Ranged vs Melee Balance

from an experienced MMO player and basing this game being similar to lineage 2 what ideas have people got to balance Range with Melee as Ranged chars always seem to have an advantage in almost every situation.

I remember the mage and archers in lineage 2 destroying in the sieges as melee just had to take damage whilst knocking down the front door.

As i agree ranged should have a slight advantage i do hope its not to noticeable that puts players off playing melee classes.

Ideas for balancing which may have been mentioned somewhere all ready but i haven't read everything.

Resistances for magic and ranged damage is the obvious solution but the advantage is they need the gear to make things fair. They should do the same for ranged maybe they miss shots/spells more often depending on distance of the player? Their gear could have increased hit/anti resistance so they can counter a geared melee with high resistances but will end up being at an advantage again. So hard to balance these.

What is the current situation or is this something AoC developers want to tackle later and more focused on design right now,.

thanks for reading, i cannot wait for this game.

Samsaint

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Beeper

Yuyukoyay wrote: »

I'd worry less about range kiting them forever and more about them ccing range forever.

ding ding ding, winner winner chicken dinner.

The biggest problem I have with MMOs as time goes on is the ridiculous amount of CC, stuns, slows, and snares that gets thrown into games. Instead of actually addressing xyz problem lets just add another abilities in an expansion and kick the can down the road.

unknown

This content has been removed.

Atama

One of the best classes in any MMO that I ever played was a Jedi Knight in SWTOR. You could leap all over the place and throw your saber like a boomerang, yank people around with the Force, etc. There was no huffing and puffing to get over to an enemy to engage them in melee. That did a lot to balance ranged and melee.

I think that’s the key. Balance damage output to defense (in other words the harder you hit the squishier you are) but don’t just make melee classes tougher as a trade off for having to get close to enemies. Just make up the difference with gap closers.

Damokles

Neurath wrote: »

Damokles wrote: »

How I would see it:
Tank>Rogue (too high physical resistances)
Rogue> Mage (bursts down too fast)
Mage>Cleric (Out damages healing)
Cleric>Ranger (Outheals damage)
Ranger>Fighter (Kites fighter if done right)
Fighter>Summoner (Cuts down summons)
Summoner>Bard (Overwhelms Bard)
Bard>Tank (Debuffs would soften up tank enough I think)

I believe we have 4 Armour Types, thus, 2 Classes will each use one type of Armour.

Just on this speculation alone I would say this:

Tank and Fighter Hard Counters Bard and Cleric.
Bard and Cleric Hard Counters Ranger and Rogue.
Ranger and Rogue Hard Counters Summoner and Mage.
Mage and Summoner Hard Counters Tank and Fighter.

Armor types are seperate from classes. All classes can wear any armor. Mages can wear plate, tanks could wear cloth.

Tragnar

I think this topic is good, but posted maybe a bit too soon, because this balance depends on the actual range of the ranged classes and also on their tab targetting abilities and their skillshots and on the melees having more gapclosers/movement abilities than the ranged

NelsonRebel

True but since we are getting closer to the alpha/beta its healthy to discuss what is wrong/bad in other games on the differences on combat just in case steven or any dev happens to be already working on these issues and challenges.

You never know, one thought and one line of coding can make a game world of a difference in a mechanical structuring. And the earlier the discussions on there for review the less chance we may have an issue with it later.

Combat is the one thing AoC has to get refined for players on release (at least to a reasonable level) to feel good if the game wants to have a smooth launch.

That being said, several AAA games had terrible launches for several different reasons and still fixed themselves later so I'm not to concerned because the mmo industry in gaming has proven that being a large company doesnt actually mean anything for quality content or quality assurances. And definitely not on release.

I would just like to see ashes avoid those problems since those big companies usually have safety nets because they are big that give them large margins of error. I dont know if thats a good thing though because it seems (to me) the reason why the mmo genre seems to suck so bad lately is because they have so many margins of error that they have gotten lazy and dont listen to feedback for it.

Syltharis

BaSkA13 wrote: »

Balancing combat is extremely difficult, so it will take a lot of time and many iterations.

My biggest concern, however, is not regarding ranged being stronger than melee and vice-versa, instead I worry if the developers' main focus is balancing group PvP, forgetting about individual class vs class balancing.

I believe that focusing on balancing class vs class combinations often means the overall combat will also be balanced. Since AoC will use the trinity concept, although there are 64 classes, I believe that focusing on the 8 main archetypes' (Mage, Summoner, Cleric, Bard, Fighter, Tank, Ranger and Rogue) balance would be a lot of work, but it would not go to waste. I don't understand yet how damage, damage mitigation, stats, armor, etc will work, but let's try to assume the following:
There's physical and magical damage;

There's armor that focus on mitigating physical damage (heavy, plate), magical damage (light, robes) and a armor that does a bit of both (medium, leather);

Although it's very important, I won't consider important aspects such as mobility, CCs, healing capabilities to make things simpler to understand, as I have no idea which skills each class will have.

Mages, Clerics and Bards deal only magical damage. Fighters, Tanks, Ranger and Rogues deal only physical damage. That can obviously change when you choose your secondary class, but we're focusing on the 8 main archetypes. The balance that makes the most sense to me is:
Mages, Clerics and Bards usually do well against Fighter and Tanks;

Fighter and Tanks usually do well against Rangers and Rogues;

Rangers and Rogues usually do well against Mages, Clerics and Bards;

Summoner is a strong class, but it also must be very difficult to play with: they are able beat anyone if they're skilled enough, but they will pay the highest price when making mistakes.

Like Steven answered recently, (player) skill should play a role in 1v1 combat, but at the same time your class, armor and weapon of choice must impact your performance against other players. If I face someone who's the quintessential counter of my class, I must fight flawlessly to win. I believe that these concepts can be the foundation to group PvP, then you'll "only" need to balance specific things such as class mobility, CC capability, healing prowess, etc.

They shouldn't balance class to class in 1v1 scenario. It is dumb and will only create oportunity for only few of the classes to be present in the mass-scale pvp. For example, if bards do good dmg but dont have much utility they would not be called for a castle siege. But if bard is lets say hard counter to rogues that you sure as hell are going to see alot of bards in castle sieges. Being a hard counter to any of the other classes creates a demand for that class.

From what i have seen so far seems like mages could be hard counters to fighters. That why i will be playing a mage (im commin for you sword-bois).

NelsonRebel

Syltharis wrote: »

BaSkA13 wrote: »

Balancing combat is extremely difficult, so it will take a lot of time and many iterations.

My biggest concern, however, is not regarding ranged being stronger than melee and vice-versa, instead I worry if the developers' main focus is balancing group PvP, forgetting about individual class vs class balancing.

I believe that focusing on balancing class vs class combinations often means the overall combat will also be balanced. Since AoC will use the trinity concept, although there are 64 classes, I believe that focusing on the 8 main archetypes' (Mage, Summoner, Cleric, Bard, Fighter, Tank, Ranger and Rogue) balance would be a lot of work, but it would not go to waste. I don't understand yet how damage, damage mitigation, stats, armor, etc will work, but let's try to assume the following:
There's physical and magical damage;

There's armor that focus on mitigating physical damage (heavy, plate), magical damage (light, robes) and a armor that does a bit of both (medium, leather);

Although it's very important, I won't consider important aspects such as mobility, CCs, healing capabilities to make things simpler to understand, as I have no idea which skills each class will have.

Mages, Clerics and Bards deal only magical damage. Fighters, Tanks, Ranger and Rogues deal only physical damage. That can obviously change when you choose your secondary class, but we're focusing on the 8 main archetypes. The balance that makes the most sense to me is:
Mages, Clerics and Bards usually do well against Fighter and Tanks;

Fighter and Tanks usually do well against Rangers and Rogues;

Rangers and Rogues usually do well against Mages, Clerics and Bards;

Summoner is a strong class, but it also must be very difficult to play with: they are able beat anyone if they're skilled enough, but they will pay the highest price when making mistakes.

Like Steven answered recently, (player) skill should play a role in 1v1 combat, but at the same time your class, armor and weapon of choice must impact your performance against other players. If I face someone who's the quintessential counter of my class, I must fight flawlessly to win. I believe that these concepts can be the foundation to group PvP, then you'll "only" need to balance specific things such as class mobility, CC capability, healing prowess, etc.

They shouldn't balance class to class in 1v1 scenario. It is dumb and will only create oportunity for only few of the classes to be present in the mass-scale pvp. For example, if bards do good dmg but dont have much utility they would not be called for a castle siege. But if bard is lets say hard counter to rogues that you sure as hell are going to see alot of bards in castle sieges. Being a hard counter to any of the other classes creates a demand for that class.

From what i have seen so far seems like mages could be hard counters to fighters. That why i will be playing a mage (im commin for you sword-bois).

I dont think it is a bad thing to try balancing the classes to be less jarring in 1v1

After all, since there are going to be key functions in the game like Mayor disputes for military nodes that are determined by a free for all deathmatch, you can't have just one or two class archtypes be supreme.

I also don't mind there being a sort of rock,paper, scissors type balance. Just as long as its not a automatic "I win" you know? There should be a degree of an advantage but not so much that the greater skilled player cant overcome the advantage.

iSinner

samsaint wrote: »

I remember the mage and archers in lineage 2 destroying in the sieges as melee just had to take damage whilst knocking down the front door.

I remember all melee classes just played with ranged weapons in sieges and switched only when the situation allowed. But melee classes could shoot only at 600 unit ranges, while ranged classes had 900 at base and in some cases more.

In guild wars 2 for example, it turned out that the most powerful group(back when it released), was a melee group of 20-25 people. I still remember killing blobs of hundreds(not an exaggeration) in a group of 25 people. Red Guard was one of the guilds who was known for this melee strategy.

I too wonder how the balance will be in AoC, will it be ranged or melee dominated? or maybe balanced?(i don't believe they can achieve that, i hope they can prove me wrong)

samsaint

Syltharis wrote: »

BaSkA13 wrote: »

They shouldn't balance class to class in 1v1 scenario. It is dumb and will only create oportunity for only few of the classes to be present in the mass-scale pvp. For example, if bards do good dmg but dont have much utility they would not be called for a castle siege. But if bard is lets say hard counter to rogues that you sure as hell are going to see alot of bards in castle sieges. Being a hard counter to any of the other classes creates a demand for that class.

If a bard is anything like a prophet in Lineage 2 which it seems to have similar traits then it wont kill anything 1 v 1 its purely a buffer and support for a party. Its class isn't built to fight just support, i believe when Steve says they aren't balancing 1 v 1 but group PVP, Bards will be there to support the group with buffs and heals. (That's based on the Primary class as a bard) I'm hoping the fact you can chose a secondary class may help balance things.

Snares/Roots and Stuns will play a big factor in balancing again in Lineage 2 the casters could sleep you then use a big hit spell then sleep you again, you couldn't do anything it was silly.

It may be a bit early for this thread until people play the game like people are saying but i agree with "Nelsonrebel" good to talk about it now there might be something they haven't thought about in this thread.

That being said it is a little worrying as far as the Arena goes as thats alot smaller group combat. Where they balance one area of PVP its going to effect another area. What i mean by this is if they make range weaker because they have an advantage in Castle Sieges when its arena combat they will be at a disadvantage.

That might be the direction they take where different classes have better advantages in different areas of PVP. If you want to be a top arena player then Melee would be the way to go. If you want to be dominating in castle sieges then choose a ranged.

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