[SH] Melee Spec community

[Brutinho]

Disclaimer: This is not a proposal topic. This is to exchange ideas that could lead to different class balance proposals.

In order to keep this civil, let's refrain from whining about other classes and only use them as examples to prove a (good) point.

I will try to keep notes of all things discussed and work with others to create realistic proposals. I have seen a few really good melee SH on the server and I would like to hear from you.

To keep this organized I would like to start talking about the basic skill that allows SH to go melee spec.

What is you opinion on what Squig Armor brings to the table? Is it good as is, could it be tweaked a bit or you think it needs a lot of work?

Information/compassion to mirror class (not mechanic mirror)

Squig armor:
Converts stats to melee
+120 str +120wounds +120 toughness
Pet gets buffed (if right pet is out it doubles armor)

Assault Stance:
Converts stats to melee
+120 str +120 ws
+10 % parry, Doubles armor
+65% Auto attack damage increase, 25% proc AA haste (33%)

Feel free to discuss, I will jump in soon enough

[Athergic]

Assault stance was buffed, to include 10% parry and auto damage/haste increase
I think this was around the time of the assault tree buff as well.

120 wounds and 120 toughness is really bad ass though, and paired with the recent squig herder changes, they are pretty balanced out.

I Miss the old melee squig though, I would come back and play today if it wasn't so different.

[Stortz]

I feel like the melee SW/ SH is working great right now, but a part of me is skeptic about it
Is their Survivability tied to the fact that we have no access to the land of the dead weapons and therefore can't brust them like we used to on Live, or have we found a good balance ?

[Brutinho]

I think that Assault stance got buffed after melee squig herder was revamped. My speculation is based on the stats are converted from ranged to melee while on Assault Stance/Squig Armor. On Assault: reduce chance to be dodge becomes reduce chance to be parried while on SA it does not transfer

I agree that Toughness and Wounds go very well with the 'sturdy' melee style of the SH, but if you want to focus on DPS it does not bring much to the table as 10% parry (from assault stance). Now, if we would get initiative instead of toughness, both DPS and Tanky SH would benefit from it and it would be a counter to our mirror class initiative debuff/ws buff tactic.

It would look something like this:

SW would get 10% parry on stance / SH gets a better defences with 13p tactic
SH gets 120 initiative on SA / SW gets a 60 initiative debuff and 120 WS buff on tactic
*Both require to use an specific skill*

AS/SA base buffs would be closer to balance and opposite class tactic version off buff/debuff are still more powerful.

I feel like the melee SW/ SH is working great right now, but a part of me is skeptic about it
Is their Survivability tied to the fact that we have no access to the land of the dead weapons and therefore can't brust them like we used to on Live, or have we found a good balance ?

Edit misunderstood: What class are you using to try to burst a mSH down? it also depends on the type of build they have. You can spec disgustingly defensive, but you wont kill targets yourself. I am trying to build my herder to DPS and I do get burst down easy by a few classes. Specially WH, WL and mSW they can bring the painzzz!

[Stortz]

Edit misunderstood: What class are you using to try to burst a mSH down? it also depends on the type of build they have. You can spec disgustingly defensive, but you wont kill targets yourself. I am trying to build my herder to DPS and I do get burst down easy by a few classes. Specially WH, WL and mSW they can bring the painzzz!

I am basing this from Live vs RoR now
On Live, any melee spec for SW/SH would fail terribly, do no damage, simply explode against anybody

Now, I've seen a SH escape from a focus fire on a scenario. Granted, he had healing from his group, but this was not possible on live. In 2009, if you tried that, it would have been a wasted effort. Tyrant gear mixed with warlord and the LotD weapons would put most MDPS at orange stats in both Weaponskill and strength, while still pilling up crit. He wouldn't have made it.

I seriously doubt you can mix RoR gear to get to a point where your crit, ws and str are at nuclear levels. And I hope it stays that way.

[Athergic]

I think that Assault stance got buffed after melee squig herder was revamped. My speculation is based on the stats are converted from ranged to melee while on Assault Stance/Squig Armor. On Assault: reduce chance to be dodge becomes reduce chance to be parried while on SA it does not transfer

I agree that Toughness and Wounds go very well with the 'sturdy' melee style of the SH, but if you want to focus on DPS it does not bring much to the table as 10% parry (from assault stance). Now, if we would get initiative instead of toughness, both DPS and Tanky SH would benefit from it and it would be a counter to our mirror class initiative debuff/ws buff tactic.

It would look something like this:

SW would get 10% parry on stance / SH gets a better defences with 13p tactic
SH gets 120 initiative on SA / SW gets a 60 initiative debuff and 120 WS buff on tactic
*Both require to use an specific skill*

AS/SA base buffs would be closer to balance and opposite class tactic version off buff/debuff are still more powerful.

I feel like the melee SW/ SH is working great right now, but a part of me is skeptic about it
Is their Survivability tied to the fact that we have no access to the land of the dead weapons and therefore can't brust them like we used to on Live, or have we found a good balance ?

Edit misunderstood: What class are you using to try to burst a mSH down? it also depends on the type of build they have. You can spec disgustingly defensive, but you wont kill targets yourself. I am trying to build my herder to DPS and I do get burst down easy by a few classes. Specially WH, WL and mSW they can bring the painzzz!

I could be mistaken, but I'm almost positive shadow warrior got it's buffs before squig herder, at least the assault stance buffs. The squig buffs were announced, but it was about a year before they were implemented. This was during the OP white lion days.

[Manatikik]

I think that Assault stance got buffed after melee squig herder was revamped. My speculation is based on the stats are converted from ranged to melee while on Assault Stance/Squig Armor. On Assault: reduce chance to be dodge becomes reduce chance to be parried while on SA it does not transfer

I agree that Toughness and Wounds go very well with the 'sturdy' melee style of the SH, but if you want to focus on DPS it does not bring much to the table as 10% parry (from assault stance). Now, if we would get initiative instead of toughness, both DPS and Tanky SH would benefit from it and it would be a counter to our mirror class initiative debuff/ws buff tactic.

It would look something like this:

SW would get 10% parry on stance / SH gets a better defences with 13p tactic
SH gets 120 initiative on SA / SW gets a 60 initiative debuff and 120 WS buff on tactic
*Both require to use an specific skill*

AS/SA base buffs would be closer to balance and opposite class tactic version off buff/debuff are still more powerful.

I feel like the melee SW/ SH is working great right now, but a part of me is skeptic about it
Is their Survivability tied to the fact that we have no access to the land of the dead weapons and therefore can't brust them like we used to on Live, or have we found a good balance ?

Edit misunderstood: What class are you using to try to burst a mSH down? it also depends on the type of build they have. You can spec disgustingly defensive, but you wont kill targets yourself. I am trying to build my herder to DPS and I do get burst down easy by a few classes. Specially WH, WL and mSW they can bring the painzzz!

I could be mistaken, but I'm almost positive shadow warrior got it's buffs before squig herder, at least the assault stance buffs. The squig buffs were announced, but it was about a year before they were implemented. This was during the OP white lion days.

Correct. The Assault buffs happened in Septemberish (on mobile and too lazy to look up actual date) of 2017 stemming from a balance proposal about Dodge striekthrough -> parry strikethrough. Then a month or two later the double initiative debuff stacking was added.

[spiritbull]

Yesterday we had an event with guild WB: Guild Leader allowed Melee SHs
Although from my point of view, all was okiesh, the feedback from the lead was: I don't see damage..
So unlikely melee SH will be allowed again to take Sorc, Chop, Mara slot.
(Here I speak about guild WB, so tanks, heals, coordinated morales, SHs specked and equipped to max DD, not for surviability or mix)

From my point of view, to bring melee SHs closer to competitive, the damage and utility should be buffed a bit:
Dodge strikethrough -> parry strikethrough in Squig Armour?
Strong 3rd morale?
A couple of additional utility skills?

Otherwise it will remain fun spec only..

[Brutinho]

Guys I would like your opinion on this 2 proposals I am thinking about.
Proposal mock up #1:
[SA buffs]

Issue: Lackluster when compared to Assault buffs)

Proposition:
+120 str
+120 wounds
+120 initiative (changed from toughness)
Add dodge strikethrough conversion like Assault stance has
option a) increase Pet AA +50-100%
option b) Give 20% armor pen to pet while user is on SA

Spoiler:

I would love fenryl's or other SW feedback specially on that last part. How much does a AA ASW hit for on light/mid targets with/without debuffs and crit/non crit?

The idea on buffing pet damage as opposed to self damage its to be able to bring more burst (AA increase) for small scale or ST damage (armor pen) without altering AOE builds with territorial aggression.

_____________________________________________

Porposal mock up #2
[Moral 3 review]

Issue: M3 are not fully compatible with mSH play, specially on a WB set up.

Spoiler:

There is an existing proposal to make Squigbeast triple damage on squig armor when slotted with territorial aggression. I think this won’t go through. Really bad gas hits from 400 to 850 crits on soft/debuffed targets + Big bouncing with is 450 to 950 crits on soft/debuffed targets. Trippling that damage for 15 secs and poping 2.5k – 5.4k AOE damage/sec would NOT be balanced.

Proposition:
a) My suggestion would be to make explosive shots work with melee skills.
b) Even better make a new version for melee skills 600 morale damage for next 5 attacks (Making it a bit stronger and bursty, but shorter than SL/Chop M2).


Give me some feedback so I can keep working on these two C:

[Orontes]

What about changing Squig Frenzy to be similar to SW's Vengeance of Nagarythe?

Some kind of armor penetration or strike through would be very helpful. I like Proposal 1#