Shield Rebalancing

[Jona]

In the past few weeks (and let's be real, for all of crpg's history) there has been a lot of talk about ranged balance, and naturally their perceived counter, shields, were mentioned several times. I too am in agreement with many who say a good starting point to balancing ranged would be to re-examine shield balance, since imo shields have always been gimped. They provide no advantages other than the abiltiy to block ranged (no small advantage, mind you), however they come with many drawbacks. Here are my suggestions for how to make them more accessible to everyone, and also less of a burden for those that choose to bring them. Note: I'm not advocating all of the following suggestions should be implemented at once, but even then, I don't foresee shields being completely OP.


1. Remove a shield's effective weight (when it is carried on your back)

• One of the major drawbacks from taking a shield into battle is that even when it is not in use, it is severely hampering your movement speed. As it stands, carrying a shield into battle is like carrying an extra set of mail armor in your pocket. Now, we obviously have more ridiculous weights in the game, such as those of certain ranged weps, however that is in place for balance reasons. Are we really concerned with people running around at their maximum potential speed when their shield is unusable? Honestly, there is even an argument to be had to remove a shield's impact on movement even when it is on your arm, with only blocking slowing you down (although this admittedly may be pushing it a little).
• Carrying a shield on your back is bad enough as it is since depending on the size of the shield, they can severely hamper your vision, thus having a negative effect on your combat ability. This hindrance is not accounted for in any stat on the website or in-game, as it is merely visual. If we expect people, even 2handers and polearmers, to carry shields into battle when they have no intention of using it in melee, we shouldn't make it feel so bad to simply carry around. Having both a deduction in movement speed and field of view is honestly too much for something that you currently aren't even benefiting from, hence why dropping it is far more likely to happen. Imo, we should never be encouraged to outright drop a part of our toolkit when there are other options available. Previous devs even made a quick-drop function for shields because this was more likely than people simply sheathing them.
• Proposed Alternatives: Severely reduce the weight of shields when sheathed instead of removing their weight entirely, or severely lower shield weight across the board if it is possible to rework the crushthrough mechanic. As it stands, the heavier the shield the more resistant to crushthrough it is, but obviously that increased weight comes at a huge price (especially when having a lighter shield simply lets you outmaneuver a maul swing much easier).
• "But muh realism" counter-argument: Carrying things on your back/close to your center of gravity is the best place to put them to them in order to shrug off much of the added weight. Since sheathed shields are attached by straps across your shoulders, they realistically shouldn't be slowing you down much at all in this position.

2. Remove/severely buff shield speed

• I suppose that the initial thought behind balancing shields was that since they block all directions at once, there should be some drawback to using them (other than the less-than-obvious-to-a-filthy-casual movement penalty), so the devs made shields much slower to block with than any weapon. Assuming you could stomach the movement nerf a shield gives you, this has always been the second biggest thing that made using a shield in melee unappealing. When everything else about melee combat is smooth and fluid, shield blocking has always felt unnecessarily sluggish and gimped.
• Using a shield in melee shouldn't detract from your ability to block things, quite the opposite in fact. As it stands, the lag between hitting RMB and actually blocking is so bad with some shields that I'd prefer losing the ability to block all melee directions at once and instead manually block each direction if I could have melee-weapon-block-speed. Sure, having yet another stat to differentiate between shields is nice, I guess, but the very premise behind it is just bad. Even with a decent connection to the servers, I've had more "wtf I totally blocked that!" moments when using a shield than with any melee weapon, even the slowest ones. And that can't be helped, given that there is a "block startup time" on shields that isn't present on weapons. This problem is only exacerbated by the delay between what I see and what the servers sees (understandable), and the fact that the "blocking window" doesn't always line up with the shield-blocking animation.
• To those thinking that shields deserve to be slower at blocking because they allow you to 1 v. many with "relative ease," let me remind you that shields break, leaving you character staggering for a moment, and it's something that melee weapons never do. If people are concerned with shields becoming too similar with the removal of a speed stat, that's fair, although imo shields being selected based on their hp, armor, and shape (read: ranged-blocking effectiveness) should be enough. Let's not forget the most important factor of all when selecting a shield: its looks.
  
• Proposed Alternatives: If you aren't content with making all shields block as quickly as melee weapons, at least buff shield speed on every shield by a significant percent.
• "But muh realism" counter-argument: If you're thinking "this argument is stupid, how can I block as quickly with a big heavy steel shield as I could a tiny little 1hander?" well, you're dumb, 'nuff said. Irl, you don't drop your guard and let your shield fall to your side uselessly every time you make an attack. You can attack and block at the same time when using a shield, something that would obviously be OP and is therefore not present in the game. That said, blocking with a shield irl is in many cases faster than switching your weapon from an attacking to a blocking position, and therefore in-game it should be at least as fast.

3. Remove shield difficulty and increase shield skill effectiveness

• Apart from all the above drawbacks to bringing a shield into battle, perhaps the one that turns off the most players is that you need to dedicate points to do so. Just like you can spec your character to be a polearmer, but still carry a 1h or 2h into battle, I think the same should be true of shields. Let anyone have access to them, but let those that want to be a shield specialist stand out. This can be done by reducing shield stats across the board and simultaneously buffing shield skill, so that it would be something as effective and necessary as powerstrike is for melee builds. Sure, you physically can fight with a melee weapon with 0 PS, but it is highly inadvisable. Let that be true for shields as well... replace their shield skill requirement with a strength requirement, and make shield skill actually do something.
• If you don't remove or lower shield requirements, how are you ever going to really encourage people to "get a shield?"
  
• Proposed Alternatives: Reduce shield requirements across the board, giving people plenty of decent options with only 0-2 shield skill.
• "But muh realism" counter-argument: It doesn't really take special training to duck behind a piece of wood when you see bows pointed your way...

4. Add slots for shields to the website

• Let us know what we're getting into before we buy something and get in-game only to find out it won't work out.
• Please and thank you.

Let me know what you think about my suggestions in the comments below, and don't forget to like and subscribe to see more of my future content.

[Nehvar]

I've played a mod or two where a shield on your back will stop projectiles that connect with it** (I don't think it gets the "forcefield" while on the back but I could be wrong).  I think that adding this functionality to cRPG shields would be a nice addition to the game.


**does not affect melee attacks from the back just to be clear.

[Jona]

I've played a mod or two where a shield on your back will stop projectiles that connect with it** (I don't think it gets the "forcefield" while on the back but I could be wrong).  I think that adding this functionality to cRPG shields would be a nice addition to the game.


**does not affect melee attacks from the back just to be clear.

I've heard rumors of there being something similar in crpg where the shield's armor value was added to your body armor, but only in a rather small area on your back (not even the entire area it covers in the case of larger shields). So in other words you'll still get hit, it just won't hurt as much. And no one really knows where exactly the on your back is considered covered. Would definitely be cool if the shield simply remained "active" against projectiles when on your back, similar to how it still blocks projectiles when you're holding it, but not blocking (although it is hella annoying how this stuns you for a brief moment).

[Gravoth_iii]

Agreed, and i think point 1 could be a global thing. Anything carried on the back could be set to 0 weight and i think it would only make for interesting playstyles.

[Umbra]

I've played a mod or two where a shield on your back will stop projectiles that connect with it** (I don't think it gets the "forcefield" while on the back but I could be wrong).  I think that adding this functionality to cRPG shields would be a nice addition to the game.


**does not affect melee attacks from the back just to be clear.

This is currently irrelevant because a shield on your back slows you down by a lot.

[Jona]

Agreed, and i think point 1 could be a global thing. Anything carried on the back could be set to 0 weight and i think it would only make for interesting playstyles.

I don't disagree, but I also don't want to bother thinking about the possible ramifications this could have on kiting ranged. Should there be no disadvantage for carrying a crossbow into battle? Idk, maybe. But that's a topic for another day, and another thread.

[PoisonedTail]

If you are using shields to duel, you are doing it wrong. Shields should be used to block arrows and attack in group fights safely. Tito (a shielder) has been dominating the scoreboards in strat. No one can even come close to the amount of points he gets. It all depends on the player behind the shield. They are perfectly viable.

[Jona]

It all depends on the player behind the shield.

Yeah, uh, duh. Same goes for every class. You could hand pick several top players and use them as an example as to why X class is balanced or OP, but you'd be wrong in doing so. Likewise, you could point at a few below-average players for the same classes and make the flawed argument that the class must be weak since they're at the bottom of the scoreboard. No point in citing one specific example in a matter like this.

They are perfectly viable.

Not saying they aren't. Sure, they block projectiles, but beyond that they are pretty useless. The purpose of this post is to encourage more players to bring them along by making them more appealing to use, instead of having only one function while weakening your other combat abilities. If shields could do more than simply block ranged attacks, then we might see more people start to use them. At the very  least, they shouldn't detract so much from your other abilities, such as your running speed when they aren't even in use. The objective of this thread isn't to get shields buffed, per se, but rather to give players more of a reason to bring them along and spec their builds to do so.

If you are using shields to duel, you are doing it wrong.

Agree to disagree, then. As of now shields are definitely a hindrance in duels, but there really isn't any reason why they should remain to be. It kinda hurts your argument that you point out how a player is good with shields so therefore they must be balanced, but if he sheathes his shield whenever he duels, is he really even a shielder? Or is he just a swashbuckler that hides behind a piece of wood when the arrows start raining down on him?

[PoisonedTail]

Not saying they aren't. Sure, they block projectiles, but beyond that they are pretty useless. The purpose of this post is to encourage more players to bring them along by making them more appealing to use, instead of having only one function while weakening your other combat abilities. If shields could do more than simply block ranged attacks, then we might see more people start to use them. At the very  least, they shouldn't detract so much from your other abilities, such as your running speed when they aren't even in use. The objective of this thread isn't to get shields buffed, per se, but rather to give players more of a reason to bring them along and spec their builds to do so.

For the life of me I cannot understand why you think shields are useless besides blocking ranged attacks. You forget the most important part, they grant your character AUTO BLOCK. There are times I wish I were a shielder when fighting more than one player. As a 2 hander, it is very difficult to block two different directional attacks at once. Whereas a shield can absorb all the blows. Shields should not be amazing in every situation like you want them to be. They are god tier in team fights. Why should they be great in dueling as well?

[Jona]

For the life of me I cannot understand why you think shields are useless besides blocking ranged attacks. You forget the most important part, they grant your character AUTO BLOCK. There are times I wish I were a shielder when fighting more than one player. As a 2 hander, it is very difficult to block two different directional attacks at once. Whereas a shield can absorb all the blows. Shields should not be amazing in every situation like you want them to be. They are god tier in team fights. Why should they be great in dueling as well?

As a non-shielder, you greatly over-estimate the efficacy of shields in group fights. I'd rather have snappy manual blocking over the laggy 'autoblocking' that shields provide, not to mention unencumbered movement that allows me to simply outmaneuver my foes rather than having to worry about blocking every single hit. Once again, you don't seem to get the point of this thread, which is to remove just one or maybe a couple of their hindrances in the hopes of encouraging more people to bring them along to combat the supposed ranged spam that the servers are full of.

[Gravoth_iii]

Indeed the only reason to really use a shield in melee is to counter ranged, or possibly to counter blockstuns as a 1h. I suppose as hoplite for the animation but in general it would be better to just get a longspear or similar. It simply is too much of a burden weight wise where maneuverability is key. I'd still always bring a shield in the current game though because it negates ranged well enough, but it does have that burdening feeling that just isnt very enjoyable, and also doesnt feel needed in a game where ranged is so hated that buffing counters to it wouldnt really bother anyone.

[Jona]

Bump

[gallonigher]

I'm not voting until you come back to cRPG.

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[Tristan_of_Erzoth]

Bump

shields got a buff in the most recent patch in terms of availability. -1 to all shield difficulties

[Jona]

shields got a buff in the most recent patch in terms of availability. -1 to all shield difficulties

Yep, hence why I bumped this. Need less encumbrance. 

I'm not voting until you come back to cRPG.

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Miss you too  bb. <3