A question of balance

[Donairian]

Lately I have been thinking about the question of PVP in Istaria, I understand it is far from being the most important aspect of the game considering the only areas where a player can truly experience it is either at the isles of battle or in Tazoon arena. Yet I am still curious about how balance between classes and for that matter dragons against Naka sits currently, its like I have a set of conflicting sources one from the devs of this game and the other from the player base, I normally would refrain from taking the initiative like this I am normally a more reclusive sort of person who prefers my own company but I really feel like I need answers.

On the one hand a certain few people who I will not be naming unless otherwise requested have been saying that dragons are under powered and that at max level an ancient would unequivocally be inferior to a similarly leveled Naka race who would have a slew of different classes he or she can utilize to maximum effect against the dragon. one of the sources in particular have said that the only real advantage to playing a dragon was flight stating that the only otherwise advantage was a matter of a few hundred extra hit points.

On the other hand though in one of the more recent updates a cool down was added to the dragon breath attacks which meant if you used one such attack you would place a 15 second cool down on all breath attacks available to you. Surely such an update would not be placed on an already under powered class unless it wasn't really under powered.

It confuses me the opinions of the people who complain against those of the the devs that implemented this update, short of getting some friends together and conducting my own research into potential balancing issues I really do not understand the whole picture regarding this debate. Hopefully there is no issue and I am just worrying myself over the possibility that there is one.

[Cilok]

Well, as I've never been to the PvP areas and my high-level experience is only with a dragon, I can't comment on those. What I will comment on though is that devs have already said in the next patch the dragon breath attacks will be unlinked.

I will add that it might not be a good idea to talk about dragon/biped balance as dragons are in a state of change after the recent Gold Rage changes, so any previous views no longer apply, and figuring things out now will only become invalid as more changes are made to dragons.

[Donairian]

Ok, then I probably would have to contain my curiosity until when the updates start to settle down just a little.

What were the gold rage changes by the way? I didn't know that ability had been updated and after using it for these last few months haven't really noticed any noticeable change at least as far as I can tell. I am granted the sort of player that mashes whatever attack ability I have available so therefore have little time to check the numbers I am doing but is it good or bad?

[meepsa]

Ok, then I probably would have to contain my curiosity until when the updates start to settle down just a little.

What were the gold rage changes by the way? I didn't know that ability had been updated and after using it for these last few months haven't really noticed any noticeable change at least as far as I can tell. I am granted the sort of player that mashes whatever attack ability I have available so therefore have little time to check the numbers I am doing but is it good or bad?

Gold rage was changed to:
guaranteed hits on all attacks.
1:00 cooldown
increased hoard cost (around 3K at VII)

[Terao]

and -20% damage (something like that)

[LOVWYRM]

^feels like ter- but not in patch notes^^^

-20 percent is on flame burst:-(((

[Vahrokh]

On the one hand a certain few people who I will not be naming unless otherwise requested have been saying that dragons are under powered and that at max level an ancient would unequivocally be inferior to a similarly leveled Naka race who would have a slew of different classes he or she can utilize to maximum effect against the dragon. one of the sources in particular have said that the only real advantage to playing a dragon was flight stating that the only otherwise advantage was a matter of a few hundred extra hit points.

First of all, let me say that I love controlled PvP in games. Controlled as in: no super-high level large gank squads roaming the maps 24/7 to gank and then perma-camp newbies and similar. Instead, have specific areas where to do it.

Said this, Istaria is basically a non PvP game, classes balance just does not happen because of PvP performance.

Plus, there's the never truly abated "dragons vs bipeds" 12 years old fight, the only, real, epic, large (PvP!) and long lasting war.

Why is that?

The story is far too long to tell, but it basically involves an hard math equation, valid for most games: "the more the effort, the more the reward".

On one side (bipeds), they claim rightful bipeds superiority because they earned their godlike powers by grinding a dozen of classes to level 100. They do have a point.

On the other side, dragons, claim that every race has to be able and win the game challenges (i.e. mobs, bosses...), therefore dragons too have to be powerful. This especially applies to group play, where components should earn their spot, not be just a "presence" that takes the reward without (being able to) contribute in a tangible way.


Now, as you can see, this is a stalemate that lasts since the early game. With a truly "Pontius Pilate" move, the old developers made dragons "decently powerful" while still leaving them with the short end of the stick.
They made both "factions" unhappy: bipeds see dragons as not deserving of being equivalent to a (little) multiclassed biped, with a lot of diverse abilities just given them on a silver platter, for no effort. Dragons feel they should be powerful, after all they are dragons!


There's only one solution to the "hard math equation" shown above: make dragons able to earn their own "super powerful" status by being able to grind as much as the other races.

But this required vision, work and effort, something the old developers did not want to invest into.

Amon looks like he wants to do changes to all of this.

I sincerely hope he'll bring us a new game balance, one where we (dragons) can earn our powers and nobody shall have a say against it any more.

[Spyrioyo]

I agree also dragons should be unique and special in there own way and not underpowered to bipeds but equal in there own way and bipeds equal in there own way.

[Korchak Strongbone]

From the beginning of my Istarian Birth in 2009 I have seen the battle between Bi-Peds and Dragons. I have since created 3 Dragons and 4 Bi-Peds but, mostly play 2 Peds and a Dragon.
On the Battle field I do not agree that every player needs to be able to kill mobs in an equal way.

PEDS:
My high rating Ped (232) I can with stand many many mobs virtually forever but, it does take a lot of time to take them down. I do not think a dragon should yield the same resistance to such brutal attacks. There are so many facets to playing Peds, some are Healers and can hardly hit anything, yet they are more than essential in a big battle. Peds have berzerkers, warriors for damage scorcers and wizards for stunners and mezzing Hybrids like Druids, but to me there needs to be a huge difference in Dragons and Peds they are not equal and they should never be changed to be.

DRAGONS:
My Ancient can fly down into a field of Golems and 1 hit a level 100 Golem and be done. Dragons are very strong and they should be, the Gold Rage should not be a guaranteed hit IMHO this is ludicrous and goes against every mechanic in any game. There has to be odds/chances to make it fair. I do agree with the timer however, as 15 seconds as it was was also ludicrous. Each attack shouldn't time out others, they were learned, they should be able to be used. Think of Dragons as Higher Damage/Higher Health/Less Resistance. That's where Peds come in to help them.

BALANCE:
In the greatest of battles any player that has been around knows that you need both Dragons and Bi-Peds to take them down, the epics. I have seen epics go down with dragons only or bipeds only yes, but it can be very brutal with many deaths. I contribute this to some mechanics in the game that have been changed to equal out the two.
We need Bi-Peds to help Crowd Control, cast COT V on Dragons, Heal Dragons and the rest of the group, cast Energy V with stun IV on it, cast Thunder Cloud V to stun the big ones while the smaller get taken down. We also need those Big, Amazing, Strong Dragons to work together in the group and teach those bigger mobs a lesson of power and authority.

CONCLUSION:
The rating of the Bi-Ped should give them a very high resistance to many mobs in Istaria but, the hit points of them should be less than a dragon. They should be able to stand and fight with out fear and win in the end especially if they are a 278 player. It just might not be as fast as they may want. The Dragon having only one class should receive more damage than a biped but I think they should have a lot more health, after all look at the shear size of the animal, they are huge. The Dragon wouldn't have all the resistances from learning all the 28 schools that Bi-Ped did but could give high damage to the enemy and make quick work of it.
-Kor

[Tilithia]

Perhaps dragons could get a slightly bigger health boost when they grow (ascend), that makes sense.

[Korchak Strongbone]

Salwirk, Something I have been thinking about was instead of the grow on ascension it would be based on /INFO time IN istaria played. The more hours put into game play the bigger you get, to a cap of course. 1% per day up to adult it would grow then if you ascended it would hit 100%. Although hatchies are so dang cute. ^.^
-Kor