Balance of power just shifted to tamers!

[imported_Yalp]

Took 2 unbonded uber dragons out Sunday. First we hit Miasma, a challenge for any self respecting Cu. With 2 ubers on it, it went down in about 10 hits. So fast one could barely loot before the next one spawned. At one point I had Miasma and Reptalon on my dragon. With my aiding, it took them both out easily, and never fell below 1/2 health.

Later in the eve group MELISADES hunt saw one tamer w/ her new uber. MEL went down fast.. second round. a few more tamers brought theirs out.. 3 in total.... Mel went down in less than 8 minutes. Third round, the remaning tamers saw the light and broke theirs out. Mel w/ 4 Dragons.. about 4 minutes. Reminder, these are UNTRAINED ubers of various hit points, resists .. none of which was the highly "prized" perfect stat dragon! Barely had time to break party before she was dead.

THX UO.. this is gonna be fun! Will tamers own FEL now too? I can't wait to find out.

LORD Yalp of ZENTO, CTDM

 

[imported_Sarphus]

I'm pretty sure there are dexer templates that can solo mel in 8 minutes. I know for a fact that dexers can outdamage these new dragons. You need really good gear to do that, though.

 

[Guest]

Not trying to be a party pooper, but don't get too excited especially about tamer PvP, Jeremy's hinted at a possible look at the taming side of things and the dreaded "balance" was used

Wenchy

 

[imported_Yalp]

Would love to see someone solo mel.. dexer, mage/tamer, whatever. I'm sure there are those that sole a dragon and take it out....

but since when will you encounter an unber dragon in FEL which is standing around by itself? I'm sure the tamer controlling this beast can whip up a template to compliment the dragon for FEL side. I can see the team effort between tamer and dragon being quite formidable indeed!

 

[imported_Yalp]

And why shouldn't Tamers *with the right pet* be the most powerful template in the game? Why does it have to be some dexer template? I guess I missed the rules on ranked templates. ...

 

[Guest]

These Greater Dragons will probably be nerfed hard next publish. They are way too easy to tame for the power they possess.

 

[Poo]

they shoudl have made the UBER dragons UBER hard to tame.

its high time we had a critter that actually taxed the high end tamers skills.

make the min taming skill (natural..... oh ya, just like bushido baby!) like 115 to even own one and tame one.

give tamers who actually WORK the skill something they can take pride in.

 

[Guest]

From the sound of Jeremy's mention, it won't stop at greater dragons. What surprised me was the mention of looking at the pets before the pet ball issues. Fingers crossed it's not some stupid rebalancing ickyness. I can just see the pets getting nerfed and the PvPers still complaining because a wussy dragon can still kill them

Wenchy

 

[LAH Architect]

When was the last time PvPers ever stop complaining ?

Dissect their arguments and you will see the majority of them are just experts at giving excuses why they lost a fight . The worst are the non-subscribers giving their outdated opinions on how UO PvP should be.

 

[Guest]

Hehe so true... I haven't been in UO a day when tamers weren't the bad smell in Felucca lol.

Wenchy

 

[Guest]

PvP should never be dominated by tamers again. it's fairly disappointing. 55 firebreath to 70 fire, and 40 a hit in melee against 70 physical. these will wreck in pvp. however, there are a few bugs regarding these dragons I was unfortunate to come across. if people learn of these bugs, could end up with many dead dragons along with dead tamers, hahaha.

 

[Guest]

Only 55 fire breath damage against 70 fire? My best dragon does almost 90.

 

[Poo]

does no one use conf. pots anymore?

 

[Guest]

<blockquote><hr>

Only 55 fire breath damage against 70 fire? My best dragon does almost 90.

[/ QUOTE ]

not likely. I haven't seen a wild one do more than 75, and there is no way a tamed one is going to do 90 damage in a firebreath versus 70 fire resist. what are the hit points for this claim?

 

[imported_Yalp]

The argument seems to factor on can an UBER dragon take out a pvp SOLO? I"m thinking the tamer might also have some offensive weapons that compliment this new pet.

Hard hitting, bleed attack, teleporting, poisoning, firebreath all come standard on the ubers, so what about the mage/tamer? Paralyze? weaken? Poison? E-Bolts? Fire balls? Lightnening strike?

What about a tamer/archer? Or a tamer/bushido?

Where is it written that tamers couldn't and shouldn't PVP? I missed the rule set that said tamers in FEL are prohibited... which seems contrary to some's opinions.

But it's just me.. thinking outside the box.

 

[imported_Sarphus]

<blockquote><hr>

<blockquote><hr>

Only 55 fire breath damage against 70 fire? My best dragon does almost 90.

[/ QUOTE ]

not likely. I haven't seen a wild one do more than 75, and there is no way a tamed one is going to do 90 damage in a firebreath versus 70 fire resist. what are the hit points for this claim?

[/ QUOTE ]

2,000 post tame... LOL

 

[imported_Sarphus]

<blockquote><hr>

Not trying to be a party pooper, but don't get too excited especially about tamer PvP, Jeremy's hinted at a possible look at the taming side of things and the dreaded "balance" was used

Wenchy

[/ QUOTE ]

If they nerf the pets instead of the broken mechanics, it fixes nothing. The pet ball, ninja forms and dismount are clearly the issue. Pets are not. Anyone who knows how to fight a tamer in pvp can beat pretty much any tamer. There are abuseable mechanics that create insta-kill situations. The mechanics are what need to be nerfed, not the pets.

Anyone who complains about the DPS of tamer's pets imo doesn't know what they're talking about. I'm not even what I'd consider a good dexer, but I am a good tamer. My dexer easily outdamages my tamer. If tamers are so crazy powerful and high damage and easy to play then why was the magincia invasion dominated by archers and melee dexers?

I have never argued that gimp tactics used with pets were a bad thing... What I have argued is that pets are already pretty well balanced with monsters and that nerfing pets because of a bunch of cry-baby pvpers breaks more than it fixes.

PVPers won't stop crying even if they do get our pets nerfed to the point where a dragon is hitting for 5 damage a hit and moving at npc walk speed. PVPers (especially the ones who post on boards) are notorious for complaining about things. If something beats you consistantly, it may just be that you don't know how to fight that something!

One thing htat really flips my lid is that I hear an argument that goes like this...
"my group of 4 guys consistantly takes on 20 guys and anihilates them. Then that group of 20 guys goes and gets their tamers and we get owned. Clearly tamers are overpowered"

That's a bad argument.

 

[Guest]

<blockquote><hr>

<blockquote><hr>

Only 55 fire breath damage against 70 fire? My best dragon does almost 90.

[/ QUOTE ]

not likely. I haven't seen a wild one do more than 75, and there is no way a tamed one is going to do 90 damage in a firebreath versus 70 fire resist. what are the hit points for this claim?

[/ QUOTE ]
I forgot I had changed my suit a little, it is only 62 fire resist and it did 82 damage. In PVP you are usually cursed so it would be even lower. Mine has 948 hit points.

 

[Guest]

Exactly

My BF and I still joke about the guy who called out "nerf cus in PvP" on UHall. Oh god that was a funny thread....

Wenchy

 

[imported_Sarphus]

some guy on uhall is claiming him and a buddy took 2 untrained ww's and took over a spawn that was guarded by 13 seasoned fighters.

Is it just me or does that just reek of bull plop? I think I could put together a group of 5 that could drop ANY 2 TRAINED greater dragon groups. I find it hard to believe that 13 people are so bad that they can't handle untrianed dragons...

especially if they're spawners, because spawners usually have at least 2 pvm characters there that SHOULD make short work of an untrained dragon. That's assuming they know how to play their character, which I think is a somewhat safe assumption.

Also, untrained dragons don't have maxed out stamina, so they don't move as fast. I really think the whole story is a fabrication with the pointed intent of getting our new dragon nerfed into a giant bean bag.

 

[Guest]

Any decent fighter should be able to solo a WW, especially if he's at a champ. If 2 wyrms wiped out 13 players, how did they expect to do a spawn? 2 dexxers cross healing would be near unkillable even to well trained wyrm, 13 should have mopped the floor with both tamers and the 2 wyrms in under a minute.


Rey~

I smell a stinky!

 

[imported_Sarphus]

He was saying they used 2 untrained super dragons and killed 13 people.

 

[Guest]

I think your suspicions are right Sarphus. I mean if the 13 were arriving 2 at a time and both tamers gimped to hell with pet ball dropping on their heads, surely said seasoned champers would be in team speak yelling to not come in small groups.

I PvP'd mostly as a RPer and even I know that's a sucky tactic!

Methinks lots of gimp tactics were used and the seasoned champers must be used to champing on a very empty shard

Just wish Jeremy would give more of a hint as to this "balancing" she mentioned... There must surely be plans for production shards, the crying there'll be if Siege is the only shard to get a fix lol.

Wenchy

 

[Guest]

LOL 1 good pvp,er will take out both tamers whit out having the dragons touch him.

 

[imported_Sarphus]

well the "tamers" he is talking about aren't tamers... they're gimplates that have pets... they don't have vet... they have a gimplate and they abuse the summoning ball, which ultimately gets our pets nerfed. It's stupid.

 

[Guest]

ah ok---well maybe there is more to it than just hp, though. anyone have the firebreath formula? what I did was, I tested it on an RC, then on a player, and I matched the resists and there was no linear difference, just a base - %. so, from what I can tell, there is no difference of firebreath damage when used on spawn or player, hehe

to clean up my fight against the "pvp tamer," my main concern is bushido bokuto nerve strike hiryu / cu sidhe tamers who go:

-nerve strike
-dismount macro
-all kill (dismount or bleed)
-if fail, remount macro; repeat loop
-if success, nerve strike; nerve strike; kill; repeat loop on next target

what do you do? there isn't anything you can do if nerve strike paralyzes you. you try to poison their pet, you try to paralyze the tamer. mages can do both easy, dexxers cannot, lol. the best tamers in these templates manage to fit magic resist on their tamer, and they are tough cookies. the weapon speed of a bokuto is insane even at 40 or less dex, and the ability to fit super mods of over 20 hci and dci (I think up to 25 with heartwood kits), along with a standard of 40 di, means weapons anyone can use at full speed, with insane hit chance and defense chance, with a maximum of mana at disposal for specials. 50 bushido for nerve strike is still crazy, and 90 tactics isn't hard to fit on a template.

as for the proposed ninjitsu trend for super dragons, if their dragon manages 35-45 a hit melee, and they do 5-12 a hit with a hit spell of 5-12 as well, that's about 47 a hit combined without factoring in firebreath (50-60 perhaps) or spells (7-20, perhaps). reds will need ninjitsu, blues will do decent on bushido twinks still, lol. at this point, I want to say super dragons will not be abused as often as other, ridable pets, because their pets are always visible to attack, and that alone is an issue. I would like to see nerve strike changed again, so the minimum to use would be perhaps 90 bushido.

 

[imported_Yalp]

If I understand correctly, if a tamer/whatever template, that has lore/taming and no vetting, uses the pet summoning ball efficiently, that's an abuse of the game mechanics? Is vetting a strict LAW for tamers? Or are all skills a matter of choice for the player?

If I read it correctly you are upset because some people incorporate a tool (pet summoning ball) into their tactics in pvp? And you want the dev's to write code which changes the game mechanics to prohibit the use of summoning balls more than 1 time in what 5 minutes, 5 hours, 5 days?

By the by.. I'm not a pvper .. and am just trying to understand the "LAW".

 

[Guest]

Think of it not so much as a law, but akin to the trick of chaining paralyse on someone while the pets eat them. Yes you could do it, legally, but while the attacker would call it efficient (and it was) it's considered a lame way to kill. You will never get respect for doing it. It takes zero PvP skill to run alongside someone hitting a summon pet-all kill macro. And yeah, I know that many PvPers can win just mushing certain combos of keys in quick succession, I'm just relaying the way they think of it, which I do agree with

IMO you shouldn't be able to form a bond with any pet if you aren't able to keep your side of the bargain and actually res said pet.

We have 3 obvious options for toning down gimp tamers:

1) nerf the gimp stuff like pet balling and not allow summoning in animal form.
2) nerf the pets so they do so little damage, a pet balling tamer isn't causing carnage.
3) link vet to bonding so PvP tamers either use disposable pets or train vet.

I'm thinking #1 would be the gentlest

Wenchy

 

[imported_Sarphus]

<blockquote><hr>

If I understand correctly, if a tamer/whatever template, that has lore/taming and no vetting, uses the pet summoning ball efficiently, that's an abuse of the game mechanics? Is vetting a strict LAW for tamers? Or are all skills a matter of choice for the player?

If I read it correctly you are upset because some people incorporate a tool (pet summoning ball) into their tactics in pvp? And you want the dev's to write code which changes the game mechanics to prohibit the use of summoning balls more than 1 time in what 5 minutes, 5 hours, 5 days?

By the by.. I'm not a pvper .. and am just trying to understand the "LAW".

[/ QUOTE ]

Sarcasm duly noted lol

I'm not saying that at all and I've posted a lot about what I think of the pet summoning ball. By and large I think the pet summoning ball is a useful and unfortunately abuseable item. I think using the summoning ball should function like casting a spell (as though you're summoning your pet or something...). A change like this prevents people from using the ball to run other people down while repeatedly summoning big nasty creatures on top of them. It also prevents people from calling their pets in as part of an offensive combo. When pets are in play, they should be attackable; not hidden from view until it's time for their owner to strike.

Current creatures rarely do enough burst damage to kill someone before they run away... unless they're careless. Being able to repeatedly summon a creature and stick it on someone as they try to run away changes this completely and makes pets look unbalanced.

Pets are balanced because their AI and movement speed are both completely counterable. Also, when a pet has to be near its owner to be in play, the tamer's opponent has an opportunity to deal with the pet. The pet ball in its current form takes both AI and pet speed out of the equation turning pets into a ranged weapon that functions kind of like moving shot with spell casting mixed in. if you think that's balanced, I completely disagree. The pet ball in its current form can also function as an instant-cast summoning spell. There's a reason summon daemon isn't an insta-cast spell.

The thing that bothers me about the pet ball is not the use of it. I care about pvpers crying about "tamers" (which are actually gimplates that abuse the pet ball, not pure tamers) and their "overpowered pets". I don't believe the pets are intrinsicly imbalanced, but rather abuse of the pet ball makes the pets function in a way other than intended (as a weapon you can use to shoot at people as you chase them). You can't balance pets with the pet ball in its current form without also nerfing the pets to the point where they're completely irrelevant in pvm. I don't want pets nerfed that hard, so I'm against pet ball abuse.

As for vet. I think it's a very useful skill and I like using it on most of my tamers. I am not against hybridization, though. I think it's fun and interesting for players to mix and match skills to try to find newer, better templates.

I don't consider a character a pure tamer if they only have vet just as I wouldn't consider a character a pure bard if they only have music and 1 bard skill. I have my share of hybrid templates including tamer/dexers, tamer/mages, tamer/necros, tamer/spellweavers and any form of tamer/bard. I'm certainly not against having a tamer without vet, but I think the mechanics of the game need to be balanced so that the skills a tamer can take with just taming and lore aren't unbalanced when used with high end pets.

Vet is part of a pure tamer because a pure tamer needs stable slots and you get at least 4 by taking vet to 120. I guess my definition of a pure tamer would be a character who's design is primarily focused around the use, control and protection of pets. I guess you could even have a pure tamer without vet... as long as you have other ways to heal your pet.

 

[imported_Sarphus]

wow wenchy... I never heard the idea of tieing bonding to vet.

I'm indifferent on it, but I'm sure that would make it harder to gimp out a tamer. I think people would just bond their pets using soulstones, though.

It's a clever idea, though.

 

[Guest]

This is why it helps when I take a break for 6 months... folks forget all the long winding posts I made so I can recycle ideas

I just figured it made sense in a RP way that a pet would surely only trust you to resurrect it, if you could actually resurrect it

Think it comes from when I used to PvP with unbonded pets, I thought it would indirectly curb the strength of a PvP gimplate if they couldn't easily maintain trained pets, and give them a reason to not toss pets left and right at a spawn, risking the need to keep taming replacement pets.

Has nothing to do with my first day as a faction tamer where I spent more time in stat loss or taming pets than actually fighting... *coughs*

Wenchy

 

[Guest]

right now, Vet is pretty pointless for me because anything worth fighting in PvM will wither you or use some other kind of area damage. Chiv mage tamers are the best fit for me. but, my main tamer is a fisher, too. lol with 100 vet. so go figure ;P. if i had to raise vet to meet bond requirements, I'd have to drop fishing, which wouldn't be that big of a deal.

i'm:

110 tame (might go to 115, if I ever get a 120 scroll)
114 lore (going to 120, I think)
110 focus
106 mage
100 fishing
100 vet
065 chiv

and for the record, I am a seriously gimp fisherman

 

[Guest]

Careful, next thing there'll be a call to nerf fisher tamers

Wenchy

 

[imported_Yalp]

I don't mean to come across as sarcastic.. just applying my logic and why the issue w/ tamers in pvp is different.. or seems to have different rules set.

Seems like the strategy of paralyze and kill is just that.. regardless of which "tool" you choose to do the killing with...
mage/dexer/ninja/bush/poisoning/tamer/archer.

Also seems like the strategy of lying in wait for your victim is also a strategy with different tools.. Hiding/Invising/Stealthing...

Having your pet waiting in the stables or in your house or around the corner seems like a strategy.. just like using various death dealing weapons in a fight.. you could switch out from your back pack during a fight.. the opponent doesn't know what's in your backpack or which spell may be coming from your spellbook.

I just can't seem to buy the argument that some pvp'rs think there are more 'honorable" ways to pvp than others. If honorable is the goal, then the entire rule set of Fel needs to change. Ganking crafters in Fel isn't honorable. Having a member of the guild stealthing around to all the champ spawns so they can call in their buds to gank the group isn't honorable. 2 on 1 isn't honorable.

My point is that pvp in Fel isnt supposed to be honorable. It is player vs player, every man woman and child for themselves. If you can be creative enough to find a way to stay alive, or form strategies that kill others, or a more creative template. armor suit or weapon group that gets the advantage over others, then god bless!

Complaining to the dev's that someone's tactic, strategy, template, weapon, etc needs to be nerfed because you can't defend against it isn't honorable either.

 

[imported_Sarphus]

Actually, I rarely pvp on a tamer. I prefer to pvp on a necro/mage... or not at all. I'm effective on a few tamer builds (including discord tamer lol) and definitely effective on my necro/mage.

As for my pvp strategy on a tamer, I'm not the guy that dismount ganks people. I'm also not the guy that stun ganks people. Sometimes I'm the guy that boxes you in at a choke point with a pack of frenzies and frenzie ganks you. Other times, I use a mage/tamer mounted on an ethy with a pair of bakes. The bakes are just secondary as I do my primary fighting with magery combos. I've killed quite a few people with both templates and I don't even carry a pet ball.

Honestly, I don't need one. My pets tend to be at least twice as powerful as an average pet, which imo is somewhat comperable to having a really good pvp suit and fighting people that are using a cheap suit. I make up for lack of a pet ball with quality of pets

I know it'll sound newb, but I don't carry bolas either.

The reason I choose these strategies has nothing to do with honor. I just like doing things differently than most people. It's REALLY funny when you run up to a guy with a pack of hellcat kittens and box/gank him. This guy was laughing at me when I killed him... I also killed the guy here with the demon (he attacked me too). I would say he was laughing because it was fun getting ganked by kittens, but I think he was just laughing at me. I don't think he expected to die, and I didn't see him for a while after this event.

All told, I only ever killed 3 people with that pack, but it was funny each time.

Another thing I did with packs that gained me a certain level of notoriety was on Siege. I took a pack of frenzies and just stood in the archway in luna. Reds run through there all the time. They would run into my pack and be instantly boxed in. It was hillarious. I went to knight of justice from nothing in one night. I know it annoyed them because they all switched to their blue tamers to peace my entire pack.

but anyway... I don't really consider myself a pvper to begin with. I generally pvp when I'm forced into it. I'm really only interested in pvp when it stands to get my pvm pets nerfed into irrelevancy (which I will fight against).

 

[LAH Architect]

<blockquote><hr>

well the "tamers" he is talking about aren't tamers... they're gimplates that have pets... they don't have vet... they have a gimplate and they abuse the summoning ball, which ultimately gets our pets nerfed. It's stupid.

[/ QUOTE ]

After the whiners are done with the 'gimplates', they will go after you. You know some people will never be satisfied till they totally remove tamers having a fighting chance in Fel. They just want them to remain only as champ (monster)killers and easy prey for pkers.

P.S. The most successful and famous red ninja stealth tamer pker on Baja has vet. He takes on huge odds and his pets die often, but we all have fun. Sometimes he and his pals win, sometimes we win. It's about learning tactics and if we field a discorder mage, he's toast ! He's so much fun compared to the usual fare of hopping LP | AI warriors, double shots heavy-xbow bush archers

 

[imported_Sarphus]

I don't really care that much if tamers are irrelevant in pvp as long as they are relevant in pvm. I really don't care about pvp.

I haven't really cared about pvp for about 7 years.