Balancing issues with COC2
- Thread starter Kius
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I will admit the Black Mage is pretty squishy, but when I said nerf, I was more talking about the items you use with it, wands should be nerfed and staffs need to be buffed, from what I can tell your rarely ever use a staff because it just isn’t as good as two wands, plus there’s the witch armor which you can get right at the start, and will carry you up until the palace. I should clarify that when I said Thief ranked third in DPS, it’s because it struggles the most against regular enemies because of it’s lack of multi target moves, I said DPS not damage for a reason, in fact it has the best single target damage in the game, and is one of the best classes against bosses, it’s just that it needs some HP buff or AOE attack for it to be better then the Fighter or Black Mage in DPS.
I’ve found that the only time you wanna use a scythe is when you’re playing white mage, it doesn’t have nearly as good damage as other weapons, and the magic buff isn’t as good as two wands, so it’s for characters that mix melee and magic. I know you can learn skills through Garth, Lyra, Vivianne Sanders etc. But I only ever do that when I’m really struggling with a fight, or when I’m already max level. so I sadly won’t be able comment much on those things.
I see most haven't discovered the joys of eating a Bento before battle so that you can grease, deadly shadow, and fireball with Briene and hexblade Cait.
Why does everyone choose Fireball over Arc Cannon? I know they do the same damage but Arc Cannon does more damage in most situations because of how many things resist fire.
Because Greaseball is more intuitive to set up (both Powers are innate to the same class) and Grease synergizes really well with a whole lot of companion abilities, while there isn't anybody else but the Champion who can take advantage of the weakness to Storm damage right now.
Sure, Arc Cannon's a good move to bring out if you know you aren't going to get as much mileage out of Fire damage but the synergy of the Greaseball combo is so good that it's a natural default for a 'splody mage build.
Sure, Arc Cannon's a good move to bring out if you know you aren't going to get as much mileage out of Fire damage but the synergy of the Greaseball combo is so good that it's a natural default for a 'splody mage build.
Like most things, attacks that take some preparation tend to do more damage overall than straight-up attacks.
Personally, I like Arc Cannon because it has immediate results that I initiated vs effects I have to carefully orchestrate through another agency.
I'm lazy.
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Grease > Fireball requires less work to get than Crackle Powder > Arc Cannon. Crackle Powder requires visiting Leorah and actually training it. Greaseball is a combo you can get without going to a move trainer at all, if you play Black Mage.
A lot of people don't even remember that Leorah has the ability to move train.
And yeah, like Wolfram said, Fire damage offers the potential to synergize with teammates better. A lot of people don't really take this into consideration - a lot of people don't even play in manual mode - but for those who do, Grease can be more attractive.
Yeah I didn't play Manual Mode until the game started forcing me too because there's no way to get through some later fights without it. It's grown on me now, though.
Because the phrase "KILL IT WITH FIRE" is so much fun. And as much as I like electricity powers, you can get fireball and grease much earlier and they synergize. I don't know if any spell does that with other elements yet. Except for crackle powder, and that one requires a ranged weapon so it can limit your options.
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Because as already mentioned several times, there are many companion abilities that benefit from Grease's debuffing effect, over half your companion characters have at least one if not multiple powers that deal Fire damage. Cait, Berwyn, Kiyoko, Brienne, Azzy and Quin all have skills that synergize with it. That means you're getting more than just a damage boost on your own followup Fireball.
Also, the knockdown effect of Grease is useful on its own to give you some breathing room even if you aren't taking advantage of its debuff, though ideally you'd be doing both at once.
Also, the knockdown effect of Grease is useful on its own to give you some breathing room even if you aren't taking advantage of its debuff, though ideally you'd be doing both at once.
And you’re only gonna be using one of those,
A good portion of the people you just mentioned either rarely do damage, or can’t tank enough damage that you’d trade Brint for them. Sure they might be good if you have Cait with you, and Cait does get buffed, but the only time Cait is doing damage is when you’re in a fight your basically guaranteed to win. And normally grease is a mage-only spell, and nobody ever should go triple mage because you could run into a enemy with high magic resistance like the Kitsune. While I’d admit it is useful, it just doesn’t do as much damage as using Fireball and Arc Cannon. Not saying it’s bad, as I said my question was more of a joke than anything else, I just don’t use it because the only time your actually using the party system is when your either a White Mage or a Warrior, maybe someone working on the project could change it from three party members to three or four so you actually start changing party members more.
A good portion of the people you just mentioned either rarely do damage, or can’t tank enough damage that you’d trade Brint for them. Sure they might be good if you have Cait with you, and Cait does get buffed, but the only time Cait is doing damage is when you’re in a fight your basically guaranteed to win. And normally grease is a mage-only spell, and nobody ever should go triple mage because you could run into a enemy with high magic resistance like the Kitsune. While I’d admit it is useful, it just doesn’t do as much damage as using Fireball and Arc Cannon. Not saying it’s bad, as I said my question was more of a joke than anything else, I just don’t use it because the only time your actually using the party system is when your either a White Mage or a Warrior, maybe someone working on the project could change it from three party members to three or four so you actually start changing party members more.
Manual control is a thing, you know. You don't have to rely on the AI for combat synergy. Time it right and have the right party setup and you can massively multiply your damage far beyond what you'd get from having Arc Cannon in your second Recharge slot. Consider that there are summons that do Fire damage as well and you can have three characters targeting that weakness while still having a non-mage for your second companion slot, and since several characters have multiple Fire-based attacks you're getting even more bonus damage .
The game was designed from day one to be balanced for three party members (plus a summon and situationally a guest), allowing you to have four outside of special situations isn't happening because that would require rebalancing everything.
Been a while since I've played, so some of this might've changed in the interim. Mostly setting aside resolve damage/charmer, because think it got an overhaul while I was gone. Of what's left, Thief is the best. There are a few factors that go into this.
One is party dynamics. As a general rule of thumb, in a party based game, increasing your own defense increases your own survivability. Increasing your offense increases everyone's survivability. The sooner things are dead, the less time they have to dish out the pain. While CoC II does a pretty good job of making room for one support, the offense dynamic is still in play, and you'll generally want to avoid doubling up on healers*. Since the PC can be anything to start with, while companions will take time to get alternate sets, it's best to play offense for the most party flexibility.
Offense is better than defense, which brings us to the next point: which is better at offense, magic or martial ability? Martial wins hands down. The first reason is that everyone gets the default attack skill, but martials improve it a lot more than magical types do, beefing up the default at will ability. The second is power selection. Martial abilities have big +attack power modifiers. Magic abilities are mostly just the thing without a modifier. IIRC they're more likely to have debuffs, but debuffs are pretty minor for the most part, and dead will always be the best debuff. The final factor is weapon-based damage types. If something resists fire, you're out of luck with your fireball. If something resists your weapon damage type, you can swap to something else as a free action in combat no sweat. You can even use a weapon with resolve damage, getting those nice +attack power abilities and switching out if something is immune.
Gonna run through all the non-charmer level 1 class perks (because they're the most impactful and I'm lazy). Perks are the only class unique thing**, so they're what make or break a class in my opinion.
*While the whole doubling up issue has had a big step forward with more alternate gear for npcs, think there's still an issue with summoners (assuming a designer imposed limitation rather than an engine one). Not sure if Berwyn gets a different set, and Etheryn is weak and her set comes pretty far along in the game. Summoner npcs work terribly with summoner pcs, because you can only have one summon at a time. In theory, summoner npcs with their summon are balanced against other npcs, and pc summon skills are balanced against other skills/builds they could use. If that's the case, it shouldn't break things to allow multiple summons. Even if it is a bit stronger than other options, I still think it should be allowed. It's like the no combat advantage transformatives thing; players shouldn't feel forced into an rp decision for mechanical benefit.
**Attribute affinities might be argued to be a class thing, but mostly I'm including this as a bonus rant because they bug me: attribute affinities are silly and should be removed. They don't meaningfully affect gameplay. You can retrain your attributes at a cost that's not too steep, IIIRC. New players won't know that though. In fact, they get hit twice by this mechanic, because attribute affinities are one of the first mechanics brought up in game text, increasing the initial hurdle of getting into the game. It's also tied to race, leading to a (very minor) potential case of roleplaying being sacrificed for mechanic reasons. But all of those issues are fine, because in return players get... nothing. Either affinities aren't an issue at all, or you deal with the irritation/tedium of retraining them (if you know you can do that). They don't enhance gameplay in any way.
One is party dynamics. As a general rule of thumb, in a party based game, increasing your own defense increases your own survivability. Increasing your offense increases everyone's survivability. The sooner things are dead, the less time they have to dish out the pain. While CoC II does a pretty good job of making room for one support, the offense dynamic is still in play, and you'll generally want to avoid doubling up on healers*. Since the PC can be anything to start with, while companions will take time to get alternate sets, it's best to play offense for the most party flexibility.
Offense is better than defense, which brings us to the next point: which is better at offense, magic or martial ability? Martial wins hands down. The first reason is that everyone gets the default attack skill, but martials improve it a lot more than magical types do, beefing up the default at will ability. The second is power selection. Martial abilities have big +attack power modifiers. Magic abilities are mostly just the thing without a modifier. IIRC they're more likely to have debuffs, but debuffs are pretty minor for the most part, and dead will always be the best debuff. The final factor is weapon-based damage types. If something resists fire, you're out of luck with your fireball. If something resists your weapon damage type, you can swap to something else as a free action in combat no sweat. You can even use a weapon with resolve damage, getting those nice +attack power abilities and switching out if something is immune.
Gonna run through all the non-charmer level 1 class perks (because they're the most impactful and I'm lazy). Perks are the only class unique thing**, so they're what make or break a class in my opinion.
- Warrior: Terrible. Threat is unreliable, and you know what else generates more threat? Doing more damage, like thief. Also pushes players towards heavy armor, which has too steep a penalty to really be worth it imo; initiative is too important to tear possibly multiple -5 chunks out of it.
- Thief: Fantastic. This is why thief is best. Boosts martial offense, the best thing around. Also makes for tons of synergy with your party. If they can debuff, you can take advantage of that.
- White Mage: Solid. While not The One True Strategy™ of martial offense, support is still plenty solid in this game, and this can really boost your healing action economy.
- Black Mage: Needs improvement. Boosting offense is nice and thematic, but this is pretty weak. At the current point in the game (level 6 I believe), it can barely beat out the thief level 3 sleep perk. Additionally, it doesn't really have a very noticeable effect, in part due to it being such a small bonus. White mage bonus is obvious in play. You got healed even though you healed someone else! Thief is a big enough bonus to be noticeably more damage. Warrior is still terrible though.
*While the whole doubling up issue has had a big step forward with more alternate gear for npcs, think there's still an issue with summoners (assuming a designer imposed limitation rather than an engine one). Not sure if Berwyn gets a different set, and Etheryn is weak and her set comes pretty far along in the game. Summoner npcs work terribly with summoner pcs, because you can only have one summon at a time. In theory, summoner npcs with their summon are balanced against other npcs, and pc summon skills are balanced against other skills/builds they could use. If that's the case, it shouldn't break things to allow multiple summons. Even if it is a bit stronger than other options, I still think it should be allowed. It's like the no combat advantage transformatives thing; players shouldn't feel forced into an rp decision for mechanical benefit.
**Attribute affinities might be argued to be a class thing, but mostly I'm including this as a bonus rant because they bug me: attribute affinities are silly and should be removed. They don't meaningfully affect gameplay. You can retrain your attributes at a cost that's not too steep, IIIRC. New players won't know that though. In fact, they get hit twice by this mechanic, because attribute affinities are one of the first mechanics brought up in game text, increasing the initial hurdle of getting into the game. It's also tied to race, leading to a (very minor) potential case of roleplaying being sacrificed for mechanic reasons. But all of those issues are fine, because in return players get... nothing. Either affinities aren't an issue at all, or you deal with the irritation/tedium of retraining them (if you know you can do that). They don't enhance gameplay in any way.
Black Mage is the sleeper class, it takes a while for it to actually start doing damage, but when it does it spirals out of control to the point you can two round every basic enemy in the game up to the glacial rift. With Black mage having three all target damaging moves that you can have at the same time, and all of them being just as strong as your other spells, it results in an endless spam of damage that’s hitting every enemy on the board and each of them doing a insane amount of damage. Fighters is the best class against bosses and minibosses period, sure thief does damage, and it can evade, but it can’t soak damage like a fighter can and I don’t think a Thief can even beat a majority of the Kitsunes without over leveling. Fighter has the second highest DPS in the game (only second to Black Mage) Thief ranks third because of it’s lack of multi-target and it’s one and done attack style. Priority doesn’t really matter with fighter, because you’re supposed to be soaking damage anyway, threat depends on your party, if your party members are taking away your threat then just switch them out, and I think fighters get a lock on skill, which forces them to attack you, so if your having threat issues just use that.
I think you need to take ability training into account. Thieves don't have multi-target attacks in their level-up, but one trip to Garth for Cleave (or giving Kohaku some electrum for Fan of Blades) and you're probably doing more DPS than Black Mage or Fighter if you're set up right. Or if you're invested in Willpower, pay Ivris to teach you how to set things on fire with your mind. Thief passives apply no matter which class's stuff you're using.
I assure you, the Thief can easily handle every encounter in the game.
A Thief can defeat Kasyrra in the Winter Palace easily? Maybe I should play that class again. =P
(For the future, is it possible to quote someone without alerting that person? Not sure I should give someone an alert just for a silly joke..)
Anyways, I think there are quite some balancing issues, but most of them just require some fine-tuning which can only be really done after all skills are implemented. Otherwise every mechanic patch would make the work obsolete.
I do think, however, that the class-specific passives should not work towards the role.
It limits customization potential, like a ranged tank who works more with evasion than health&armor.
Still, that is more a thing of personal preference and the general design idea than an actual issue that would *need* to be fixed.
Shizenhakai said:
Yeah I'm pretty sure if you hit reply, and then remove the ", post: numberHere, member: numberHere" and just leave the member's name in the quotations instead it'll appear as the above reply without notifying them.
As to what potential balancing fixes I'd suggest, I'm pretty sure I covered it way too extensively (probably beating a very much decaying horse) on this thread here.
I did beat Kas in the Winter City on my thief, yes (thanks to a user-submitted build). That's why Resolve got reworked afterwards
I did beat Kas in the Winter City on my thief, yes (thanks to a user-submitted build). That's why Resolve got reworked afterwards
The reason why I'm saying thief is bad is because it lacks multi-target, I never said it wasn't good or was bad against bosses I believe that it could be way better than fighter given the right build, it just takes a lot of tweaking. The reason I personally dislike Thief is because of it's overreliance on luck, though that's more personal preference than anything.
Thief relies on debuffs, not luck. Crits are nice but they can be completely negated by the enemy simply having a shield equipped. The 50% damage increase on an enemy that's debuffed is the most important. Also this needs aoe is nonsense, there's no limits on what abilities you can learn. Just go learn another ability that is aoe and sub it in, it's literally that simple. There's an ability for almost any situation.
....being abducted by the big bad and having to be rescued by the MC, if I'm being honest. =P
For what it's worth, I firmly believe that discussions of classes only go as far as their perks, as the "lacks multi target" is completely invalidated by picking up cleave.
Smoke bomb + cleave is fucking brutal
Smoke bomb + cleave is fucking brutal
Bad jokes aside, unless the end of content area is that much different (never been there), area attacks don't really feel that useful.
Having single target burst damage defeats the dangerous parts of most groups and the tankier ones can't outdamage the healer.
On top of that, the really tough enemies are often single bosses, where the targeted burst is much better.
So onless you know in advance what you are facing, single target is the better choice, imho.
Having single target burst damage defeats the dangerous parts of most groups and the tankier ones can't outdamage the healer.
On top of that, the really tough enemies are often single bosses, where the targeted burst is much better.
So onless you know in advance what you are facing, single target is the better choice, imho.