Current Balance: are you happy?

[Kamirane]

my GF needs some Balance. Give her bigger boobs, more libido and let her eye color switch when her mood changes.....

[San]

What do you mean with off?

You answered your own question pretty well.

Hoplites got hurt bad by the latest patch, I can still do really well but it is just incredibly unreliable and frustrating for me to play right now. The more difficult stab sweetspots and the removal of the slight polearm stagger makes people get in your face pretty badly. Doing any stabs at less than perfect reach is very risky and I can't seem to grasp how to make it work consistently.

All of this. I tried hoplite for a few weeks and I was stuck performing close spinstabs at people's feet or close up to down stabs, unable to use a good portion of my reach unless I receive a large speed bonus. "Off" means that it's difficult to get a feel for the stab and it visually doesn't make much sense when you see it hit/glance, an awkward feeling. Lack of intuitiveness makes it feel like the old 1h stab. Final performance was 2.6:1, decent/mediocre, but a noticeable hit compared to what kills would have been achieved/deaths avoided before the patch.

I mentioned long spear / pike weapons since I believe that they may have similar issues, but I haven't played them myself.

[Jona]

I still think IF is bad compared to other skills.

Ummm... what? The difference between having 2 and 6 IF on my characters is HUGE. Sure, it is a 4 point difference, and those points could be spent on other things like shield or riding, but for a pure melee build IF is a necessity nowadays. With stabs still being the go-to attack, that is a lot of pierce damage coming your way. Armor doesn't help so much in that case, so the more IF the better. With 6 IF I can withstand a solid 1 - 2, sometimes even 3, hits more than with 2 IF. Stacking +3 plate on an agi build is simply foolish since anyone with a good pierce or blunt weapon will still cut you down in only a couple hits. IF is absolutely necessary for some builds, and sure it might be less useful on other builds, but it is still not something to dismiss entirely, ever. Being an agi build for ages, I always dismissed IF as a luxury. Now that I actually have IF I can only say that I have definitely been missing out all this time.

[San]

I think you're trying to argue against points I wasn't even trying to make. Also, going from 8IF build to 0IF, my opinion is the opposite to yours. You can make up for it with better armour, which is overall more efficient. You don't need plate to get to 60+ armour, which is all you need if you want to feel tanky.

Ummm... what? The difference between having 2 and 6 IF on my characters is HUGE. Sure, it is a 4 point difference, and those points could be spent on other things like shield or riding

You're agreeing with me. 1 IF is not worth 1PS, 1ath, WM, and riding by far. Even on a non-shielder, 1 IF vs  1 shield is debatable. 2 to 6 IF is a smaller difference than 2 to 6 WM, 2 to 6 riding, and 2 to 6 shield.

With 6 IF I can withstand a solid 1 - 2, sometimes even 3, hits more than with 2 IF.

3 hp of damage per hit? Makes perfect sense.

[Jona]

I think you're trying to argue against points I wasn't even trying to make. Also, going from 8IF build to 0IF, my opinion is the opposite to yours. You can make up for it with better armour, which is overall more efficient. You don't need plate to get to 60+ armour, which is all you need if you want to feel tanky.

I am arguing that IF is perfectly useful as is... you were arguing it isn't useful enough.

You're agreeing with me. 1 IF is not worth 1PS, 1ath, WM, and riding by far. Even on a non-shielder, 1 IF vs  1 shield is debatable. 2 to 6 IF is a smaller difference than 2 to 6 WM, 2 to 6 riding, and 2 to 6 shield.

All a matter of opinion. There are plenty of guys who prefer str builds and would want to maximize their total health above all else. If you are an agi build, sure IF isn't going to be as useful as more of what you're 'supposed' to use.

3 hp of damage per hit? Makes perfect sense.

Suit up in fully loomed plate, then have a wimpy 1handed sword start wailing on you.

[San]

I guess I got hung up on the 'dismiss entirely' part. I think it feels like other skills are worth 3-5 IF points instead of ~1. I believe we agree on that, but agree to disagree over whether that's okay or not. I believed it was okay in the past, since WM wasn't so great either, but now IF is alone.

To me, I can only look at the actual increase it gives, dismissing the "I take X many more hits!" as just a psychological effect.

Edit: to go into more detail, I think the general hp levels are fine, but IF has too little of an impact compared to strength giving "enough" hp by itself. This was how I felt with free wpf from leveling, although this isn't as bad. Since Hp is coded heavily into the game, IF is kind of stuck imo.

[GOBBLINKINGREATLEADER]

Ummm... what? The difference between having 2 and 6 IF on my characters is HUGE. Sure, it is a 4 point difference, and those points could be spent on other things like shield or riding, but for a pure melee build IF is a necessity nowadays. With stabs still being the go-to attack, that is a lot of pierce damage coming your way. Armor doesn't help so much in that case, so the more IF the better. With 6 IF I can withstand a solid 1 - 2, sometimes even 3, hits more than with 2 IF. Stacking +3 plate on an agi build is simply foolish since anyone with a good pierce or blunt weapon will still cut you down in only a couple hits. IF is absolutely necessary for some builds, and sure it might be less useful on other builds, but it is still not something to dismiss entirely, ever. Being an agi build for ages, I always dismissed IF as a luxury. Now that I actually have IF I can only say that I have definitely been missing out all this time.

I don't know dude I played with 0 IF in NA_1 a lot recently topping the scoreboard pretty EZ when I tried. However for strat 1 IF really gets you screwed with the ranged metagame and having no armor at all.

[Jona]

To me, I can only look at the actual increase it gives, dismissing the "I take X many more hits!" as just a psychological effect.

Not going to argue, I am sure it is somewhat psychological... but honestly ever since I've actually put IF into my build it's been so much better. Now you assume that each hit I was talking about did some 3 hp each, or something... which is not necessarily the case. You can function with only 1hp left. Many times I walk away from a vicious ganking with nought but a sliver of health left and know that is was the small increase in health from my IF that saved me. Heck, the small increase in IF saves me even when I am wearing my peasant gear a heck of a lot... I guess that on average 2 swings from most weapons would be enough to cut someone down who has only 2 IF, but any IF over that amount is just enough to limp away from such an encounter, and that can mean a world of difference.
 
Also I feel that our views might differ because you are a battle player, where you can consistently get 1-shot by cav or ranged, making total health not matter much, or pick your fights such that each scenario is more in your favor, be it 1v1 where you just shit on the poor bastard or something... while I play mostly in siege where willingly jumping into a moshpit is mandatory at times. Sometimes surviving in a moshpit on the flag for even a single second or two longer than you would have with lower IF can be a gamechanger, making IF more useful in my siege-player's eyes.

Also, I will admit I also forgot to mention that along with the 4 IF increase I also had a 3 strength increase... my bad. In my opinion if they removed the health bonus from stacking strength, and made IF the only way to  increase your max health (and changing the amount of health it gives) then IF would be as useful as athletics or PS. The problem is that each point in strength gives you 1 hp, which is a 2.63% increase per point over the base health (38 hp, according to the character planners). Meanwhile, each point in agility "makes you move a bit faster" which I think is a 0.5% running speed increase, or something like that. Granted now that agility also provides wpf, it is more balanced, but a single point in strength should not give such a large increase, while each point in IF should grant more.

I don't know dude I played with 0 IF in NA_1 a lot recently topping the scoreboard pretty EZ when I tried. However for strat 1 IF really gets you screwed with the ranged metagame and having no armor at all.

I can do quite well in battle with no IF, as well. Especially as my shielder alt (who shuns IF in favor of riding), and you are a shielder, no? Having that shield in place of IF makes a whole lot of difference... IF and footwork is a non-shielders' only defense against ranged. As I said above, IF is more useful for us (non-shielder) siege guys, I think.

[San]

I was just poking fun at you when you said you take 3 more hits with 4 more IF, I know that's not what you meant  (or if I read wrong).

Strength gives a strength / 5 raw damage bonus and +1hp. 2 strength = 1 IF

Agility and athletics affects acceleration and running speed at approximately 4 agility = 1 athletics.
At 0WM, 3->8 agility gives you the same benefit as 1WM. At higher levels, you need much more than a 5 agility increase to = 1 WM.

I think this secondary effect is similar to the strength / 5 bonus, while the movement speed mirror's strength's relationship with IF. I'm not saying IF is bad, since it has some use with the +3 strength increase. I'm trying to argue that it's comparatively not as good due to the needed buffs to WM (and partly the shield armour buff making shield more desirable).

Had this concern for a long time, although most disagreed back then: http://forum.melee.org/general-discussion/will-if-be-too-weak-after-the-wm-change/

[722_]

You answered your own question pretty well.

All of this. I tried hoplite for a few weeks and I was stuck performing close spinstabs at people's feet or close up to down stabs, unable to use a good portion of my reach unless I receive a large speed bonus. "Off" means that it's difficult to get a feel for the stab and it visually doesn't make much sense when you see it hit/glance, an awkward feeling. Lack of intuitiveness makes it feel like the old 1h stab. Final performance was 2.6:1, decent/mediocre, but a noticeable hit compared to what kills would have been achieved/deaths avoided before the patch.

I mentioned long spear / pike weapons since I believe that they may have similar issues, but I haven't played them myself.

Its noticeable with my long awlpike now, i cant really use the reach to my advantage any more because you just glance, get stunned and then get hit. but i also tried hoplite and its not as bad as that