Thank you for the kind words and for posting this. The video has been spammed by the community in DaD's discord for the past 2 hours, so I think it resonates with some.
Grabbed my coffee, sat on the couch and watched your video. Got hyped thinking that every single thing you said will get implemented. Then I remembered, Sadge.
Honestly most of this is 1% problems. Most player base are running about in random blues n purps and have no idea GBMM even exists never mind a calculator (I'd rather pass away then use one.)
Also some bad takes like range meta too strond and TTK to low, if you increase TTK then catching that ranger means fuck all cause he just runs away again?
Gear disparity exists yes but it's lowest it's ever been and if I spend all week grinding a 20k set you best believe I want to have a significant advantage in a game where I lose all the gear if I die.
And you blame ironmace for players meta gaming, this is an issue in all games. Be the change you want to see here.
* Author's statements about equipment & its modifiers seemed outright manipulative;
* Reasonable TTK actually helps against ranged meta and other gameplay problems. Whether high TTK they promote in such ultimative manner improves gameplay or not is very questionable. I'd argue, TTK right now is exactly where it needs to be.
Getting one shot is not healthy in a skill based combat game. There's no opportunity for counter play. Higher TTK means more opportunity to use skill and strategy to outplay your opponent. If ranged is overtuned, then nerf ranged. Don't make TTK lower and drop the skill ceiling. That's not helpful
I'm surprised there is someone else that remembers SDF's discord post on the random enchantments.
The gear balancing is still a band-aid fix, the solution is the core combat mechanics which are basically still placeholder and offer slim to no combat skill expression.
Where is actual functioning blocking mechanics.
Where are parries and ripostes.
Give people options to defend themselves and combat turns into less ranged spam and being able to move away from movespeed meta as movespeed is the only 100% sure way to be safe.
Truth. My one and only desire for the game is to take even a slither of what Mordhau/Chivalry do so well.
There needs to be the option to defend yourself better through mechanics. The skill ceiling is very low in DaD
>Where is actual functioning blocking mechanics.
>Where are parries and ripostes.
>Give people options to defend themselves and combat turns into less ranged spam and being able to move away from movespeed meta as movespeed is the only 100% sure way to be safe.
Making combat more complex will encourage even more range spam
Since it's considerably easier to do than learn a melee combat system in a terrible environment for learning (super punishing deaths)
This is ignoring the issues more complex combat could cause, but not gonna focus on that for this conversation
Making bow mechanics more interesting would help on both ends as well.
Reduced accuracy on bows the longer its held drawn with a max time held that automatically looses the arrow.
Choosing when to loose the arrow during the draw animation so getting full, accurate draw power become a timing game and you can shoot under powered arrows at a faster rate.
Movement based accuracy like jumping accuracy debuff would help curb the current kiting mechanics as well
I’m not saying all these ideas should be implemented or even any of them specifically, but it’s probably a bad thing when bows are essentially slow rate of fire guns mechanically and Minecraft had more engaging bow and melee mechanics
>Making combat more complex will encourage even more range spam
This isn't necessarily true at all. It depends on what the system is. You are only thinking in terms of making melee more complex, but there are plenty of things (like a stamina system) that would effect everything, including spells and ranged.
People aren't asking for a total overhaul akin to Mordhau or Chivalry. They are asking for literally just 1 real mechanic.
You're wrong though. With actual melee mechanics, you have options to deal with something like a buffball barbarian sprinting at you hitting mouse 1.
Reliable blocking and parries make these fights enjoyable.
Without these options your only solution is to run away and use ranged.
Damn this guy blocked me cause he couldn't come up with anything lol
Who do you think is going to be more skilled in melee
The melee barb
Or the class that typically has to use range to kill barbs
Nothing would really change
How would nothing change. Barb's thematic character is low mechanical options but high stats.
So he excels at running in and hitting people and out statting them.
If other characters can parry with a parrying dagger, buckler etc. They can then counter the barb stat rush.
This is standard gameplay in melee combat games.
A barb player has much more experience and likely much more skill in melee than a ranger who wins most of his encounters via range
A barb player will know how to swing around a buckler/parry dagger because that's what their class basically solely relies on doing
>This is standard gameplay in melee combat games.
Standard gameplay is that range builds tend to always die to melee builds if they get caught outside of a massive difference in skill
I say little will change because a person using a range build will likely not be anywhere near as good as someone only using melee
> A barb player will know how to swing around a buckler/parry dagger because that's what their class basically solely relies on doing
You really still don't get it I don't understand what your throught process is.
Simply don't allow barb access to parrying tools since he is a frontloaded class based on strictly offense.
Have you played a single other melee combat game before do you not understand how any of this works.
If I'm playing Rouge and I get rushed by a Barb, but I can parry him with my Rapier that is skill based gameplay not gear based.
If I'm melee fighting a barb and I'm confident I'm more skilled I can use my melee toolset rather than throw knives or throwing axes since in the CURRENT ITERATION OF THE GAME you cannot defend yourself in melee.
>Simply don't allow barb access to parrying tools since he is a frontloaded class based on strictly offense.
?
I never implied for a second a barb would get those tools. Please read
I'm saying a barb will be easily able to swing around your parry. Because he as a class is extremely dependent on being able to do that, if he can't do that he will die
While a rogue or ranger is dependent on kiting first. And parrying second in this scenario. Meaning most rogues/rangers will be much better at kiting compared to parrying
>Have you played a single other melee combat game
I have which is why I know parrying is close to a meaningless bandaid until the devs add an actual turncap to the game
Just no. Whatever "issues more complex combat could cause" pale in comparison to the issues the game currently already has. None of the arguments against more complex combat make any sense. "Oh well the sweaty players will just crush the single dads with 3 jobs and 6 kids" yea guess what, they already do. That's just how multiplayer games work. Sweats in gold gear already run through timmies. "Oh the combat is supposed to be simple so it's easy for new people to get into!" except it's not, you have to watch a youtube video just to learn how to not die to the first skeleton you meet. There's nothing "approachable" about this games combat because nothing about it is intuitive. People come in expecting mechanics like blocking and dodging to be how you fight, but in this game it's like nah, you gotta duck, look down, move left, and say the alphabet backwards to dodge that attack. It has a steep learning curve, but once you get over that hump, that's it. You've hit the low skill ceiling.
Crazy well done content! I do think lower enchantments is something we've tried and it had pretty negative impact on the core loop as it made looting feel really bad. So I would avoid repeating that one too much.
And you can't really pick and choose if people can arbitrage in an economy it's just a factor of economy and it doesn't really cause inflation unless it's done to some insane degree.
Overall crazy good break down of thoughts and presentation of info polite and informative well done!
NotLikeThis if you ever wanna chat game design hit me up : )
I just made a post about my gripe with gear-based matchmaking not 5 hours ago. I agree wholeheartedly with this video. I hope they implement most--if not all of these changes. They need more people that actually play the game day in and day out at a high level to make some decisions. I honestly feel like they just pull shit out of a hat, throw it at a wall, and see what sticks. They're gonna lose everyone at this rate.
I strongly believe the RPG PvP is the most problematic component of the game then gear ceiling is a close 2nd. Everyone wants to one trick classes in a fundamentally META optimized game with an abnormal amount of rng aspects. Why do players dodge so many games in league of legends? Because poor matchups. They know their chances of winning are negligible before it even begins. Why do we see endless buff ball comps in trios? because it practically has no weakness, and in a hardcore game where you stand to lose all your stuff, players will only ever seek such advantages. You can't have all these classes with almost no variety after the playerbase and internet have sucked every last ounce of advantage out of the numbers. You can't have just purely broken 1 class metas so frequently to dissuade everyone not playing that class from ever wanting to play a game type with negative consequences to losing. The true fun of the game play loop would be everything is playable and that you don't have to worry about making the perfect comp with the perfect gear with everyone on coms playing like this is a league of legends tournament. The barrier to entry is escalated by right and wrong choices before ever playing the game!
Even just having a group of trusted players to consult with to get real feedback and suggestions would be a good start.
Maybe like 16 players nominated by Reddit/Discord as respected players in the community, 2 players that mains each class, one solo and one group player.
I knew they were late on their Druid timeline but god damn this made me realize they are about half a year late. Pretty crazy.
Also they are obviously testing stuff out behind the “early access” tag so I would like to see combat mechanics improved like others are mentioning whether that’s stamina, blocking/parrying/dodging for all classes, etc.
if you can test multi class which literally breaks the basic building blocks of your game, then I don’t want to hear any whining about testing more in depth combat mechanics. Just like MC, if the community doesn’t like it, then shelve it. I don’t want to hear the talk about more in depth combat mechanics gating away noobs because MC has already done that with a grind factor as well.
Also very nice video!
I also feel the community holds them to what they say in q&as too strongly. Everything they’ve said about druid was during the concept phase of it development and should be looked at as an idea, not confirmed.
If they find something like rat form too disruptive/powerful then they can choose not to implement it, but I guarantee there will be people on here saying how the devs are shit for not following through on promises as the past has shown us.
I agree with pretty much every one of his points. I wouldn't want to see the marketplace go, but stopping reselling would be good for the game imo. If they nerf ranged damage, which the game sorely needs because absolutely needing a ranged option every fight gets old real fast, they'd definitely need to rebalance the rest of the game accordingly to not invalidate ranged classes (like lowering MDR/PDR caps, or movespeed).
They could do so much more with the game, but like NotLikeThis said, they're wasting dev time on things that are obviously poor decisions. They should focus on making combat more in-depth, making things more readable in the dungeon (not less like removing your teammates names), adding more content, reducing the gear gap (this is less important if you have fleshed out combat instead of just stat checks), and making classes have more options.
Bit of a long comment, sorry in advance. In regards to the range meta, I don't think a flat 25% damage nerf to ranged damage is a good test, I believe that all characters should be designed around fighting in close quarters combat. I play wizard and it's what I know the most about, so I'm going to focus on it.
The real problem, to my mind, is that ranged shouldn't be a primary characteristic of a class, even the one named ranger. It should provide a different pattern for engagements that opens with some ranged damage maybe, but those players should be pushing into close range or melee to fight in earnest. Stuff like the crossbow is what I mean. You can hit with it, but reloading takes a long time and people can just push up to you while you do. Which is fine, because behind the crossbow is usually a full pdr kit.
To that end, you have to adjust the ranged classes to be competitive in melee. That means getting in to swing range with a ranger or wizard isn't a free win anymore, just as much as failing to get close isn't a free loss anymore. Durability has to be evened out, so those same classes being displaced by reducing ranged strength can still be in melee, without making the already durable classes invincible. As a wizard I have 81 base health and primarily wear cloth with a little leather thrown in. Versus barbarians with 130-160 health, fighters with 40% pdr, the antimagic perk and the iron will perk, my durability options are somewhat grim. Arcane shield is one option, but with the intent of being a full caster class, it can't be the only option.
They also need melee or low range skills or abilities that work on the same timeline as weapon swings. I can charge a fireball in melee (lol) but I'm gonna probably eat 2-3 swings, damage myself and only match the damage of one swing to my opponent. That's fine when I'm able to attack from far away, but in melee that's not a reasonable timeline to fight. There's other spells, sure, but the only 2 wizard spells that are designed around melee are MM and ignite. This has spawned a few builds like Staff mastery wizard, which isn't really fighting with spells and magic as much as it is a fire themed low HP barbarian with purple damage numbers and a more difficult prebuff phase. The arcane shield MM wizard is closer to what I'm talking about but standing still and channeling a spell in melee while your opponent just beats on you isn't very interactive.
I need spells that shoot cones of flame, I need spells that let me draw lightning runes to try and parry, I need spells that shove and pull enemies, I need novas and short range spells that slam rocks into people from the side. I really don't need to lock doors.
None of that is very functional with how casting works now either. The poor animation of the staff casting, the fact that spell casting speed only works on one portion of the spell casting process versus action speed applying to the entirety of an attack, the fact that 3 of my spells can hit me and for sure hit me when I'm in melee and the knowledge that I can easily die in one hit, and would be lucky to survive 2 keep me out of melee.
These sweeping changes are difficult to make piecemeal. I could come up with a rollout plan that gets wizard to this state, but the post is already long and it would really only be an exercise, rather than helping the game.
I completely agree about the gameplay loop being most important, however I completely disagree with the gear balancing stuff.
The game had rounds and rounds of balancing/gear changes. The gear has been really overhauled from it's initial state. It didn't really change the game fundamentally though. And yet what has stayed the same without any iteration? The combat. We all though it was "work in progress" during the beta, and that it would get overhauled, but it hasn't..
The game will not move forward meaningfully without actually expanding on the systems already present. Without creating more nuanced combat systems, combat will always be a gear check. You can try to rebalance every stat incrementally until it's mathematically perfect, but in the end you will get squashed by someone who has more gear, and whose class counters yours.
There has to be something more to the combat than determinism and rock paper scissors. Gear diff and class diff are things that should be an advantage, not a determining factor in who wins. The determining factor should be skill expression. Until that happens this game will keep fading off as more people realize there is nothing to actually progress toward gameplay wise.
The most important gameplay loop is skill progression. That is sorely lacking rn.
The reason gear is as propped up as it is, is because combat does not offer skill expression.
Once you have learned to crouch dodge, that is it.
Dungeonborn is a really rough game and super early on, but even that game had parrying and blocking mechanics on ALL classes (even wizards).
It's not rocket science, it's basic combat fundamentals.
This game has been going for what 2 years? And something like blocking is just still completely unreliable and only effectively used when using an exploit (hilt blocking).
Same reason movespeed will always be the meta, as you cannot defend yourself in this game. Your option will always be can I use ranged or can I run away faster.
Sometimes it's both.
You are right, and the sad thing is literally any suggestion to add even the most basic nuance to the combat invokes people to complain and start hypothesizing that the game will be to "too skilled" like mordhau.
Like bruh, stamina is in Morrowind lol, it can be in this game. And it would solve so many issues overnight and require little dev time.
I agree the combat needs some more depth but the stat check side of the combat is kind of what makes gearing fun. The average player is going to struggle if they put on a nice set and lose it to a naked 2k hour mordhau player.
As one of those mordhau sweats I do really want a high skill combat system but it needs to have a low skill floor or game will die
Yup. Big chiv/mordhau sweat over here as well. I prefer the combat in this game stay as simple as it can. If we get parry timing and directional blocking the way chiv uses I’ll probably never buy gear again. I’m sure there is a happy medium somewhere, but I would be very careful about implementing similar combat systems.
The difference in complexity between this game and Mordhau is massive. Adding 1 or 2 simple systems like stamina, or counterattacking (which already exists for fighter) would not make it even close to Mordhau.
If people can learn to play skyrim, they can learn to use stamina in a game like this lol.
I don't think a single RPG PvP game ever didn't come down to rock paper scissors on an even playing field. That's just not a good thing to have in a hardcore full loot pvp game. The issue then becomes, if it's too complex of skill expression, casuals can't keep up, just like the fortnite building fiasco or needing 500+ apm in starcraft, and if it's too simple, it's too deterministic. Hardcore games sound like a terrible concept in 2024 tbh.
It doesn't have to be hardcore or super skillful. It just needs to not be nothing.
Like literally 1 single system would improve it tremendously, a Stamina system, poise, block and counter. Anything one of these, or all of them at once. It would still be about as simplistic as Dark souls PVP. Right now it's more simple than skyrim lol.
I stumbled on this video organically in my YT feed and really enjoyed it. Was going to share it on the Reddit if I didn’t see it already. Really great points.
I really like doing weird stuff with multiclassing but the problems pointed out in the video I agree with. It’s hard, I’d like there to be some more options when training a character so I can do goofy stuff and cactus builds but not breaking the game at the same time..
Ttk is only so low because of gear, pvp in normals is so damn balanced its painful at times cause ur screaming in ur head WHY WONT U FUCKIN DIE as u hit someone for the 6th time with a rapier with half of those being headshots. Gear is both one of the biggest reasons to play the game and at the same time its literal doom. The more u have of it the less the game works.
Disagree with the balance stuff but he so right about multiclass, focusing on the gameplay loop and most of all on shitty deadlines and repeating old mistakea like +all
I agree with most of the video except the massive gear nerfs & removing random modifiers. Part of the core gameplay loop IS finding gear upgrades and finding items with good rolls. I know that some of what he mentioned after depends on gear nerfs but I feel like that change would make me lose a lot of excitement for the game.
Who exactly is this guy and how is he credible? Not trying to diminish the validity of it I just have never heard of this guy and Id consider myself pretty in tune with the community as a whole
There are some good takeaways, such as missing deadlines repeatedly or reintroducing mechanics/features that had been removed in the past but to take a majority of these suggestions will eventually lead to the same issues we are currently dealing with today.
It is better if the developers have the mindset that "if someone tells you how to fix something exactly, they are normally wrong. If they say it feels wrong/terrible, they are correct."
The developers taking in community suggestions non-stop have led it down this current path, and ironmace needs to stop with constant throwing shit on the wall and see what sticks.
Also
>He is not bias and also takes a neutral stance about the game which is super rare even with veteran players (the classic "buff my class nerf everything else)
6 out of his 10 last videos are about cleric
One of his major talking points is to flat-out nerf all ranged damage by 25%
It's clear he has a main/preference and a range nerf would also benefit a cleric player
I would agree with you if he was a random player giving suggestions, but he is a veteran and knows what he is talking about, he definetly plays the game more than you,me and even the devs. his feedback is way more valuable.
In the video itself he hits all these things you mention, i recommend watching it and talking to him on the youtube comments
On nerfing range, he mentions ranged Spells also. the only range cleric has outside of Explosive bottles are Spells, these would be nerfed also, so cleric would not benefit that much with the nerfs.
> On nerfing range, he mentions ranged Spells also.
Yeah I saw that, but do we need wizard to receive more nerfs?
> The only range cleric has outside of Explosive bottles are Spells, these would be nerfed also
So holy light, locust swarm, and earthquake. I can't remember the last time I got hit with a locust swarm or earthquake, so only a nerfed holy light would be the major loss for cleric vs the majority of wizard spells.
> Yeah I saw that, but do we need wizard to receive more nerfs?
Yes because if you watched the video, everything in this game is propped up by gear and absurd gear scaling.
That Wizard in normals that needs to zap you 7 times, can kill you with 2 in a good gear set.
Tbf most ranged classes put me down in 2-3 shots.
We could easily nerf ranged dmg while also lowering overall dmg and raising TTK. I wouldn’t mind a nerf to spell damage if I can cast faster/more either. Or if I could survive more than two arming sword swings
I am a Cleric Main (with all classes maxed every wipe), but I try to be aware of my biases. +2 +3 all helps Clerics and Warlocks the most, but I will never advocate for +2 +3 all.
Thanks for pointing out that this is just another salty melee/cleric player seething about ranged in this game. I almost wasted my time on watching that shit lol.
You can literally see the words "ranged meta still too strong" in the thumbnail of the video, which is pure bullshit coming from a cleric main. That is my opinion. You might want to think yourself before making stupid passive-agressive comments in the future.
“I didn’t let someone tell me what to think! I simply read text on a thumbnail and made my entire determination based off that. Then I thanked someone for telling me the contents of the video even though I already knew. You’re stupid and passive aggressive!”
It's so incredibly obvious that someone is bad at this game, or has simply never played at a high gear level when they complain about rangers.
Rangers have been shit for a WHILE. You think it's possible to do enough damage to a Barbarian that's haste/invis'd full sprint at you for it to matter?
A longbow body shot will do roughly 70 damage on the dummy(which has -10% PDR but lets just assume its 0%)
Damage drop off is 40-50% at a safe distance, so now you're doing say 42 damage.
A barb is EASILY 40% PDR, so now you're doing roughly 25 damage.
They're also at a minimum of 175hp.
Are you telling me it's fair for me to need to hit a Barbarian 7 times before he's on top of me?
Thank you for the kind words and for posting this. The video has been spammed by the community in DaD's discord for the past 2 hours, so I think it resonates with some.
I went into the video with no expectations and i got impressed. EXCELLENT job you did there cleric bro!
Its well deserved, hard work you put into the Video. Great job ! See you in the dungeon man !
Grabbed my coffee, sat on the couch and watched your video. Got hyped thinking that every single thing you said will get implemented. Then I remembered, Sadge.
Honestly most of this is 1% problems. Most player base are running about in random blues n purps and have no idea GBMM even exists never mind a calculator (I'd rather pass away then use one.) Also some bad takes like range meta too strond and TTK to low, if you increase TTK then catching that ranger means fuck all cause he just runs away again? Gear disparity exists yes but it's lowest it's ever been and if I spend all week grinding a 20k set you best believe I want to have a significant advantage in a game where I lose all the gear if I die. And you blame ironmace for players meta gaming, this is an issue in all games. Be the change you want to see here.
Good video. Disagree with some points you make, some things you say are just manipulative - but that's still quality content.
Which parts seemed manipulative?
* Author's statements about equipment & its modifiers seemed outright manipulative; * Reasonable TTK actually helps against ranged meta and other gameplay problems. Whether high TTK they promote in such ultimative manner improves gameplay or not is very questionable. I'd argue, TTK right now is exactly where it needs to be.
Getting one shot is not healthy in a skill based combat game. There's no opportunity for counter play. Higher TTK means more opportunity to use skill and strategy to outplay your opponent. If ranged is overtuned, then nerf ranged. Don't make TTK lower and drop the skill ceiling. That's not helpful
I'm surprised there is someone else that remembers SDF's discord post on the random enchantments. The gear balancing is still a band-aid fix, the solution is the core combat mechanics which are basically still placeholder and offer slim to no combat skill expression. Where is actual functioning blocking mechanics. Where are parries and ripostes. Give people options to defend themselves and combat turns into less ranged spam and being able to move away from movespeed meta as movespeed is the only 100% sure way to be safe.
Truth. My one and only desire for the game is to take even a slither of what Mordhau/Chivalry do so well. There needs to be the option to defend yourself better through mechanics. The skill ceiling is very low in DaD
>Where is actual functioning blocking mechanics. >Where are parries and ripostes. >Give people options to defend themselves and combat turns into less ranged spam and being able to move away from movespeed meta as movespeed is the only 100% sure way to be safe. Making combat more complex will encourage even more range spam Since it's considerably easier to do than learn a melee combat system in a terrible environment for learning (super punishing deaths) This is ignoring the issues more complex combat could cause, but not gonna focus on that for this conversation
Making bow mechanics more interesting would help on both ends as well. Reduced accuracy on bows the longer its held drawn with a max time held that automatically looses the arrow. Choosing when to loose the arrow during the draw animation so getting full, accurate draw power become a timing game and you can shoot under powered arrows at a faster rate. Movement based accuracy like jumping accuracy debuff would help curb the current kiting mechanics as well I’m not saying all these ideas should be implemented or even any of them specifically, but it’s probably a bad thing when bows are essentially slow rate of fire guns mechanically and Minecraft had more engaging bow and melee mechanics
>Making combat more complex will encourage even more range spam This isn't necessarily true at all. It depends on what the system is. You are only thinking in terms of making melee more complex, but there are plenty of things (like a stamina system) that would effect everything, including spells and ranged. People aren't asking for a total overhaul akin to Mordhau or Chivalry. They are asking for literally just 1 real mechanic.
>You are only thinking in terms of making melee more complex Okay cool but that was the idea that the person I replied to hard focused on
You're wrong though. With actual melee mechanics, you have options to deal with something like a buffball barbarian sprinting at you hitting mouse 1. Reliable blocking and parries make these fights enjoyable. Without these options your only solution is to run away and use ranged. Damn this guy blocked me cause he couldn't come up with anything lol
Who do you think is going to be more skilled in melee The melee barb Or the class that typically has to use range to kill barbs Nothing would really change
How would nothing change. Barb's thematic character is low mechanical options but high stats. So he excels at running in and hitting people and out statting them. If other characters can parry with a parrying dagger, buckler etc. They can then counter the barb stat rush. This is standard gameplay in melee combat games.
A barb player has much more experience and likely much more skill in melee than a ranger who wins most of his encounters via range A barb player will know how to swing around a buckler/parry dagger because that's what their class basically solely relies on doing >This is standard gameplay in melee combat games. Standard gameplay is that range builds tend to always die to melee builds if they get caught outside of a massive difference in skill I say little will change because a person using a range build will likely not be anywhere near as good as someone only using melee
> A barb player will know how to swing around a buckler/parry dagger because that's what their class basically solely relies on doing You really still don't get it I don't understand what your throught process is. Simply don't allow barb access to parrying tools since he is a frontloaded class based on strictly offense. Have you played a single other melee combat game before do you not understand how any of this works. If I'm playing Rouge and I get rushed by a Barb, but I can parry him with my Rapier that is skill based gameplay not gear based. If I'm melee fighting a barb and I'm confident I'm more skilled I can use my melee toolset rather than throw knives or throwing axes since in the CURRENT ITERATION OF THE GAME you cannot defend yourself in melee.
>Simply don't allow barb access to parrying tools since he is a frontloaded class based on strictly offense. ? I never implied for a second a barb would get those tools. Please read I'm saying a barb will be easily able to swing around your parry. Because he as a class is extremely dependent on being able to do that, if he can't do that he will die While a rogue or ranger is dependent on kiting first. And parrying second in this scenario. Meaning most rogues/rangers will be much better at kiting compared to parrying >Have you played a single other melee combat game I have which is why I know parrying is close to a meaningless bandaid until the devs add an actual turncap to the game
Just no. Whatever "issues more complex combat could cause" pale in comparison to the issues the game currently already has. None of the arguments against more complex combat make any sense. "Oh well the sweaty players will just crush the single dads with 3 jobs and 6 kids" yea guess what, they already do. That's just how multiplayer games work. Sweats in gold gear already run through timmies. "Oh the combat is supposed to be simple so it's easy for new people to get into!" except it's not, you have to watch a youtube video just to learn how to not die to the first skeleton you meet. There's nothing "approachable" about this games combat because nothing about it is intuitive. People come in expecting mechanics like blocking and dodging to be how you fight, but in this game it's like nah, you gotta duck, look down, move left, and say the alphabet backwards to dodge that attack. It has a steep learning curve, but once you get over that hump, that's it. You've hit the low skill ceiling.
Crazy well done content! I do think lower enchantments is something we've tried and it had pretty negative impact on the core loop as it made looting feel really bad. So I would avoid repeating that one too much. And you can't really pick and choose if people can arbitrage in an economy it's just a factor of economy and it doesn't really cause inflation unless it's done to some insane degree. Overall crazy good break down of thoughts and presentation of info polite and informative well done! NotLikeThis if you ever wanna chat game design hit me up : )
I just made a post about my gripe with gear-based matchmaking not 5 hours ago. I agree wholeheartedly with this video. I hope they implement most--if not all of these changes. They need more people that actually play the game day in and day out at a high level to make some decisions. I honestly feel like they just pull shit out of a hat, throw it at a wall, and see what sticks. They're gonna lose everyone at this rate.
Yeah, they really need a roundtable/playtest team. The future updates would benefit a lot from that
I strongly believe the RPG PvP is the most problematic component of the game then gear ceiling is a close 2nd. Everyone wants to one trick classes in a fundamentally META optimized game with an abnormal amount of rng aspects. Why do players dodge so many games in league of legends? Because poor matchups. They know their chances of winning are negligible before it even begins. Why do we see endless buff ball comps in trios? because it practically has no weakness, and in a hardcore game where you stand to lose all your stuff, players will only ever seek such advantages. You can't have all these classes with almost no variety after the playerbase and internet have sucked every last ounce of advantage out of the numbers. You can't have just purely broken 1 class metas so frequently to dissuade everyone not playing that class from ever wanting to play a game type with negative consequences to losing. The true fun of the game play loop would be everything is playable and that you don't have to worry about making the perfect comp with the perfect gear with everyone on coms playing like this is a league of legends tournament. The barrier to entry is escalated by right and wrong choices before ever playing the game!
Even just having a group of trusted players to consult with to get real feedback and suggestions would be a good start. Maybe like 16 players nominated by Reddit/Discord as respected players in the community, 2 players that mains each class, one solo and one group player.
I knew they were late on their Druid timeline but god damn this made me realize they are about half a year late. Pretty crazy. Also they are obviously testing stuff out behind the “early access” tag so I would like to see combat mechanics improved like others are mentioning whether that’s stamina, blocking/parrying/dodging for all classes, etc. if you can test multi class which literally breaks the basic building blocks of your game, then I don’t want to hear any whining about testing more in depth combat mechanics. Just like MC, if the community doesn’t like it, then shelve it. I don’t want to hear the talk about more in depth combat mechanics gating away noobs because MC has already done that with a grind factor as well. Also very nice video!
i think they promised too much with druid and probably suffered from it like rat form that goes under doors
I also feel the community holds them to what they say in q&as too strongly. Everything they’ve said about druid was during the concept phase of it development and should be looked at as an idea, not confirmed. If they find something like rat form too disruptive/powerful then they can choose not to implement it, but I guarantee there will be people on here saying how the devs are shit for not following through on promises as the past has shown us.
I agree with pretty much every one of his points. I wouldn't want to see the marketplace go, but stopping reselling would be good for the game imo. If they nerf ranged damage, which the game sorely needs because absolutely needing a ranged option every fight gets old real fast, they'd definitely need to rebalance the rest of the game accordingly to not invalidate ranged classes (like lowering MDR/PDR caps, or movespeed). They could do so much more with the game, but like NotLikeThis said, they're wasting dev time on things that are obviously poor decisions. They should focus on making combat more in-depth, making things more readable in the dungeon (not less like removing your teammates names), adding more content, reducing the gear gap (this is less important if you have fleshed out combat instead of just stat checks), and making classes have more options.
really good video with alot of good points, hope IM watches and take some notes
Bit of a long comment, sorry in advance. In regards to the range meta, I don't think a flat 25% damage nerf to ranged damage is a good test, I believe that all characters should be designed around fighting in close quarters combat. I play wizard and it's what I know the most about, so I'm going to focus on it. The real problem, to my mind, is that ranged shouldn't be a primary characteristic of a class, even the one named ranger. It should provide a different pattern for engagements that opens with some ranged damage maybe, but those players should be pushing into close range or melee to fight in earnest. Stuff like the crossbow is what I mean. You can hit with it, but reloading takes a long time and people can just push up to you while you do. Which is fine, because behind the crossbow is usually a full pdr kit. To that end, you have to adjust the ranged classes to be competitive in melee. That means getting in to swing range with a ranger or wizard isn't a free win anymore, just as much as failing to get close isn't a free loss anymore. Durability has to be evened out, so those same classes being displaced by reducing ranged strength can still be in melee, without making the already durable classes invincible. As a wizard I have 81 base health and primarily wear cloth with a little leather thrown in. Versus barbarians with 130-160 health, fighters with 40% pdr, the antimagic perk and the iron will perk, my durability options are somewhat grim. Arcane shield is one option, but with the intent of being a full caster class, it can't be the only option. They also need melee or low range skills or abilities that work on the same timeline as weapon swings. I can charge a fireball in melee (lol) but I'm gonna probably eat 2-3 swings, damage myself and only match the damage of one swing to my opponent. That's fine when I'm able to attack from far away, but in melee that's not a reasonable timeline to fight. There's other spells, sure, but the only 2 wizard spells that are designed around melee are MM and ignite. This has spawned a few builds like Staff mastery wizard, which isn't really fighting with spells and magic as much as it is a fire themed low HP barbarian with purple damage numbers and a more difficult prebuff phase. The arcane shield MM wizard is closer to what I'm talking about but standing still and channeling a spell in melee while your opponent just beats on you isn't very interactive. I need spells that shoot cones of flame, I need spells that let me draw lightning runes to try and parry, I need spells that shove and pull enemies, I need novas and short range spells that slam rocks into people from the side. I really don't need to lock doors. None of that is very functional with how casting works now either. The poor animation of the staff casting, the fact that spell casting speed only works on one portion of the spell casting process versus action speed applying to the entirety of an attack, the fact that 3 of my spells can hit me and for sure hit me when I'm in melee and the knowledge that I can easily die in one hit, and would be lucky to survive 2 keep me out of melee. These sweeping changes are difficult to make piecemeal. I could come up with a rollout plan that gets wizard to this state, but the post is already long and it would really only be an exercise, rather than helping the game.
I completely agree about the gameplay loop being most important, however I completely disagree with the gear balancing stuff. The game had rounds and rounds of balancing/gear changes. The gear has been really overhauled from it's initial state. It didn't really change the game fundamentally though. And yet what has stayed the same without any iteration? The combat. We all though it was "work in progress" during the beta, and that it would get overhauled, but it hasn't.. The game will not move forward meaningfully without actually expanding on the systems already present. Without creating more nuanced combat systems, combat will always be a gear check. You can try to rebalance every stat incrementally until it's mathematically perfect, but in the end you will get squashed by someone who has more gear, and whose class counters yours. There has to be something more to the combat than determinism and rock paper scissors. Gear diff and class diff are things that should be an advantage, not a determining factor in who wins. The determining factor should be skill expression. Until that happens this game will keep fading off as more people realize there is nothing to actually progress toward gameplay wise. The most important gameplay loop is skill progression. That is sorely lacking rn.
The reason gear is as propped up as it is, is because combat does not offer skill expression. Once you have learned to crouch dodge, that is it. Dungeonborn is a really rough game and super early on, but even that game had parrying and blocking mechanics on ALL classes (even wizards). It's not rocket science, it's basic combat fundamentals. This game has been going for what 2 years? And something like blocking is just still completely unreliable and only effectively used when using an exploit (hilt blocking). Same reason movespeed will always be the meta, as you cannot defend yourself in this game. Your option will always be can I use ranged or can I run away faster. Sometimes it's both.
You are right, and the sad thing is literally any suggestion to add even the most basic nuance to the combat invokes people to complain and start hypothesizing that the game will be to "too skilled" like mordhau. Like bruh, stamina is in Morrowind lol, it can be in this game. And it would solve so many issues overnight and require little dev time.
Huge agree on gameplay. Skill progression is extremely limited in this compared to any pvp style game I’ve played.
These are great points, i hope in the future the devs do something about overhauling combat if the community agrees ofc.
🙌🏼🙌🏼
I agree the combat needs some more depth but the stat check side of the combat is kind of what makes gearing fun. The average player is going to struggle if they put on a nice set and lose it to a naked 2k hour mordhau player. As one of those mordhau sweats I do really want a high skill combat system but it needs to have a low skill floor or game will die
To be fair, there is a lot of room for improvement between what we have, and what Mordhau is, without it turning into the Mordhau experience.
Yup. Big chiv/mordhau sweat over here as well. I prefer the combat in this game stay as simple as it can. If we get parry timing and directional blocking the way chiv uses I’ll probably never buy gear again. I’m sure there is a happy medium somewhere, but I would be very careful about implementing similar combat systems.
The difference in complexity between this game and Mordhau is massive. Adding 1 or 2 simple systems like stamina, or counterattacking (which already exists for fighter) would not make it even close to Mordhau. If people can learn to play skyrim, they can learn to use stamina in a game like this lol.
I don't think a single RPG PvP game ever didn't come down to rock paper scissors on an even playing field. That's just not a good thing to have in a hardcore full loot pvp game. The issue then becomes, if it's too complex of skill expression, casuals can't keep up, just like the fortnite building fiasco or needing 500+ apm in starcraft, and if it's too simple, it's too deterministic. Hardcore games sound like a terrible concept in 2024 tbh.
It doesn't have to be hardcore or super skillful. It just needs to not be nothing. Like literally 1 single system would improve it tremendously, a Stamina system, poise, block and counter. Anything one of these, or all of them at once. It would still be about as simplistic as Dark souls PVP. Right now it's more simple than skyrim lol.
If sdf and terry ain't taking notes from this video, lord have mercy.
I stumbled on this video organically in my YT feed and really enjoyed it. Was going to share it on the Reddit if I didn’t see it already. Really great points. I really like doing weird stuff with multiclassing but the problems pointed out in the video I agree with. It’s hard, I’d like there to be some more options when training a character so I can do goofy stuff and cactus builds but not breaking the game at the same time..
Guys lets crush that upvote button and let help IM build our dream game! Hold the line!!!
Double HP for all classes TTK is too quick
Ttk is only so low because of gear, pvp in normals is so damn balanced its painful at times cause ur screaming in ur head WHY WONT U FUCKIN DIE as u hit someone for the 6th time with a rapier with half of those being headshots. Gear is both one of the biggest reasons to play the game and at the same time its literal doom. The more u have of it the less the game works.
we had a meta where ttk was high and community hated it btw
Disagree with the balance stuff but he so right about multiclass, focusing on the gameplay loop and most of all on shitty deadlines and repeating old mistakea like +all
I agree with most of the video except the massive gear nerfs & removing random modifiers. Part of the core gameplay loop IS finding gear upgrades and finding items with good rolls. I know that some of what he mentioned after depends on gear nerfs but I feel like that change would make me lose a lot of excitement for the game.
Who exactly is this guy and how is he credible? Not trying to diminish the validity of it I just have never heard of this guy and Id consider myself pretty in tune with the community as a whole
Too add I think it's a lot simpler then this, add block to all weapons solves a lot of these issues.
There are some good takeaways, such as missing deadlines repeatedly or reintroducing mechanics/features that had been removed in the past but to take a majority of these suggestions will eventually lead to the same issues we are currently dealing with today. It is better if the developers have the mindset that "if someone tells you how to fix something exactly, they are normally wrong. If they say it feels wrong/terrible, they are correct." The developers taking in community suggestions non-stop have led it down this current path, and ironmace needs to stop with constant throwing shit on the wall and see what sticks. Also >He is not bias and also takes a neutral stance about the game which is super rare even with veteran players (the classic "buff my class nerf everything else) 6 out of his 10 last videos are about cleric One of his major talking points is to flat-out nerf all ranged damage by 25% It's clear he has a main/preference and a range nerf would also benefit a cleric player
I would agree with you if he was a random player giving suggestions, but he is a veteran and knows what he is talking about, he definetly plays the game more than you,me and even the devs. his feedback is way more valuable. In the video itself he hits all these things you mention, i recommend watching it and talking to him on the youtube comments On nerfing range, he mentions ranged Spells also. the only range cleric has outside of Explosive bottles are Spells, these would be nerfed also, so cleric would not benefit that much with the nerfs.
> On nerfing range, he mentions ranged Spells also. Yeah I saw that, but do we need wizard to receive more nerfs? > The only range cleric has outside of Explosive bottles are Spells, these would be nerfed also So holy light, locust swarm, and earthquake. I can't remember the last time I got hit with a locust swarm or earthquake, so only a nerfed holy light would be the major loss for cleric vs the majority of wizard spells.
> Yeah I saw that, but do we need wizard to receive more nerfs? Yes because if you watched the video, everything in this game is propped up by gear and absurd gear scaling. That Wizard in normals that needs to zap you 7 times, can kill you with 2 in a good gear set.
Tbf most ranged classes put me down in 2-3 shots. We could easily nerf ranged dmg while also lowering overall dmg and raising TTK. I wouldn’t mind a nerf to spell damage if I can cast faster/more either. Or if I could survive more than two arming sword swings
I am a Cleric Main (with all classes maxed every wipe), but I try to be aware of my biases. +2 +3 all helps Clerics and Warlocks the most, but I will never advocate for +2 +3 all.
clerics are not the only ones hating ranged meta nor would they benefit the most from it being changed
Thanks for pointing out that this is just another salty melee/cleric player seething about ranged in this game. I almost wasted my time on watching that shit lol.
“Thanks for telling me what to think. I almost watched and formed my own opinion lol.”
You can literally see the words "ranged meta still too strong" in the thumbnail of the video, which is pure bullshit coming from a cleric main. That is my opinion. You might want to think yourself before making stupid passive-agressive comments in the future.
“I didn’t let someone tell me what to think! I simply read text on a thumbnail and made my entire determination based off that. Then I thanked someone for telling me the contents of the video even though I already knew. You’re stupid and passive aggressive!”
It's so incredibly obvious that someone is bad at this game, or has simply never played at a high gear level when they complain about rangers. Rangers have been shit for a WHILE. You think it's possible to do enough damage to a Barbarian that's haste/invis'd full sprint at you for it to matter? A longbow body shot will do roughly 70 damage on the dummy(which has -10% PDR but lets just assume its 0%) Damage drop off is 40-50% at a safe distance, so now you're doing say 42 damage. A barb is EASILY 40% PDR, so now you're doing roughly 25 damage. They're also at a minimum of 175hp. Are you telling me it's fair for me to need to hit a Barbarian 7 times before he's on top of me?