AOC - General Discussion II

[Pyros]

Assassins suffer from a lot of different issues.

First, for whatever reasons, they don't have any snares. They have a few CC, but only at the very bottom of their feat trees, which means you won't get them before lvl 60 or 70 depending on the tree(poison has snap kick at 60 I think). Combine that to the shitty range of 1h weapons in general, and the squishiness of assassins, and you get a good combo for getting kited like a fucking idiot by anyone smarter than a couple of stones.

2nd, stealthing sucks in PvE. It's good in PvP, unless you run into one of the many invisible pbae/ae, but it's a one chance thing, since you can't restealth in combat, you can't restealth if your group members are in combat, and you can't restealth most of the time if someone is close to you. In PvE, what I heard is, if it's not night, you're not sneaking up on ANY mob. Ever. Even when maxxed hiding, items which increase it, higher level, coming from behind and trying to stay in shadows.

3rd part is, their dps is nothing to write books about. It's not very high at all, and it's single target dps. A HoX will do more burst, with better CC(and that's saying a lot), and his large swings+breath will hit more than one target if people are packed. Barbarians do the same, less bursty, but better CCs. Assassins get NEITHER. They get their stealth attack which is bursty, somewhat, until lvl 40, then it removes like 40% of a mage healthbar at most. As a HoX, my "stealth" attack is called BURNING DEATH COMBO OF HELL and takes about 100% of someone's healthbar. Or 140%. Sometimes even 250%. It's not very stealthy though, but still ^^.

If you want to play a rogue archetype, play a barbarian. Even rangers are very average, not to say shitty, at high level. I have yet to see a ranger do good damage ever in group pvp, they stand there lighting up with fancy colors and weird stances, totally owning our ToS by taking his life down to 50% in one hit, then taking another 10secs to get another hit. I usually run up to them and one hit them once we're done with their friends. Assassins usually just fall over from random AEing, after running around behind a ToS waving his toothpicks only hitting air.

Barbs on the other hand... They can hurt. Bad. When a barbs turns toward me, it's stam pot and active blocking time.

[matmanx2]

Totally disagree with all the bitching about Conall Valley. I think it's probably the most beautiful zone I've seen in any game, period. That song combined with the the mountain vistas, waterfalls and ruined, war ravaged landscape can be quite moving IF you let yourself get immersed.

Its my feeling that Conall Valley was designed to look and feel as "real" and immersive as possible and that the gameplay elements were secondary. I love this. To me it truly is a little like existing in another world for awhile, especially if you are reading and paying attention to the quests and whats going on around you.

The counterpoint to this being the WoW design philosophy where you set out to make the game and build the world around it. God knows I've had alot of fun with WoW over the years but always with an "amusement park" mentality. Go to zone "X" and do "Y" quests which leads to loot "Z" and so forth. Reminds me of when I was a kid and we'd all go to Showbiz Pizza or Chucky Cheese and buy our tickets so we could go hit the attractions. Fun, but not exactly immersive.

Edited to add that if your goal is powergaming and leveling as quickly as possible then I can see why Conall Valley would annoy you. There is alot of running around and it is fairly spread out.

[Gilgamel]

Ok, one of the 80s here surely knows how to fix this. We have tried repeatedly unbinding our ravine/frost swamp/oasis instances, disbanding, and zoning in. The mobs all respawn, but they are still locked at their earlier levels. We did manage to get one person's instance to reset to their current level, but we did nothing special and it was not repeatable. These zones are supposed to reset, but they do not, and I know there is a trick to it because people are farming it at 80 who also had previously been locked to lower instances. If anyone could hook a brother up with some knowledge I would appreciate it, because it is driving me crazy.

[Fog]

I enjoy my Assassin at 40. In groups, I certainly feel like I'm doing a ton of DPS; I have to usually back it down a few notches to avoid drawing aggro. In PvP, I have yet to lose a fight against someone my level or below, and frequently kill higher-level players in 1 or 2 combos if I get the jump on them when they're distracted with a mob. (This probably says more about how dumb my opponents are than how awesome I am.)

I can do solo PvE with no problem. I find that I can solo two mobs of my level no problem. I can solo three or four at once if I get a little lucky or use Cat's Paw or Golden Lotus Extract (three-minute abilities.)

You get Snap Kick at 30 if you spec into it. (I'm Lotus so far.)

My single two biggest issues with the class are both things that probably count as "bugs" -- you can't hide if a groupmate is in combat, and it's difficult to combo a moving target since you are frozen in place during the last hit.

[Elerion]

Originally Posted by Fog

it's difficult to combo a moving target since you are frozen in place during the last hit.

Irrelevant, sort of. As long as he is in range when the cast bar begins at the start of the final hit, he will be hit by the combo. It still means you have to catch up after the combo finishes though.

[Twobit Whore]

Originally Posted by nu_11

Sounds like you're trying too hard really. Level 50 is getting pretty far into the game for now. It's 2 week old MMO and a lot of things are to be expected.

Level 50 is barely halfway into the levelling process... and numerically exp-wise it isn't even close to halfway. That's not to be expected...

P.S: I don't get what's so wrong with the interface. No problems for me. Want to elaborate?

Oh nm. If you think this then you probably don't mind level 50+ to be unfinished either.

[Rhym]

is active blocking actually worth it? I've not used it once. I'm playing a caster so I always try to a kite a melee and never thought to stand there trying to block.

[spronk]

Almost every class at endgame has flaws that are either good balance decisions (everybody suffers, nobodys happy) or stuff that will get looked at. Soldiers are good at PVE, not so hot at group PVP (conq AOE rez is insanely awesome though). HoX's are #1 endgame DPS, but have to be in melee range and die easily in both PVE/PVP. Rangers/assassins are good single target DPS, poor AOE dps (plus assassins have to be in melee range). Necros run out of mana and pretty squishy. Demos are squishy. Bear shamans are front-line healers but paper thin and die often. etc, etc. The only classes I don't see complain much are conqs, barbarians, TOS's and POMs, although I'm sure they have their flaws too.

Some of the complaints are valid imo (assassins, necros, bear shamans are all endgame weak) while others reflect more an issue of some classes being better at PVE or PVP, but not both.

The only thing that bugs me about the startup message right now is that it sounds like the Gaute guy is saying "well, AoC is mostly done, but because we're really cool guys we'll go back and fix some minor bugs and add a little bit of extra content for you". No motherfucker, AoC is not fucking done, get that 50-80 shit fleshed out and introduce a fuckton of new content in that range and also at endgame. Its probably a english thing, but I really hope they plan on introducing new content monthly or bimonthly for free, instead of trying to pull some EQ style 6-month expansion pack bullshit.

active blocking is definitely worth it against some classes, if you see a ranger push your shields to top (control-2) and you'll like deflect 70% of his damage. Against other classes it doesn't do as much (as a bear shaman the only class I've had insta-death problems with is rangers, and active blocking lets me at least live and get away).

[Tolanin]

Originally Posted by spronk

Almost every class at endgame has flaws that are either good balance decisions (everybody suffers, nobodys happy) or stuff that will get looked at. Soldiers are good at PVE, not so hot at group PVP (conq AOE rez is insanely awesome though). HoX's are #1 endgame DPS, but have to be in melee range and die easily in both PVE/PVP. Rangers/assassins are good single target DPS, poor AOE dps (plus assassins have to be in melee range). Necros run out of mana and pretty squishy. Demos are squishy. Bear shamans are front-line healers but paper thin and die often. etc, etc. The only classes I don't see complain much are conqs, barbarians, TOS's and POMs, although I'm sure they have their flaws too.

Some of the complaints are valid imo (assassins, necros, bear shamans are all endgame weak) while others reflect more an issue of some classes being better at PVE or PVP, but not both.

The only thing that bugs me about the startup message right now is that it sounds like the Gaute guy is saying "well, AoC is mostly done, but because we're really cool guys we'll go back and fix some minor bugs and add a little bit of extra content for you". No motherfucker, AoC is not fucking done, get that 50-80 shit fleshed out and introduce a fuckton of new content in that range and also at endgame. Its probably a english thing, but I really hope they plan on introducing new content monthly or bimonthly for free, instead of trying to pull some EQ style 6-month expansion pack bullshit.

active blocking is definitely worth it against some classes, if you see a ranger push your shields to top (control-2) and you'll like deflect 70% of his damage. Against other classes it doesn't do as much (as a bear shaman the only class I've had insta-death problems with is rangers, and active blocking lets me at least live and get away).

fight a guardian i am pretty sure they will 1shot brshm especially in group pvp.

[Draynar]

Originally Posted by spronk

active blocking is definitely worth it against some classes, if you see a ranger push your shields to top (control-2) and you'll like deflect 70% of his damage. Against other classes it doesn't do as much (as a bear shaman the only class I've had insta-death problems with is rangers, and active blocking lets me at least live and get away).

Thats shielding and ya it works great against rangers I found on my HoX after being rapped for so long.
Active blocking is holding down the default X key. It slowly eats it stamina.

I havn't extensively tested active blocking at all on my HoX but in pve when a mob turns to me as it always does if it's a big shit kill me in 4 hits boss I'll turn on active block and last until my stam runs out. (basically I start parrying like it's going out of style and very little hits) I'd like to see it tested vs magic and rangers thought.

[Gilgamel]

Originally Posted by Tolanin

fight a guardian i am pretty sure they will 1shot brshm especially in group pvp.

Guardians are going to get the dogshit nerfed out of overreach in the next month.

[Hatorade]

Originally Posted by Gilgamel

Ok, one of the 80s here surely knows how to fix this. We have tried repeatedly unbinding our ravine/frost swamp/oasis instances, disbanding, and zoning in. The mobs all respawn, but they are still locked at their earlier levels. We did manage to get one person's instance to reset to their current level, but we did nothing special and it was not repeatable. These zones are supposed to reset, but they do not, and I know there is a trick to it because people are farming it at 80 who also had previously been locked to lower instances. If anyone could hook a brother up with some knowledge I would appreciate it, because it is driving me crazy.

Delete the quest and get it again...as they are quest zones.

[Rythonn]

Originally Posted by Valaden

Most likely is. I've seen complaints about Overreach IV hitting for 4k but 16k is a bit extreme.

I hope they dont nerf Overreach because knowing MMO developpers, they would nerf all iterations of it. Only rank 4 seems unbalanced. Rank 3 and below are perfectly balanced.

Rank 4 can one-shot light tanks, priests, clothies.
Rank 3 can rarely one-shot clothies.

There are so many things wrong with this I don't even know where to start. The guardian with 9k hps should not come close to ever one shoting anyone.

[Jaded]

Thanks for the info, think I'm gonna give assassin a shot, since neither DT nor necro seems very appealing.

You'll regret it. In fact, it'll probably make you want to quit the game outright.

I don't know what this guy saying he's never lost a PVP fight in 40 levels is smoking. When every class in the game has some form of CC but you and you have zero countermeasures to deal with it (Excellent Balance might work 50% of the time if you're lucky), you're gonna get fucked no matter how "good" you are.

Pyros already mentioned a lot of problems with the class. Lowest armor, lowest health, lowest weapon range, etc. It's a very bad combination with no benefits to make up for it.

Oh, and someone mentioned Snap Kick as CC. That's a low level Lotus tree feat and it works on cloth wearers only. That's right. Don't even try it on anyone wearing light or higher, it won't work. At all. Ever.

DoTs seem pretty broken, in that they don't do much damage. Stances don't seem to add the damage they're supposed to. Stealth attack does less damage than many other classes' single-shot combos, even some 2hander regular swings.

[Gilgamel]

Originally Posted by Hatorade

Delete the quest and get it again...as they are quest zones.

I've tried that a million times and I'm starting to think it is an issue with a corrupt quest log or something. For example I can grab the villa quests and it will be for 20k exp at 75, then I zone in(my instance is broken there too) and when I zone out and check my log it is an earlier version of the same quest that only gives 8k exp. For some reason it is like it is not completely deleting the quests from our books and instead is giving us the exact same one we did at a much earlier level thereby locking our instances.