Christo I don't find the game frustrating. I find frustration in the 'lobbyists' who fight desired changes with abandon, rather than working with people to advance the dialectic and find balanced ways of implementing suggestions. I want the game to evolve and see the balance extend to more subtle and micro-scaled advantages and disadvantages, keeping tactics more important than finding the most effective 'build' in any 'class'.
While I like 1h, I am not strictly biased towards it. Personally I just dislike the current shield balancing/representation, and I think it could be made better without vastly changing game balance.
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Regarding your comments on my comments:
You disagreed on a point of fact about 1h vs. 2h damage. Look at the damage numbers for each weapon, it does make a difference when armor starts factoring in. Also I use an elite cavalry shield regularly, and the same PS that can make 1h weapons as you say so great, makes the anti-shield 2hand weapons able to take out an elite cavalry shield in 2-3 hits. Further, shield use is not just RMB. You still have to aim the shield, and factor in it's size and shape, and against groups worry about how to squeeze around to block multiple hits at once.
Even if it's limited to 4 of your weapon choices, 2handers still have four weapons with a move that does blow through any shield. And all of those weapons have knockdown as well. Shielders have no different option than anyone else against these weapons, dodge and swing, no matter how good their shield is.
The complaint about recognition is not about my ego or personal score, it's about me seeing aspects of teamwork which people should be rewarded for. A peasant who can get lots of assists around the battlefield is much more valuable to his team than one who runs in for a lucky kill only to get slaughtered right away. It'd also give people a way to evaluate how team-vs.-frag-oriented different players are. Anyway that's for the assist thread more than here.
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I'd really like to see shield bash. I think it should have the same stun effect and only hit one person, but have shorter range and hit a bit faster and harder than a kick. Because the kicks go straight out but a shield bash goes on an inside-outside/guarded-unguarded arc, I don't think kicks should counter them, or that it should only be possible in a tight window. Kick already stuns through a raised shield.
I want shield bash for box-in situations so a shielder can have a chance to make momentary breathing space when faced by multiple attackers, without the full exposure (time-wise) of a kick. I don't think it would break balance. It would give those with the skill to use it well
a chance of getting out of some of the tight situations that are hard to fight out of with 1h&shield.
