The Severe Injustice of Balance between the Dragon Race and the bipedal Races.

[Vlisson]

hmm i like my dragon, ok the difference ingame between lunus and helian is a joke :(

i dont want to see a power increase for low lvl dragons (lvl 0-60)

i would like to see a powerincrease for lvl 100+ dragons

We never got the statement that dragons will gain power fast as bipeds! we have to invest more time, more sweat... its ok for me

but i think if we get ancienthood we will be equal to a (non-multiclassed) biped

and i compare a chaoswarrior with a lunus
Mage with an helian

take a look at a lvl 100 chaoswarrior dealing 150 damage per hit to a lvl 80 mob and a lvl 100 dragon dealing 100-120 damage per hit (and if we count the use of specials then all get more worse)

the damage is only an expample, i dont know if its correct (ive played with an chaoswarrior doing 50% more damage like me but has been 20 lvls below of me

[evilkarl]

Why? Biped damage shields do about the same damage and biped heals blow away the Breeze HoTs, especially since they can be teched to the gills. Try a Quick Powered Revitalize V of Purifying sometime; they are awesome.

No melee biped school gets a damage shield thats why. I have the spell you mention and yes it is nice however refreshing breeze allows you to take much more damage than you would normally. While a revitalise will heal you for lots up front once its cast its gone for 20 sec having a breeze there to cover the difference would be nice

[Pharcellus]

I have not seen anyone in the biped adventurer school on order could you point one out to me?

Oh, don't be obtuse.

I knew entering the game that dragons had no classes, I didn't even follow beta

Yah, but my point was that we had NO IDEA what they would end up doing with the RoP. There was talk of bringing back classes or something similar when the RoP was discussed. Yes, we knew that we had only 2 classes, but we were also assured that it would not be a limiting factor, as AE had "big plans" for Dragons. Well, they still do. I think.

Any XP earn't over 100 is lost to us as well. However we can join a new school and be weak for a period and keep earning xp.

Right, it is only "lost" if you ALLOW it to be lost. We have already lost it, and will continue to lose any more. What, exactly, is my motivation to play a dead-end character, in comparison? To me, it doesn't seem to be about reaping my "reward" for the effort I put into it.

You have a 100/100 Dragon, that is something to show for it. You also have a collection of techs and forms that would probably rival some bipeds.

..and that means what, exactly? How does it help me get the forms and techs I need? How does it allow me to help my guildmates and especially Dragon hatchlings who need to kill Kaa or get Wraith Ectoplasm when my (then) lowly healer biped is of more use to them in accomplishing their goals? My biped healer now gets more forms / techs in a day than my Dragon has ever gotten, partly because he gets invited to hunts because he is more useful. Though I will be able to multiclass him to hell and back in a month or so, and he can hunt them solo.

Of course, you dodged your own point with that rebuttal. The point was that in terms of the EXTRA XP above my two classes, I would have liked to done something useful with it as well, but am denied, and you don't like that I complain about it.

Oh, by the way, you know what that collection cost me, my guild, and my friends to acquire? I can tell you that there is probably no Lair in my future. Plus having the collection is turning out to be a mostly meaningless endeavor, except to be able to make my own stuff and stuff for my guild. Few people bother buying anything from me, even with that extensive collection, because the market is saturated with other Dragons (and biped spellcrafters) who can make the exact same products for themselves and others for free. IE, I don't see Rahndor et al beating a path to my lair to have scales/spells made. However, that's a problem with the game's economic system, and not germaine to the subject at hand, so I don't think we should go down that avenue any further, do you?

[Fireclaw]

A few comments:
1. Dragon breeze HOT spells are awful. They only last 30 seconds and have an incredibly long cast time ensuring the dragon will be hit 1-2x at least while casting it. The amount of healing the provide is almost unnoticeable and insufficient against most mobs. For instance, the very best dragon heal spell available - level 97 quickening breeze V, has a cast delay of 40 and heals just 38-42 every 5 seconds for 30 seconds. Compare to Biped xRegen IV which heals 44 per tick for 30 seconds with a much shorter 20 cast delay and is a full tier lower than the dragon spell. AND can be teched (dragon HOTs cannot be teched).

2. One poster is saying it is ridiculous to compare the time it takes to level 1 class of dragon to 100 compared to leveling 2 biped classes to 100 because the biped needs twice as much exp. Personally, I think its ridiculous to ignore all other factors and look only at exp while ignoring the fact it takes much longer to get a dragon to 100 with all its quests done.

3. All Dragon combat spells cast SLOWLY. Sure Prime bolt might look like it does more damage than many other bolts, but it fires off MUCH slower. Also dragonspells cannot be teched with roots, stuns or mezzes which pretty much mean that kiting as a dragon is very difficult if not impossible. A dragon caster hunting solo has to tank the mobs like a warrior. Without any way to speed up casting, a dragon caster hunting solo is pretty weak except when hunting much lower level mobs.

4. Another poster commented that dragons should have zero evasion but extremely high resistance to all damage types. I can agree with that. Unfortunately, now dragons have generally worse armor than bipeds, worse resistance to different damage types, by far the worst healing, AND almost zero evasion (when I fight mobs my level, they hit me 95% of the time).

PROPOSAL:
1. Raise level cap for dragons ONLY to 150.
2. Complete all missing dragon adventurer quests (recently AE has been adding in dragoncrafter quests, but they seem to have forgotten the adventurer quests). Many of our quests stop at level 40. None go over level 70.

ALTERNATE PROPOSAL:
1. When AE raises the level cap to 120, make it a RATING cap instead of a level cap. That way bipeds would have to choose which classes to level up and if they want to be 120 in one class, then they cannot multiclass. This would help to balance bipeds and dragons as well as possibly making bipeds use more strategy in multiclassing.
2. Complete all missing dragon adventurer quests (recently AE has been adding in dragoncrafter quests, but they seem to have forgotten the adventurer quests). Many of our quests stop at level 40. None go over level 70.

SECOND ALTERNATE PROPOSAL:
1. Add limited multiclassing for high-level dragons. Requirements would be level 100 dragon adventurer, ancient dragon, + hoard req. This way, the current feel of the single-classed dragon would be preserved while at the same time preventing the "game-over" situation dragons are in when they hit 100/100. Right now the only things a high-level dragon has to look forward to are: (1) AROP, (2) lairs, and (3) level cap raise to 120. Once those are all live, probably by the middle of next year, dragons will have NOTHING to look forward to and it will be game over unless something is done.
2. Complete all missing dragon adventurer quests (recently AE has been adding in dragoncrafter quests, but they seem to have forgotten the adventurer quests). Many of our quests stop at level 40. None go over level 70.

[Pharcellus]

I have neither trivialized nor have I denied there is an imbalance...

The comment was not intended to specifically single you out. We're not the only ones in the discussion, ya know.

I'm utterly sick of folks whining about the imbalance w/o offering reasonable solutions...

The problem is that we HAVE been offerring reasonable solutions; what causes these topics to come up repeatedly is someone makes an off-hand comment about the fact of the situation in another thread, and immediately the "you're whining, shut up!" bellyachers jump on it like buzzards on fresh roadkill, and it degenerates from there.

Instead of unfairly characterizing everything we are saying as "whining and complaining" (clue for you: it isn't), how about trying a little compassion and understanding? Stating you are "utterly sick" doesn't sound like you are any more tolerant of our stance than we are of yours, and doesn't engender a very suitable environment for "offerring reasonable solutions".

Pharcellus if you can find anywhere that I have done either by all means produce them...

Always denegrating any mention of the subject fits the bill, in my estimation. "Whining about whining", gotta love it.

I KNOW there is a problem with the balance... and I KNOW that there are MANY problems with HZ.... I will submit to YOU that standing there with a bullhorn yelling that there is a problem without offering solutions is counterproductive and eventually sours the potential support you might gain IF you were to offer real and logical solutions.

As long as there is someone on the other side of the fence, standing there yelling that there isn't, it doesn't leave me with much choice. If you are an innocent bystander who just doesn't like the noise, either ignore it, take up a side, or, heaven forbid, be a part of a solution.

Taking up your own bullhorn to add to the noise won't help.

When you have a reasonable, workable solution then submit it to AE and post it here. Whining and slamming your potential backers isnt wise lest you end up alienating them and instead of having them backing you they are picking apart every solution that you may offer and watching them spiral down in flames.

I hope they like noise, then. [:)]

[Vesuvius]

The Core of the Argument starts with Breath Weapons. The Rest is important, but if you wish to skim through you should read themost important parts at least ;)

Alright, I am sorry it took me longer to get to where I could post again than I expected.

As I stated before, the dragon adventurer school is for the most part well balanced. It seems some of you are starting to understand that, and are starting to realize that those of us (100/100 dragons playingfrom or near the beginning) that really know what we are talking about are not asking for anything handed to us on a silver platter. Here are a few minor tweaks to the school that I think should be added.

Magic:
- Promote Mind equivilant to the Promote Vitality line.
- Two Gifts of Somekind. One should be a gift version of True Grit, the other should be a kind of general all around buff, perhaps a collection of T3-4 biped gift equivilents including alacrity merged into one(at T5 for the dragon gift) that does NOT stack with the Alacrity line. For a third gift, I think a flightspeed gift would be neat.
- Revamp of the Spell HoTs. Currently there are four lines. Two of these are never used. I suggest changing them so that (Spell lines 1-4):

1) Short term Hot, same timer as current. Heals aboutthree times whatthe bestdoes currently for the six tic duration. Single Target.
2) Medium Term Hot, Three times the duration of current, 2 minute recharge. Heals for the same amount as the best HoT. Single Target.
3) AoE Group Version of 1. Higher requirements and slightly less effective.
4) AoE Group Version of 2. Higher requirements and slightly less effective.

-While this is not a balance issue, some actual spell graphics would be nice as well.

Spellbased Equivlants to Melee Specials
This is really more of an inner dragon balance than dragon vs. biped. In my opinion, being that we were forced into one class, there should be equal opprotunites to take the spell path or the melee path. Currently, most abilities are melee based. There should be equally effective abilities on the casting side on linked timers with the melee abilites. (Perhaps a sort of multicast to the ravage, A Primal Dot to the Bite, Epic type attack to gold rage, perhaps a doublecast with damage boost to silver strike, ect). Some abilites already function like this (Determination and Primal Roar for example). I think the system should be fleshed out for all, if not at least most abilites.

Quest-lines
-All ability quests need to go up to level 100.
-Teir 5Dragon's Gift Quest
-Healing Mastery needs to effect HoTs
-Smelting and Stoneworking Quest Lines
-Additional Crystal Quests (Especially when Claw Slots are finished)
-Probably something I am missing here

Breath Weapons
This is one of those places that are really hurting for dragons. Currently two breath lines exist, Fire and Ice/Lightning (depending on faction). Fire is on a five minute timer, Ice/Lightning on a 10minute timer. They have a small area of effect in front of the dragon (assuming they are adults).

I have 26million hoard, about 700k over the maximum cap (to get an idea just how hard it is to max hoard, I know of two other dragons that have a maximum hoard, and that encompasses all of the live shards). My ice breath, IF it hits does mabey 350damage to a mob much lower level than I. Afterwards, it has an effect that lasts for one minute that, while decent, is not all that amazing. Also understand that the breath weapons are on 100% linked timers relative to the time of the ability.

If you went around the world and asked what the trademark ability of a dragon was, about 90% would probably say the breath weapon. As it now stands, I hardly use my breathweapons do to how utterly worthless they are.

I suggest revamping the ability into three sections per type.

1) A breath weapon with the same effectiveness as is currently in the game. Reduced timer to 1 minute recycle for fire, 2 for faction breaths. Fire available to hatchling.
2) Linked timer to number 1. (Fire:3) (Ice/Lightning:5) minute Recharge. Much larger area of effect, much higher damage (Depending on level of ability, % Multiplier of hoard bonus - this is where the extra damage comes from. A dragon with 0 hoard would see minimal difference between this and 1). Ancient/Adult only.
3) Epic style Breath weapon. 30 minute recharge for fire, 1 hour for faction. Linked timer with other epic breath weapons. Massive damage dependent on hoard. Has extra nasty effects. For flame, this would probably be a DoT. Bears a hoard cost of around 1000 for fire, 2000 for faction. Impressive visual and deadly results. Ancient only.

Faction and Fire breaths are not on linked timers, with the exception of the epic version.

Hoard
Ah yes. The big tamalle. This is arguabley the place that hurts dragons more than anything. This is the place where rewards are so far out sinc with the effort it is near sickening. This is the one place that can make the biggest difference in rewarding a dragon for putting effort into their character. Here are some numbers to help you understand what the current system is.

The current (non-cumulative):
100k hoard: 30 breath damage, 120ac
1mil hoard: 50 breath damage, 200ac
25.3mil+ hoard: 100 breath damage, 480ac

As of now, there are three dragons I know of including myself that have reached the 25.3mil hoard point. The amount of effort required is probably somewhere around getting your fourth 100 class in adventuring from the point you maxed out your first 100. Roughly. Someone mentioned something about getting 50 levels of craft experience while getting hoard up and so its worth it. This is untrue. Not only is it not worth it to do untill you can craft mithril scales (even at 100 we are not 2:1 at mithril yet we can mine T6), but that is craft experience you would be sacrificing in deconstruction. Hoard is a completely seperate grind. It is comparable to multiclassing for bipeds, though, minus the rewards.

What Needs to Be Done:
First off, hatchlings should get the exact same bonus they do now. Nothing should change.

For adults and ancients, the system should be altered drastically. There should be multiple sets of teirs within the hoard which grant their own bonuses, one of those being the current teir. All teirs should be based on level and max out at ~25.3mil hoard.

Lets start with the current teir that exists which currently adds 4ac and 1 breath damage (postweighted) per level. At level 100, another 80ac is thrown in there. For adults, armor per hoard level should double to 8ac per level. Breath weapon damage should increase from 1 breath damage to 5. In addition, there should be a 1 damage postweighted bonus to melee and 1.25-1.5 to primal damage.

In addition to this, new teir systems should be added in that follow different numbers. One of these should be health, speed, attack speed/recycle,and stat bonuses, though mostly focused on health. This would have six levels with much larger gaps between.

Another should add in a few interesting active abilites. Perhaps 3 of these within the entire 25.3mil.

The end result for an adult at level 100 with maxed hoard should look something along the lines of:

+960ac
+1000hp
15% Alacrity (Stacks and is Passive)
+100 meleedamage
+125-150 primaldamage
+500breath damage
+200 to all stats
+25 flight speed
3 interesting combat abilites

In my opinion, 25.3mil hoard should be part of the requirement for Ancient. If it is not, then proportionally, that difference in ability should be represented through hoard. Some of you may think the above seems overpowered. If you understood the amount of effort required, then you would see quite clearly that it is not.

Hoard is probably the easiest thing to change and it would have the greatest impact on balance. It would also be nice sometime in the future to have a UI window for it to really see where you were and to see what you were getting out of it.

Scales
This is another place where bipeds get alot more out of it than do dragons. As Teirs increase, the difference just becomes greater. Bipeds should also understand that a dragon cannot use all of his/her scale slots untill level 90 for a total of 10 (excluding the scalepack. I do not count this as a true scale.)

Scales function as the Teir*10 (with the exceptionof the tail scale. For some reason this is as if it were a teir higher)of whatever stat the scale stands for (Armor, Strength, Power, Health, ect). They have no base armor and can be teched normally. Foreleg scales and chest scales can be armor socketed. Wingscales can be speed/velocity teched.

So, a set of T5 armor scales at 100 would give you 510ac.

Two things need to happen with dragonscales. First of all, all scales should have a base armor to them. In my opinion 5ac per teir with the hoard changes would be perfect. Even cargo armor has some base armor to it, why shouldnt dragon scales?

Secondly, being that bipeds get jewlery and alot more slots in general to technique, teqniques should grant a higher bonus to scales to compensate for this. Armor techniques should be techable to armor scales as well.

Something After 100/100/100
Ancient RoP will be neat (hopefully...), but that, just like adult, is a one time thing. Dragons need a way to progress through killing/crafting after they have reached 100. For this I suggest an alternate advancement system much like what Everquest Live offers. It would accomplish the task quitewell without introducing multiclassing to dragons.

And thats it. Again I apologize for taking so long.

[Neon]

I love when dragons use the "don't compare us to monk schools" lines. Why the heck not? I've played a Monk all the way up to 100, and I GUARUNTEE you it was a heck of a lot harder than leveling a dragon to 100. Let's see .. I've got no damage, no spells, no AoE attacks, no damage shield, much worse heals (a single crap HoT and a big 5 min heal at 80), armor every bit as poor as yours (and I leveled to 100 on level 61 armor thank you very much), no quests to improve my skills, no hoard abilities, and I CAN'T FLY!!!![:@]

I'm not saying Dragons are perfect, far from it. I think it would have been best if they just left it like in beta with the dragon schools they had then. No lairs? Yes that is very uncool. No multiclassing? Not good. But having played a pure monk all the way to 100 I more than feel your pain.

This game has lots of problems, and I'm glad to finally leave it behind.

[Fireclaw]

Very well thought out post Vesuvius. Not sure I agree with 25.3 mil hoard being a req for AROP though. If only 3 dragons will ever meet the reqs to become ancient then its not worth it for the devs to spend the dev time necessary to program in AROP.

[Pharcellus]

No melee biped school gets a damage shield thats why. I have the spell you mention and yes it is nice however refreshing breeze allows you to take much more damage than you would normally. While a revitalise will heal you for lots up front once its cast its gone for 20 sec having a breeze there to cover the difference would be nice

Actually, I think that is incorrect. Some of the Specialist fighter schools (Ranger/KNoC?) get the associated damage shield spells from the caster half of their schools. No, they don't get it as an innate ability, as Dragons do (one that has to be quested for, at that), but it is also on a two-minute timer as a result, so you only get to use it every other battle.

Besides, the point is that if you want a decent Damage Shield, switch to the class whose damage shield you want and powerlevel it up to where you get it. Shouldn't take you more than a week to achieve it.

Refreshing Breeze is an ability on a three minute timer. It lasts for one minute, and is only available every other battle at most, usually every 3rd battle. You can cast about 5 times as much healing with a biped healing spell with no downtime, plus you can get at least 2 (Revitalize/Improved Revitalize) that are usable by any class, so double that figure.

The Breeze SPELLS, on the other hand, heal at most the amount of one good teched Revit of similar level, over a 30-second period, with a 1 minute recycle. They are not good for combat heals and, up until recently overrode Refreshing Breeze. Bipeds also get a HoT spell in the form of Generate Health as well, and it is about the same power level as a Breeze.

[Vesuvius]

I love when dragons use the "don't compare us to monk schools" lines. Why the heck not? I've played a Monk all the way up to 100, and I GUARUNTEE you it was a heck of a lot harder than leveling a dragon to 100. Let's see .. I've got no damage, no spells, no AoE attacks, no damage shield, much worse heals (a single crap HoT and a big 5 min heal at 80), armor every bit as poor as yours (and I leveled to 100 on level 61 armor thank you very much), no quests to improve my skills, no hoard abilities, and I CAN'T FLY!!!![img]/Web//emoticons/emotion-12.gif[/img]

I'm not saying Dragons are perfect, far from it. I think it would have been best if they just left it like in beta with the dragon schools they had then. No lairs? Yes that is very uncool. No multiclassing? Not good. But having played a pure monk all the way to 100 I more than feel your pain.

This game has lots of problems, and I'm glad to finally leave it behind.

Monks need work, that is a given. The difference is that while the monk school needs some serious boosts, the dragon adventurer school does not. The dragon race needs boosts. Things such as hoard, ability quests, age, ect have nothing to do with the school other than requirements. A dragon should have the same potential to become powerful as a biped character for the same amount of effort. Being that we cannot multiclass, other mechanics need to exist in place of that. My post above illustrated that.

[Vesuvius]

Very well thought out post Vesuvius. Not sure I agree with 25.3 mil hoard being a req for AROP though. If only 3 dragons will ever meet the reqs to become ancient then its not worth it for the devs to spend the dev time necessary to program in AROP.

Thank you. ::Chuckle:: Well, as I said, that part of the requirement is just opinionated to me. I do think it should be something reasonabley hard to acheive though, perhaps 10mil. So long as the hoard bonus increased with ancient and was an important part of the bonus it granted, I would be fine.

It would be nice if the Devs would sit down with some of the high level dragons and discuss things... too bad the several hours I put into that post up there were probably in vain.

[Pharcellus]

Aye, Neon, I fully support and stand by any Monk player in their quest to improve their class.

I also would NEVER deign to call your pleas for acknowledgement and support "whining", as you have every right to complain.

As much as I fight for my own race/class, I support Monks with the same fervor. It is too bad some of them can't see fit to support me in mine.

[Vahrokh]

But you fly!

All my not newbie guildies made a flying dragon alt or are in the process.
So they first got up an horse power of biped character then in few days pumped and created from scratch a flying dragon to enjoy being powerful AND to fly.
So... all fly or can fly now. It takes maybe 3 days to if you have a fat biped main.
Took me weeks without. Only difference, they play their main and every now and then dust off the dragon to fly a bit around and look at the scenery (it's about all what they use the dragon for).
I got this game to play only as dragon instead and don't want to follow the same way.

My entire point is if you want AE to listen to you then present clear, concise, logical suggestions, sadly most of the dissertation I have seen does not even remotely meet that idea.

All you have to do is look at the beginnings of this thread to see the rants and whines.

I looked at the beginning of like 30 threads about removing machines from the fields (tazoon.com times and some posts here and there in this forum) and who I saw mad at it there was not a dragon.
Guess who was? You. And after 30 threads of your truly clear, concise, logical suggestions, they were ... sent to bin.

Same for ours.
In our case the guy following our race acted so negligently that has been fired.

Me and others are a fully year that created threads about the bugs and the artificially imposed limits etc., in all forms.
Some of the suggestions even made into the game and just now on Blight is being fixed a bug that vexated us for half a year.
It's not like we did not try hard to state our points in all the possible forms.
In case you never noticed, it's just several months that in most dragon and monks signatures there is a link to suggestions etc.
I think that dragon and monk lives are really similar.

Before the big world change both classes were more or less handling their own.
They were visibly under par in some situations but still the mobs were "easy", their evasion was "human", their damage "sensate" and their skills were gimped.
Add this to the fact that mobs were limited to level 80 and you see a rosey picture.
Just to say... I had to be level 95 to kill a lone level 80 avatar of pain without using hoard. Now I cannot be level 115 to kill a level 100 abomination of pain.


Then the world changed.

Now a monk or dragon still deals risible damage like before (I will never consider hoard wasting attacks an useable move unless the hoard items drop enough to make those moves possible to do more than once in an hour. I should not be supposed to be craft 80 to make hoard back enough to adventure only), the mobs now evade like mad, their abilities are pumped up, their damage high and they are now up to level 120.
So a pure monk has more or less ceased to be a viable pure class. And it's fanatics of that class that still keep it as main.
Every now and then they even complain on the boards but they are still there, unchanged.

Too bad because monks get a several neat and interesting abilities other multiclasser love to grab taking monk up some levels.
A monk is cool and nice and original yet... a monk nowadays is not "enough anymore". He just dies.
Same for my race. There is no point at being cool and generalist etc. if the end result are gobs of death points because "you are not enough".
The very possible point of strength, flight, has never done anything but being good at crafting faster, because we are like archers who got their bow removed because it has been deemed unbalancing (by others). So no more scouting for us (now mobs don't even spawn if you don't walk at a 1 meter distance and sit down contemplating the smell of flowers), no more pulling from far (same reason), no attack from the sky.
Nothing but lame spells and lamer melee.

What will ancient improve?

I don't think that ancient will bring anything new under the sun. Nothing that would morph a dragon from a gimp to a mythical beast of power.
I see a mild armor increase, a 200 hp increase. Maybe breath improved (who cares, it's another dragon only ability that deals 120 damage every 5 minutes - so effective that in all my life I never have been asked to tech a dragon equipment with dragon breath).
Period. Making an adult dragon 100 equivalent to a 150 total levels multiclassed biped to an ancient dragon equivalent to a level 180 biped, capped, ended, done. Officially this time.

And I foresee most dragon players finally wake up, realize that they just won't cut it and quit the game as they should have done months ago.
Expecially since dragon lairs will be another hairy thing that will once more rub on worn nerves.


Unless AE says something officially (and AE did at merge with weeks in advance but not now that we are supposed to be 1 month from lairs) dragons won't get:

- any token for plots. They'll have to buy 8 - 15 gold lairs or after a year of waiting get a 25 x 25 hole in the middle of nowhere.
- any enlarged vault. We'll have to do it the hard way.
- no help. While it's feasible for a dragon to ferry stuff to help bipeds at their plots, the contrary won't apply. Plus the lesser carrying capacity that will be fully exploited at tier VI like it had been for almost a year.
- all the bipeds with two accounts will of course want a lair for their "pet dwaggie". And knowing the precedents we'll get a lair every 100 dragons.
- no novian resources, no "special disk" to carry more of one kind (and I mined so much iron that I could have as well taken miner to 300 in my life). Porting galore.
- No way to get rewarded to have resisted twelve months plotless. A dragon alt level 2 will snatch away the lair I want because his main gave it and bidded 10 gold no dragon I know has.
- possibly there will be a time requirement that will make so that an unused level 2 hatchling made at end of beta to "look at what a dragon is like" and then forgotten would easily beat me at level 100/100. And then get the lair and ask in turn strangling prices to resell it, like is now for dragon techs.


I still would really like to see how a lair needs to be bigger than a crafting cave, since a small crafting cave can contain already all the needed machines. For silos maybe?
Likewise I'd love to know what to do to at least become eligible to run for a lair. Full hoard? Most of my level 100/100 friends have no more than 1.5M hoard. It would be kind to know if we have to stop playing now for a month and grind sub-optimally tons of hoard.

To make a full hoard, hoarding iron is pointless (besides exp less). Hoarding cobalt too as the time involved outweighs by far any advantage.
Mithril would do (824 a scale, non alloy). But a level 100/100 is 3:1 on mithril unless gets tier V and teched V craft scales.
As of now I am the one dragon in my shard (none to date demonstrated the contrary) with those techs but the others don't have the money to buy my scales (1 gold of reagents, mostly sathyr isles hard mobs or not in game. And no, for them 1 gold apparently is not a single day affair to get).
I'll gonna laugh if the requirements to ancient are i.e. 10M or full hoard. Either my long time friends won't have hoard enough to apply for ancient or will get it but having to throw at vielos the money they need to buy craft scales they won't have enough money to get a lair.

The fact it can't be improved upon is one of its two major downfalls. The other major downfall being the fact that a large majority of your ability quests which are almost required to advance are not present in game. If all the adventure quests where present in game it would go a long way to helping dragons, but then we would also hear about the cost of higher tiers of GR and SS.

Getting more 30 points in tooth and claw, or more 30 skill points in primal won't change our life. Overall, all the ability quests completed will give us about 2 levels worth of "more power".
I die to a mob that still has half health but 12 levels below me (abomination of something I don't recall). With all quests done to level 100 it will change do die to the same mob with it having 20% remaining mob health.
Basically I'd still fall into the "not good enough to be really viable as pure class" cathegory. But I could not get another class to counter my main class deficencies.

About the cost of higher tier GR and SS... you would not hear anything as most dragons I know including me never use them.
GR, after the world change and the insane mob evasion boost, misses at least one hit of 3 and often the mob acts like spiritists (0/0/0 GR damage) or like beetles / fyakkis (the mobs we dragons can afford "reliably") they harden shell so I'd get a 30/30/30 damage.
SS... is so weak I never felt the need to use it. A galewind blast deals almost the same and recycles fast enough and pierces cheesy mob armor boosting abilities.
Gold shield... I am waiting for a single dragon bothering to even put it on a hot bar. I used it once, lost 30000 hoard and died like dung to the mob exactly like when I do without. Expires at half the battle together with the healing ability and bam! dead dragon.

[Pharcellus]

Ves,

I assure you that they were not in vain, as much as I have a say in it, anyway. Though I have some of my own ideas I am working up and submitting, between all of us, we will at least be heard by the Devs.

[Seranthor]

Actually Kumu I dont laugh that dragons may be underpowered... I laugh cause y'all sound like chickens when you fight and when you gather you look like huge cats trying to bury something in the sandbox.... :) :) :) :)

[Vesuvius]

::Sighs:: You know I would really love to believe that Malt. At this point I am amazed I actually took the time to post it. Hopefully you will end up being right.

[Seranthor]

Actually Vahrokh since you decided to bring up a past crusade of mine I'll remind you that you actually took great glee in trying to pick it apart and belitting it every chance you got. I remember quite well much of what you said and how you even twisted some of our PMs to your advantage to denigrate my crusade to benefit ALL of us.

Personally I could care less about finishing machines in the fields anymore, I could give a flip less if YOU get any of these wonderful boosts that you so desperately want. I can most definately assure you that due to your past actions I am very reluctant to support anything that you desire. I'm going to enjoy HZ in the time I have left to play it, regardless of your complaints or 'suggestions'

[evilkarl]

The end result for an adult at level 100 with maxed hoard should look something along the lines of:

+960ac
+1000hp
15% Alacrity (Stacks and is Passive)
+100 meleedamage
+125-150 primaldamage
+500breath damage
+200 to all stats
+25 flight speed
3 interesting combat abilites

I would love to see a bonus like this for those that do put in the time to raise the cap. However there should built upto this point as it goes a long and not get this cool and sexy reward just at 100

[Jaraiden]

[img]/Web/Themes/Generic/images/icon-quote.gif[/img]Vesuvius wrote: Do not oversimplify our abilities to make them soundworse than what they are.

** I do think dragons deservebetternatural armor.

Gold Rage ONLY does that kind of damage if the dragon specifically specs themselves for melee damage.
All classes spec towards their skills and u only have 2 yet get 3 techs.
It costs hoard and it doesnt automatically hit.
And bipeds never miss..melee has1 attack every 5 mins that auto hits

A dragon would need to have Strength based scales with Tooth and Claw, Dexterity, Armor. . . at a sacrifice of some armor. Training points would be spent in Tooth and Claw and Strength and/or Dexterity. Still, you don't realize, Dragons will need to restore their hoard or slowly lose armor (4/hoard level).

If a dragon were like a Battlemage, I am sure the Battlemage would need to favor one style (spells) over another style (melee) to be most effective. Without hoard powered spells (implied by lore) we lack in the spellcasting area.

[snip]

You have absolutely NO idea what kind of effort it takes to max out hoard.
yah..the difference between 1mil hoard and 25mil is 200 armor..so the last 24mil are not that usefull andhardly worth complaining about.
ly compares to leveling up two more 100 classes in time and effort, possibly more.
My friend just went from 8mil to 22mil hoard in under4 weeks..
Not only that the grind is painstakingly boring andthe rewards for hoard are pathetic.

I hope you are not referring to the time of the 1,000,000 bulk vault OR the exploit of hoarding Mithril Dexterity Chest scales. Elaborate more please. Did he pay for hoard or had guild (biped) help? Per lore Dragons should be able to make hoard items besides scales and spells, but we can't make gem or silver/gold likehoard items (except for scalepacks that use gems).

I have neither trivialized nor have I denied there is an imbalance... I'm utterly sick of folks whining about the imbalance w/o offering reasonable solutions... Pharcellus if you can find anywhere that I have done either by all means produce them... I KNOW there is a problem with the balance... and I KNOW that there are MANY problems with HZ.... I will submit to YOU that standing there with a bullhorn yelling that there is a problem without offering solutions is counterproductive and eventually sours the potential support you might gain IF you were to offer real and logical solutions.

Fact: an imbalance exists, I dont deny that nor have I ever...

Solution: No Idea, I'm not the one screaming that the imbalance exists.

When you have a reasonable, workable solution then submit it to AE and post it here. Whining and slamming your potential backers isnt wise lest you end up alienating them and instead of having them backing you they are picking apart every solution that you may offer and watching them spiral down in flames.

If the role were reversed, you would be. Odd how the winning side of an inbalance simply enjoys the beneifts. Kumu and others have posted issues showing incompleteness and some suggestions for dragons. This is being done for monks also. Likely Elemental Archers too.

Well, here are mine.
* Address the Dragon Issues forum topic to finish the race
* Ensure the game mechanics of dragons matches Istarian lore
* Statistics - Health boost due to size, Armor (natural) to match lore, Strength to match Half-giant, Dexterity should loweras size increases, Power and Focus in balance per lore
-- so this strikes a balance for melee (hit a bit less, but for more damage) and spellcasting
* Adventure skillsper level (hatchling/adult/ancient andallow a one time deal to respend training points):
- Armor - 6/8/10 (and eliminate the weak Adult bonus, make sure it matches biped scalemail)
- Evasion - 8/6/4 but have a bonus while in Khutit form to 8/level
- Magic defense - 8/8/9
-Primal - 8/9/10 with primal bonus as Helian
- Tooth and claw - 8/9/10 with T&C bonus as Lunus
* Crafting skills - similar skill mastery (tasks give 10 points every 10 levels, but most are at 9 effective points/level)
- Smelting/Stoneworking/Scalecrafting bonus to Lunus
-Stoneworking/Essence shaping/Spellcrafting bonus to Helian
* Levels 101 to 120 allow for one of two quests - spellcasting package or melee package

On the biped side, limit multiclassing at the epic levels of 101 to 120. One primary class should be more than sufficient at these levels with the optimal gear. Be a Reaver and known as one, but a mix match of schools at those levels.

At a level 120 cap, the only way dragons can further develop are by events and quests. The events lack dragon content and the quests are not even working well (as in Become a True Helian/Lunus and the simple skill quests). AE has a poor track record for the dragon race, yet enjoys plasteringdragon images all over the place.

- - - -
Oh the current advantage enjoyed by biped players (mainly in mass farming for drop only items) has its consequences.

[Korial]

Easy. It is called "Biped Adventurer", and it is a ******** sight more powerful as a generalist class than "Dragon Adventurer".

Again, "Biped Adventurer/Crafter" gets them. Biped Adventurer gets 10 in every stat per level, and Biped Crafter gets 10/11 in every skill per level.

Well done for an amazing comparison between one thing that needs about 35 million xp, and another that requires over 150 million xp. If you want to lump crafting in there, then up that total to a good 250 million xp or more.

Now, I can see exactly what you're getting at. The problem is the fact that Bipeds can multiclass, and Dragons cannot. As far as single classes go, the Dragon adventurer class is a good class. It just gets totally overshadowed by rating 130 bipeds soloing 6 L80+ mobs at once.

Yes, Dragons need something here. But I for one am still waiting on AE to see what they will do about multiclassing in general, and their worry about the lack of distinction between multischooled bipeds.