What does melee have that is better than ranged

finalslaps · August 2013

Tanks that use ranged attacks are better off than tanks that use melee attacks because melee attacks aren't going to hit a tank that is flying and shooting from a distance. Tanks that are ranged also have that extra distance to use as defense. Tanks that are ranged can hit untapped enemies faster than a melee one that has to lunge first then attack.

In terms of DPS a melee DPS is in greater danger of getting pummeled by a PBAoE and has to chase his target around this is even worst when the aggroed teammate is running around with the target in tow. Ranged DPS has it pretty easy attacking from a distance or in the air with no fear of being brought down and having a less chance of getting hit by PBAoE. Melee mobs would just be chasing them all around. Damage wise there is hardly any difference. The only good thing is the Strength Primary Stat and it's Juggernaut spec. It wouldnt gimp a ranged to take that route though so once again melee doesn't have anything to stand against ranged.

Melee healers? Nonexistent.

In PvP, melee may get the advantage if they successfully knock the enemy but ranged can knock people around too. Melee in PvP is laughable because they're now fighting player minded enemies.

nepht · August 2013

finalslaps wrote: »

Melee healers? Nonexistent.

.

Dunno Dr Punchurface would disagree that guy heals like a boss and does mad DPS @_@"

jorifice1 · August 2013

Melee has Caliga.
It needs nothing else.

crypticbuxom · August 2013

Melee back in the day had a seriously heavy buff to help balance this out as well as increase melee range 10 feet. But that was ruined when ranged stackable Forms were introduced and Aggression was changed to an AO.

And to think Aggression was the reason why a bunch of melee powers got a nerf because of it. And when they change it to an AO without unnerfing the damage.

So no, there is no point in choosing melee over range for anything other than concept.

nightr0d · August 2013

Punching enemies 300ft with a haymaker or a roomsweeper is great fun:cool:. You can do all sorts of things with them. Like throwing mobs into a volcano or over cliffs maybe on top of buildings. Say what you will about melee but Might is a really fun set to play. Well IMO.

falchoin · August 2013

Hmm, in general I agree that ranged is probably better/easier to use and play. However, there are a few melee perks.

Arguably the best tanking power, Devour Essence, is melee. High damage, easy to debuff the damage type, decent healing and it's a maintain that ticks every half second so putting Crippling Challenge on it makes a big difference threat-wise.

Melee gets to pick between two shield advantages (in addition to all the others) which can provide significant boosts to survivability, at the cost of some damage output (Energy Shield's Laser Knight and Parry's Elusive Monk).

As far as I know, melee gets the highest non-crit spike damage from Shadow Strike. When including crits (which honestly it would silly not to count crits since CO might as well be Crits Online), Force Cascade and other heavy hitting ranged powers can hit about as hard as Shadow Strike.

The majority of bosses in game are either melee or will try to close the gap anyway. Those that don't are often just as deadly at 50 feet as they are in melee range. Ranged tanks kiting in most cases just annoys other players having to continually chase the boss. Others, like Teleiosaurus or Qwyjibo, may punish flying characters by removing their travel powers so long as they're within 100 feet. Really bad things happen if you try to use a travel power and kite Mega Terak.

While technically not melee, I run a PBAoE based support character who is in melee range more often than not. Despite running AoED and having only 80 Con she survives the Gravitar alert most of the time, though she cannot solo it.

cptmillennium · August 2013

crypticbuxom wrote: »

Melee back in the day had a seriously heavy buff to help balance this out as well as increase melee range 10 feet. But that was ruined when ranged stackable Forms were introduced and Aggression was changed to an AO.

And to think Aggression was the reason why a bunch of melee powers got a nerf because of it. And when they change it to an AO without unnerfing the damage.

So no, there is no point in choosing melee over range for anything other than concept.

This. So much this.

Melee could really use its buff back. Right now Captain Millennium is doing more damage than he's ever done. He's kitted out with crazy expensive and hard-to-get gear, yet he still pales in comparison to a Two Gun Mojo/Quarry alt with run-of-the-mill gear. That character effortlessly drops enemies in seconds, and with Evasive Maneuvers and Lead Tempest up can hit 96% dodge and around 75% avoidance, making him about as survivable as well. Makes me kinda sad.

bluhman · August 2013

I can think of a few:

Melee characters get a lot more defensive bonuses from things like blocks and passives. Though, they pretty much need it to survive when everything is trying to kill them up-close.
Attacks are more efficient. Usually. Special note goes to Martial Arts, which can grant itself 1-8 second energy boosts with dragon attacks. With the widespread availability of energy efficiency upgrades, this all gets a bit mitigated.
The better stat and spec tree - Strength, as a stat, provides the user a lot of useful knockback resistance alongside the damage. Strength's Spec Tree also is really good, with a spec that gives you about 100+ defense if you use Constitution.
Crowd Control - Let's be honest here, the best abilities out there that outright stop enemies from attacking? All melee. You got great things like Thunderclap, Dragon kick, Inexorable Tides, and Brimstone, that can all swiftly knock and stun enemies in large areas. Compare to any ranged control ability you can get - either they're painfully slow (grasping shadows), only get one target (any other hold), have considerable windup or cooldown (force detonation or faultline), or don't last that long (ego sleep) - all the best CC seems to be PBAoE, actually.

But in general, I agree that it needs some kind of compensation - something like brawler role getting CC resistance or idunno.

neuraldamage · August 2013

Stacks of Bleed.

sekimen · August 2013

falchoin wrote: »

Ranged tanks kiting in most cases just annoys other players having to continually chase the boss.

Ranged tanks are often either a gimmick or an annoyance. I'd say tanking is the only thing melee has an advantage over ranged.

Also, melee healers can work somewhat. I experimented with a few builds and you can be a melee support healer by using various specs and advantages that heal others while you deal damage. Kinda like a Shout/Banner Warrior in GW2, only with higher numbers.

sistersilicon · August 2013

sekimen wrote: »

Ranged tanks are often either a gimmick or an annoyance. I'd say tanking is the only thing melee has an advantage over ranged.

Ranged "tanks" who kite aren't tanks, they're blasters with an inflated sense of their own damage mitigation. It's a tab-target system. Unless the power and/or advantage explicitly states that it's affected by proximity to target, you're merely using ranged animations at melee distance.

Being a ranged tank means that I can hold aggro on a ranged boss without being in melee range, and if the boss comes to me, that's his business. So if you see Sister Silicon Prime in a Deadman Walkin' burst alert, just stay out of our line of fire.

smoochan · August 2013

The existence of melee powers allows you to create melee characters. This is invaluable for people who want to create melee-themed characters. It should come as no surprise that people want to make super heroes that punch and kick.

As far as the mechanical aspects go: The highest burst attacks come from melee. Also there's lots of fast stuns and knocks that come from melee attacks.

Realistically though, you're never going to see "LF1M NEED MELEE". Of course, that's because you'll never see NEED.

jellycupsowbug · August 2013

Ranged tanks would ideally protect melee dps from aoe attacks by being where they are not, and control the position of the enemy by utilizing knowledge of the enemy ai. They should pull mobs into tight clusters that maximize aoe dps.

Freon, Viper X, Madame Mayhem, Dead Man Walkin', Draconis, Devana Hawke, Kevin Poe, Demoiselle Noctourne, and munitions nemeses are good examples of bosses that should ideally be tanked at range. They have all have sphere aoes and/or kite until they are at their preferred range.

Ripper, is probably the opposite. There may be others, but Ripper is the one boss that I always try to stay in melee reach of when I have aggro, because he uses NttG, and will chase me to the ends of the earth while throwing boulders.

If melee has an advantage, it's more aoe powers that have high damage for relatively low energy cost. The aoe is tiny, though, so the damage is more like compensation. High damage ranged powers tend to use a ton of energy. Boomerangs and Two Gun Mojo turned that system on its head.

doveoflove · August 2013

smoochan wrote: »

The existence of melee powers allows you to create melee characters. This is invaluable for people who want to create melee-themed characters. It should come as no surprise that people want to make super heroes that punch and kick.

As far as the mechanical aspects go: The highest burst attacks come from melee. Also there's lots of fast stuns and knocks that come from melee attacks.

Realistically though, you're never going to see "LF1M NEED MELEE". Of course, that's because you'll never see NEED.

Hi
Isn't strafing run the highest burst attack in game?
And ofc u won't see anyone saying LF1M NEED MELEE(Looking For 1 Melee NEED MELEE ...it just doesn't make any sense does it?)

chaelk · August 2013

drain life is a ranged attack but you cvan use it for melee heal, just stand next to combat and heal the group

flamingbunnyman · August 2013

doveoflove wrote: »

And ofc u won't see anyone saying LF1M NEED MELEE(Looking For 1 Melee NEED MELEE ...it just doesn't make any sense does it?)

"Looking For 1 More, Need Melee"

doveoflove · August 2013

flamingbunnyman wrote: »

"Looking For 1 More, Need Melee"

Oh yes, that makes sense too.

itsbrou · August 2013

Melee usually has better defensive features on its offensive passives. It's also fun.

chaosdrgnz43 · August 2013

I wish that Melee have more advantage against Ranged. Most of the strong builds I know are ranged. I wonder if Mountain powers count as Melee than range...*ponders*

alexofspades · August 2013

Melee is more fun. Champions is a game. Games are meant to be fun. And melee wins the fun contest.

Seriously, when i'm playing with Ocelot (my TK Blade) there is just SO MUCH going on. I'm doing combos to heal myself and stack Ego Leech while keeping an eye on my Glory buff - when its close to getting a stack of 30 (and Ego Leech a stack of 5) i do TK Eruption for the buff, then Ego Surge, then another combo (for Setup buff) and then i have a window of a few seconds to land my rupture (Annihilation) that, buffed by Setup (buffs next attack) and Glory (buffs damage) and Eruption (moar damage) and Ego Surge (MOAR damage) will have a 70% chance of critting dealing near 19,000 damage and instantly killing anyone i'm fighting against. Oh, all of that while quicky tapping my block between heavy attacks (because i have 5100 health).

Then i log in with my Infernal whose gameplay consists of holding Epidemic down until everyone is toast and if i'm hurt i just use Resurgence. Sooo boring!

Melee is fun and challenging!

smoochan · August 2013

doveoflove wrote: »

Hi
Isn't strafing run the highest burst attack in game?
And ofc u won't see anyone saying LF1M NEED MELEE(Looking For 1 Melee NEED MELEE ...it just doesn't make any sense does it?)

LF1M = Looking For 1 More. Welcome to MMOs.

And no it isn't.

shadowzero66 · August 2013

crypticbuxom wrote: »

Melee back in the day had a seriously heavy buff to help balance this out as well as increase melee range 10 feet. But that was ruined when ranged stackable Forms were introduced and Aggression was changed to an AO.

And to think Aggression was the reason why a bunch of melee powers got a nerf because of it. And when they change it to an AO without unnerfing the damage.

So no, there is no point in choosing melee over range for anything other than concept.

Relying on powers to somewhat fix an innate game issue; I say "somewhat" because if I recall correctly the balance became skewed the other way. At least that had a decent reason. Anyone remember the wave of "this power can not crit" changes because of the old Imbue?

Melee could use a boost. It doesn't need to be increased damage. Something more subtle like reduced energy cost, and/or the old Brawler role snaring could do.

gamehobo · August 2013

I can tell you what it does not have..

A competent combat designer. The original mechanics and improvements to Melee DPS (not tanking) have been eroded away

theravenforce · August 2013

For me personally Melee brings a "dynamic" feel to combat which ranged lacks, and the range of animations is also nice.

zerothdimension · August 2013

aurinkosi wrote: »

Melee is more fun. Champions is a game. Games are meant to be fun. And melee wins the fun contest.

Seriously, when i'm playing with Ocelot (my TK Blade) there is just SO MUCH going on. I'm doing combos to heal myself and stack Ego Leech while keeping an eye on my Glory buff - when its close to getting a stack of 30 (and Ego Leech a stack of 5) i do TK Eruption for the buff, then Ego Surge, then another combo (for Setup buff) and then i have a window of a few seconds to land my rupture (Annihilation) that, buffed by Setup (buffs next attack) and Glory (buffs damage) and Eruption (moar damage) and Ego Surge (MOAR damage) will have a 70% chance of critting dealing near 19,000 damage and instantly killing anyone i'm fighting against. Oh, all of that while quicky tapping my block between heavy attacks (because i have 5100 health).

Then i log in with my Infernal whose gameplay consists of holding Epidemic down until everyone is toast and if i'm hurt i just use Resurgence. Sooo boring!

Melee is fun and challenging!

This.

I have a handful of ranged toons, and a handful of melee toons. Specifics aside...the melee toons are just more fun to play.

cptmillennium · August 2013

I enjoy melee more than anything, but it's occasionally frustrating to play a ranged character that simply blows away any melee in terms of effectiveness.

chaelk · August 2013

sistersilicon wrote: »

Ranged "tanks" who kite aren't tanks, they're blasters with an inflated sense of their own damage mitigation. It's a tab-target system. Unless the power and/or advantage explicitly states that it's affected by proximity to target, you're merely using ranged animations at melee distance.

Being a ranged tank means that I can hold aggro on a ranged boss without being in melee range, and if the boss comes to me, that's his business. So if you see Sister Silicon Prime in a Deadman Walkin' burst alert, just stay out of our line of fire.

why get out of the way, just stand and shoot, the closer the more damage they take. No problem.

Mind you, having seen some of the damage from sister silicon, the docks shook blow up.

You don't need to kite bosses unless you forget flight or a self heal. You can hold them perfectly well by hovering above, while they attack you and everyone else attacks them.

chaelk · August 2013

chaosdrgnz43 wrote: »

I wish that Melee have more advantage against Ranged. Most of the strong builds I know are ranged. I wonder if Mountain powers count as Melee than range...*ponders*

Yes a lot of mountain powers are actually ranged.

Biggest problem I have with melee is speed, the attacks seem to be really slow.
ON the other hand , they get head butt(lunge). Definately usefull.

as for the LF1M, the only needs i see are the same in most MMO's , healer.

finalslaps · August 2013

sekimen wrote: »

Ranged tanks are often either a gimmick or an annoyance. I'd say tanking is the only thing melee has an advantage over ranged.

Also, melee healers can work somewhat. I experimented with a few builds and you can be a melee support healer by using various specs and advantages that heal others while you deal damage. Kinda like a Shout/Banner Warrior in GW2, only with higher numbers.

That depends. If the ranged tank is flying he could just stay up in the air and force melee enemies to do a lunge or throw shuriken which heavily minimizes damage taken. And actually I found ranged tanks are better than melee tanks when I'm the melee DPS because any ranged AoE thrown around will go to the ranged tank while I have zero fear of taking a hit. Ranged tanks can also play a special bait and switch action against annoyances like Gas Arrow or Foxbat's weird sand dust thing by letting that drop somewhere else and they can just move to another location and keep on tanking. Melee tanks are forced to sit in that dust cloud or poison cloud and get CCed or constantly damaged.

lovehammer1 · August 2013

Fun? Ranged or Melee?

No contest IMHO. Melee. All day. Everyday. Twice on Sunday. Something about fighting up close and personal. Mixing it up and using your skills to evade, defend, battle in close quarters that ranged (I call beetch mode) just can't do for me. Too easy. And boring as all hell. Just my opinion. Yeah, I do have some ranged toons, but it's really just a change of pace thing. Stunning foes from 100ft out? Blasting them away with Force or (yawn) Ebon ruin? Really...how much of a challenge is that? None for me. Dam, just talking about that made me sleepy!

roughbearmattach · August 2013

Defensive combo.

nepht · August 2013

Melee has hammers. Big freaking hammers \o/

jorifice1 · August 2013

Whirlwind Spam Builds!
Eye Of The Storm!
CHAINSAWS!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

sistersilicon · August 2013

Lasers. All the lasers.

xaogarrent · August 2013

I find it kinda funny that CO started out super ranged dominant, they made melee overpowered, then they buffed at least some of ranged up to a fairly balanced point, then made a huge change several years in that more or less brought them back to their starting point of ranged outclassing almost everything else.

chaelk · August 2013

and in the PTS right now, we have Laser swords, melee and WAYYY over powered.
well thought out ,
They are a collect , stack and burn power set but oh god, the damage when you burn. Also it took the power down from its 8 second base time to 0.9 seconds

On a level 40 I got a 9K non crit, with only stats and powers.

NO spec tree,
No gear,
NO active offence,
NO passive.

with gear someone else got a 70k crit.

Thats ets gonna be really popular if that isn't amended before live.

nepht · August 2013

jorifice1 wrote: »

Whirlwind Spam Builds!
Eye Of The Storm!
CHAINSAWS!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

God damn love chainsaw

What does melee have that is better than ranged

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