splorks post

[Melanthe]

I believe the classes are fairly well balanced as is. I see no more reason to "nerf" necromancers anymore. All the old classes have been upgraded incredibly; in fact I am amazed at how powerful they are. I don't have any sympathy for anyone anymore that says necromancers are overpowered; cause they aren't.

If anything, necromancers are incredibly underpowered in groups. What do we do? Weaken and blast destruction? LOL. I am attuned to necromancy and even then my weakens only land 1/3rd of the time. By the time I've landed it, the mob is dead. And what does it do? Lowers mob strength by a whopping 3 str! Also, I felt useful in groups infusing corpses for the main tank when there were avatar bonuses and heal gear bonuses to them. Now they only heal the main tank for 100.

How about adding some skills/spells to necromancer to be more useful in groups, like Marchessa said. How about modifiying the master soul infusion so it gets avatar heal bonus if the tank, in the point position, while grouped with more than 2 players, is in the same room? (or somethign along those lines).

I don't feel stronger than many prime classes. Only reason I've hit the top20 the past 3 weeks is cause of my play time (which has been all day every day for the past few weeks). And if you notice, most of my recent xp is coming from grouping. I enjoy grouping. I agree this game is about grouping, but also people like to solo at times; doing small eq mobs and drachma quests etc. Some like to solo for money runs and xp (e.g. thieves ).

Melanthe

[12345]

Saying weaken isn't useful in groups is plain silly. In fact, I have several necros that I routinely ask to join my groups specifically for weakening.

Only lowers 3 str? Do you have any idea what you just said? Let me clear it up for you.

Take your average 18/100 str mob. Lower it's strenth to 18/70 and it loses +1 hit and +3 damage per hit.

Nevermind that the entire idea behind debuffed mobs is to lower their +hit to the point they can't hit anything. This is -1 hit more than anything that was possible before the spell existed. It's the entire difference between killing a 5 mil mob at level 1x40 and killing a 25 mil mob at 1x40.

Even running -10 with damn/web/blinds, this spell can reduce the damage I take from mobs by 50% just from the -hit.

You get a +hit from strength at 17, 18/51 and 18/100. Any reduction in strength that causes a mob to cross one of those borders makes a necro invaluable to the group. If you're fighting a mob of 16 strength or lower, the spell doesn't do you any good... but when was the last time you fought one of those off valk in a serious group?

And I know many necros that are attuned and can rapidly weaken a mob. Usually I try to have at least 2 dedicated to weakening to overcome saves. Hell, I have the entire group blinding for the same reason, why should this spell be any different?

If you don't think you're useful in groups, your leader isn't using you right.

[Avatar]

I'll echo everything 12345 said. Weaken just rocks, plain and simple. If you're getting (attuned) a successful weaken 1/3 of the time, that's wonderful. Non-attuned I'd estimate success at 1/10 maybe, and even then it's well worth spamming weakens.

** of course depending on the mobs. If you're running stab/blast it's usually not worth waiting for debuffs. If, as you say, by the time you've cast it 3 times the mob is dead, you may be using it against the wrong mobs.

It's unfortunate that necro's don't have anything specific to do AFTER the weaken, but complaining about weaken is silly. I guess that's what a class order is for, after weaken we can try to use skills from one of our other three classes.

[Melanthe]

Well in my experience with weaken and blind, blind seems to about 5 times more valuable. But I guess I could be wrong.

Melanthe

[Roadrunr]

I'll correct 12345 and take the blame off the leader. There are plenty of things you can do in a group. You have 4 classes. If you cant find something to do after weaken, you're not trying very hard.

As a tank, I'll take 100hp souls, better than nothing when the healo falls asleep and I'm already out of mana...it happens more than it should, one of the reasons I run so much mana.

And Melanthe, do you really want to say that you dont feel any more powerful than any other prime class? How would you know unless you've played them to the same level you are now?

So now that the clerics aren't so disgruntled its the necro's turn to whine?

I think we need a chaos night so I can properly vent. (and die repeatedly w/o consequence).

[Avatar]

Well, like many things in life I'd say "It depends." Weaken has a few advantages. Weaken has a longer duration. Weaken works on every mob. Weaken doesn't get removed if the target heals self.

Best of all, although it's not an advantage vs. blind, weaken stacks with blind.

[12345]

To be precise, in your experience, blind is -4 to hit, weaken is a potential -1. Blind is 4x more useful. Blind and Acid Blast also have duration problems. I've frequently asked for a reblind, I can't ever remember having asked for a reweaken unless someone dispelled it.

Like any spell, it's only as useful as the way you use it. Take the vault protector in the BH Castle... probably the bestest example. You have a mob that is infinately thick, and with -10/damn/blind/web and say... 5 group members, you'll probably have to reblind it at least once and drain your healo chopping him down. ~32 mil payoff means everyone caps, then you rest up for another run. Or, if you weaken, everyone can take a nap and regen for the next mob because he just can't hit you.

If you have a mob that hits on an 18 of 20 with all those spells and you weaken him, he needs a 19 in 20 to hit. That means you're only taking 50% of the damage you would have taken without the spell. If you want to back it up to 17 to 18, that's still a 33% improvement. Either way, that's hps that the healo doesn't have to replace. Considering the incredible difference in cost of weaken and restore... I'll opt for the weakeners every day of the week.

You'll always run into mobs that will beat strongly through debuffs... that's what mages are for.

[Melanthe]

[quote="Roadrunr":3soozyb9]I'll correct 12345 and take the blame off the leader. There are plenty of things you can do in a group. You have 4 classes. If you cant find something to do after weaken, you're not trying very hard.
[/quote:3soozyb9]

Of course I use my other class skills in group. E.g. cleric, floating on heals. But Marchessa and I are talking about *prime skills* here.

[quote="Roadrunr":3soozyb9]
As a tank, I'll take 100hp souls, better than nothing when the healo falls asleep and I'm already out of mana...it happens more than it should, one of the reasons I run so much mana.
[/quote:3soozyb9]

Sure they are useful still. Just not as useful.

[quote="Roadrunr":3soozyb9]
And Melanthe, do you really want to say that you dont feel any more powerful than any other prime class? How would you know unless you've played them to the same level you are now?
[/quote:3soozyb9]

Cause I've talked to many 5x40 and know what they are capable of. And I've played other classes.

[quote="Roadrunr":3soozyb9]
So now that the clerics aren't so disgruntled its the necro's turn to whine?
[/quote:3soozyb9]

I think others are uneccesarily whining about necromancer's power, disregarding their own powerful skills.

[quote="Roadrunr":3soozyb9]
I think we need a chaos night so I can properly vent. (and die repeatedly w/o consequence).[/quote:3soozyb9]

I am cool, no need to vent here. I will play my classo regardless of anymore nerfs. Live with what I got.

[Gimlet]

talking about *prime classes*?

I just have one reply for you and marchessa then

find me 1 prime class that can use all its skills or find all its skills useful in EVERY SINGLE situaion (group/solo) or every mob in the mud.

[Medios]

Why do you assume that mobs have 18/100 strength, 25 is max.

Mike

[12345]

I think I said average... I wanted to use numbers that could be easily confirmed in the game. A mob with strength of 19 or higher works just as well though, and in the case of strenght 25, works even better than the examples given.

[Avatar]

I haven't played necro prime to any respectable level, but I have played two characters with necro in the classo to avatar levels. I agree with RR, it's difficult to talk about relative power unless you've played the classes and "learned" how to play them. Necro definitely has it's own style of play. They are strong at some things and weak at others.

What was my point? I don't want to ramble too much. It seems that necro's don't get much sympathy when complaining about their weaknesses. My guess is because their strengths are so apparent.

[Roadrunr]

[quote="Melanthe":kot2q4it]
How about adding some skills/spells to necromancer to be more useful in groups, like Marchessa said. How about modifiying the master soul infusion so it gets avatar heal bonus if the tank, in the point position, while grouped with more than 2 players, is in the same room? (or somethign along those lines).Melanthe[/quote:kot2q4it]

And why dont we have pigs fly out of the tanks butt while playing trumpets if there are more than 3 people in the group too...they could do some proc damage upon landing on the mob maybe while providing some massive damage bonus to all necro pets due to the trumpets while we're at it. Stop asking for stupid shit.

[quote="Melanthe":kot2q4it]I don't feel stronger than many prime classes. Only reason I've hit the top20 the past 3 weeks is cause of my play time (which has been all day every day for the past few weeks). [b:kot2q4it]And if you notice, most of my recent xp is coming from grouping.[/b:kot2q4it] I enjoy grouping. I agree this game is about grouping, but also people like to solo at times; doing small eq mobs and drachma quests etc. Some like to solo for money runs and xp (e.g. thieves ).

Melanthe[/quote:kot2q4it]

Only reason you hit the top 20? You mean topped? And wow, you must have some nasty short term memory loss that you forgot all of last week...err the last month...most of your recent xp in groups indeed. I submit the following ....

1 Melanthe 1,258,856,764

All stats this week are:
Total Experience 1,258,856,764
Total Gold 8,533,238
Experience while alone 1,005,825,936
Experience while grouped 238,477,993
Experience for leading 0
Experience for tanking 0
Sacrifice points 12,092
Mobiles killed 376
Players killed (legally or not) 0
Deaths 23

I suppose that group xp could be considered 'most' if you are mathematically challenged.

How about the week before (this one was close but to me, 'most' means more than half when you're only talking about two conditions):

1 Melanthe 2,490,508,986

All stats this week are:
Total Experience 2,490,508,986
Total Gold 9,451,673
Experience while alone 1,385,609,109
Experience while grouped 1,077,129,332
Experience for leading 0
Experience for tanking 0
Sacrifice points 15,665
Mobiles killed 234
Players killed (legally or not) 4
Deaths 17


Or this one at a mere 2x40:

1 Melanthe 1,250,445,341

All stats this week are:
Total Experience 1,250,445,341
Total Gold 8,941,551
Experience while alone 1,204,915,489
Experience while grouped 24,565,692
Experience for leading 0
Experience for tanking 0
Sacrifice points 13,655
Mobiles killed 301
Players killed (legally or not) 0
Deaths 8

week before that at 1x40:

1 Melanthe 658,268,101

All stats this week are:
Total Experience 658,268,101
Total Gold 5,479,716
Experience while alone 588,116,284
Experience while grouped 51,079,490
Experience for leading 0
Experience for tanking 0
Sacrifice points 15,581
Mobiles killed 403
Players killed (legally or not) 0
Deaths 10


Yup, you sure did get most of your xp from grouping lately....ummm one thing....your pets dont officially count as a group. I will say, those are pretty impressive totals to me (I know, they're probably pathetic by necro standards but hey, I'm just a simple warrior who remembers when it took more than 3 weeks to go from 1x40 to 3x40 (nearly 4x40). You prove my point well. Necros needed a nerf (probably still do.)

[Weasel]

wtf? Thanks for those enlightening stats RR - I don't believe I've ever achieved that much solo exp in one week at 5x40 let alone 2x40, and yes, I have spent a lot of time online some weeks as well.. damn that's just insane.. All this does is highlight just how excessively overpowered they appear to be, particularly solo, so might be a good time to stop complaining before the coders realize that they haven't nerfed anywhere near enough as yet..

[Guinex]

RR sad as this may sound even Fyrstenheart xped faster than that, ahem he was a prime warrior. I don't really think melanthe's xp numbers for a week are that impressive for someone that is online for 18 hours a day.

Im not trying to back melanthe or anything, but give me a break.

Oh yea, fyrstenheart didn't even realise his pets worth worth using til he was almost 4x40.