Sup guys. Been having a blast since returning and I’ve been thinking about class balance in general.
Many games have frequent discussions of what class is meta and what issues are hovering around the weaker classes. This is especially prevalent in MOBA games today as balance is extremely important for a game to thrive. What’s funny is that i’ve never actually seen anything like this being openly discussed on our forums before, even if we knew specifically that “omg gene is OP, GX is OP” etc. A open discussion can allow developers as well as our server moderaters to better see the games balance which can and will make the game more attractive for players in the long run.Knowing that we will almost never see nerfs in the current state of game anymore, seeing huge buffs in the right place is a good thing to look forward, even if our player base is small.
I myself have a ton of crap to talk about the rune knight class so that’s what i focus on, but im sure some of you have real legit things to say about your class too (i did voice my opinion on some of them but it’s just my inexperienced opinions so you may pay them no heed if it’s disagreed).
You may add on to the relevant class below with your name, or do it whatever way you want. Please keep this constructive and civilized, thank you.
3rd classes:
1. Rune Knight (improving physical damage aspect)
Blackcross:
A fall from grace from our past pre-renewal overlord- the Lordknight; has two vastly different builds: DB and Physical.
DB RK
DB has been strong when properly geared since the very first iteration from renewal and has barely changed (only range modifier added). However, for all but the richest of all players (tao+kiel’s), DB RK’s dps output for most players when playing solo is highly limited due to the skills long after cast delay and fixed elements. This makes them highly niche due to their extreme attractiveness for party plays but generally less stellar performance in solo plays for non MVP players.
Gears that reduce aftercast delay that has been implemented is doing great for most DB players without MVPs and i feel its in the right direction for further release. A semi tao card (something like +30-40%HP in armour?) effect will eventually be great as well to allow for players to have an increase QoL in instances without undermining the power of real MVP tao for those that put in the hard money or effort for them. We’ve been stuck with peco card for a decade now if it’s not obvious.
Physical RK
Physical RK on the other hand, used to be complained about when renewal was just released as players complained about OP spiral pierce and even storm blast, mainly in PVP/WOE context. Both skills got nerfed hard, and as we look at them now it seems kinda silly because PVP is dead and these skills even at their prime wouldn’t hold a candle to many skills’ dps output.
Since the nerfs, physical RKs remain as a dead class for competent players for years due to the lack of any actually worthwhile and spammable skills. Wind cutter is junk with 2 seconds cd on a weak 350% modifier, sonic wave is another junk skill despite its 1000% base modifier due to a split 1 sec cd and 1 sec after delay, leaving us with only bowling bash- nerfed to oblivion in iRO due to abuse, and Ignition break, which has a decent aoe but has a long 2 seconds CD.
Physical RKs also basically have zero real role in any parties despite being the face of the game in many marketing materials holding a nice sword (real players will know that it is useless). Its only saving grace was to build crit to emulate GX due to their ability to reach high aspd easily as well as the random chance to do 3x damage. However, even with all these, the dps dealt is nowhere near close to what GX can do (for players with equal gear, 1/5th of the damage done is a good comparison).
As a solo class today, physical RK is relatively okay in instances despite the huge flaws spoken due to their natural tankiness as well as power of crits coupled with buffs from runestones even if they end up being only a fraction of GX’s output (this eventually leads to point on how GXs thus have an extremely strong easy time with almost all game contents instance wise) . Lastly, we talk about the power of rune stones. Most of these are selfbuffs except for storm blast and Crush strike, whereby storm blast has long since become useless after its initial nerf, while crush strike has a long 30 seconds cool down while even breaking your weapon- in additional to a situation where most RKs has no reliable unbreakable weapon to pair it with. The implementation of bio 5 headgear has since improved the quality of life for the physical rune knight, but has not changed its ranking amongst the classes as the improvement on others is equally strong while issues with RK is unchanged.
Mitigation done by other servers: kRO implemented Runestone improvement that vastly improved the power of rune stones, allowing RKs to hit about 1/2th of GX’s dps while bringing stormblast back into the game. jRO has entirely remodelled windcutter into a pretty-looking spammable skill, as well as entirely removing crush strike’s cool down. An accessible unbreakable sword is also implemented for rune knights to enjoy a higher quality of life while using runes. Any plans for implementation of these coming in iRO will inevitably make me happy. I’m personally hoping for devs to eventually remove sonic wave’s fixed 1sec cd so it will allow physical RKs to have a role in party as an additional dps while in strings. This also offers absolutely nothing OP in all situations.
2. Royal Guard (IMO the only class i feel is strong without being overly OP due to availability of strong AOE and spammable skills (cannon spear and OB for AOE, Vanishing Point for spam) coupled with high tankiness. Huge crit damage from Exceed Break without fixed CD but instead has long cast time so that it has potential to be insanely good after being properly geared. Lastly, inspiration is a strong buff that comes with an appropriate drawback. I will leave the pro RG players to talk about real areas for improvement though)
ChakriGuard:
https://forums.warpp...ents/?p=2722423
(In short they are great jack of all trades).
3. Guillotine Cross (many will say way too strong and need no targeted attention and i agree, but WOE is an area that they could look for improvements without further making them more obscene than others.)
Ashuckel
4. Shadow Chaser (several jRO related items have been provided which i feel has jacked up SC’s playability for instances)
Usurper:
Yeah jRO gears gave them the ability of clearing instances conveniently and faster but still lack support skills for parties in PvM.
Personally I think a little boost on PvM skills might make a big change on how others see SCs as party mates:
1.) Dimension Door - Make this skill work a bit like G. Fly Wings (Only downside is it's not instant and characters would need to move to DD's cell to be able to teleport)
2.) Invisibility - Make the skill toggle-able, giving the SC the ability to turn this skill on/off would be a great improvement. (Not really sure how this would help the party in PvM but still a nice and reasonable change.)
The future update allowing Auto-spell to work with bows is definitely a nice improvement but still doesn't help in parties. (blackcross: random G.fly wings seems like a cool idea and fits their concept perfectly lol. Wonder if its hard to implement. Anyway, Auto-spell on bows actually seems legitly strong even in parties as auto-spelling AOE spells will definitely make them strong enough as ranged AOE dps with our mixed jRO gears on kRO mechanics here (magician gloves and lunar moon to be exact). It's a good thing to look forward to.)
5. Arch Bishop (Not too sure, but some support for adoramus maybe?)
6. Sura (support brought in from jRO items)
7. Warlock (used to be in same situation as physical RK, but jRO’s love from OCP has now elevated them to join (almost actually) the ranks of god tier with gene and GX. A good example of buffing done right and I hope this happens to physical RKs too)
Kusanagisama
8. Sorcerer
Svoike:
9. Ranger
Nirvanna21:
10. Minstrel/Wanderer
11. Mechanic
12. Genetic
Others:
1. Rebel
2. Kagerou/Oboro
3. Taekwon Kid
4. Super Novice
5. Doram
Edited by blackCROSSCY, 11 October 2017 - 11:53 AM.