@Raidil That's fair. Although you seems distressed when you vehemently wrote about balanced so that's why I was more like, Chill, now is the time to experiment, not balance :)
Raidil said: But it's not really just the rogue It seems that all the DPS classes can off tank ...
Where on earth are you getting this idea?
This is an absolutely wild thread that very heavily assumes enchanters/support classes are only good for CC. A rogue dropping all or most of their DPS to CC a few targets - offering the group pretty much nothing in terms of buffs/debuffs or other support beyond CC, is absolute trash next to a proper support class. I'd bet 99 out of 100 times groups will absolutely be looking for support classes to fill slots before ever considering alternatives.
Rogue offering a helping of CC at the expense of most/all their DPS does not make them multi-role (CC is not a role). CC is only part of what the Support role offers to a group.
Raidil said: The main problem I see is if 3/4 of the DPS classes can either off tank or CC it reduces the need for a second tank class in group.
No, the fact that individual mobs are intended to be very strong/threatening reduces the need for a second tank in the group. Because adding a second tank would mean adding a second healer to keep up with healing that tank as a single healer cannot keep up with the damage going out across two focused group members. Off-tanking a second target is entirely situational and generally a poor choice next to hard CC.
I feel it would be more balanced if the rogue could only lock down 1 other target while remaining stealthed and not attacking. That way it can help out in an emergency or until the tank or other cc can get things under control and start attacking. But they wouldn't be considered a solution to large pulls all by themselves.
My fear is that when groups are looking for a DPS they will only select the Wizard. Rogue is too busy doing crowd control to out damage the Wizard and no other DPS can compare to the Wizard class at this time. That is what we should really be looking at...
For those who are going to say we do not know the damage between different DPS classes because they have not been shown yet... That is my point.
@Chogar We don't know the damage numbers between different DPS classes yet xD
In all seriousness, the fear of not being grouped because you are not the optimal class at least while leveling isn't a concern to me.
I've played the worst class in the game to level up in DAoC with a 2handed Paladin and I always was finding a group to play as tank or DPS although I was worse than a shield tank or a real melee DPS. But ppl would always group me to just to go grind XP as soon as possible instead of having to wait and undefined amount of time.
(Although I gotta say I had a good reputation to being very alert and reactive as a tank eventhough I was squishy 'cause I had no shield).
In my experience, players prefer picking up whatever DPS's available to complete the group and go get xp rather than waiting god knows how long for the perfect match that might take hours to come by and is only marginally better (yeah we kill mobs 10 seconds faster it was worth waiting for one hour... YAY).
Of course this is assuming you have the base of a decent group with one Tank one Healer.
But this is also the beauty of the DPS, your are not a critical class for the group to function. It's even possible you'll see groups leveling up with 3 tanks et 3 healers. I ran so many Janky groups in DAoC and EQ2 to level up just because that's the players available at the time in the level range we are. And we want to play, we don't want to just sit here waiting for Class X to suddently log-in.
vjek said:Sure we do, based on the last 4 videos where community members were allowed to record their sessions. At that moment in time, at least.
That was a joke. And even then those are far from:
1. Being final a representation of balance
2. A representation of end game performance (not all skills are implemented)
Raidil said: So currently in Pantheon we're supposed to have a four distinct class makeups. We have the tank We have the DPS and we have the healer and then as with EQ we were supposed to have crowd control class. But from what I've seen from last streams this last class grouping we no longer need. So a a group will no longer need a secondary tank or one the secondary thing because they're not going to need to be off taking anything.
To the OP:
Yeah I think you are on the right track here, and it's not so much about whehter the CC class is missing right now (which it is) but whether they classes that are in the game are distinct (which they are not). As you said, VR have promised DISTINCT class archetypes. Whether they go holy trinity, or quaternity (as Brad referred to it) or octuplet or sextuplet or whatever, the question is are the classes unique and do they fulfill a role which the others cannot.
So far from what we have seen some of the classes, like the rogue can excel in DPS (primary role) but are also proficient enough in CC or offtank as a secondary role to negate the necessity to ever have CC class in your party. If a rogue has CC that is suboptimal when compared to an Enchanter in a silo, but serviceable in a "real-world" dungeon scenario then of course you would want a rogue in your party and the Enchanter will be the dumpster class of the game.
The question will be whether VR can design the encounters so a CC class is equally viable to having a second rogue, and as you said we haven't seen that.
There are alot of mouthpieces on the forum that will describe what they want to see in the game but then there is also what VR have shown us.
@vjek
vjek said:I'm honestly surprised they have left the Rogue and demonstrated it like it is.
It's hard not to ignore most of what's posted on this forum, but I read some of your posts in this thread, and you do realize you are making too much sense to be on these forums right? What are you even doing here, I'm not sure this is safe place for you.
You are supposed to say: "It's only Pre-Alpha man, everything's going to be fine."
See you in a couple months if you are still alive. Good luck.
So there is no Enchanter or Bard in the demo, but we are worried the rogue has been balanced to have CC capability?
We have all no doubt seen finished games where other classes have some CC ability and some utility ability, but we are worried that this pre-alpha demo has too little class distinction?
Really?
@Olympeus, no one is suggesting "It's only Pre-Alpha man, everything's going to be fine", but, yes, "It's only Pre-Alpha man, everything's going to change. No need to freak out".
Not assuming the worst doesn't equal being a brainless fanboi.
Olympeus said:@vjek
...
You are supposed to say: "It's only Pre-Alpha man, everything's going to be fine."
See you in a couple months if you are still alive. Good luck.
Ha! Yes! I know.. heheh. Ah, that made me smile & laugh, thanks Olympeus.
I've seen that same "It's only.." repeated too many times over the past 25+ years.. good times. :)
They need to simply move some of the Rogue utility over to the Bard. A lot of how Minus played that Rogue looks like how a Bard should play in my opinion, except the Bard would also have his buff/debuff songs going as well. I liked how engaging and strategic the CC was with the Rogue, that's the type of challenge a CC class should have, not just some type of easy mode AoE mez. Would feel good on the Bard to keep him engaged between his support roles. The Rogue should maintain some utility obviously, but they get a lot just being able to stealth, scout, and steal. Any type of mez should be removed from the Rogue altogether, that's an entirely different class role. Some type of short duration stun with Smoke Trick based on opportunity would make sense to encourage popping in and out of combat and helping to slow damage by mobs. The reality is the Rogue is *THE* melee DPS class for this game, the only other potential competition is the Monk and their kit is pulling and off tanking. It might be old hat, but as the only primarily dedicated melee dps class, the Rogue should be centered around dealing melee damage, and that needs to be very engaging and intense. Their utility is killing things quickly, especially things immune or resistent to magic.
Say it with me here: There is no CC role. There is a Support role that includes CC but also much more.
A rogue dropping everything to fulfill a portion of a support role is a generally poor group choice compared to having a real support role that would bring so much more to the party.
Look you can try to change what people feel that the enchanter class is but we all know it's not a support class it's the crowd control and it'll always be that it's in the make of What an enchanter is.And just because they changed the name on the website to say support they have said in many times and streams and before they changed it that it would be the crowd control class the CC class and they've interchanged that the CC class that you know support with buffs and stuff to that effect. So in turn enchanters main goal is crowd control. Just like the shame and clerics and druids main goal is healing just like tanks main goal is going to be tanking warrior paladin direlord. And then you have your dps ranger monk rogue. And then you have your wizard and summonor. I mean what would support do otherwise What function if you're talking for specific elements that has been stated by Brad in the past will be in game What would support do other than crowd control and buffs.
Just because I change the name to support from crowd control does not mean they change what their mean duties are The name change just means that they have more that they can do within their utility
VR has never came out and stated that they will no longer be the crowd control group in all their statements it's always what it's been. They just changed the name on the website to support That means absolutely nothing
So let's look at the classes that are probably going to be in this support crowd control group What they do You have an illusionist aka an enchanter then you have a bard and then you have a necromancer and how these typically work? Well I'm illusionist enchanter typically controls people by making them think something else is going on with their enchantments aka crowd control. A a bard to increase morale through singing but they also mainly entice people to their music and so they're no longer paying attention to what's going on around them because they're memorized or put to sleep or something to that fact what's that The crowd control. And a necromancer typically controls with fear making people too scared to move making people run away this all crowd control.
You're really down to it The rogue is an OP class big time You probably shouldn't have any crowd control. They already have even without that The biggest utility of any class. They can sneak and hide which lets them pull and they have the highest DPS and not to mention the fact that they have road trip to help everybody climb. Then they have a snare and a root with their traps which is cool and then you give them smoke trick so they can take and crowd control that does make any sense they can do everything virtually except for heal somebody. personally I think the smoke track should do nothing but support themselves as a selfish class being a rogue or assassin and it should do nothing but remove them from a fight and reduce their argument and maybe one of them completely removes them from the Argo list.
Raidil said: Look you can try to change what people feel that the enchanter class is but we all know it's not a support class it's the crowd control and it'll always be that it's in the make of What an enchanter is.And just because they changed the name on the website to say support they have said in many times and streams and before they changed it that it would be the crowd control class the CC class and they've interchanged that the CC class that you know support with buffs and stuff to that effect. So in turn enchanters main goal is crowd control. Just like the shame and clerics and druids main goal is healing just like tanks main goal is going to be tanking warrior paladin direlord. And then you have your dps ranger monk rogue. And then you have your wizard and summonor. I mean what would support do otherwise What function if you're talking for specific elements that has been stated by Brad in the past will be in game What would support do other than crowd control and buffs.
You want to willfully ignore that the site says "Group Role: Support" and not Crowd Control then I don't know what to tell you. Yes CC is a notable part of supporting a group but not by any means all of what they do or bring to a group. I'd imagine each Support class will lean more or less heavily on that aspect of the support role.
It doesn't matter if a rogue can drop everything to CC a few mobs (likely with masteries to support this even), that is an extremely poor replacement for a real support who can do that same CC all while providing various buffs/debuffs for the group, keep damaging mobs, and giving mana/resource regens to the party. I think you are severly undervaluing the other aspects of support, things like: melee/spell haste, mana regen (both via buff and restored for the group from doing damage), debuffing the damage mobs are doing with things like Eyumai’s Dulling, and really who knows what else yet. Even with just this we can see massive efficiency boosts for any group that would bring a support class like enchanter over someone like a rogue who offers little (if anything) in terms of group boons and does little if any damage while trying to keep multiple targets CC'd.
So really even if the role was still called "Crowd Control" it wouldn't matter, because rogue would still have nothing on someone who mained that role.
Goosefraba
While people may not like the "excuse" that the game is in pre-Alpha, that is currently where the game is. This is the time that large changes to a class should be made and even a complete re-work of how they think a class should work. This is when VR should be giving abilities to classes in the game to test those abilities out with a player base (not just the dev team) to use and abuse the skill. Keep what works and toss the stuff that does not or tweak the skill/mastery until you get the desired result.
I didn't ignore the change of name one bit change your name doesn't change the role that they're doing. What is supportthey've never defined a support role they've defined a crowd control role and now they've named that crowd control role support That's not ignoring the name change. Secondly what would support mean when they have already stated they're going to have four distinct play types DPS tank heal and originally stated men crowd control which now they're calling support. What is support in this Well they called the crowd control and they change names I'm sure it's still crowd control. Second it would be the class to allow and help the other classes do their main role which again points to oh crowd control. And yes that meaning extra box haste and stuff like that But they're not going to be buffing everything and that's not going to be the primary focus I can guarantee because no one wants to be a buff bot
Chogar thank you that's exactly my meaning when I started this post and when people say pre-alpha that's exactly my thought is this is not considered a nerve this is considered changes to make the game the best it can be before it comes out
So I might be stretching it but to me support is a role where that class enhance a group's capability.
And you can achieve that with different means:
- CC. So you can take on each enemies one by one.
- Group buffs. so everyone is more resilient, take less damage or do more damage to kill faster.
- Health/Mana regen to reduce downtime and be able to chain big fights more frequently without needing to be to mindful of your ressources.
You can improve the group efficiency with different means and that's why (I think) they changed the role's name to a broader sense instead of just being CC, then having another role for the bard being buffer/CC/Healer/Regener.
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As for the "It's only Pre-Alpha", I'll double down on what Chogar says above.
I'm sorry but yeah, it's very early and you CANNOT expect the game to be balanced at this point, it's just that simple. How would you balance a game when you are missing half of the classes and the classes implemented don't even have all their skills (or they haven't been shown at least).
It doesn't mean you can't voice concerns. Of course you can tell the devs: "Damn that seems too much" or "That class seems underwhelming".
But:
1. Nobody expect the game have a perfect class balance even for launch.
2. The players will define the meta of the best group composition, so we'll only see the biggest balance problem when there will be a a big enough sample size of players to try different things. And that will only happen in Alpha or Beta, ... and you guessed it the game isn't there yet.
Some are already drawing end game conclusion like that class will never find a group, and that's simply to early for that. Sorry if you don't like the "It's only pre-alpha" but that's the case.
Bards in EQ were wanted in groups and raids for the songs they sang. While Bards could CC (and some did an outstanding job) the main reason they were invited to a group was for their group buff songs.
That is what I would call a support class. While they could CC that was not their strong point.