Don't make the same mistake WoW did with its hybrid classes. Dont wait 3 years to learn this lesson.

Basically for the entire duration of vanilla wow, hybrid classes such as retribution paladin, feral druid, dps shaman, etc were at best memes but never actually functional, never actually viable for anything.

If someone wants to be a hybrid dps-healer you shouldn't give him half the damage a full dps does. Thats just bad design, nobody will want to play that.

What you should do (let's compare an assassin and a templar) is this:

Both should deal good damage. Sure give the full dps a slight edge.
The rest of the templar's performance should come from healing, buffs and resilience, which are his classe's theme.
The rest of the assassin's performance should come from his stealth, high mobility and crowd control, which are his classe's theme.

Don't make hybrid classes memes and jacks of all trade, in practice, they will end up being only disappointments.

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Azherae

Dygz wrote: »

Viability is determined by the Primary Archetype, so... shouldn't be many noob traps.

Normally I let your weirdness slide, but if this is your take, you definitely don't know what a noob trap is or you are doing that conflation thing where you believe that because it 'is possible to play it and not utterly fail at everything, then it's viable and shouldn't be considered a trap'.

Which is technically the same thing, but at least it's 'disagreeing on what noob traps are' and not 'being unable to see the possibility of them'.

I don't suppose it matters if I point out to you that your way of responding is not helping even Intrepid? When was the last time other than something related to RNG, that you saw your response actually seem to make anyone more comfortable, confident, or relieved?

Do you even care about that?

Percimes

Gimping your character isn't that much of a big deal if you can re-spec when you want (not at will, but without to much of a fuss, let say you have to be at a trainer).

SirChancelot

beaushinkle wrote: »

I don't think I would advocate for the full FFXIV approach, but I do find it interesting (and elegant) from a design perspective.

While this works for FFXIV, I feel it's the opposite of what Ashes is going for. I'm hoping they continue to lean more into the Pathfinder'esque mix and match what you want to come up with what you like approach.
Is x/y going to be as good as y/x, maybe not. But if built right and played well I hope it can perform well enough to complete the content.

Dygz

Azherae wrote: »

Normally I let your weirdness slide, but if this is your take, you definitely don't know what a noob trap is or you are doing that conflation thing where you believe that because it 'is possible to play it and not utterly fail at everything, then it's viable and shouldn't be considered a trap'.

The context of that side-discussion is in terms of the 64 classes; not the 8 Primary Archetypes.
And the balance of the game is determined by the Primary Archetypes; not the augments.
(Also, yes, you can respec.)

Azherae wrote: »

I don't suppose it matters if I point out to you that your way of responding is not helping even Intrepid? When was the last time other than something related to RNG, that you saw your response actually seem to make anyone more comfortable, confident, or relieved?

Facts are facts.
Should be easy enough to review the dev quotes and say, "I think the dev quotes mean something else".
Summoner will be a great litmus test. Let's see if a "more Tank-oriented" Summon rivals a Primary Archetype Tank as main tank.

beaushinkle

Dygz wrote: »

And the balance of the game is determined by the Primary Archetypes; not the augments.

Can you elaborate on what you mean here, possibly with an example?

Dygz

https://discord.com/channels/256164085366915072/256164085366915072/739365922246098987

QUESTION: If i use secondary cleric can i heal others?
STEVEN: indirectly there are some augments when applied to certain skills that can do this. But it would not replace a cleric archetype.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=u8ne-4Xl3Rw&t=983s
You will need a tank more or less depending on what's happening in the environment. Certainly in dungeons you will need a tank. I don't picture us creating any encounters that wouldn't need that sort of control. Now we're not just focused on aggro in terms of control and managing mobs... It's not just about mitigating damage, although that's a part of the sort of calculus there, but it's also about making sure that the mobs are doing what you want them to do.
---Jeffrey

https://youtu.be/ndtjwBxhwtw?t=2009
It's a big, huge, gigantic thing to work on. But, the way we're approaching it philosophically is not 1v1 combat. That would be an impossible thing for us to do and it's not really a direction we want to go with the game. We're really focused on mass PvP, not one 1v1 encounters; not really even party v party encounters, but these big, big fights around Nodes...these fights around Castles, these big fights around Caravans...
So, a lot of it is trying to figure out balancing ways for classes to work together synergistically. So that, your focus as a team is building out the comp that synergizes best for what you've got. And we balance it that way.
So, we balance party on party, group on group and different configurations of those things. We look at it more as a macro scale balance problem rather than a micro scale balance problem.
So, there certainly will be classes depending on your build, because we're a build focused game, that just blow other comps out of the water. And that's OK for us. But, what we do want is for parties to be relatively well-balanced as long as they've been built with the encounter in mind.
---Jeffrey

The Active Skills stem from your base Archetype. So, from a design standpoint, even though augments do radically change the way your Active Skills provide you abilities, there's still a primary focus on the base archetype; not the 64 whole classes.
----Steven

That's a really good point. We're not really talking about 64 true classes, we're talking about eight classes with 64 variants... There isn't as much variance between the 64 classes as you might expect. It's not like there are, you know, 64 different versions of... radically different classes.
---Jeffrey

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Xg2l6DJgHV0&t=3661s
Certain archetypes are capable of moving the gap between their counterpart per-se. If I am a Tank archetype and a Mage is my counter, I can take a Mage secondary and kind of bridge the divide slightly; and then move my identity that direction ever so slightly.
---Steven

beaushinkle

Let me know if I'm reading what you're trying to imply correctly. The way that I read all of those quotes is they say that a mage/fighter is a mage with fighter flavor and a fighter/mage is a fighter with mage flavor. Fully agree and understand here.

That doesn't directly talk about "the balance of the game is determined by the primary archetypes". For instance, it could be the case by optimizing a fighter/mage, you wind up with a build capable of being around 35% more effective than the best build you can put together with fighter/ranger, which no real appreciable loss of utility. This sort of thing has happened before.

This is, more or less, what the original post of the thread was about. The WoW devs reasoned that the hybrid classes, those that could both heal and do DPS should be worse than those that could only do one or the other. As a result, when players started figuring out the game, it turned out that parties composed of "pure" classes like rogues, warriors, priests, and mages were WAY more efficient than those that had hybrids in them, because people were able to specialize in their role and not have to pay the "hybrid tax".

We're saying that these sorts of builds and the options to choose them are "noob traps", generally, and that it takes really careful design to make sure that players don't accidentally shoot themselves in the foot.

Dygz

beaushinkle wrote: »

Let me know if I'm reading what you're trying to imply correctly. The way that I read all of those quotes is they say that a mage/fighter is a mage with fighter flavor and a fighter/mage is a fighter with mage flavor. Fully agree and understand here.

That doesn't directly talk about "the balance of the game is determined by the primary archetypes". For instance, it could be the case by optimizing a fighter/mage, you wind up with a build capable of being around 35% more effective than the best build you can put together with fighter/ranger, which no real appreciable loss of utility. This sort of thing has happened before.

"The Active Skills stem from your base Archetype. So, from a design standpoint, even though augments do radically change the way your Active Skills provide you abilities, there's still a primary focus on the base archetype; not the 64 whole classes."
---Steven

"That's a really good point. We're not really talking about 64 true classes, we're talking about eight classes with 64 variants... There isn't as much variance between the 64 classes as you might expect. It's not like there are, you know, 64 different versions of... radically different classes."
---Jeffrey

The question they are answering in that vid is how they will deal with balancing the 64 classes. So I dunno how you could thing the answers are not about balancing around the Primary Archetypes rather than the augments.
Any Primary Archetype/x is viable in their primary role. So, "more effective" is irrelevant.
There is no competition between a Fighter/Mage and a Fighter/Ranger. It's just different playstyles.
Fighter/Ranger just needs to be viable enough to win the encounter - doesn't matter if the Fighter/Mage is more effective as long as the encounter is defeated.
Also, you can't properly determine 35% more effectiveness because it depends on how the individual characters synergize with the rest of the group. The focus is on the larger group and synergy; not an individual character - like trying to focus on an "objective meta rotation" for a Fighter/x.

beaushinkle wrote: »

This is, more or less, what the original post of the thread was about. The WoW devs reasoned that the hybrid classes, those that could both heal and do DPS should be worse than those that could only do one or the other. As a result, when players started figuring out the game, it turned out that parties composed of "pure" classes like rogues, warriors, priests, and mages were WAY more efficient than those that had hybrids in them, because people were able to specialize in their role and not have to pay the "hybrid tax".

I don't agree. The WoW devs didn't reason anything beyond caving to player whining about OP classes so they could make more money.

beaushinkle wrote: »

We're saying that these sorts of builds and the options to choose them are "noob traps", generally, and that it takes really careful design to make sure that players don't accidentally shoot themselves in the foot.

Just because you say something, that doesn't make it true.
You have 25 levels to learn your Primary Archetype and you use the same Active Skills for the next 25 levels.
The Primary Archetypes/x are designed to be viable in any dungeon or raid.
The devs are not balancing to ensure that characters can commonly find success when trying to make their secondary roles their primary roles. If you try that, you will probably have a very challenging time.
So...the noob move would be trying to swap out your primary role and make your secondary role your primary role.

SirChancelot

Oooh, semantics time
Notice how he says tank and not tank archtype or tank primary.

Dygz wrote: »

You will need a tank more or less depending on what's happening in the environment. Certainly in dungeons you will need a tank. I don't picture us creating any encounters that wouldn't need that sort of control. Now we're not just focused on aggro in terms of control and managing mobs... It's not just about mitigating damage, although that's a part of the sort of calculus there, but it's also about making sure that the mobs are doing what you want them to do.
---Jeffrey

Lol
If anything this saying it's not just about aggro and mitigation means I don't need to have all the tank archtype mitigation activated abilities, that I could use something else as long as I can make the mobs dance to my tune.
#bardtank

Also

Dygz wrote: »

balancing around the Primary Archetypes rather than the augments.
Any Primary Archetype/x is viable in their primary role. So, "more effective" is irrelevant.
There is no competition between a Fighter/Mage and a Fighter/Ranger. It's just different playstyles.
.

I'm sorry
I read this and the only take away I get is "your choice is irrelevant." This has been determined for you already by your primary archtype.
If I can complete everything with whatever I choose then the choices don't matter... So shouldn't I be able to at least have fun with it and make weird shit choices.

Dygz

A Tank/x does not have to have all the Tank Archetype mitigation abilities activated to be successful.
A Bard/Tank could use something else to make the mobs dance to their tune - that doesn't mean they could out main tank the Tank/x in an 8-person group.
You could try it and find out.

beaushinkle

edit: repositing my choice type definitions because we're two pages past them now:

option 1 best for the individual and the best for the group
option 2 best for the individual but not the best for the group
option 3 not the best for the individual but the best for the group
option 4 not the best for the individual and not the best for the group

Dygz wrote: »

So, "more effective" is irrelevant.
There is no competition between a Fighter/Mage and a Fighter/Ranger. It's just different playstyles.
Fighter/Ranger just needs to be viable enough to win the encounter - doesn't matter if the Fighter/Mage is more effective as long as the encounter is defeated.

More effective isn't irrelevant. It determines how much weight you can pull. If you're advertising in chat that you're looking for a group or a guild, folks will want to know what class you're playing. If you're choosing to play a fighter/ranger when it's 35% less effective than a fighter/mage, then you've identified as an option-2 player, and option-3 players will self-segregate and just ignore your advertisements and not invite you. (Because it's relatively easy to switch from fighter/ranger to fighter/mage)

Can retribution paladins and shadow priests defeat the easy raiding content in classic WoW? Of course they can. They're just contributing far less than the fury warrior, rogues, and mages. Option-2 type players don't care about that and are more than willing to bring along players that want to play retribution paladins and shadow priests, and so they form guilds of mostly option-2 type players. Option-3 type players wonder "why wouldn't you switch to fighter/mage? why do you not respect everyone else's time?". This lead to thousands of retribution paladin and shadow priest players having an extremely hard time finding raiding guilds. This stuff actually happens.

Dygz wrote: »

Also, you can't properly determine 35% more effectiveness because it depends on how the individual characters synergize with the rest of the group. The focus is on the larger group and synergy; not an individual character - like trying to focus on an "objective meta rotation" for a Fighter/x.

Synergy can be (and is) simulated to calculate overall effectiveness for comparison.

Dygz wrote: »

I don't agree. The WoW devs didn't reason anything beyond caving to player whining about OP classes so they could make more money.

I'm referring to a period at the very beginning of the game's life - back when their class design was in line with their own product vision.

Dygz wrote: »

Just because you say something, that doesn't make it true.

Agreed, which is why I generally back up the things I say with a large amount of supporting evidence. I try to start with things that are agreed upon as true and then logically build to a conclusion.

Dygz wrote: »

The devs are not balancing to ensure that characters can commonly find success when trying to make their secondary roles their primary roles. If you try that, you will probably have a very challenging time.
So...the noob move would be trying to swap out your primary role and make your secondary role your primary role.

Do you think I've advocated for this somewhere?

Dygz

"beaushinkle wrote: »

More effective isn't irrelevant. It determines how much weight you can pull.

No. It doesn't.
I understand that that is the elitist meta-obsessed perspective, but it is not objectively true.
It's just how some gamers like to play.

"beaushinkle wrote: »

If you're advertising in chat that you're looking for a group or a guild, folks will want to know what class you're playing. If you're choosing to play a fighter/ranger when it's 35% less effective than a fighter/mage, then you've identified as an option-2 player, and option-3 players will self-segregate and just ignore your advertisements and not invite you. (Because it's relatively easy to switch from fighter/ranger to fighter/mage)

What's most important is what Primary Archetype you're playing because that's the way encounters are balanced. What class helps determine some tactics, sure. Who will try to synergize with whom.
There may be some obviously wise choices, but it doesn't have to be the most efficient. It just has to be good enough to win.
Your option-2 and option-3 concept, again, is irrelevant.
I dunno why you keep trying to include that concept.

"beaushinkle wrote: »

Can retribution paladins and shadow priests defeat the easy raiding content in classic WoW? Of course they can. They're just contributing far less than the fury warrior, rogues, and mages. Option-2 type players don't care about that and are more than willing to bring along players that want to play retribution paladins and shadow priests, and so they form guilds of mostly option-2 type players. Option-3 type players wonder "why wouldn't you switch to fighter/mage? why do you not respect everyone else's time?". This lead to thousands of retribution paladin and shadow priest players having an extremely hard time finding raiding guilds. This stuff actually happens.

Ashes is not WoW.
The class systems are really nothing alike.

"beaushinkle wrote: »

Synergy can be (and is) simulated to calculate overall effectiveness for comparison.

There is no way for you to objectively determine that with all of the augment combinations and also somehow factor in individual player prowess.

Dygz wrote: »

Agreed, which is why I generally back up the things I say with a large amount of supporting evidence. I try to start with things that are agreed upon as true and then logically build to a conclusion.

LMAO
That is not what you actually do.

beaushinkle wrote: »

Do you think I've advocated for this somewhere?

Did I say you advocated that?

Azherae

Still at it, huh? This is Infinite Azure though.

No corner to reach.

Maybe try 'extrapolating things that must be true from other things said' until contradictions appear' instead for a step or two. The response 'should' be an attempt at obfuscation, with any luck you'll get one of those 'links to a video that doesn't mean what Dygz thinks it means' and therefore a closer range?

Who do you even play in Smash? I'd guess Marth, you strike me as a 'top tiers when serious' sort of person.

Dygz

SirChancelot11 wrote: »

Oooh, semantics time
Notice how he says tank and not tank archtype or tank primary.

Yep. And you have to put what he said in context with that specific discussion/question.
And also in context with all of his other quotes. I'm not going to do all of your research for you.

SirChancelot11 wrote: »

Lol
If anything this saying it's not just about aggro and mitigation means I don't need to have all the tank archtype mitigation activated abilities, that I could use something else as long as I can make the mobs dance to my tune.
#bardtank

You don't have to have all the Tank Damage Mitigation Active Skills.
You could try having your Bard make mobs dance to your tune. That doesn't mean you would commonly be able to out main tank a Tank/x in an encounter designed for an 8-person group.

SirChancelot11 wrote: »

I'm sorry
I read this and the only take away I get is "your choice is irrelevant." This has been determined for you already by your primary archtype.
If I can complete everything with whatever I choose then the choices don't matter... So shouldn't I be able to at least have fun with it and make weird shit choices.

You can purposefully make shit choice if you want to. Sure.
You could try to make your secondary role your primary role, for instance.

beaushinkle

Dygz wrote: »

I understand that that is the elitist meta-obsessed perspective, but it is not objectively true.

How does your effectiveness not determine how much weight you can pull? Totally lost on how this isn't objective fact.

Dygz wrote: »

Your option-2 and option-3 concept, again, is irrelevant.

Why is it irrelevant?

Dygz wrote: »

Ashes is not WoW.
The class systems are really nothing alike.

I think the class systems are close enough (you pick a class that allows you to make build choices that define your character's available options, class identity, role, synergy, and effectiveness) that the historic social dynamics are worth referencing.

Dygz wrote: »

There is no way for you to objectively determine that with all of the augment combinations and also somehow factor in individual player prowess.

Why do you feel at all confident in this assertion? We have artificial intelligences that can operate self-driving cars and machine learning algorithms that learned how to play starcraft 2 that only operate from the data on-screen. Are you sure this is beyond human engineering? I think you're out of your depth here.

Player prowess doesn't have to be considered at all, you can just simulate them as playing "with mistakes" or perfect - simulationcraft can be simmed for either.

Dygz wrote: »

Did I say you advocated that?

No, just felt like you thought I did or something. Maybe it was just a weird tangent.

beaushinkle

Azherae wrote: »

Still at it, huh? This is Infinite Azure though.

No corner to reach.

Maybe try 'extrapolating things that must be true from other things said' until contradictions appear' instead for a step or two. The response 'should' be an attempt at obfuscation, with any luck you'll get one of those 'links to a video that doesn't mean what Dygz thinks it means' and therefore a closer range?

Who do you even play in Smash? I'd guess Marth, you strike me as a 'top tiers when serious' sort of person.

Fox and Falco, though mainly falco. Marth is actually the only top tier I've never dabbled with. And yeah, it's top tiers all the time in every game. Usually strictly whatever character is the absolute best no exceptions no secondaries

Dygz

beaushinkle wrote: »

How does your effectiveness not determine how much weight you can pull? Totally lost on how this isn't objective fact.

Did I write, "Your effectiveness does not determine how much weight you can pull?"
That's your biased interpretation of what I actually wrote.
I've already told you why your meta options are irrelevant. I don't know why you keep bringing it into the conversation.

beaushinkle wrote: »

I think the class systems are close enough (you pick a class that allows you to make build choices that define your character's available options, class identity, role, synergy, and effectiveness) that the historic social dynamics are worth referencing.

Well, we disagree that they are close at all.

beaushinkle wrote: »

Why do you feel at all confident in this assertion? We have artificial intelligences that can operate self-driving cars and machine learning algorithms that learned how to play starcraft 2 that only operate from the data on-screen. Are you sure this is beyond human engineering? I think you're out of your depth here.

You often think that, but your counter-argument is patently absurd.

beaushinkle wrote: »

Player prowess doesn't have to be considered at all, you can just simulate them as playing "with mistakes" or perfect - simulationcraft can be simmed for either.

That is false. I mean you could do that...and the resulting data would be irrelevant.

Azherae

Dygz wrote: »

You often think that, but your counter-argument is patently absurd.

You don't believe in self-driving cars?

Or quantum computers?

beaushinkle

Azherae wrote: »

Back in the 'Ranger Fantasy XI' days of FFXI, people were able to actually do a pretty good 'calculation' of 'how much 'fun costs'.

5-7% performance.

When the gap between 'The best class for party' and 'the next best' is around that point, people don't wait around looking for that perfect class (in those days, Ranger). Unless they are going to be playing for upwards of 4 hours straight, they just go 'let's just take the Dark Knight, it's about the same, maybe something interesting will happen if they are good'. And ofc, a good DRK is equal or better than FOTM Rangers.

Past that though, it got interesting.

I forgot to respond to this!

In a lot of ways that's not even the cost of fun, that's the cost of waiting around for a few more seconds compared to the marginal benefit of efficiency. For instance, if a Ranger does 400 DPS (example), and the DK does 380 DPS, the ranger outperforms by 5%. But, in a 6 person group (had to google ffxi group size) that might be 1600 total dps vs 1580 total dps (the rest of the group does 1200 dps). Now you only have a 2.25% benefit. If you have to wait around for 2 more minutes to put the group together, and you're only actually doing dps like 1/2 of the time you're actually farming (waiting for respawns, etc), then now you're farming for ~180 (2 / 0.0225 * 2) minutes before you make up those lost 2 minutes.

I think people have an intuitive sense of "getting started sooner is better than getting started later", and "doing more dps is better than doing less dps", but the breakpoint for how long you should wait for how much extra dps is often surprising until you math it out a few times like above.

beaushinkle

Dygz wrote: »

Did I write, "Your effectiveness does not determine how much weight you can pull?"
That's your biased interpretation of what I actually wrote.

I wrote "More effective isn't irrelevant. It determines how much weight you can pull." and then you responded "No it doesn't". Am I being gaslit or something? Do you think that effectiveness determines how much weight you can pull or not?

Dygz wrote: »

I've already told you why your meta options are irrelevant. I don't know why you keep bringing it into the conversation.

I keep looking for where you did this, and I haven't found it yet. Can you please repost it?

Dygz wrote: »

You often think that, but your counter-argument is patently absurd

What makes it absurd?

Dygz wrote: »

That is false. I mean you could do that...and the resulting data would be irrelevant.

What makes it false? What makes the resulting data irrelevant?

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