Another update where we got pooed on...

Burnout - Harshlands

Eoria - Harshlands wrote: »

Generally, the agreement for 1v1s on this server is self-buffed unless both are able to purge or one person has a significant advantage over another. So no, those pots aren't usually used.

Then the archer is willfully fighting at a disadvantage, as purge proc is a rather significant part of an archer's killing power + balance.

Astraelys - Raging Tide

I want resume this saying "The grass is greener on tbe other side". b:mischievous

RankNine - Momaganon

Burnout - Harshlands wrote: »

Then the archer is willfully fighting at a disadvantage, as purge proc is a rather significant part of an archer's killing power + balance.

exactly. and tbh every class can purge! every! but there is only one that cant zerk nor purify.

Aeliah - Dreamweaver

Astraelys - Raging Tide wrote: »

I want resume this saying "The grass is greener on tbe other side". b:mischievous

True! But I'm not trying to make the archer class to be the villain or victim here. I believe that the archer class is fairly balanced at endgame. And I certainly love my own class! My issue has always been with players of the archer class---people who try to understate the advantages of their class while overstating its weaknesses. Like any class, the archer has its strengths of weaknesses. Unfortunately, many archers feel that because other classes may be stronger in self-buffed 1vs1, that the archer class in general is weak. That would be like me as a cleric saying 'because I can't quickly kill many people in group pvp, my class is weak'. Both of these statements are patently untrue.

Ursa - Dreamweaver

RankNine - Momaganon wrote: »

exactly. and tbh every class can purge! every! but there is only one that cant zerk nor purify.

please enlighten me how can I purge?b:dirty

Eoria - Harshlands

Ursa - Dreamweaver wrote: »

please enlighten me how can I purge?b:dirty

Purge genie.

Astraelys - Raging Tide

Aeliah - Dreamweaver wrote: »

True! But I'm not trying to make the archer class to be the villain or victim here. I believe that the archer class is fairly balanced at endgame. And I certainly love my own class! My issue has always been with players of the archer class---people who try to understate the advantages of their class while overstating its weaknesses. Like any class, the archer has its strengths of weaknesses. Unfortunately, many archers feel that because other classes may be stronger in self-buffed 1vs1, that the archer class in general is weak. That would be like me as a cleric saying 'because I can't quickly kill many people in group pvp, my class is weak'. Both of these statements are patently untrue.

All class have pros and cons, but this time all the archers we feel this time, pw,made changes that harmed us . But i guess i need wait for the expansion and test the skill myself.

Aeliah - Dreamweaver

RankNine - Momaganon wrote: »

exactly. and tbh every class can purge! every! but there is only one that cant zerk nor purify.

Now there's an interesting thought... OK so get this. BM and BARB purge with r8r weapon. These weapons have roughly 60 fewer attack lvls lower than the r9rr weapons. Melee classes don't get the purge AND the zerk on the SAME weapon. So in theory, I'd be pretty OK with archers getting zerk... but only on a r8r or lesser weapon. In other words, the reverse of the situation for melees.

Lets see... no I won't pretend to know how to run that sort of math. My intuition tells me that a zerk crit on a r8r bow would come out to a little bit higher than a crit on a r9rr bow, but not by much. Can anybody do the #-crunching for me please?

My intuition also says that archers wouldn't use a zerk bow if it wasn't their r9rr weapon, because their AVERAGE damage would suffer way too badly. The difference between purge and zerk here is that, when melees use purge weapon, they purge you, then switch back to r9rr weapon and keep that one in. A purge usually stays effective for a while, so you only need maybe 1 or 2 purges. But for a zerk weapon to be effective, you need to keep zerking, until you get a zerk + crit, and that zerk + crit has to take place when enemy is (preferably) purged + near half hp. So if the zerk + crit on a r8r bow isn't a significantly greater amount of damage than the normal crit on a r9rr bow, it wouldn't be particularly useful.

I'm fairly certain we can all see the danger in putting zerk on a r9rr bow. Bows have the highest base damage, and the highest refine rate of any weapon. The archer class has much higher physical attack and attack rate, range, and crit than the other melee classes. That means that zerk + crits wouldn't be rare like they are on melee classes; they'd be common, they would be EXPECTED. As much as I dislike purge, r9rr bow zerk crits from 32 meters away scares me even more. Archers could still purge enemies easily with r8r purge bows, then switch to r9rr bow for the zerk-crits. And before you say 'assassins zerk crit a lot too', yes, they do: but they at least are constrained by lower attack rate, lower physical attack, fewer aoes, and because they are melee not range).

Anyways, yeah, that is why archers don't get zerk lol.

Purify proc, of course, was only given to arcane classes (the classes with low hp, low physical defense and low evasion, for which aps was particularly problematic). It isn't particularly relevant to say that archer's don't have purify proc: none of the physical-dmg classes do.

Ursa - Dreamweaver

Eoria - Harshlands wrote: »

Purge genie.

yup, I guess is working great since everyone is using it.

Aeliah - Dreamweaver

Ursa - Dreamweaver wrote: »

yup, I guess is working great since everyone is using it.

The skill is 'fist eruption', the starter skill for one type of genie, can't remember which atm. Anyways, at lvl 100 the genie skill costs 80 energy. It has a 10% chance to purge. Assuming a genie that regenerates 3 energy per second, a nice optimistic #, we are looking at (80/3) = 26.6, lets say 25 seconds between tries. Spamming this skill then would give us approximately 1 purge every 250 seconds, or ~1 purge every 4 minutes.

Yes, you can purge. Is it particularly practical? Usually its not. For most people, the amount of time and genie energy spent getting the purge isn't worth it. In some cases, like when I fought this seeker it has uses. I got a little bit lucky on the second fight; on the third fight it took lot more tries to get the purge off. Personally I only pull out the purge genie when the person I'm fighting is so well-geared and buffed that, unless I get some hella good crit luck (talking 3-4 crits back to back when I triple spark, which for my class is pretty darn rare!) I cannot kill that person before their charm ticks, period. There are a couple seekers, barbs, and mystics I know of who meet this criteria.

Dangers of using purge genie are tanking enemy damage with genie perpetually on cooldown, and having the enemy pop a spirit of defense after I purge. For example, the seeker in the video used spirit of defense after I purged, knowing that I can't easily/frequently purge, and because with spirit of defense buffs in, that seeker is almost unkillable.

RankNine - Momaganon

Ursa - Dreamweaver wrote: »

yup, I guess is working great since everyone is using it.

more like nobody knew about it until a few days/weeks ago. even now the majority of players is unaware

and i am not demanding zerk on r9 bow, i am just showing you how weak purge is compared to zerk and purify spell.
imagine a headhunt could not zerk.
imagine a tackling slash could not zerk.
imagine a rib strike(sage) could not zerk.
now look at stunning arrow, aim low and sharpentooth. they all cant purge. every kind of debuff cant purge.

in order to purge you, i most likely have to stand there, autoshoting at you. will you let me? will any decent opponent let me? or will they rather put pressure on me?

also, you know what happens when i get purged? (and heck, venos love me)
i instantly use a spirit of defense. and im surely not gonna claim that nobody else can do that. but which pot can we use after a sparked headhunt zerk crit? or an occult ice+clean sweep + amrageddon(zerk crit) combo? or an "look-i will-use-onehundredthousand-selfdebuffs+debuffs-on-you-within-2-seconds-and-qpq-your-***-followed-by-an-ionspike-zerkcrit-6-digit-dmg-roflcopter-combo? yep. the same pot, cause we died.

oh and btw..just one more thing.
the amount of stunning arrows that activate my enemies purify spell is ridiculous.
my record was 3 in a row, ask Zoldi thats 45 seconds of not being able to kill an equally geared mystic..but whatever, archers are op! purge is op! rawr!

edit: funny that you mention the "1 purge every 4 minute" issue.
i fought a sage sin for more than 10 minutes onces and did not manage to purge him a single time..

Aeliah - Dreamweaver

Wait wait wait. Let me get this straight. Are you honestly telling me you'd prefer that assassins PURGE on their daggers instead of zerk? I honestly can't tell if you are serious, or just running your mouth. DPS assassins would have a field day if this happened. An assassin... who could 5aps... with purge... on daggers. Please tell me you are just joking. Because I think that would be the most OP thing imaginable, worse than any of the things you listed.

Burnout - Harshlands

RankNine - Momaganon wrote: »

more like nobody knew about it until a few days/weeks ago. even now the majority of players is unaware

and i am not demanding zerk on r9 bow, i am just showing you how weak purge is compared to zerk and purify spell.
imagine a headhunt could not zerk.
imagine a tackling slash could not zerk.
imagine a rib strike(sage) could not zerk.
now look at stunning arrow, aim low and sharpentooth. they all cant purge. every kind of debuff cant purge.

in order to purge you, i most likely have to stand there, autoshoting at you. will you let me? will any decent opponent let me? or will they rather put pressure on me?

also, you know what happens when i get purged? (and heck, venos love me)
i instantly use a spirit of defense. and im surely not gonna claim that nobody else can do that. but which pot can we use after a sparked headhunt zerk crit? or an occult ice+clean sweep + amrageddon(zerk crit) combo? or an "look-i will-use-onehundredthousand-selfdebuffs+debuffs-on-you-within-2-seconds-and-qpq-your-***-followed-by-an-ionspike-zerkcrit-6-digit-dmg-roflcopter-combo? yep. the same pot, cause we died.

oh and btw..just one more thing.
the amount of stunning arrows that activate my enemies purify spell is ridiculous.
my record was 3 in a row, ask Zoldi thats 45 seconds of not being able to kill an equally geared mystic..but whatever, archers are op! purge is op! rawr!

edit: funny that you mention the "1 purge every 4 minute" issue.
i fought a sage sin for more than 10 minutes onces and did not manage to purge him a single time..

Purge is weak? Lets look at some numbers to see whether this is true.

Assuming a wiz is just out with only self buff + cleric buffs (the bare minimum nowadays),

21150 p. def with buffs = 83% p resists.
8445 p. def while purged = 67% p resists.

(100-67)/(100-83) = 1.94

So once purge proc goes off, the wizard is now taking 94% more damage than if he had just cleric and self buffs up.

GoF is a 20% chance to do double damage (correct me if I'm wrong). This means on average GoF increases damage by 20%.

So 20% vs 94%. Purge has a much lower proc rate, but once purged most classes aren't able to recover from it. This is also only assuming he's running around with armor buff, but in most cases, it also purges magic shell, spirit's gift, and beast king's inspiration as well.

Would you really give up purge proc for GoF, even given those numbers? Ask a sin to kill a wiz/mystic/cleric with buffs up. They'll tell you how stupidly hard it is, even with GoF, unless they get REALLY lucky.

Slivaf - Dreamweaver

Burnout - Harshlands wrote: »

Purge is weak? Lets look at some numbers to see whether this is true.

Assuming a wiz is just out with only self buff + cleric buffs (the bare minimum nowadays),

21150 p. def with buffs = 83% p resists.
8445 p. def while purged = 67% p resists.

(100-67)/(100-83) = 1.94

So once purge proc goes off, the wizard is now taking 94% more damage than if he had just cleric and self buffs up.

GoF is a 20% chance to do double damage (correct me if I'm wrong). This means on average GoF increases damage by 20%.

So 20% vs 94%. Purge has a much lower proc rate, but once purged most classes aren't able to recover from it. This is also only assuming he's running around with armor buff, but in most cases, it also purges magic shell, spirit's gift, and beast king's inspiration as well.

Would you really give up purge proc for GoF, even given those numbers? Ask a sin to kill a wiz/mystic/cleric with buffs up. They'll tell you how stupidly hard it is, even with GoF, unless they get REALLY lucky.

I think his/others complaining about the proc... real issue is the fact that it doesn't activate often at all.

Also lets not forget that melees hit much weaker than any caster/archer, AND they HAVE to get up right beside others for the proc to even have a chance to activate. (The only class where GOF shine out of that criteria of having to be right up on others is the seeker class.)

I agree it is stupidly hard for ANY melee to kill AA classes thanks to their buffs/other natural advantage range/much harder hits. AA's can really push their phys defense to stupid insane ridiculous amounts.

EDIT: Again each proc has its advantages, and disadvantages, the same can easily be said about every single other class.

Quilue - Sanctuary

Burnout - Harshlands wrote: »

Actually, I'll be the first to admit that archer has great difficulty killing an AA that has cleric + self buff active (even if you're supposed to specialize in killing AA). Despite that you guys still do your job very well only because of purge proc. Purging an AA makes them retardedly squishy due to the nature of AA defenses.

Again, AA defenses compared to what? Endgame AA are approaching LA in pdef unbuffed. Archers are pretty much the best at killing each other than any other classes.

Triple buffed wizards with x2 pdef rings are nearing 30k pdef now because of the new rings and R93 armor. It's not like they're one shots after being Purged, especially those with Jades.

Burnout - Harshlands

Quilue - Sanctuary wrote: »

Again, AA defenses compared to what? Endgame AA are approaching LA in pdef unbuffed. Archers are pretty much the best at killing each other than any other classes.

Triple buffed wizards with x2 pdef rings are nearing 30k pdef now because of the new rings and R93 armor. It's not like they're one shots after being Purged, especially those with Jades.

That's only because the majority of archers choose to use elemental defense cube necks over p. def.

Casters also have to give up m. attack and channeling to use a p.def ring if they don't want to get insta-jibbed by every purge.

DionDagger - Dreamweaver

Quilue - Sanctuary wrote: »

Again, AA defenses compared to what? Endgame AA are approaching LA in pdef unbuffed. Archers are pretty much the best at killing each other than any other classes.

Triple buffed wizards with x2 pdef rings are nearing 30k pdef now because of the new rings and R93 armor. It's not like they're one shots after being Purged, especially those with Jades.

LOL, this is so wrong. I know end game sins with 12k pdef ubuffed and mystics with the same pdef. Mytics and wizards have their own Pdef buff which puts them ahead of LA classes.

Aeliah - Dreamweaver

I fail to see how the buffs are even relevant fighting archer. If the archer survives for a modest amount of time, they will get a purge, and then who gives a darn about triple buffed yaddi-doo-da. All that is gone in an instant. What matters then is, do you have gear good enough to buy yourself a few seconds of time to react? Wizards and seekers have combos that are difficult to react to, but not impossible: for them, they telegraph their combo with a debuff. Don't get me wrong, they are very deadly, fearsome combos in their own right!

But archer purge is different. Even the archer doing the purging doesn't react to his own purge. This is the crucial difference between a purge from an archer and from a melee class; the melee doing the purging has to switch weapons after getting a purge, then select a skill to hit. This always leaves us with 1-2 seconds of time to react to the purge. But an archer purge animation is slow, and you'll be hit 1-3 times from auto attacks before you even see the purge animation to alert you to the danger you are in. By that point it could be too late. If the archer was triple sparked, had blood vow/tangling mire on you, or had quickshot proc, you are pretty much screwed if you are arcane or light armor.

Really, the offensive strategy of an archer against these fearsomely buffed arcanes is a no-brainer. Hit the arcane enough times, and that arcane will die. The real test of skill is, can the archer survive long enough to get the hits in for that purge proc and likely death of their opponent? This is where I think archers are quite fairly balanced. They lack many self-defense skills, but they do have a lot of mobility, and they aren't likely to lose their buffs, so spirit of defense apoth is a great option for them. This seems fair to me. If we compare that to me, I am highly likely to lose my buffs in pvp (no movement speed skill leaves me a sitting duck most of the time), but I do have a lot of defensive options if purged. Balance.

On the subject of elemental defense... we regularly see arcanes give up a ring to physical defense, as well as having a physical defense neck. But archers hardly ever give up a physical defense ring for a magic defense ring. Why not? Accuracy is almost a non-issue fighting the arcanes who will be doing magic damage to you! I have a grand total of 500 evasion. Even with a ring missing, an archer will have well over ten times that amount of accuracy. Sure, archers lose a bit of damage (something every arcane has to deal with too) but in return they get 1.5k raw, or ~2.5k extra buffed magic defense. Quite a significant defensive boost. Naturally *sometimes* you need the accuracy or physical defense... mainly when fighting other archers or assassins. So just have your two rings on your skillbar and switch between them as needed, same way that you'd switch between o'malleys blessing and jones blessing.

Quilue - Sanctuary

@Dion
I know endgame wizards with 10k pdef unbuffed. Learn the definition of the word Approaching.

@Aeliah

Archer game play involving surviving for luck rolls has been what I've been saying since 3 years ago. Again, get back to the topic of the thread. The reason this update would be troublesome for archers is not only the fact that we get another Vicious Arrow adjustment, it's the fact that surviving the kind of damage you see in those descriptions isn't something archers are likely to be capable of doing.

For example:

The wizard base + 800% + 9k nuke is not even a long channeling or a short ranged nuke. It's a 2s channel, 30 range nuke that gives 30 chi instead of even having a chi requirement. This isn't something people can survive because it comes out in a **** from long range away.

With archer defense the way it is now, you're not likely going to one shot an endgame archer with this, but it's easily a bypass.

Do you want to see what a real bleed is by the way?

Psy is getting a base + 500% + 6k bleed over 12s, at the end of 12s, target suffers an additional base + 150% + 7.5k nuke to the face.

Remember the sin skill that hits for 320% base damage that I posted before? A new update suggests it does an additional 900% weapon damage over 9s.

Asterelle - Sanctuary

Aeliah - Dreamweaver wrote: »

we regularly see arcanes give up a ring to physical defense, as well as having a physical defense neck. But archers hardly ever give up a physical defense ring for a magic defense ring. Why not?

<_<

Arcanes give up the magic ring because their mres is extremely high already from the armor and 800 points of MAG.

Similarly an HA class can use a magic ring because they have extremely high pdef from their armor and from all that STR.

Dex gives no pdef and no mres. LA classes have naturally bad mres AND bad pdef. That's why archers don't switch rings. They are in need of mres, pdef, and pattack. Might rings have 2 out of 3 of those and Magic rings are only 1 out of 3. That's why archers would swap out their neck to mres first before they swap a ring. If they swap out both the neck and the rings they'd be one shot by plume shot or something.

This is honestly basic stuff.

Slivaf - Dreamweaver

Asterelle - Sanctuary wrote: »

<_<

Arcanes give up the magic ring because their mres is extremely high already from the armor and 800 points of MAG.

Aye, that they do, and they don't suffer too much in their attack department for doing so... so it's far easier to justify doing that on a Arcane class.

Similarly an HA class can use a magic ring because they have extremely high pdef from their armor and from all that STR.

Sure, you can say that it undoubtedly helps their defense but it also makes their physical attack suffer from choosing to go down that road, and when arcanes are getting phys def that rivals, and even sometimes <-- keyword... (and think loosely) surpasses that of a true HA... it can be just another double edged sword for melees. Especially when they hit for so much less than casters/archers to begin with EVEN when melees (not just bms) use their skills.

Dex gives no pdef and no mres. LA classes have naturally bad mres AND bad pdef. That's why archers don't switch rings. They are in need of mres, pdef, and pattack. Might rings have 2 out of 3 of those and Magic rings are only 1 out of 3. That's why archers would swap out their neck to mres first before they swap a ring. If they swap out both the neck and the rings they'd be one shot by plume shot or something.

This is honestly basic stuff.

I have no arguments/anything else to add to your last statement about LA, however there is definitely ring options that give both mres, and pres... the r9 ring from nw for example (an archer on my server linked me it... it's so badass... I want it even for my bm /o\.) EDIT: Yes there is a few way before it, and they arguably aren't all that viable/useful for pretty much any class... but still they are indeed out there.... and they certainly aren't anywhere near as useful as a pure magic/physical ring.

EDIT 2: Wewt for 17 (CORRECTION: 18 pages not 17) pages of fairly off topic discussion! Rawr!

Quilue - Sanctuary

Well every R93 ring of any class is double refinement so...

Oh yeah...just saw Aeliah put pdef neck in that post...OMG what an impossible handicap! Robes should have so much pdef they can wear evasion necks and get away with it!

Also, it's better to give up mag ring for phys ring because the extra pdef stacks better with more pdef buffs in the game.

Aeliah - Dreamweaver

Quilue - Sanctuary wrote: »

I know endgame wizards with 10k pdef unbuffed. Approaching.

@Aeliah

Archer game play involving surviving for luck rolls has been what I've been saying since 2 years ago. Again, get back to the topic of the thread. The reason this update would be troublesome for archers is not only the fact that we get another Vicious Arrow adjustment, it's the fact that surviving the kind of damage you see in those descriptions isn't something archers are likely to be capable of doing.

I think I am on topic. I've said that archers don't need that much tweaking, because their class already does just fine. I gave lots of examples to demonstrate why they are doing just fine. If an archer looks at the new skills he'll be getting and thinks 'mine don't look as super-fantastic as X class' just remember that this means archers are already doing just fine. Archers got their fancy updates already: leaps and stealth were HUGELY game-changing for archers.

Imagine if the devs always gave each class super powerful new upgrades, so that nobody would ever feel left out, but never addressed the problem of balancing the classes after the inclusion of their new skills. Eventually some classes would end up with a combination of skills that make them much stronger than other classes. The fact that not every class is getting equally powerful upgrades this time shows me that the devs are trying hard to balance the upgrades, to avoid making any one class too strong. I've already spoken plenty about effective archers can be in group pvp, and how they can also fare fine in 1vs1. I firmly believe that archer's don't *need* a defensive upgrade, and that making an archer too tanky could definitely throw off game balance. Archers are supposed to have run from damage!

Remember your roots guys. In game and in real life, archers have always been fleet-footed, lightly-armored, and deadly. In the real world of ancient warfare, too much armor slowed archers down. Naturally an archer wasn't able to defend himself well when the enemy got in close, but that often wasn't an issue, because archers would kill their enemies before they could get near, and if the enemy did get near, the archer would run away, and hide behind his heavily-armored allies.

If you expect an archer to be a defensive-type class, you've probably picked the wrong class to play. For their offensive firepower, archers have always had to give up some armor---instead they are mobile. Thats just how the class works. Hit and run. Hit and run. Then run some more. Asking to be able to tank the strongest combinations of other classes, while also being able to devastate them with purge dps, is really asking for too much. It really is. Be happy with what you've got for once!

Quilue - Sanctuary

You're being obtuse. Go look at those skills descriptions that people are complaining about and get back to me. I don't think even heavies are going to like tanking that, least of all I'd like to see you complain about getting hit for 7k by archers while purged when sins zerk crit you with the 320% base damage skill from stealth.

Aeliah - Dreamweaver

Quilue - Sanctuary wrote: »

You're being obtuse. Go look at those skills descriptions that people are complaining about and get back to me. I don't think even heavies are going to like tanking that, least of all I'd like to see you complain about getting hit for 7k by archers while purged when sins zerk crit you with the 320% base damage skill from stealth.

I've already given more than my fair share of evidence showing that archers can still charm bypass, and still do fine even if they don't. In comparison, many other classes need to rely on charm bypasses, which can be difficult to pull off. (One of my biggest problems is overshooting the half-hp mark when trying to set up a somebody for a charm bypass attempt... it is so easy to accidentally tick their charm and send them back to full hp, = I ruined my attempt). For details, read my previous posts. I provide plenty of evidence.

Your point about the new skills seeming strong seems true. However, I have this simple point to make:

'We aren't going to see this update for nearly half a year'. That's right. This update hasn't even hit PWI China yet. Really, everybody currently complaining about how archers are currently underpowered (which I disagree with) or how they will be (I reserve judgement) needs to keep this fact in mind: by the time this new content arrives, it will have probably have gone through many small revisions and tweaks.

Also, skills can still be adjusted after we get them. Classic examples of skill fixes:

-sin triple sparking in stealth without being pulled from stealth
-absorb soul going through absolute domain in pvp
-venomancer's 'soul link thingy' was adjusted so that if you and the doll linked to you get aoed, the dmg from the doll lands 1 second later, not at same time
-venomancer befuddling mist + accuracy debuff from genie putting people's accuracy to 0

All of these skills were adjusted to not be so powerful.

Furthermore, this new content may have a myriad of other features that offset the improved skill damage from certain classes. I'm thinking: newer/stronger gear, new apoths/buffs, more titles for additional stats, etc etc. We really can't know at this point.

Given all this, the flurry of QQ seems premature at best, and completely mistaken at worst. Why not save your comments for when we actually GET this update?

Cheers,

Aeliah

DarkSkiesx - Dreamweaver

So now that the crazy bright blue cleric dude has left..

Omg has anyone seen the new archer skills. QQ

I want a 800% 2s channel nuke. Or a magic version of plume shell.. b:dirty

_blood_rain - Sanctuary

Aeliah, do you ever actually lose to an archer in a situation where you can see them and aren't being ganked by several people? When you are being ganked, which class/classes do you know you can eliminate the easiest?

How can you seem to be so observant and still be so immune to some of the most basic information/common sense?

When was the last time a really good archer beat you 1v1? Or even had a chance? When was the last time an archer of equal ability/gear to a player of another class had equality, let alone "class advantage" over them in a situation where the non archer was able to see the archer coming?

Everything you have to say about archers comes from a very specific type of experience fighting them(+ limited experience playing), yet you think you can get pushy w/ your ill-informed ideas about the class that some of us have played for years?

Do you just assume that you are just that good to be consistently beating a certain class? You really can't fathom that the archer class may actually have some disabilities?

RankNine - Momaganon

Burnout - Harshlands wrote: »

Purge is weak? Lets look at some numbers to see whether this is true.

Assuming a wiz is just out with only self buff + cleric buffs (the bare minimum nowadays),

21150 p. def with buffs = 83% p resists.
8445 p. def while purged = 67% p resists.

(100-67)/(100-83) = 1.94

So once purge proc goes off, the wizard is now taking 94% more damage than if he had just cleric and self buffs up.

GoF is a 20% chance to do double damage (correct me if I'm wrong). This means on average GoF increases damage by 20%.

So 20% vs 94%. Purge has a much lower proc rate, but once purged most classes aren't able to recover from it. This is also only assuming he's running around with armor buff, but in most cases, it also purges magic shell, spirit's gift, and beast king's inspiration as well.

Would you really give up purge proc for GoF, even given those numbers? Ask a sin to kill a wiz/mystic/cleric with buffs up. They'll tell you how stupidly hard it is, even with GoF, unless they get REALLY lucky.

judging from your reply i come to the conclusion that you didnt read my post at all.
and yes i would give up purge for anything, i can still use my lunar bow or r8r or whatever for purges - just like other classes do.

o0shay0o

my r9 bow rarely purge in NW or TW, and there was a time it didnt proc at all in one NW

id rather have something that let me use my archer skills than letting me auto attack till purge proc...

Aeliah - Dreamweaver

Well gee, do I lose to archer in 1vs1? Not usually*

I'm the wrong person to ask that question though. The question you should be asking is,

'Do I regularly lose to 'anybody' in 1vs1? The answer is still, 'no'. Clerics are very strong in 1vs1, my gear is good, and I practice a lot.

*Exception: deity archers can win---because they can charm-bypass me if they get a purge/crit when I'm near half hp and debuffed with, say, extreme poison. There was a particularly memorable 1vs1 against Heartz in the pk tourney. He had every buff under the sun, making him nearly as tanky as a jades archer, but with the advantage of doing way more damage. Because of how many buffs he had in, I couldn't see my own sleep or seal of gods debuff on him, and I completely botched my combos. He eventually did a stealth triple spark, purge, and I was dead before I could do anything... I assure you it was definitely a charm bypass.

I'll still usually win against a deity archer, but they have a much better chance than a jades archer. In fact, they have a much better chance than most classes in general (qualifier: I haven't fought a deity-build of every class yet). If I fight a jades archer, the fight could go over 20 minutes, but I"ll probably win in the end. If I fight a deity archer, the fight will almost surely end in under 5 minutes, but I stand a decent chance of losing.

Archers vs. others: I have a video I'm currently uploading of our faction tourney. In there you'll get to see an archer popping spirit of defense, and then proceeding to do quite well against everybody else in 1vs1 situations. There is a particularly interesting fight where he goes up against the tankiest mystic in server for nearly 15 minutes... after close shaves on both sides but neither managing to finish the battle, the fight eventually ended when his charm ran out. He pretty much rolled everybody else, including a beautiful metal crit that bypassed charm of a +10-12 barb, and your typical will surge > dps combo on a well geared demon psychic. I also regularly watch archers fighting in west pvp, and the archers seem to do just fine there... perhaps I'll go grab some fresh footage. And it goes without saying that archers do more than fine in group pvp.

Archers are not weak. If you feel weak, it is probably just you.

For *my class*, purge is a lot worse than zerk. I think honestly which proc scares you the most depends on your class quite a bit. Purge worries classes with heals more, because these classes don't often have their hp floating near half... they can heal to full within a second (mystic), 2 seconds (cleric), or several seconds (wizard/psychic). For heavy armor classes, purge is probably worse, because most zerk-crit damage is physical (exception is a seeker metal zerk crit; fortunately a seeker by itself will not purge you---not likely anyway). For light armor classes, though, I can understand zerk seeming to be scarier. You can often avoid purges due to your mobility (archer) or tidal protection (assassin) but you aren't able to quickly get your hp to full like healing classes.

Here is how I see the power of purge against my class. Lets say its a group situation and I'm healing or dding away.

A psychic starts to hit me. I tank it. A wizard joins in. I tank that too, probably start healing myself. A cleric and mystic start hitting me, I start kiting and spam healing to tank all this massive damage... and I can still manage to outheal all of this damage. My ironheart is very strong, and I can purify off most debuffs.

Now add in a single archer, and suddenly all of my defense gets randomly tossed out the window. Hit, hit, purge, dead. Often my charm won't tick when this occurs, because with multiple people hitting and my ironheart heal instantly gone, the hits land at same time and combine to bypass charm.

Any group pvp situation, I can tank a number of regular dds. But add in just one purger, and my survivability plummets.

Honestly, zerk crit worries me a lot less when I'm fully buffed. Sure, I can get charm-bypassed with zerk crit. But the odds of it happening at just the right hp (has to be near half) and when I'm debuffed, and when the enemy actually gets the zerk crit on a HARD hitting skill... its honestly quite rare. I can recall roughly 3 times it has happened in the last month or so of pvp and NW and TW... and one of those times I had also just been purged (was carrying flag too so couldn't use genie).

In comparison, I don't even bother keeping track of how often I die to a purge. You might even say, the reason I can keep track of zerk-crits so well is BECAUSE they so rarely kill me. Generally the rule of thumb is, you need to purge me first before you can consider killing me (which is pretty true of most endgame jaded classes, I think we could all agree).

Really, jaded characters fighting each other in full buffs endgame is just a lose-lose proposition. Unless one of them is an idiot, they'll have difficulty killing each other *quickly* regardless of class. This rule doesn't really apply to people who purge though, because as long as the purger survives long enough (not difficult with buffs in), they'll get a purge off, and either end the fight right there and then, or else they have a sizeable advantage for the rest of the fight.

"Archers are too honorable to enter fights with buffs in, so they totally deserve to get additional self-buffs to make them as tanky as other classes. But don't touch their dps/crit/range/purge/ though!" - Totally legit /sarcasm.