Dragon Ability feedback

[Frith-Rae]

This was our style of fight for years and years.

It's what'd happen with GR nerf. I was here to see how bad it was back then.

Well its how I"ve always played and continue to play, bcause I consider gold rage an "IOH CRAP" ability that I Use in ONLY those situations, as its suppose to be used - because I have that old hoard mentality .

But anyone can experience that playstyle and what its like to wait for all those ability timers, and feel how under-powered those abilities are - just don't use GR unless you're about to die, and don't even use SS unless its realy necessary.

But I think a GR nef would be perfectly fine - as long as SIMULTANEOUSLY the other abilities got their timer cooldowns shortened, and several of the ones meant to be "bigger damagers" (i.e. ravage, galewind, etc.) got their damaged upped a bit each to make up for the nerf to GR.

[Dragonboy]

Well its how I"ve always played and continue to play, bcause I consider gold rage an "IOH CRAP" ability that I Use in ONLY those situations, as its suppose to be used - because I have that old hoard mentality .

But anyone can experience that playstyle and what its like to wait for all those ability timers, and feel how under-powered those abilities are - just don't use GR unless you're about to die, and don't even use SS unless its realy necessary.

But I think a GR nef would be perfectly fine - as long as SIMULTANEOUSLY the other abilities got their timer cooldowns shortened, and several of the ones meant to be "bigger damagers" (i.e. ravage, galewind, etc.) got their damaged upped a bit each to make up for the nerf to GR.

While I agree with your suggestion at the end of your post, but I do hope that you know that by refusing to use Gold Rage you are severely weakening yourself in combat. As level 100 ancient not only does it make T5 mobs a lot more difficulty then needed, it also makes most T6 mobs near impossible.
This old hoard mentality you currently still have is just no longer needed so why weaken yourself needlessly.

[cauri_order]

While I agree with your suggestion at the end of your post, but I do hope that you know that by refusing to use Gold Rage you are severely weakening yourself in combat. As level 100 ancient not only does it make T5 mobs a lot more difficulty then needed, it also makes most T6 mobs near impossible.
This old hoard mentality you currently still have is just no longer needed so why weaken yourself needlessly.

That's pretty much the point - dragon melee combat pretty much revolves around using gold rage every cooldown. The devs could, in theory, maintain the same level of damage, by reducing gold rage damage, increasing the cooldown and as Frith stated, simultaneously decreasing cooldowns on the leveled abilities and increasing their damage.

Nice, quick (dunno about easy) way to liven up dragon melee combat. I'd much prefer cycling through several abilities every 30-45 seconds instead of spamming 1 attack every 15 seconds.

[Frith-Rae]

Yes, Cauri, Exactly.

I'm use to playing games where you're using more than one attack to kill stuff. That you have a wide vareity of means at your disposal - and that using ALL those attacks gets the SAME job accomplished as using one ability.

The fact that the above statement is not true about dragon fighting - that as dragonboy you stated - to not use this ONE ability is to severely gimp yourself- is a sad fact.

The fact that apparently I could literally (from what I'm gathering what others have said..) REMOVE almost every other dragon fighting ability off my toolbar and just keep SS/GR on there, spiked scales, and shield of gold(which is actually not on my toolbar as I hate the direction of using hoard for all our abilities) and be just fine - is to me not a "working as intended." Or at least, it shouldn't be.

I do understand that by not using it every fight I'm gimping myself. Honestly I can also say I've not battle many things at my level for years due to being stuck in crafting mode and everytime I go out to try and fight something equal to myself I die in short order (wether I Use GR or not), leaving me frustrated and unwilling to run all the way back to repeat the death.

But no I understand what you're saying DB.

I'm just feeling that dragon combat, as Cauri said, could be so much more interactive and about choices - we have 10-12 fighting abilities. The fact that most dragons use 1-2 of them for EVERY SINGLE FIGHT, tells me the *whole system* is a bit borked. Not just the one ability.

I hope that what comes from this thread - however - is not just a GR Nerf and everything else left the same. (or even better, a GR nerf and a "we're working on the other abilities but we went ahead and did this - you'll get the rest in a year." Though honestly, as I'm bitter towards gaming devs as a whole, it wouldn't surprise me if this happens. I hope I'm wrong.

I would hope to see as I said before - IF there is a GR nerf (better be a subsequent hoard cost decrease...) - that simultaneously the other dragon abilities that SHOULD be strong contenders (not necessarily bite and tail whip but hey you can tweak all of them would be great) get buffed (and continue to not cost hoard...), their timers reduced so that you can fight more than one fight every 3 minutes, and therefore allow GR to be a real "oh crap" ability, that isn't *required* to beat anything 20 levels under you and beyond...

But to me timers are as equally important in my points as the damage. If every other ability was brought in line to be as effective as a slightly-nerfed GR, it wouldn't really make any difference in a fight if they all continued to have 1-3 minutes timers.

And breath of fire..oy..don't even get me started. Shameful!

[LOVWYRM]

to be honest- I do not quite understand parts of this dicussion here:
I use all my abilities, spells and all my breaths ( and I love the breaths- they make a hell of damage- though I had to find out how to make them more effective). I would not survive if I did not.
And I play that way from the very beginning- getting better by experience.

If someone chooses to use only GR- its the players choice.
DO NOT NERF GR!!

It will be nerfed automatically, if the player wants his other abilities to be more powerful.

I am very satisfied with how I am atm, with the choice and variety of "weapons" I have. There are only a few bosses I cant solo (and they are not ment to be soloed^^)
I do not envy the drags who make a lot more damage with GR- while they are waiting for gr to return- I keep on fighting and heal a mate or myself.
And I can change tactics if a mob proves to be resistant to my atack.

I mean-I`m nothing special- just one of our kind.
If I should ever get that Reklar- Scale (*sigh*^^)- I even would be more powerful.

Maybe- I just did not get the point of that discussion

[AmonGwareth]

to be honest- I do not quite understand parts of this dicussion here:

imagine how we feel. We really don't understand the discussions here. Particularly since my first post included this line:

Please note that we are NOT looking for feedback on Gold Rage or Drulkar's Wrath or the Breath Attacks. Thanks!

Heheh

That said, I've made all the changes I plan on making for the foreseeable future.

[LOVWYRM]

(I was talking about GR-sry- ^^corrected it in my post above)

[AmonGwareth]

I was talking about GR-sry- ^^

Its okay... And you are welcome to discuss it. But I want to make clear that we arent' planning on changing anything with GR or DW or the Breaths at this time. In fact, I'm done mucking with dragon abilities for a while. Will be moving to other things.

[LOVWYRM]

lol
just realized that I repeated myself at least 3x in this thread

pls call it "authenticity" instead of "Alzheimer`s" ^^

[Dragonboy]

But no I understand what you're saying DB.

I'm just feeling that dragon combat, as Cauri said, could be so much more interactive and about choices - we have 10-12 fighting abilities. The fact that most dragons use 1-2 of them for EVERY SINGLE FIGHT, tells me the *whole system* is a bit borked. Not just the one ability.

I totally agree with you Frith-Rae and apart from Menacing Presence which I now remember that I have forgotten to place it back on my hotkey bars after I did some re-organizing I use ALL my abilities.

And yes I use Gold Rage a lot, and why shouldn't I? It is my primaire attack ability, which all T1-T4 and some T5 die in 1 hit by Gold Rage (named bosses not included).
However to be honest I still prefer and love to see my dragon dance by doing a tail whip, ravage, any Breath weapon and perhaps a snarl in between.
It just makes me sad sometimes that the timers are way to long for some abilities so that the dancing becomes way to short for my taste and thus out of annoyance finish the dance by a Gold Rage.

[Frith-Rae]

imagine how we feel. We really don't understand the discussions here. Particularly since my first post included this line:

Heheh

That said, I've made all the changes I plan on making for the foreseeable future.

Even though its pointless now - I would like to point out its why my first post was more about "all the other abilities"..and not really about GR and Breath :P

[Vahrokh]

Well its how I"ve always played and continue to play, bcause I consider gold rage an "IOH CRAP" ability that I Use in ONLY those situations, as its suppose to be used - because I have that old hoard mentality

You are right in your "hoard mentality".
Dragons are portrayed as being very very concerned at keeping and increasing their hoard.

Making hoard a vastly available consummable to use in day by day activities "works" as game mechanic but it kind of taints the roleplay value.

But anyone can experience that playstyle and what its like to wait for all those ability timers, and feel how under-powered those abilities are - just don't use GR unless you're about to die, and don't even use SS unless its realy necessary.

Well, besides the "under powered" aspect (which I am sure it's debatable for some), there's another factor.
When I play(ed) my biped, I had a set of tools to pick at the appropriate time and apply them, possibly in an intelligent way (expecially when mobs used to be more sensitive to certain attacks in certain moments).

As dragon all I have to do is to cycle thru the stuff. What happens is minimally connected with how and when I apply stuff.
The debuffs never looked like something I'd really make a living or a death of. The exact spells were just not effective enough to be battle changing. The breaths were never nothing but mild icing on the cake.
I could have had 1000 general buttons called "bite" and spammed all of them for a similar result, except maybe on savagely rare cases of really vulnerable mobs vs a certain exact damage type.

This is what I always despised about playing a dragon in Istaria. The rare interaction, the low skill barrier (gone lower with the "all migthy" GR that fixes so many mistakes). Not being powerful or not.

So, when Istaria economy died and when I lost my 110 x 110 plot (EU player) I lost the last reasons for me to play.
Too bad, playing dragon is really something I'd love, if only this implementation was not SO boring.

While I agree with your suggestion at the end of your post, but I do hope that you know that by refusing to use Gold Rage you are severely weakening yourself in combat. As level 100 ancient not only does it make T5 mobs a lot more difficulty then needed, it also makes most T6 mobs near impossible.
This old hoard mentality you currently still have is just no longer needed so why weaken yourself needlessly.

Imho turning Gold rage in 4-5 "lesser" attacks a la silver strike, each one to activate in a smart way, would do dragons much more justice than the "I WIN" one button.


All I'd love to see is turning the playing dragon experience from Bland into Grand

[cauri_order]

imagine how we feel. We really don't understand the discussions here. Particularly since my first post included this line:

Heheh

That said, I've made all the changes I plan on making for the foreseeable future.

Yes you did specifically state you were not looking for feedback on Gold Rage and I apologize if the thread was derailed

In any event, Gold Rage was brought up (sorry) since it ties into the feedback from some of your players regarding dragon activated abilities.

In all honesty, I hardly log into the game. I simply find the combat to be mind-numbingly boring. I wish I felt otherwise, but clicking one button, in my opinion, just isn't that much fun.

But hey, it's Virtrium's game to do with as it will. I even continue to keep my subs active to support the game.