to increase the vertical hit box on the mid head. If you're able to fatten the horizontal hitbox on mid head so that cleave can touch it, then you can increase the vertical hitbox as well surely.

 

The main difference from pre-patch is that Paladin used to only lose damage on left head duck when midhead cancels, but now they lose damage both on left head duck when midhead cancels and mid head duck when left head cancels.

From very rough observations, HT heads spend about 1/3 of its time in cancel on average, and approximately 2 out of 8 blasts are lost to ducks. Using these (fairly naive) approximations, Paladins have lost about 7% of their damage. Though in practice not every head animation results in a duck so in practice the loss is probably around 5-6% ballpark.

This doesn't sound very large, but Paladin was already at a fairly bad spot in HT - much worse than any of the cleaving classes, in fact. In general, on a 1 Hero/DrK cleave 4 range 1 bishop run the cleaver can spend about 40-50% of the entire runtime (prehead included) cleaving 2 parts (wing damage doesn't count), and given that Hero/DrK damage is about 80-85% of a equivalent ranged character (except NLs at very high gear level comparison; those are closer to 75%) on a single target, that 1 Hero/DrK is doing a lot more effective damage than the ranged characters. Cleave time decreases on 2 cleave 3 range setups but even then they can generally keep even. On the other hand, Paladins with about 5-7% damage loss is basically what their damage situation was like before the Holy Charge buff, meaning that they're now basically doing archer damage without SE and still confined to a single location. The effect of this patch's change on Horntail ended up basically buffing already very competitive classes at the cost of nerfing a class that was already barely able to compete, and seems utterly nonsensical when viewed in this light.