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Death of a Paladin – An Opinion Piece
ragnarz2
Member Posts: 208 Arc User
Neverwinter is under going massive changes with MOD 16. The case can be made that change was imperative. Too much was out of balance. Most reasonable players would IMO agree with this characterization. Rather than point to specific changes that are debatable I want to focus on the root cause rather than multiple symptoms and provide a singular example.
Before a single line of code is written a philosophy of parameters is formulated. These act as the design template for everything. Rather than create a diverse set of parameters that would yield a rich set of choices for the players one of commonality was put forth.
The Paladin which was arguably the most flexible of classes has for all intents and purposes been removed from the game. It now shares a block mechanic and a divinity mechanic with other classes. The result is the most flexible class has been narrowed to have few choices. Use divinity and block to regain divinity.
I find this highly objectionable. Introducing a simplistic and highly limiting scheme for the Paladin is a class killer for me. I often see people refer to "cookie cutter" builds, this is now a cookie cutter class. One size fits all. Choice has been removed. While I am sure some segment of the player base celebrates the death of the over powered Paladin I lament the elimination of choice and creativity. Change should enhance the gaming experience not lobotomize it.
In conclusion, decisions were made up front that have resulted in what I consider to be uncompelling results. It will very interesting to see what the state of the game will be 2 months out from live. I might be way off base but I expect that there will be a dramatic fall off in what classes get played and by extension overall population.
Before a single line of code is written a philosophy of parameters is formulated. These act as the design template for everything. Rather than create a diverse set of parameters that would yield a rich set of choices for the players one of commonality was put forth.
The Paladin which was arguably the most flexible of classes has for all intents and purposes been removed from the game. It now shares a block mechanic and a divinity mechanic with other classes. The result is the most flexible class has been narrowed to have few choices. Use divinity and block to regain divinity.
I find this highly objectionable. Introducing a simplistic and highly limiting scheme for the Paladin is a class killer for me. I often see people refer to "cookie cutter" builds, this is now a cookie cutter class. One size fits all. Choice has been removed. While I am sure some segment of the player base celebrates the death of the over powered Paladin I lament the elimination of choice and creativity. Change should enhance the gaming experience not lobotomize it.
In conclusion, decisions were made up front that have resulted in what I consider to be uncompelling results. It will very interesting to see what the state of the game will be 2 months out from live. I might be way off base but I expect that there will be a dramatic fall off in what classes get played and by extension overall population.
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Nah, that was too much for them. Just butcher the entire thing and pray that the game continues to make money with dramatically oversimplified classes and combat. This tedious new combat is the polar opposite of fun. I used to be able to grind like a mindless puppet for hours because of entertaining combat and mechanics. Not anymore.
If someone's idea of fun is spamming smite on enemy after enemy, then I think I'm in the wrong universe.
I might stay if that happens. Right now it is not even remotely fun being limit to 2-3 encounters for your everyday grind. Why at-wills exist, or why they made new ones that deal no damage either, is beyond me.
Blood Magic (RELEASED) - NW-DUU2P7HCO
Children of the Fey (RELEASED) - NW-DKSSAPFPF
Buried Under Blacklake (WIP) - NW-DEDV2PAEP
The Redcap Rebels (WIP) - NW-DO23AFHFH
My Foundry playthrough channel: https://www.youtube.com/user/Ruskaga/featured
Human being hate changes. Some of us have invested fairly large amounts of time and/or money in our characters, and much of it will be voided in mod 16. So I will not be surprised if mod 16 leads to a large loss of veteran players.
But I am not sure if Cryptic cares. The large majority of the playerbase is fairly short-lived fairly casual players rotating through. They come and go quickly, and leave behind a little chunk of money each that Cryptic lives off. The BiS veterans have little reason to spend much money and just eat up resources with no payback.
This change actually should make game more attractive for the less-developed characters, as the difference between a 12k IL and a 18k IL will be dramatically reduced. While the dps difference today can be 1:10, after mod 16 it is my guess it will be reduced to 1:2. There will be much less reason to kick people from groups for lack of gear.
New players? That's a @#$%in joke. They're going to take one taste, and go check out another game that offers vastly more diversity. They literally destroyed everything that made this game unique with the snap of their finger.
Lets start with the paragon "feature". Deal 30% less damage and generate more threat. With the current encounter powers and dailies we are stuck with, why do we need a permanent 30% debuff.
How about the great new feats we get? Pick a power to use to get a minor improvement to its effects. At least 3 of the 5 feat choices tie you to one or the other power, only 1 power of which will be slotted on my power bar. so at least 2 feats that I will not be getting any benefit from. The last 2 feats seem very underwhelming as well.
How about boons? I have allocated my boons and I am never allowed to put another point in master boons or tier 5 boons? I have to choose whether to get a 1% bonus against cultists, dynos, undead or demons for any boons I may gain in the future. I know you were trying to reduce the value of boons, but where is the incentive to earn new boons?
I don't know how the powers stack up against other classes powers, but I would bet they are worse than most classes especially when we take into account our permanent debuff.
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19k OP tank on live, can solo FBI in under an hour with no deaths. On preview tried to solo ESOT, got to the boss okish, could not survive in the boss' chamber. Mainly because its a multi mob boss encounter and paladins are very slow and sheild only points one way now. I could not stop myself being flanked by the boss and his two drakes, and everytime they flanked me, i got one shot killed.
This could go both ways. I spend a few bucks here and there, I tend to buy Leg. Dragon Keys. I run a dungeon, I wanna open my chests
I'm floored that new players spend money in game. I honestly am. If ever I'm asked by a new player what to buy, my answer is always the same. Buy NOTHING until you hit level 70. It's a whole new game from there.