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Fix The Gap B/w Giants and Every Other Race

Your Fallen GodYour Fallen God
Mabinogi Rep: 1,070
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edited July 31, 2019 in Feedback and Suggestions
Maybe give humans the ability to dual wield axes? Maybe give elves the ability to dual wield in general, fix the damage/def/prot balance giants take 1's with their cheapest vales shield while they hold a lance/2h sword for humans in their other hand... They have an overwhelming amount of OP skills Stampede, Final Strike, Windguard, Full Swing without being in trans, shieldless charge without reforge, higher smash damage, a skill that literally gives them 10% more damage while humans get 10% more speed (making them STILL SLOWER than both other races even with it active), higher charge damage, higher stats overall.. as it stands they have the most skills, most stats and cheapest OP gear with the least amount of effort. Ranged skills are the biggest pain in the butt, not to mention you have to pay NX if you want 1k arrows without carrying around endless amounts of em, they don't have to nerf giants just bring the other races up to par, especially if people are hosting pvp tournaments and expecting to see giants lose to an elf with "no mag spam" restrictions. Who else would like to see some balancing to this game?
DanievictriaSherri
  1. Update for human/elf races16 votes
    1. Yes
       75% (12 votes)
    2. No
       25% (4 votes)

Comments

  • DanievictriaDanievictria
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    I'm all for this.

    Give Elves the ability to dual-wield daggers, a skill that allows them to infuse a melee weapon with an elemental spell, and the ability to use Hide in battle.

    Give Humans a boost to their base speed, combat yo-yo's or a combat boomerang as a race-exclusive weapon, and either make them stronger with support abilities or give them a success bonus when crafting.

    Then, of course, create a rogue talent that's exclusive to Humans and Elves, but has different progression paths for both races. So, an Elf rogue would would be oriented more around stealth and poisons and a Human rogue would be oriented more around traps and lock picking, for example. Yes, I still want a proper rogue talent...
  • UrufuUrufu
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  • HelsaHelsa
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    and I this and this
  • MaiaMaia
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    edited August 1, 2019
    cheapest OP gear with the least amount of effort.

    Huh? Giants have the absolute most expensive gear if I'm not mistaken. A full max combat set is like 3b just in enchants (whether you're human, giant, or elf archer it's pretty much the same). Add on the 200-400m per massive despair item (arguably more expensive than a divine blade, though the recent price hike puts them closer together... except it's double if you make the sword + shield).

    That aside there are a few other considerations when comparing giants to the other races:

    Final Strike is decent but not nearly as useful as FH which is far better for raids, peeling, quick room clearing, etc. FS is pretty situational because of the super slow build-up time and no way to buff attack speed. It's better in some techs which negate smol damage sure though.

    Humans can rig huge damage solo with support shot, giants just can't.

    Elves/Archery is still one of the best single-target DPS powerhouses out there (at least in KR :) ). Knuckles are also now up there but at least all races can use these, though giants are better.

    Mage master race is possibly on the horizon with ego revamp. Elves > humans > giants in this category as well if I recall.

    Yes giants have the best defensive capabilities. Yes they get more knuckle/chain/combat damage. However, they can't FH (FS isn't the same) and they can't use any archery which are two other meta builds.

    That said, if people like the gameplay offered by giants so much- why don't they play giants then? Instead of trying to strip it away from them. Humans have a different playstyle which consists of largely FH, support, jack of all trades whereas elves are built around archery/magic, gottagofast. With things like puppetry and alchemy remaining relatively neutral. Even ninja and chains are only marginally different if I recall.
    SherriLutetiumVeylaineSuu
  • LeineiLeinei
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    I'm all for this.

    Give Elves the ability to dual-wield daggers, a skill that allows them to infuse a melee weapon with an elemental spell, and the ability to use Hide in battle.

    Give Humans a boost to their base speed, combat yo-yo's or a combat boomerang as a race-exclusive weapon, and either make them stronger with support abilities or give them a success bonus when crafting.

    Then, of course, create a rogue talent that's exclusive to Humans and Elves, but has different progression paths for both races. So, an Elf rogue would would be oriented more around stealth and poisons and a Human rogue would be oriented more around traps and lock picking, for example. Yes, I still want a proper rogue talent...

    Combat Yoyos?

    149064a21d28ab847b822120dfa60ea8.gif
    SherriDanievictriaMegasoulSuu
  • DanievictriaDanievictria
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    Leinei wrote: »
    I'm all for this.

    Give Elves the ability to dual-wield daggers, a skill that allows them to infuse a melee weapon with an elemental spell, and the ability to use Hide in battle.

    Give Humans a boost to their base speed, combat yo-yo's or a combat boomerang as a race-exclusive weapon, and either make them stronger with support abilities or give them a success bonus when crafting.

    Then, of course, create a rogue talent that's exclusive to Humans and Elves, but has different progression paths for both races. So, an Elf rogue would would be oriented more around stealth and poisons and a Human rogue would be oriented more around traps and lock picking, for example. Yes, I still want a proper rogue talent...

    Combat Yoyos?

    149064a21d28ab847b822120dfa60ea8.gif

    Heck yeah!
  • nomigid15nomigid15
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    Let humans 2H-wield Great Swords. :D
  • FinityFinity
    Mabinogi Rep: 2,100
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    edited August 2, 2019
    Maia wrote: »
    cheapest OP gear with the least amount of effort.

    Huh? Giants have the absolute most expensive gear if I'm not mistaken. A full max combat set is like 3b just in enchants (whether you're human, giant, or elf archer it's pretty much the same). Add on the 200-400m per massive despair item (arguably more expensive than a divine blade, though the recent price hike puts them closer together... except it's double if you make the sword + shield).

    That aside there are a few other considerations when comparing giants to the other races:

    Final Strike is decent but not nearly as useful as FH which is far better for raids, peeling, quick room clearing, etc. FS is pretty situational because of the super slow build-up time and no way to buff attack speed. It's better in some techs which negate smol damage sure though.

    Humans can rig huge damage solo with support shot, giants just can't.

    Elves/Archery is still one of the best single-target DPS powerhouses out there (at least in KR :) ). Knuckles are also now up there but at least all races can use these, though giants are better.

    Mage master race is possibly on the horizon with ego revamp. Elves > humans > giants in this category as well if I recall.

    Yes giants have the best defensive capabilities. Yes they get more knuckle/chain/combat damage. However, they can't FH (FS isn't the same) and they can't use any archery which are two other meta builds.

    That said, if people like the gameplay offered by giants so much- why don't they play giants then? Instead of trying to strip it away from them. Humans have a different playstyle which consists of largely FH, support, jack of all trades whereas elves are built around archery/magic, gottagofast. With things like puppetry and alchemy remaining relatively neutral. Even ninja and chains are only marginally different if I recall.

    I agree that giant gears are no cheaper than other race's gears, especially with rarity of new weapon mats and reforges...

    But I disagree that elves have most advantage on magic over other race. Out of all magic skills we only have "ice spear casting speed" as "advantage for magic talent" which doesn't really make elves a "master magic race". Giants use 30% more mana than other races, but it really doesn't mean much when there's many ways to recover mana(pots, staff upgrade,erg,upcoming staff ego). In the end, magic is equal for all races dps wise.

    I also doubt that spirit weapon update really fixed magic, magic still has it's own problems that are neglected. Most of monsters in end-game content has high magic defense and protection. Intermediate magic is notorious for drawing aggro and scattering monsters. Magic is crippled with its damage calculation as well, going from 800 to 900 magic attack will gain less than going from 300 to 400 magic attack.(The higher you get, the less you'll gain!) Magic enchants give pathetically low magic attack compared to max damage enchants, etc.

    Now on knuckles, yes all races can use them, but elves carry big disadvantage unlike giants with magic. Giants have 40% combo mastery damage increase, humans have 30%, while elves have 20%. Giants has less combo skill cooldown as default as well. In the end there is no way for elves to catch up on other race's knuckle damage output, given that they are using same gears.

    I think race penalty/advantage is really outdated. Maybe ice spear casting speed meant something back then ice spear was strong. Maybe 30% additional mana usage was a big deal when pots were expensive and other methods to reduce mana usage didn't exist. But it really doesn't mean anything nowadays.

  • HelsaHelsa
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    Aren't elves supposed to be stupidly OP in Korea? Perhaps the giant update was to give them more parity there. Since all the gaming races are different and all the installs of Mabinogi are different it is impossible to make the gaming races "equal". In terms of raids, where everyone can have a job, gaming races not being equal is less of an issue. But in PvP, like the highlander, there can be only one. PvPers will find "the best race" for PvP and gravitate towards it. If game mechanics changes that, then people complain. So, either make all the gaming races equal with only cosmetic differences or allow race change at rebirth.
  • LutetiumLutetium
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    Give Elves the ability to dual-wield daggers
    Not you specifically but everyone asking for this for all these years clearly doesn't understand just how garbage dual wielding actually is in mabinogi. The minimum attack time is doubled when using dual wield so you're hitting at the same rate as using a 2h of equal speed (stacking attack speed boosts can boost normal 2h to the same speed as a very fast 1h ofc) for FH, but you lose critical damage from R type, have lower base weapon damage, worse enchants, worthless erg upgrades (unless you're a giant then the 50% cdr is pretty big for rage impact if you're rich enough for two erg 50 1h blunts), lose the 20% bonus to smash's (and final strike) multiplier as well as the 5% boost to critical chance cap. Sure the R crit bonus and weapon max/enchants stack for single hit skills (smash, wm, counter, final strike) but it dual wield still just can't compare to 2h for anything but windmill, which they lose to erg 1h axe on anyway due to the wm boost they provide at higher levels.
    Finity wrote: »
    But I disagree that elves have most advantage on magic over other race. Out of all magic skills we only have "ice spear casting speed" as "advantage for magic talent" which doesn't really make elves a "master magic race". Giants use 30% more mana than other races, but it really doesn't mean much when there's many ways to recover mana(pots, staff upgrade,erg,upcoming staff ego). In the end, magic is equal for all races dps wise.
    This is entirely valid, magic needs a complete overhaul and elves need to benefit for it like giants do for fighter, the 10/20 matk they have over human/giant now makes effectively no difference.
    Finity wrote: »
    I also doubt that spirit weapon update really fixed magic, magic still has it's own problems that are neglected. Most of monsters in end-game content has high magic defense and protection. Intermediate magic is notorious for drawing aggro and scattering monsters. Magic is crippled with its damage calculation as well, going from 800 to 900 magic attack will gain less than going from 300 to 400 magic attack.(The higher you get, the less you'll gain!) Magic enchants give pathetically low magic attack compared to max damage enchants, etc.
    Most of this is also correct except the part about matk being diminishing return, 300 to 400 for example with fireball adds 1200 to it's base damage, 800 to 900 also adds 1200, before fire mastery or any other multipliers like combo cards of course, matk adds flat min/max but each spell has a different coefficient so some benefit less than others, like icebolt for example will only get 40 max from that same 100 matk.
    Helsa wrote: »
    Aren't elves supposed to be stupidly OP in Korea? Perhaps the giant update was to give them more parity there.
    Elf mag spam is the best dps in the game, but archery is broken in NA due to aim rate being tied to latency and mabinogi using in order encrypted TCP packets to communicate with the server, 90% on KR is 90% but 90% on NA is only 90% if you're in Oregon (California before servers were moved to amazon cloud), the further you are the more desynced your client aim meter and the server side aim meter become due to the repeated latency add from TCP acknowledgements. In KR you're generally going to have 1~3ms of latency to the server, so little to no desync occurs and you'll see any korean elf gameplay video archery will hit much more than the vast majority of NA player's because of that. Personally after 7 years of playing an elf trying to use archery with 48~68ms of latency, I find archery to be completely unusable. A large part of why I play a giant now.

    Also props to Maia for being one of the only people to understand you can play on other characters of other races instead of crying for nerfs on the forum every update.

    PS: yes elf (this also applies to human) can get 2h smash from celtic warrior axe/hammer, yes they can support shot their own smashes, yes they will STILL out damage a giant smashing -> 2 bashes with a 2h sword+shield despite strength deficit and lower base smash multiplier.

    I could go on and on but honestly for everyone that thinks X race is "op" play it or Y race "is trash" don't play it, leveling up is trivialized by blaanid beginner quests + baltane missions, training skills is trivialized by talent level bonus skill exp, ap training, training seals, and constant training events/training potion handouts from events so there's 0 excuse not to play another character, I shelved my 25k total elf with basically every skill r1/cap to play giant and my giant's already 27k with everything r1/cap besides magic craft, act 9, and rest in less than a third of the time it took to get my elf there due to the HEAVY casualization of the game that TRIVIALIZES character progression in comparison to how it use to be. Yes I know you can get 40k+ and all skills in less than a year but I'm a casual deal with it.
    Sherri
  • DraechDraech
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    edited August 2, 2019
    Lutetium wrote: »
    Give Elves the ability to dual-wield daggers
    Not you specifically but everyone asking for this for all these years clearly doesn't understand just how garbage dual wielding actually is in mabinogi.

    It might not be all that good in terms of meta, but for role-playing purposes, why can't elves dual wield? Are they incapable of holding two sharp weapons at the same time because of some secret racial handicap?
    Danievictria
  • LutetiumLutetium
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    Draech wrote: »
    but for role-playing purposes
    I thought this was a discussion of game mechanics and balance for the action fantasy MMO Mabinogi. I didn't know this was a D&D forum, my mistake I don't know how I got here I am bad at internet.
  • DanievictriaDanievictria
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    Lutetium wrote: »
    Draech wrote: »
    but for role-playing purposes
    I thought this was a discussion of game mechanics and balance for the action fantasy MMO Mabinogi. I didn't know this was a D&D forum, my mistake I don't know how I got here I am bad at internet.

    You know, the "RPG" in "MMORPG" stands for "Role-Playing." Just putting that out there. And, yes, while for some players the meta and min-maxing their character to perfection is the end-all-be-all of the game, others do play it for the thrill of adventure and to play out their fantasy of being on an epic magical journey as *insert classic RPG character type or mix of classic character types here*. The only character type not properly represented in this game? Rogue. What are rogues known for? Stealing, stealth, and...say it with me now...dual-wielding daggers! If we can't get a proper rogue talent, the least we can get is Elves dual-wielding daggers. Besides, it could finally make daggers relevant if they also add some new types of daggers and have the Elf version of dual-wielding come with things like increased chance of inflicting bleed, a high crit chance, or the ability to unlock combat hide or backstab at a high enough rank. (Really, daggers are basically dead content. The only reason to keep one around is if it has an enchantment you can't burn off yet. It's depressing.)

    Besides, if you think dual-wielding is such an inferior strategy, what should it matter to you if one more race can do it anyway? It may not be optimal if you play solely based on numbers, but it's fun and it makes people feel bad-oars. As they say, sometimes the perfect is the enemy of the good...
    DraechSherri
  • LutetiumLutetium
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    You know, the "RPG" in "MMORPG" stands for "Role-Playing." Just putting that out there.
    Yes as I'm sure anyone with a triple digit IQ does, but I understand your instinctual reaction to talk down to me in response to a comment made in jest due to the off topic nature of that which it was in response to.
    However regardless of that Mabinogi is an action sandbox MMO not an MMORPG. Mabinogi has some RPG elements like the stats system, but you can slap a character level on a first person shooter as well, it does not suddenly become an RPG. An RPG involves above all else choices an consequences, Mabinogi as a sandbox lacks these things, at no point are you actually role playing in the game outside of self imposed restrictions, which are unrelated to game design, Mabinogi does however contain some "Illusion of choice" in some of it's storylines, moreso with the recent ones but your choices are, as the phrase implies, an illusion and have no effect on the outcome of the story or influence on the world because the game is a sandbox which must remain in a singular state for all players so they can go through the linear storylines too.
    The closest things to actual choices with consequences in Mabinogi are which race you play, and if you're a human which transformation you decide to use, an (MMO)RPG would involve those sorts of choices throughout the storylines and the world, in Mabinogi if you cut down a tree the tree never disappears, it simply "runs out" of wood and eventually regenerates, keeping the world in a static state for the next player who wants to gather wood.
    And, yes, while for some players the meta and min-maxing their character to perfection is the end-all-be-all of the game, others do play it for the thrill of adventure and to play out their fantasy of being on an epic magical journey as *insert classic RPG character type or mix of classic character types here*.
    That's an artificial restriction imposed by the player while playing the sandbox, and not a game mechanic of Mabinogi, a discussion of gameplay balance needs to involve discussing the actual balance of the gameplay and not arbitrary self imposed restrictions the players may or may not impose on themselves.
    I personally respect anyone's right to play any video, tabletop, or otherwise game however they wish but those choice can't be accounted for when balancing a game that simply is not designed to cater to that sort of gameplay where the player has choices to make.
    The only character type not properly represented in this game? Rogue. What are rogues known for? Stealing, stealth, and...say it with me now...dual-wielding daggers! If we can't get a proper rogue talent, the least we can get is Elves dual-wielding daggers.
    The only? What about necromancers?! How about Deckers? Where are the corporations to even break into?!
    Besides, if you think dual-wielding is such an inferior strategy, what should it matter to you if one more race can do it anyway? It may not be optimal if you play solely based on numbers, but it's fun and it makes people feel bad-oars.
    Because Mabinogi is an action sandbox not an RPG and the game mechanics for the supposed "melee oriented" races should actually reflect that by them having some sort of unique advantage in the same way Elves, the "archery and magic" should have legitimate advantages in those skills to make up for their lacking performance in others from a purely game balance point of view.
    As they say, sometimes the perfect is the enemy of the good...
    I only offer my opinions as a video game developer, published author, and avid player of role playing games in various formats, I don't claim "perfection" and as a proponent of free speech and open debate I welcome your disagreements with me, condensation included, and am willing to discuss them, and banter in return, in places where they are on topic and relevant, but the simple fact is this thread is a discussion of videogame mechanics and their balance in relation to other mechanics, and not a discussion of roleplaying inside the confines of a sandbox where it has no effect on the actual mechanics so I don't believe it's on topic to discuss that here.
    VeylaineDanievictriaSherriUrufu
  • DanievictriaDanievictria
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    Lutetium wrote: »
    You know, the "RPG" in "MMORPG" stands for "Role-Playing." Just putting that out there.
    Yes as I'm sure anyone with a triple digit IQ does, but I understand your instinctual reaction to talk down to me in response to a comment made in jest due to the off topic nature of that which it was in response to.
    However regardless of that Mabinogi is an action sandbox MMO not an MMORPG. Mabinogi has some RPG elements like the stats system, but you can slap a character level on a first person shooter as well, it does not suddenly become an RPG. An RPG involves above all else choices an consequences, Mabinogi as a sandbox lacks these things, at no point are you actually role playing in the game outside of self imposed restrictions, which are unrelated to game design, Mabinogi does however contain some "Illusion of choice" in some of it's storylines, moreso with the recent ones but your choices are, as the phrase implies, an illusion and have no effect on the outcome of the story or influence on the world because the game is a sandbox which must remain in a singular state for all players so they can go through the linear storylines too.
    The closest things to actual choices with consequences in Mabinogi are which race you play, and if you're a human which transformation you decide to use, an (MMO)RPG would involve those sorts of choices throughout the storylines and the world, in Mabinogi if you cut down a tree the tree never disappears, it simply "runs out" of wood and eventually regenerates, keeping the world in a static state for the next player who wants to gather wood.
    And, yes, while for some players the meta and min-maxing their character to perfection is the end-all-be-all of the game, others do play it for the thrill of adventure and to play out their fantasy of being on an epic magical journey as *insert classic RPG character type or mix of classic character types here*.
    That's an artificial restriction imposed by the player while playing the sandbox, and not a game mechanic of Mabinogi, a discussion of gameplay balance needs to involve discussing the actual balance of the gameplay and not arbitrary self imposed restrictions the players may or may not impose on themselves.
    I personally respect anyone's right to play any video, tabletop, or otherwise game however they wish but those choice can't be accounted for when balancing a game that simply is not designed to cater to that sort of gameplay where the player has choices to make.
    The only character type not properly represented in this game? Rogue. What are rogues known for? Stealing, stealth, and...say it with me now...dual-wielding daggers! If we can't get a proper rogue talent, the least we can get is Elves dual-wielding daggers.
    The only? What about necromancers?! How about Deckers? Where are the corporations to even break into?!
    Besides, if you think dual-wielding is such an inferior strategy, what should it matter to you if one more race can do it anyway? It may not be optimal if you play solely based on numbers, but it's fun and it makes people feel bad-oars.
    Because Mabinogi is an action sandbox not an RPG and the game mechanics for the supposed "melee oriented" races should actually reflect that by them having some sort of unique advantage in the same way Elves, the "archery and magic" should have legitimate advantages in those skills to make up for their lacking performance in others from a purely game balance point of view.
    As they say, sometimes the perfect is the enemy of the good...
    I only offer my opinions as a video game developer, published author, and avid player of role playing games in various formats, I don't claim "perfection" and as a proponent of free speech and open debate I welcome your disagreements with me, condensation included, and am willing to discuss them, and banter in return, in places where they are on topic and relevant, but the simple fact is this thread is a discussion of videogame mechanics and their balance in relation to other mechanics, and not a discussion of roleplaying inside the confines of a sandbox where it has no effect on the actual mechanics so I don't believe it's on topic to discuss that here.

    Sorry if I ruffled your feathers a bit with my snark. And, yes, I forgot Necromancers, but I was thinking mainly of the go-to classic character archetypes: Mage, Cleric, Warrior, Ranger, Bard, and Rogue. Not so much their sub-archetypes, like Gunner, Necromancer, Adventurer, etc. As I said in my original post, I do definitely think that Elves need more magic support, but a little more support for their under-utilized stealth potential would be appreciated too. They are the quickest race, they are the squishiest race, and they have an innate stealth ability in Hide. If they could just dual-wield daggers (with some kind of special bonus added to their version of dual-wielding, as I mentioned above with giving them the highest dual-wield crit chance or a higher chance of inflicting bleed) and get access to Hide in combat (as an advanced skill from dual-wielding), they could make near perfect rogues.

    And, yes, from a pure numbers perspective, dual-wielding has never been optimal, but as a game developer I'm sure you know that there's more to a game mechanic (and game balance) than just what's under the hood. How a mechanic feels to use is also very important. If the most supported way to play is not also the most fun, while the most fun way to play is poorly supported, players will be unhappy with the state of the game. Elves get more support for Archery, but Archery is not fun...at least not on the NA servers. It's clunky, slow, and the latency screws up your accuracy. Magic is more fun because even though there are charge times involved, your aim is 100%, the gameplay flows more smoothly, and the flashes, spell effects, screen shake, and sound effects make casting feel really satisfying. Melee is also more fun than Archery in this game because whether you're using a sword and shield, two weapons, a zweihander, or a mace, the combat feels fluid and your hits connect as they should. In fact, when most people cry out for the races to be balanced better, what they really want is more developer support for the more fun way to play and to make what's already there more fun as well.

    For instance, the base human movement speed is...well, not fun. Pets, pots, and abilities like Final Hit, March Song, and Anchor Rush can mitigate it...but it's still pretty bad. In terms of creating balance through imbalance by giving humans the weakness of the slowest movement speed, while Giants are bleh Mages and Elves are the worst in-fighters, it looks good on paper. But, how it feels in-game, for the average player behind the keyboard...it feels terrible, so it makes humans seem not "equally unequal," but "broken"--in the bad way, not the fun way. And, yes, there is a way to make imbalance fun...but it has to be done in a way that doesn't just look good on paper, but feels good to the player too. Players shouldn't feel like their favorite race or class is neglected, or like they are being punished by the game for not playing a specific race or class, or like the game is trying to herd them into a playstyle that they do not find enjoyable because there is little or no support for what they do enjoy. (This, of course, is why there are also lots of complaints about the DPS-Over-Tactics direction newer high-level content has gone into of late.) Fun and mechanical balance are not divorced from each other, but rather two halves of the same whole. If something is perfectly balanced but not fun, players will complain or leave. If something is fun but poorly balanced, people will also complain or leave (though, because it's at least fun until the craters in the balancing really start getting on everyone's nerves, people will stay a bit longer).

    I get where you're coming from on a pure numbers perspective, but player psychology is also important--how the game feels, how players view the game they're playing (a role-player versus a PVPer versus a hardcore endgame raider, and so on), and how well the game meets or exceeds a player's standards and expectations in terms of the game's genre. The man behind the curtain doesn't matter if the big head on stage fails to impress.
    Sherri
  • DraechDraech
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    edited August 3, 2019
    Lutetium wrote: »
    Not you specifically but everyone asking for this for all these years clearly doesn't understand just how garbage dual wielding actually is in mabinogi. The minimum attack time is doubled when using dual wield so you're hitting at the same rate as using a 2h of equal speed

    At its core, your argument is that Dual Wielding is not as good as 2H weapons, and while that's mostly true, elves aren't intended to wield 2H weapons; that's why dual wielding would actually be worthwhile to them. Yes, they could get the ability to wield 2H weapons, but that's an explicit racial restriction compared to dual wielding, and Final Hit doesn't even come into account when talking about elves. (I'm intentionally excluding rapiers, as they are 2H weapons but are not really endgame weapons and can't be erged as far as I've found)
    Lutetium wrote: »
    You know, the "RPG" in "MMORPG" stands for "Role-Playing." Just putting that out there.
    Yes as I'm sure anyone with a triple digit IQ does, but I understand your instinctual reaction to talk down to me in response to a comment made in jest due to the off topic nature of that which it was in response to.
    However regardless of that Mabinogi is an action sandbox MMO not an MMORPG. Mabinogi has some RPG elements like the stats system, but you can slap a character level on a first person shooter as well, it does not suddenly become an RPG. An RPG involves above all else choices an consequences, Mabinogi as a sandbox lacks these things, at no point are you actually role playing in the game outside of self imposed restrictions, which are unrelated to game design, Mabinogi does however contain some "Illusion of choice" in some of it's storylines, moreso with the recent ones but your choices are, as the phrase implies, an illusion and have no effect on the outcome of the story or influence on the world because the game is a sandbox which must remain in a singular state for all players so they can go through the linear storylines too.
    The closest things to actual choices with consequences in Mabinogi are which race you play, and if you're a human which transformation you decide to use, an (MMO)RPG would involve those sorts of choices throughout the storylines and the world, in Mabinogi if you cut down a tree the tree never disappears, it simply "runs out" of wood and eventually regenerates, keeping the world in a static state for the next player who wants to gather wood.
    And, yes, while for some players the meta and min-maxing their character to perfection is the end-all-be-all of the game, others do play it for the thrill of adventure and to play out their fantasy of being on an epic magical journey as *insert classic RPG character type or mix of classic character types here*.
    That's an artificial restriction imposed by the player while playing the sandbox, and not a game mechanic of Mabinogi, a discussion of gameplay balance needs to involve discussing the actual balance of the gameplay and not arbitrary self imposed restrictions the players may or may not impose on themselves.
    I personally respect anyone's right to play any video, tabletop, or otherwise game however they wish but those choice can't be accounted for when balancing a game that simply is not designed to cater to that sort of gameplay where the player has choices to make.
    Besides, if you think dual-wielding is such an inferior strategy, what should it matter to you if one more race can do it anyway? It may not be optimal if you play solely based on numbers, but it's fun and it makes people feel bad-oars.
    Because Mabinogi is an action sandbox not an RPG and the game mechanics for the supposed "melee oriented" races should actually reflect that by them having some sort of unique advantage in the same way Elves, the "archery and magic" should have legitimate advantages in those skills to make up for their lacking performance in others from a purely game balance point of view.

    You know that this game advertises itself as "The world's most expressive MMORPG," right? And a sandbox game means you can directly alter the world players interact with, usually via terraforming or adding permanent items in the world. Mabinogi doesn't allow that much freedom (at least not yet), but it does allow you to "live your fantasy life." And ultimately, your comment was aimed at all who want dual wiedling for elves in forever, not just in the context of this thread. So, role-playing does come into context.
    Lutetium wrote: »
    As they say, sometimes the perfect is the enemy of the good...
    I only offer my opinions as a video game developer, published author, and avid player of role playing games in various formats, I don't claim "perfection" and as a proponent of free speech and open debate I welcome your disagreements with me, condensation included, and am willing to discuss them, and banter in return, in places where they are on topic and relevant, but the simple fact is this thread is a discussion of videogame mechanics and their balance in relation to other mechanics, and not a discussion of roleplaying inside the confines of a sandbox where it has no effect on the actual mechanics so I don't believe it's on topic to discuss that here.

    You mean condescension, I think. And while I agree that it's not directly related to the thread, I remind you that your original statement addressed "everyone asking for this for all these years."
    DanievictriaSherri
  • LutetiumLutetium
    Mabinogi Rep: 3,605
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    (I'm spoiler-ing quotes here for page length and readability sake.)
    Sorry if I ruffled your feathers a bit with my snark. And, yes, I forgot Necromancers, but I was thinking mainly of the go-to classic character archetypes: Mage, Cleric, Warrior, Ranger, Bard, and Rogue. Not so much their sub-archetypes, like Gunner, Necromancer, Adventurer, etc. As I said in my original post, I do definitely think that Elves need more magic support, but a little more support for their under-utilized stealth potential would be appreciated too. They are the quickest race, they are the squishiest race, and they have an innate stealth ability in Hide. If they could just dual-wield daggers (with some kind of special bonus added to their version of dual-wielding, as I mentioned above with giving them the highest dual-wield crit chance or a higher chance of inflicting bleed) and get access to Hide in combat (as an advanced skill from dual-wielding), they could make near perfect rogues.

    And, yes, from a pure numbers perspective, dual-wielding has never been optimal, but as a game developer I'm sure you know that there's more to a game mechanic (and game balance) than just what's under the hood. How a mechanic feels to use is also very important. If the most supported way to play is not also the most fun, while the most fun way to play is poorly supported, players will be unhappy with the state of the game.
    Don't get me wrong I don't disagree about giving Elves a stealth based skill set at all, rather my point was more along the lines of it doesn't have to be melee dual wielding because that's suppose to be "unique" to Human and Giant warriors and I personally would rather see expansion on each race's unique aspects rather than "race as a cosmetic" and move the game more towards being the RPG it claims to be.
    In Mabinogi's specific case, I believe the best approach to a rogue class weapon would be a "pseudo dual wield" in the way it handles dual guns as a "single" weapon, shurikens coming with a kunai in your other hand, or a knuckle type weapon fits one to both of the character's hands. Visually you would have a knife or even multiple knives in both hands with the theoretical "Rogue daggers" weapon type but functionally it would be unique from dual melee sword/blunt and allow the developers to more easily make unique animations to further differentiate the feel of the weapon and skills. Existing daggers could be converted over to the new weapon type in the way old knuckles were when the fighter skillset launched of course.
    Elves get more support for Archery, but Archery is not fun...at least not on the NA servers. It's clunky, slow, and the latency screws up your accuracy. Magic is more fun because even though there are charge times involved, your aim is 100%, the gameplay flows more smoothly, and the flashes, spell effects, screen shake, and sound effects make casting feel really satisfying. Melee is also more fun than Archery in this game because whether you're using a sword and shield, two weapons, a zweihander, or a mace, the combat feels fluid and your hits connect as they should. In fact, when most people cry out for the races to be balanced better, what they really want is more developer support for the more fun way to play and to make what's already there more fun as well.
    1ccf06673b.png
    The feel of archery on NA is why I stopped playing my elf, no one agrees more with that statement than I do. Elves even get shafted in archery by getting less aim multiplier and max damage from ranged attack, double the cooldown on support shot of 1 second vs human's 0.5 (ranged attack's aim speed boost actually applies on support shot so they also end up missing more than humans as well), archery even baited us at low ranks into believing crash shot would have a lower cooldown by 1 second for Elves over humans, but instead it cuts off at higher ranks and ends with 5.5 seconds for both races. Not to mention you're punished for using "long ranged attacks" from far away with a lower aim ratio, and paradoxically encouraged to shoot your bow only while standing inside of monsters hitboxes.
    Personally I would like to see a total overhaul to archery, replacing the terribly designed and coded aiming mechanic that literally doesn't function when exposed to more than about 10ms of latency with a system that uses drawback strength for bows or loading pullback in the case of crossbows (functionally the same in both cases as the charging mechanics for Shuriken Charge, Focused Fist, Blaze, Lightning Rod, or Act 7, it wouldn't actually require new code from scratch), and along with that arrow flight as a mechanic so an archer can actually function at long range, but if he or she is too far an agile monster would be able to dodge the arrow or defend against it with a shield or otherwise so as not to make archery into a super overpowered "you can stand out of reach and rain death" skillset but still allow for timed and calculated sniping shots (engaging gameplay!).
    Furthermore my idealized version of archery in Mabinogi would break bows into different archetypes in a similar fashion to "one handed sword" "two handed sword" and "lance" for melee combat, with a Short Bow being a faster drawing and shooting but lower damage output option, a Long Bow being the slower drawn but higher damage output perhaps with a small level of piercing, and Crossbows being a medium~slow speed bolt loaded medium damage but fast shooting and high piercing option allowing and encouraging different play styles for archery without making it into three completely different skillsets.
    As for Elves, they would benefit from additional cooldown reduction to archery skills (from the ranged attack skill ideally) compared to humans and bonus damage multipliers for draw time from the individual masteries for each bow type, this is functionally equivalent to Giant's benefiting from 40% combo mastery bonus skill damage and 20% cooldown reduction compared to Humans/Elves at 30%/20% damage and 10% cooldown reduction respectively but broken up between skills to differentiate weapon types and allow more player choice (role playing?! choices that affect gameplay!). Vision of Ladeca would be changed to give a modest speedup to elves draw time but also a bonus to their effective range with all bow types, Final Shot would compound ontop of this reducing draw times to a fraction of their norm and boosting arrow travel speed helping an elf score strong and fast hits from far away for it's duration ideally putting it in line with Final Hit and Final Strike without completely breaking things. An elf would be able to truly shine as the ultimate archers of the sands in the way a giant's Might of Ladeca allows them to shine as the great warriors of the northern snowfields.
    But look at me designing Devcat's game for them for free in my off time hahah, if I was fluent in Korean I might be able to actually give their developers my ideas in a way that could actually get considered :)
    For instance, the base human movement speed is...well, not fun. Pets, pots, and abilities like Final Hit, March Song, and Anchor Rush can mitigate it...but it's still pretty bad. In terms of creating balance through imbalance by giving humans the weakness of the slowest movement speed, while Giants are bleh Mages and Elves are the worst in-fighters, it looks good on paper. But, how it feels in-game, for the average player behind the keyboard...it feels terrible, so it makes humans seem not "equally unequal," but "broken"--in the bad way, not the fun way. And, yes, there is a way to make imbalance fun...but it has to be done in a way that doesn't just look good on paper, but feels good to the player too. Players shouldn't feel like their favorite race or class is neglected, or like they are being punished by the game for not playing a specific race or class, or like the game is trying to herd them into a playstyle that they do not find enjoyable because there is little or no support for what they do enjoy. (This, of course, is why there are also lots of complaints about the DPS-Over-Tactics direction newer high-level content has gone into of late.) Fun and mechanical balance are not divorced from each other, but rather two halves of the same whole. If something is perfectly balanced but not fun, players will complain or leave. If something is fun but poorly balanced, people will also complain or leave (though, because it's at least fun until the craters in the balancing really start getting on everyone's nerves, people will stay a bit longer).

    I get where you're coming from on a pure numbers perspective, but player psychology is also important--how the game feels, how players view the game they're playing (a role-player versus a PVPer versus a hardcore endgame raider, and so on), and how well the game meets or exceeds a player's standards and expectations in terms of the game's genre. The man behind the curtain doesn't matter if the big head on stage fails to impress.
    I ended up addressing some of this a bit above after breaking up the post in sections I wanted to respond to, but in the case of movement speed specifically I entirely agree humans move far too slow for the scale of the game's content (dungeons, shadow missions, etc.) Personally I would move human's base speed up to 1.4x, slightly higher than an Elf's currently, Giants and Elves 1.5 and 1.6x humans current base speed respectively to lessen that gap a bit, but Elves would be able to benefit from a passive movement speed bonus up to 1.75x when equiped with the aforementioned Rogue dagger type weapon as a nice little racial bonus where it should be.
    The new content is DPS oriented issue partially stems from NA's exclusive choice to remove the Mysterious Reforging Tool from the commerce shop and lock reforging behind a paywall to nickle and dime us to death if we want to be effective in late game content that was designed for late game players with reforged gear, a problem which doesn't exist on KR where the content is designed and isn't acknowledged by nerfing the content to a level it can be completed without reforges for NA.
    Ontop of that primary issue is the Zombie, the Zombie is pinnacle bad game design, an enemy that you have to hit for an arbitrarily high amount of damage in a single hit in a game where so many of the players available skills for various weapon types do smaller damage over multiple hits, e.g. an Alchemist can use Flame Burst on the zombie, do 20k total damage to it over 8 hits using the Flame Burst duration reforge, but still be unable to kill it in normal level difficulty due to a single hit not doing 10k damage. Devcat should, in my opinion, be ashamed of the Zombie, remove it from the game, and issue a public apology for it's existence to all regions player bases for ever implementing it.
    But in all truth Mabinogi has had massive balancing problems ever since the dynamic combat update shifted it from the "rock paper scissors"~"defense counter smash" style gameplay into it's current action style, tactical combat has suffered greatly in favor of "making skills go faster", some of this comes from the developers trying to appeal to the western millennial instant gratification culture that many of us that didn't grow up playing "Nintendo hard" games adhere to, to reward the dopamine hit of "yay I one shot the enemy" rather than the lasting satisfaction of "I overcame and outplayed the monster by using my available options strategically", but it's somewhat understandable because giving out constant dopamine hits through game play encourages the player to buy micro-transactions, especially when the micro-transactions influence the difference between one shotting something and two shotting it. Player psychology does have a lot to do with the game, and in some ways more sinister than it should.
    PvP in Mabinogi I have a similar opinion to as role playing, the gameplay does not cater to doing so, there are no "skill bans" option for pvp, no ability to select "rulesets", no customization for damage ratios of certain skills or skill sets under a detailed rule set configurator, and no in game tournament system mechanics. PvP in the sandbox "as it is" is an option at least, as much as you can role play using the sandbox as effectively a chat room with 3D avatars for your characters. I'm not trying to discount PvP and role playing as options, but I believe they're huge issues of their own to address separately after some semblance of balance can be brought to the game's core gameplay, the combat and skills.
    Role playing specifically I'd like to add, it may be more ideal to have a spinoff RP server with proper RP mechanics such as character advantages/disadvantages "traits" if you will, and actual limitations when it comes to skillsets, breaking them up into more traditional classes and being more able to "hold their own" compared to the sandbox servers rather than being designed for the master of all trades Millitian with infinite knowledge of all forms of combat for every situation.

    I'm getting a little long in the tooth with this but I'd like to say I appreciate your respectful and polite response, I feel like we as a community could accomplish a lot more and be able to actually get some acknowledgement from the developers even if it's through the pipeline from our regional staff by having discussions like this than just screaming about nerfing things we don't like while being unable to work towards solutions with each other.
    Draech wrote: »
    You mean condescension, I think. And while I agree that it's not directly related to the thread, I remind you that your original statement addressed "everyone asking for this for all these years."
    You got me, I didn't proof read my spellchecker's correction at 5 AM after a long Friday on 5 hours of sleep and a sick stomach, that was in fact what I meant hahah. But I would like to reiterate that I said that within the context purely of combat gameplay balance.
    VeylaineSherriDanievictria
  • MaiaMaia
    Mabinogi Rep: 7,195
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    I admit I just skimmed through the last few posts there lol but let's be honest, we're talking about meta here not RPG. The OP and honestly this whole argument is about "why isn't my race the best" (which is mostly humans and some elves- because they make up the majority of the mabinogi community). Keep in mind also that most of those arguing that the game is unbalanced are probably not even meta players. The meta humans/elves either switched (if they felt that they were excluded) or more often than not, found the nyches where they thrive and invested in those.

    Again, if you wanted everything to be "equal" then maybe you joined the wrong game. Mabinogi in over 10 years has never been balanced. It's not a game that constantly tries to go back and balance content. You can either adapt with the times or you can try to swim against the current and be less-than-perfect. Honestly, every race should have enough talents they are great at (if not the best at) where you have a variety to pick from.

    I played an endgame near-40k human. I liked to play offensively with close combat. Giants have routinely gotten buffed in this category. Would I take a handout of race changing availability? Sure. Did I stick around and wait for that? No because I wanted to actually play the game the way I wanted so I saw my human for what it was to me: a sunk cost. Started over on a giant. It took like 7-8 months to surpass my human in every category. This isn't the dark ages, you can rack up thousands of levels a month easily with nonstop events going on. Just play the character you actually want to play people.
    Veylaine
  • FinityFinity
    Mabinogi Rep: 2,100
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    edited August 3, 2019
    Balancing and meta changes frequently nowadays but in a different way. We rarely get skills directly buffed like renovation update.
    Rather than changing/fixing the talent and skills itself we get updates with new weapons(example: kraken weapons) or weapon enhancing methods- like spirit weapon or erg. In other words, if you don't invest into erg or spirit weapon or certain type of weapon that are new, you won't feel any difference.
    Each type of weapon receives different erg effects and in upcoming update, each spirit weapons will have different unique upgrades and ultimate spirit skill. The effects are something amazing(knuckles, 2h swords, etc's erg,) if devs intended to buff it, and it's something lame if devs intended to nerf it. (example: 1h sword only gets 20 weapon damage at erg 50) Eventually the buffed weapon will overpower non-buffed weapon and be the new meta- which is indirect nerf to non-buffed weapons.
    The same happens with spirit weapon update, except that you can choose your spirit weapon upgrade path. But some weapon's ultimate are not so useful than others (bow/crossbow's ultimate is unlimited arrow/bolts- I rather pick something that helps dps than this, 2h's ultimate is movement speed increase for 10 seconds after finishing an enemy) so they're are bound with other upgrade paths, while some weapons ultimate effects are very useful. If those buffed/nerfed weapons are affected by racial disadvantage/advantage, it'll make many people dissatisfied.

    Long story short, people won't really be happy when there's a really old outdated racial gap that makes no sense in today's standards and "balancing" is done through p2w contents.


    Lutetium wrote: »
    Finity wrote: »
    I also doubt that spirit weapon update really fixed magic, magic still has it's own problems that are neglected. Most of monsters in end-game content has high magic defense and protection. Intermediate magic is notorious for drawing aggro and scattering monsters. Magic is crippled with its damage calculation as well, going from 800 to 900 magic attack will gain less than going from 300 to 400 magic attack.(The higher you get, the less you'll gain!) Magic enchants give pathetically low magic attack compared to max damage enchants, etc.
    Most of this is also correct except the part about matk being diminishing return, 300 to 400 for example with fireball adds 1200 to it's base damage, 800 to 900 also adds 1200, before fire mastery or any other multipliers like combo cards of course, matk adds flat min/max but each spell has a different coefficient so some benefit less than others, like icebolt for example will only get 40 max from that same 100 matk.
    Helsa wrote: »
    Aren't elves supposed to be stupidly OP in Korea? Perhaps the giant update was to give them more parity there.
    Elf mag spam is the best dps in the game, but archery is broken in NA due to aim rate being tied to latency and mabinogi using in order encrypted TCP packets to communicate with the server, 90% on KR is 90% but 90% on NA is only 90% if you're in Oregon (California before servers were moved to amazon cloud), the further you are the more desynced your client aim meter and the server side aim meter become due to the repeated latency add from TCP acknowledgements. In KR you're generally going to have 1~3ms of latency to the server, so little to no desync occurs and you'll see any korean elf gameplay video archery will hit much more than the vast majority of NA player's because of that. Personally after 7 years of playing an elf trying to use archery with 48~68ms of latency, I find archery to be completely unusable. A large part of why I play a giant now.

    Also props to Maia for being one of the only people to understand you can play on other characters of other races instead of crying for nerfs on the forum every update.


    I could go on and on but honestly for everyone that thinks X race is "op" play it or Y race "is trash" don't play it, leveling up is trivialized by blaanid beginner quests + baltane missions, training skills is trivialized by talent level bonus skill exp, ap training, training seals, and constant training events/training potion handouts from events so there's 0 excuse not to play another character, I shelved my 25k total elf with basically every skill r1/cap to play giant and my giant's already 27k with everything r1/cap besides magic craft, act 9, and rest in less than a third of the time it took to get my elf there due to the HEAVY casualization of the game that TRIVIALIZES character progression in comparison to how it use to be. Yes I know you can get 40k+ and all skills in less than a year but I'm a casual deal with it.

    You're right- I was wrong about diminishing return. Magic is really a complicated talent to balance because every skill has different formula so every skill get effected differently with same magic attack value. At this point I really don't expect magic to be fixed nor for elves to get proper racial advantage with it.

    It is really not easy to switch to different character, I know starting up a new character is much easier with memorial update, frequent training boost event and additional multiplier item such as prisms but it still takes a lot of effort to achieve other things- such as building up cumulative level for shine of eweca, renown, alban totem(or commander totem), dan tests,gens,grandmaster, combo card, squires(for extra stats),etc and of course making or buying entire different equip sets. I'm pretty sure a lot of people never wanna do it again, including myself. Especially with how bad reforging is nowadays :(


    SherriDanievictria
  • DanievictriaDanievictria
    Mabinogi Rep: 3,695
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    Lutetium wrote: »
    But look at me designing Devcat's game for them for free in my off time hahah, if I was fluent in Korean I might be able to actually give their developers my ideas in a way that could actually get considered :)

    Maybe you should find yourself a good translator, because your ideas for Archery would actually make it good! I haven't even bothered with Archery on any of my characters because I took one look at it in the try-out thing you get before your first rebirth and I was like, "Nope."
    Lutetium wrote: »
    Ontop of that primary issue is the Zombie, the Zombie is pinnacle bad game design, an enemy that you have to hit for an arbitrarily high amount of damage in a single hit in a game where so many of the players available skills for various weapon types do smaller damage over multiple hits, e.g. an Alchemist can use Flame Burst on the zombie, do 20k total damage to it over 8 hits using the Flame Burst duration reforge, but still be unable to kill it in normal level difficulty due to a single hit not doing 10k damage. Devcat should, in my opinion, be ashamed of the Zombie, remove it from the game, and issue a public apology for it's existence to all regions player bases for ever implementing it.

    I 100% agree with this statement.