Why is the Heavy lance still around?

[Soldier_of_God]

Lance Cav is absolutely one of the most easy classes out there, requiring little to no proficiency to couch a tin can and one shot him. also, you can pretty much be whatever build you want to be when off the horse, although slightly weaker because of the 2-6 riding it takes to ride, taking 6 points off the table. There is good reason to nerf lances because of this, and as a result the most commonly used lance, the heavy lance, has now been nerfed.

HOWEVER, I feel that -11 speed and -5 pierce for a weapon that is only 10 units longer is ridiculous.

Couching hardly ever gets a kill on a moving target, or a target with more than medium armor on and full health, where a "lighter" lance, has more propensity to kill, typically always killing anyone caught off guard by a couched lance.

Does anyone think that this needs a little bit of reevaluation? I feel that this is a little heavy handed, and i feel that the damage should be more, or at least the speed increased. To me, this is a worthless weapon not worth owning, because the lance is better in almost all situations, except for length, which the great lance solves wonderfully.

It is worthy to note i usually ride a destrier and have 92 wpf and 8 powerstrike when using this weapon, as my main is a 1h/pole arm cav or "Knight", and has been for a long time.

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Heavy Lance
weapon length: 190
weight: 1.8
difficulty: 11
speed rating: 74
weapon length: 190
thrust damage: 23 pierce
swing damage: 17 blunt
slots: 2
Couchable
Can't sheath

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Lance
weapon length: 180
weight: 1.5
difficulty: 10
speed rating: 85
weapon length: 180
thrust damage: 28 pierce
swing damage: 16 blunt
slots: 2
Couchable
Can't sheath
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Light Lance
weapon length: 175
weight: 1.5
difficulty: 9
speed rating: 91
weapon length: 175
thrust damage: 27 pierce
swing damage: 16 blunt
slots: 2
Couchable
Can't sheath

[Pentecost]

>Why is the Heavy lance still around?

1.) 10 weapon length is only an insignificant thing on paper. If you have to face off another lancer with good timing that's using a Heavy Lance with just a normal Lance, you will lose the majority of your engagements unless you are far better than your opponent is.

2.) The Heavy Lance being slow actually is a boon once you're used to the timing of it because of how speed bonus is calculated. A weapon with low speed hitting a target moving towards you at high speed applies a larger bonus than a weapon with high speed hitting a target moving towards you at high speed.

3.) The weak couching you're describing is a moot point. Besides the fact that the reason why you use a Heavy Lance in the first place is to actually lance with it, I have heard that the damage penalty applied to couching in the last patch or the one before that was reverted (need official confirmation on this).

Just out of curiosity, how good would you say your lance timing is?

[Torben]

a few points:

The heavy lance

had to be nerfed
can still be used highly effective
is to weak compared to the other lances considering its substantially higher price.

it excels in:
reaching game vs great lancers
can keep your horse from taking damage when attacking aware opponents due to its reach
gives you a longer window of opportunity (low speed) and a wider attacking diameter when in mids of the inf battle

really gay is:
that it is so weak against the normal lance due to its very low speed.
(it should be the best anti-cav lance.)
way too predictable because of its low speed,  rendering it almost useless in many situations


my suggestion:  keep its other stats,  but increase its speed (nearly) to that of the normal lance

this would make it au par (damage vs length trade off) with the other lances vs infantry and give it an advantage vs. cav (first hit).

my two cents to make her worth her money

[Torben]

>Why is the Heavy lance still around?

1.) 10 weapon length is only an insignificant thing on paper. If you have to face off another lancer with good timing that's using a Heavy Lance with just a normal Lance, you will lose the majority of your engagements unless you are far better than your opponent is.
in lower skill levels this is true.  unfortunatly,  the predictability of the HLs slow attack,  combined with its long stun etc  makes the lancer win vs the heavy lancer if both are of same high skill level


2.) The Heavy Lance being slow actually is a boon once you're used to the timing of it because of how speed bonus is calculated. A weapon with low speed hitting a target moving towards you at high speed applies a larger bonus than a weapon with high speed hitting a target moving towards you at high speed.
I was certain this was true,  however cmp clarified that it is not

3.) The weak couching you're describing is a moot point. Besides the fact that the reason why you use a Heavy Lance in the first place is to actually lance with it, I have heard that the damage penalty applied to couching in the last patch or the one before that was reverted (need official confirmation on this).
confirmed.  its couch is stronger then the other lances's due to its reach advantage.
Just out of curiosity, how good would you say your lance timing is?

edit:
I just couched a peasant archer at full speed with 7 riding on my champ courser on flat ground with heavy lance,  and he did not die. 

[CrazyCracka420]

Heavy lance really is only useful for one thing now, lancing other cavalry lancers.  I feel like my lance is superior to the heavy lance in most ways.  I just can't go head to head against someone with good timing on their heavy lance or I will die.  Lance is far better for engaging infantry, and for taking out cavalry when not going completely head on.  cavalry are most useful when engaging infantry, and typically it's not worth it to go actually engage another lancer (your odds of survival are much lower than strafing infantry who are fighting your own infantry)

The damage is too low on it however, 23 pierce is a joke.  Even with 7 PS it was terrible trying to kill anyone in strat battles with that piece of shit.  People are better off with the lance, or great lance at this point.

[Torben]

Talk all you want guys, but truth is that most people (in EU) switched to the Lance. I see this every day.

Most dedicated lancers now use Masterwork Lance, and only way you can get one yourself is to loom it. (demand on market is insane)

Heavy lance, on the other hand, can be bought right now on marketplace for less than two loom points.

All in all, great job by balance team.

it was a good job,  they just did a small overkill.  putting it into a fair equation with the other lances instead of insanely better (before nerf) or insanely worse (post nerf) status can now be done easily,  that spot has practically been triangulated


              HL    L 
damage   -      +
reach      +(-)  -(+)
speed      -      +
price       -       +

whilst the only HLs advantage is not ubiquitously applicable,  as the insanely slow speed gives the target the possibility to maneuver in and out of reach while the HLs attack is triggered.   the reach can only effectively be used in most situations if upping speed.
by doing that we would have two great alternatives:

HL  with a true reach advantage,  which is worth the higher price and lower damage due to a broad spectrum  of use (sry my englisch sucks a lot this morning)
L    with a good damage advantage,  making it better in many cases then the HL,  but not all.

short: 
always hitting first,  but costing more and doing less damage
vs
hitting harder and costing less at a small reach disadvantage

this is a great solution in which both lances would have their rightful place.

[oprah_winfrey]

I still use the heavy lance, and I still think it is slightly better then the lance. It used to be the heavy lance was far and away better then the lance, now the margins are closer.

To me, the ability to lance people head on is worth the damage I am giving up.

Also, I think the price should be dropped a bit though.

[CrazyCracka420]

I still use the heavy lance, and I still think it is slightly better then the lance. It used to be the heavy lance was far and away better then the lance, now the margins are closer.

To me, the ability to lance people head on is worth the damage I am giving up.

Also, I think the price should be dropped a bit though.

You wouldn't say that if you weren't using a MW Heavy Lance.  Balance should not be done around masterworked items, which is exactly what they did with the heavy lance.  23 pierce is a joke.  I had a MW Heavy Lance and 26p was too low for me too, the normal lance is 28p damage and I started using that over my MW Heavy Lance.  Ended up trading my MW heavy lance and +1 wisby gauntlets for a MW Lance.  Best trade I've ever made.

The Heavy Lance is a joke weapon now, only useful for going up against other cavalry, and even then cavalry are usually more useful not trying to take out enemy cav.  Don't try to use it on a rouncey or if you have less than 7 ps (especially if it's not MW)

[BADPLAYER_old2]

Range is everything if you want to play Cavalry in any way other than only backstabbing unaware (or bad) people, and that's why the Heavy Lance will always be the best one.
If you are gonna use the normal Lance I don't see why you wouldn't just use a 1h/2h weapon since they do more damage anyways, the normal Lance gets outranged by too many weapons to be effective.

[CrazyCracka420]

I always agreed with your statement, but with only 6 power strike, even riding a +3 courser, 26pierce was not enough for killing ground troops effectively. That's what finally made me justify giving up the 10 length for the speed and damage of the lance.  The Heavy Lance is still superior when going against other lancers, but that is literally the only situation it's better than the lance.

As a cavalry lancer your best strength is in killing ground troops, not engaging other cavalry lancers (it's more dangerous going against other lancers than infantry, and it takes longer to engage them than it does to ride through stabbing infantry every few seconds, you can kill more infantry and quicker than you can trying to hunt down other cavalry). 

Lance is far superior (at this point) to the heavy lance when it comes to stabbing or couching infantry, the 10 less reach is not putting me at more risk than if I had a heavy lance when I fight ground targets, not to mention I can stab more people (since it's quicker) and I'm doing more damage (31pierce).  If you have A.D.D. (as I usually do, and most other cavalry) then yes, you will be engaging other lancer cavalry even though you can kill more people by going after infantry, so heavy lance would still be superior there.  In any other instance, the lance is better (besides going head to head versus another lancer).  I can still take out people who have heavy lances, I just try not not to go directly head to head against them.

Love my MW lance, and I wouldn't go back to the MW Heavy Lance even if someone traded me +3 loompoints on top of it.

[Gurnisson]

Love my MW lance, and I wouldn't go back to the MW Heavy Lance even if someone traded me +3 loompoints on top of it.

... which you could make a +3 lance out of

[CrazyCracka420]

... which you could make a +3 lance out of

I wouldn't trade my MW Lance for a MW Heavy Lance, even if they threw in 3 loom points on top ...

[Torben]

I wouldn't trade my MW Lance for a MW Heavy Lance, even if they threw in 3 loom points on top ...

lies ^^

[oprah_winfrey]

I wouldn't trade my MW Lance for a MW Heavy Lance, even if they threw in 3 loom points on top ...

You wouldn't trade your +3 lance for a +3 heavy lance and a +3 lance???

[CrazyCracka420]

You wouldn't trade your +3 lance for a +3 heavy lance and a +3 lance???

Ok I clearly wasn't thinking very logically...you got me there.  I would take that trade for +3 loompoints.  However, I wouldn't do it for +2