Possible change to armor handling: increase damage reduce, decrease soak effect.

[Tzar]

Dumben the game down is Paul´s speciality

While i would love that i can avoid gettin killed in 2 hits by Str builds this change is not really needed

This change would really do alot dmg to the current game then good

[Punisher]

I am reluctant to agree on this since it involves some major nerfing and changing of game mechanics.

First heavy armor, it is kept in place by the upkeep and not really a problem, and except people with full strenght builds in lordly plates anyone with a balanced build and decent weapon can take down an enemy with ~60 armor in 3-4 hits. After the january patch, I have yet to see those tincans who go tearing through enemies surving dozens of hits so I don't really understand why an armor nerf is in order.

Second, any strenght oriented build will be heavily nerfed. With power strike being a lot less important, going higher than 5 or 6 would be pretty pointless since stacking agility would bring much more benefits. I can imagine the current situation reversed, with most people going for agility builds and wearing light-medium armor. Also ironflesh would be even more useless, hitting strenght/balanced builds further.

Ranged and especially archers will be heavily buffed. With reduced soak, they will also be encouraged to go for agility builds, since 4-5 power draw would be more then enough if you can just stagger everyone to death using a fast bow, like the khergit or strongbow and agility would offer better accuracy and speed.

1h+shield will be heavily buffed as well since with powerstrike being less important they will be able to stack agility and outspam their way to victory.

The hardest hit by this change would be 2h,polearms and cav. 2h/polearms will go for agility stacking as well but in melee combat 1h+shield will generally have the upper hand due to nerfed armors and significantly faster weapons. Both 2h/polearms and cav will be a lot more vulnerable to ranged.

To try balancing it
- damage on all melee weapons will need to be nerfed to make up for the lower powerstrike impact and avoid only agility builds being viable
- archery will need to be reworked, either by lowering bow damage - a significant damage nerf would be required to make up for the soak nerf and force archers to invest in power draw, or by severely nerfing accuracy so it requires more WPF, keeping high agility builds in order
- 1h weapons will need further nerfing after the overall melee weapon damage nerf, either lower damage or lower speed in comparison to 2h/polearms since damage being less important will provide a significant indirect buff for them
- all pierce damage weapons will need further nerfing to make up for the soak reduction
Also a full stat and heirloom respec (is that even possible since the market was implemented?) would be necessary considering the major changes.

I just think that the current situation is fine, just wait for WSE and take out the random used armor value calculation, it would fix most problems addresed without requiring complete rebalancing.

Since the game is now more balanced then ever and considering the long time it took for it to reach this balance, the advantages of implementing this don't seem to make for all the trouble it will cause. Rebalancing it from the start will be impossible and since I am not looking forward on more months of imbalanced weapons, nerfs and whining I voted on leaving it as it is, no need to fix something that's not broken.

[Tzar]

Paul if u wanna fix something how about you start with xbows and formula 1 race horses instead??

[ArchonAlarion]

I wish armor glanced more and Health was decreased.

Your armor should protect you from damage, but if a shot does go through, you should pay for it heavily.

The gold expense of armor can be modified accordingly.

[Largg]

Am I only one who thinks glances happen really rarely? Ok, it's understandable if you're a level 10 peasant you'll most probably glance from a tincan. But on higher levels, that's really rare thing to happen. Considering unexperienced or new players, isn't there a "skip the fun" option if they feel saddened by the amount of glances they get early in the game. Besides, heavy armor currently is kinda mixed trade, being slow and having greatly reduced wpf is something not everyone is willing to trade.

Having really low soak values would also make tincans dance in a silly way when horde of peasant archers starts shooting at them  .

[Lech]

I am reluctant to agree on this since it involves some major nerfing and changing of game mechanics.

First heavy armor, it is kept in place by the upkeep and not really a problem, and except people with full strenght builds in lordly plates anyone with a balanced build and decent weapon can take down an enemy with ~60 armor in 3-4 hits. After the january patch, I have yet to see those tincans who go tearing through enemies surving dozens of hits so I don't really understand why an armor nerf is in order.

Second, any strenght oriented build will be heavily nerfed. With power strike being a lot less important, going higher than 5 or 6 would be pretty pointless since stacking agility would bring much more benefits. I can imagine the current situation reversed, with most people going for agility builds and wearing light-medium armor. Also ironflesh would be even more useless, hitting strenght/balanced builds further.

Ranged and especially archers will be heavily buffed. With reduced soak, they will also be encouraged to go for agility builds, since 4-5 power draw would be more then enough if you can just stagger everyone to death using a fast bow, like the khergit or strongbow and agility would offer better accuracy and speed.

1h+shield will be heavily buffed as well since with powerstrike being less important they will be able to stack agility and outspam their way to victory.

The hardest hit by this change would be 2h,polearms and cav. 2h/polearms will go for agility stacking as well but in melee combat 1h+shield will generally have the upper hand due to nerfed armors and significantly faster weapons. Both 2h/polearms and cav will be a lot more vulnerable to ranged.

To try balancing it
- damage on all melee weapons will need to be nerfed to make up for the lower powerstrike impact and avoid only agility builds being viable
- archery will need to be reworked, either by lowering bow damage - a significant damage nerf would be required to make up for the soak nerf and force archers to invest in power draw, or by severely nerfing accuracy so it requires more WPF, keeping high agility builds in order
- 1h weapons will need further nerfing after the overall melee weapon damage nerf, either lower damage or lower speed in comparison to 2h/polearms since damage being less important will provide a significant indirect buff for them
- all pierce damage weapons will need further nerfing to make up for the soak reduction
Also a full stat and heirloom respec (is that even possible since the market was implemented?) would be necessary considering the major changes.

I just think that the current situation is fine, just wait for WSE and take out the random used armor value calculation, it would fix most problems addresed without requiring complete rebalancing.

Since the game is now more balanced then ever and considering the long time it took for it to reach this balance, the advantages of implementing this don't seem to make for all the trouble it will cause. Rebalancing it from the start will be impossible and since I am not looking forward on more months of imbalanced weapons, nerfs and whining I voted on leaving it as it is, no need to fix something that's not broken.

I call it bs. Did you even read Urist's suggestion ? If so, you don't understand the game mechanic.

This change would not make number of hits required to take down something lower. It will increase number of hit required to take someone down.

High str are currently the way to go, changing it to make balanced build the best build is good move. Full agi will not dominate with the patch, full agi characters even currently hardly glance. Ironflesh will be just as useful as currently, maybe even better as more hits will be required to take people down.

Ranged will not be buffed, it won't one-shot people down like currently.

Powerstrike still will be very important for 1h, no change here.

Armor will be BUFFED, not nerfed. Just plate will be 'nerfed' indirectly as it will stop forcing people to glance off, all normal armor will be buffed. Cav will be hit just because their lances will not instant kill everyone, but it's good news actually. 2h and poles will be just as good as always.

[Kafein]

I chose buff both but my opinion is keep soak as it is and buff the armor reduce.

[DrKronic]

The current way of avoiding glance (using blunt weapons or Pierce if u are low powerstrike) is better than a solution that causes high armor wearers to take more hits and inadvertently buffs all spear/Pike lolstabs(I.e. Pierce attacks)

I wish u would fix Pike thrust hitboxes(supposed to glance at extremely close range but instead we have the machinegun stab)

THIS WOULD  actually make lolstabs and lawlpiking even worse and more used

Also this would nerf cut damage since if reduction from a 80 armor set of heirloomed plate and gauntlets added to needed weapon and buffed armor heirlooms

Pierce being even better and blunt gets weaker too, sounds like alot of unintentional bad consequences to get rid of an issue that really only occurs to fail builds

I mean just change weaponmaster so that agility over 15 actually gives u a meaningful increase to swing speed or damage if you want ago builds to work again, heavy armor guys already take many hits to down, and being interrupted by super fast peasants with butter knives while in full plate sounds retarded

Honestly sounds like a failution to a nonexistent problem

All the damage and heirloom nerfs mean most people take multiple hits anyway

[Punisher]

I call it bs. Did you even read Urist's suggestion ? If so, you don't understand the game mechanic.

This change would not make number of hits required to take down something lower. It will increase number of hit required to take someone down.

High str are currently the way to go, changing it to make balanced build the best build is good move. Full agi will not dominate with the patch, full agi characters even currently hardly glance. Ironflesh will be just as useful as currently, maybe even better as more hits will be required to take people down.

Ranged will not be buffed, it won't one-shot people down like currently.

Powerstrike still will be very important for 1h, no change here.

Armor will be BUFFED, not nerfed. Just plate will be 'nerfed' indirectly as it will stop forcing people to glance off, all normal armor will be buffed. Cav will be hit just because their lances will not instant kill everyone, but it's good news actually. 2h and poles will be just as good as always.

You missed the effects reduced soak will have. Number of hits required to take something down won't be lower but without glancing and lower damage being more effective against armor what reason would there be for going above 6 PS for example if you don't gain anything significant from it? Stacking agility would be much more useful. Full strenght builds will get nerfed in a way that will encourage balanced builds. No need to nerf them further.

Ranged will be buffed since with reduced soak their hits won't glance. Take archers for example, it would be much more effective to stay at 5 PD and stack agility, giving improved speed and accuracy if you can stagger your target to death. Think of the machinegun archers before the january patch, it's a bit exagerated comparison but the principle is the same.

Powerstrike won't be as importat for 1h since without glancing and more effective lower damage staying at 4 powerstrike for example and stacking agility would provide a much better advantage then going for a balanced/strenght build.

[Damug]

Buffing reduce and decreasing soak certainly seems reasonable.  When I put on my plate armor I can take cut attacks all day long, but as soon as someone with a blunt or pierce attack looks at me I go down in 1-3 hits.

[Paul]

I had the feeling with my numberous alts that powerstrike is too important. I find myself stacking it even with 0 melee wpf "pure" ranged builds. It's just so important to be able to interrupt someone in melee.
0 wpf is ok because the influence on damage is low and the speed loss can be compensated with personal skill. 0 PS is.. a challenge because one has to charge up every hit against a tin can and hope for a decent dice roll.

 I don't like the luck factor. It's ok for me if I need 8, 10 or 15 hits as long as I don't bounce of with hit number 7 on perfect range and sweetspot position just because of a high armor roll.
For Baldrider: The bad sweetspot glances will still happen. The penalty here is very big and still reduces the damage below the glance treshold. Good positioning and decent hit angles are still needed to overcome soak.

[Punisher]

I had the feeling with my numberous alts that powerstrike is too important. I find myself stacking it even with 0 melee wpf "pure" ranged builds. It's just so important to be able to interrupt someone in melee.
0 wpf is ok because the influence on damage is low and the speed loss can be compensated with personal skill. 0 PS is.. a challenge because one has to charge up every hit against a tin can and hope for a decent dice roll. I don't like the luck factor.

And why would low PS be more rewarding then any other "power" skill? Don't take it wrong I'm not whining about 0 PS people being able to hit without glancing, just going on the same rationality. Obviously 0 PS people not bouncing won't be a problem, but PS being not really important will make agility builds the way to go. You might need more hits in order to get a kill but the difference will be way lower then it is with the current armor calculation system and stunlocking your enemy while spamming him to death will be well worth it.

[Paul]

PS would still be very important for dealing damage. It would just lose some importance for overcoming the glance threshold. Furthermore powestrike gives alot of advantages such as better chances for crushthrough, better stun, better knockdown chance(within limits) and not to mention that it is quite a difference if I can dispose my opponents with 2 or 3 instead of 5 hits - especially on the battlefield.

[DrKronic]

But pure PD all wpf in archery wpf builds with no PS should suck in melee even with high IF and good armor u can't take many hits

So a buff for 0 powerstrike characters and level 9 characters? Just rebalance how much wpf u get with agility to fix the agi "nerf "

By the way your trying to reinvent and possibly ruin the great fluid combat system to make up for  the agility nerf YOU created? Lol

Just seems so much work and potential unbalancing and unintentional consequences to fix a Dec created issue,  before the ago nerf any build actually worked, go backwards

And I can't shoot or kill people with 0 PD or 0 PT, why give ranged guys who can run away forever more advantages

Learn how to use speed bonus and positioning

[Thomek]

I'm absolutely for this, as it reduces randomness and trades it for the skill of players.

Would be great for ninjas of course, since we have a high probability of glancing because our distance to enemy is often too close. (because of katana short range)

I suggest going a little bit over top with this in the first patch, then perhaps reducing the effect in the next. (To keep the trolling rep of the devs alive!)