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i'd also suggest just coating us in a viscous goo to achieve this same slip n slide effect. snail rp

 

it's a little funny that you are quoting your own chart that says "for entertainment purposes only"

also the problem with such tier-list is that people are selective about what bosses they run, because we simply don't have the time to run all 20 bosses daily. Also it doesn't take into account multi-clienting which obviously is a focus on balancing NLs.

 

imo just nerf the damage already. i dont want muh active and engaging gameplay. if we really have to choose between avoid and damage, give me avoid. let me watch my shows while i play, thats all i want.

 

At the risk of derailing this thread and making it about non-NLs, the “set up” cost of NL is negligible compared to other ranged characters. They have by far the easiest leveling curve of all ranged classes, and are the only ones with a viable 3rd job self-leveling method through Shadow Web. Their 4th job also has the smoothest power curve, only requiring 3 skills for maximum power (and even then one of them doesn’t even increase their damage and just saves money). Their washing is identical in cost to archers and cheaper than Corsairs for non-30k builds. They dominate at low levels of funding and have reduced pot costs and upkeep compared to other ranged characters.

NLs are easier and cheaper to build and maintain than other ranged classes, and their SE reliance is one of the few things keeping archers remotely relevant. None of these things are sufficiently offsetting to justify their upsides.

FWIW they do have very clear downsides, most notably struggling in cleave scenarios, and I would rather see balance achieved through high end, high value group content with actual variety that isn’t NL dominated rather than seeing the class identity heavily tampered with, but trying to make the argument that NLs are difficult to make is disingenuous.

 

1 day into NL damage nerf:

"Why are NL so weak"
"Why bring NL to anything"
"Why make NL at all"

 

"Vince why are you on your NL bring your MM"

 

I personally would love the pre nerf shifter back but i'll take anything compared to this 12s shifter since im not really into DPM or BEST damage ever. nerf the damage output and return the passive shifter. of course the reduction shouldnt be that ridiculous imo since some of us solo content and needs to pin(nameless/dunas/whatever else ppl these days) maybe in the range where an apple can solve the problem?

 

I also think the single client NL player should not be affected by NL nerfs if they are mostly aimed for the Multi Clienters. It would be better to change bosses to make Multi clienting harder. I think both sides might love it, since a friend of my only likes to multi client because it is more engaging and fun, having to react fast and do several things at once.
If NL get nerf for making multi clienting unplayable, people will continue to the next best class to multi client on. Breaking the cycle would be buffing bosses i think.
Maybe an attack u can avoid by jumping and if you fail the jump u have to spam left and right to break free? with a set cool down with like +-20% on the cool down to make it slightly random.
Or attacks where u have to duck?
Or go to a certain place (in the map) in time?

 

It's funny that you mention apple as a solution for NL as I view them (and gelts) as one of NLs problems. Without these strong attack buffs the average NL would much more fall in line with other jobs in terms of bossing capabilities while mostly retaining their high ceiling when heavily funded (which is great, keeps people striving for more). This would also counteract multiclient attacking which seems to be desired by staff.

 

This is a lukewarm take, and one that’s harder to address than saying “NLs are broken” but I’m convinced NLs aren’t inherently the issue. The fact that they hover in the top 3 for almost every meaningful fight in the game would at a glance imply they’re too strong, but the standings are unfairly skewed due to poor enemy design.

When you have a class that thrives in single-target, high-pressure scenarios where death from enemy abilities is an actual risk, repositioning is vital, and there’s nothing to prevent them from hitting a single fat enemy, but “struggles” in scenarios where there are multiple targets or in scenarios where other classes with higher base damage can freefire, the solution is to create boss encounters that exploit those vulnerabilities or allow other classes opportunities to shine.

However, Neckson generally designed fights by throwing enemies at players one at a time, often needing to be bursted down separately, and then adding difficulty by spamming the ever loving fuck out of status effects and map attacks. These are the precise conditions NLs thrive at, and very few fights deviate from this formula, and those that do often have absolutely piss poor rewards.

The problem isn’t simply that NLs are too strong. The issue is that no fight actually attempts to challenge NL hegemony or reward other classes through the right combination of fight design and rewards.

Now, granted, changing fights or adding new ones is significantly harder than adjusting NL abilities, so I understand why this route may be taken instead. But I do think this discrepancy needs to be addressed and discussed.

 

I personally feel that NL was considered a top dps only because we could just hold down TT with passive shifter and eat apples as if we were addicted to them? because without eating apple i've mostly not out dps anyone else that has more funding than i do. so to me i feel like that if the price of getting holding down TT was to reduce the dmg we deal overall sounds like a very fair trade and is not something that we need to over complicate to compensate(by eating my fav fruit) and might make APQ more profitable.

 

The goal should always have been to give other classes more NL-like optionality in skill-based play.
Instead we get crab legs.

 

I didn't play NL before but now I have started an Ironman journey together with friends and just got to Night Lord.
I do really like the class but grinding with it is and have never been an easy task. Avenger being the only attack hitting multiple targets up to 6? I am yet to try Ninja Storm in a couple of levels I guess.
This is something that I personally feel is missing as I am always training myself instead of leeching like I think most NL's do upto "bossing levels".

Shifter seems like interesting changes either way with activation being like a "burst cd", I really do think this is the way to go instead of reverting to pure dodge if that's what it was before.

My opinions may be a little uneducated but I do have faith in staff+playerbase to come up with some interesting changes together and I look forward to see something new.

 

Don't get me wrong, I love stance on Shad, I think it's probably better than shifter, but the goal of balancing here isn't to indiscriminately punish NLs for their avoid solely to make them hurt more/pay more for pots - it's to address us being the biggest damage yet most AFK class, so giving us Stance too sadly doesn't really solve anything on that front. Just like with the Alchemist nerf, ultimately it really just makes us spend a little more money - a bandaid solution that doesn't treat the deeper issues.

(And it has been pointed out as having the more conceptual issue of class identity being threatened, so this would potentially just add salt to that wound. To be fair, I don't know how to reconcile the identity issue... But I admit I am into the stance now. Stance is sick fr fr bro I love standing.)

 

Wait now you’re going to nerf the NL I’ve spent years on making strong?

Glad this game offers easy job changes /s

 

More or less accurate with them being top tier, but they're still not the best. In Horntail MuscleUncle will dominate any NL setup(even duos) on Hero of all things, and DKs are still more or less untested in the waters but are no doubt capable of some silly numbers. It's also content that is almost entirely dictated by the bishop, their ability is what makes and breaks runs. There's a lot of very mediocre Night Lords and they hardly put out numbers worth looking at, relying on apples in order to overcome all of the major drawbacks of the class.

PB is kind of a joke now since a 180 shad with a 125 dagger can white the bean. It's a boss that suffers from infrastructure being months or years away from new metas, as the development of characters takes time but there's tech building going on that is beyond Balance Team's knowledge, as they focus on wondering why people are still playing the characters they keep nerfing and will continue to do so until this server is just a Maple Classic waiting room. At some point you have to just wonder why any of these changes are made when they don't really make anyone happy and make the game actively worse to play for the average player.

It's really just a class of drawbacks for players who want to be comfortable and relax while playing the game.

This thread as a whole is pretty shit as it doesn't seem like anything other than a formality to cook up more nerfs with a foregone conclusion about a class irrespective of the reality of class balance. If they're overpowered then Balance Team should show it instead of using the consensus of every 22 iq player on the server. This Shifter rework will just breed toxicity as you'll be a D tier class if you just use the passive shifter and piss your party off or use it and just hate the class it turned into. I have no idea what the FJ change is supposed to do, it looks like an absolute waste of dev time. Is it just a sadistic desire for Balance Team to make wagies dance or something?

 

These changes are already hurting people with less gear.

And people that run APQ hurt themselves.

 

I'd actually advocate for the opposite approach. If more content required apples, there would be more demand. More demand would increase the cost of apples, making it such that apple-ing on 3x Night Lords at the same time becomes a more expensive endeavor... decreasing the return on investment.

 

Thanks for confirming this. As a shad main, I was quite vocal about the Shad changes initially but honestly just gave up talking about it as I felt like staff had already made up their mind. I'll reserve my comments/feedback for the Shad thread for now.

Regarding Night lord changes, I personally do not have NL but based purely on anecdotal experience, I personally know of 2 NLs who have basically quit after the changes. Both of them were "single client attackers" for what its worth. I guess what I'm trying to say is, while the intention of staff was to tackle multiclienting attackers, many others were collateral damage and I feel this approach is detrimental to this game we love. From a player perspective, it's devastating to save up years of NX, buy/save for gear and go all-in on a class you love, only to let it get completely rekt by unforeseen changes.

I think shifter revert is absolutely necessary. Currently, shifter is completely useless in most cases and people dont even use them strategically (the intended use case is literally too niche scenario). Also, many players love the random F2 when shifter procs, it just makes thief what it is, a sly smirking SOB lurking in the darkness. Whether 15% is too low, that could be discussed. I would say 15% would have been fine if there was no avoid calculation changes, but I believe the avoid calc changes was a double whammy to overall avoidability. Maybe 20% (1 in 5 chance) might be better. Comparatively Shad would be 25/30%.

Flash jump adding to Shifter rate sounds like a cool idea, I dig that.

Base damage being lowered, will that affect NL's long-standing identity as a top single target damage dealer?