Lokkjim wrote: ↑Sat 5 Sep 2020 6:09 PM
First I'll address the escape tools. Archers have access to melee snares, Ranger/Hunter have access to speed bursts while Scout has access to slam and the root-snare. Use the snare and speed burst to escape. Time your escape and purge if necessary. Then when you have distance, stealth away. If you are solo you can easily avoid stealth lore. If you don't have access to these tools that is your choice, but they are there. Snares and stealth are escape tools, sure it's not as great as stun/mez/root but they are escape tools.
Second I'll address the damage difference between casters and archers. The full bow archer starts the fight with a crit shot for 750~ damage at 2000 range as that is most often when they are revealed. They then proceed to normal shot for 400~ damage while the target is running towards them. Now the target is at 1500 range and the Ranger has done 1150~ damage and the caster can now attack since they are in range. Do I need to add in the fact that a caster still has to debuff the target to get close to 400 damage before they can do damage and it only has an 8-second duration? Sure, a caster will EVENTUALLY overtake an archer in damage, but by the time they do, squishies are definitely dead, light tanks are dead, tanks might still be alive for the archer. Now, this did ignore the fact that there are shields in the game, but it also ignored interrupts and any form of CC from the caster.
Lastly, the idea of treating archery like bolts wouldn't hamper your proposed playstyle. As I've said in other posts all an archer would have to do is coordinate their targets which I'm absolutely fine with. Not 2 or 3 archers shooting the same target for 400~ damage each. This wouldn't be a nerf to groups but a nerf to archery assist damage. There is already a penalty for being in a stealth group and the archer population did not go down. So you have to work a little harder to maximize damage, shouldn't be hard with actual coordination instead of just pop and shoot.
You are writing too much about paper DAoC.
If you fight other melees they will have access to snares too. If your enemy isn't a brainless sticker it is harder for the Archer to get the snare off and purge will be mostly needed for stun because with the lower weaponskill evade/parry for the enemy to get his stun off will be most likely. Speed is something good but even if you run and press it right after an Attack, the enemy will mostly still be able to attack you before you are out of attack range. Only Sniper that can easily defend himself is the Scout.
The 750 damage will not be done on Critshot. If you start with crit shot, only half damage will be done. Bubble still takes 50% damage here unless you use longshot/volley but longshot can only be done for normal. Most casters have more than 1500 Range. Sorc mezz, Bolts, Nearsights, Theurg pets and or pets from Caba/Ench etc.
Which Light tank will be dead? Light Tanks like Berserker have 2500 HP, no Archer will be able to kill that by just walking, even if you don't consider any interrupts, blocks, evades and so. Even with my SB I got shot by a Ranger and could just walk and survive that. Vs most Hybrids it is very hard/near impossible to win(Reaver for example)
As for your lastly, it is hard to find a right balance. Archers should do much damage. Before the archery buffs, archery was pretty gimp. Archers got completely ignored when fighting, because Sins/Melee specced Archers did more damage than actual snipers. I dunno how often I ran into stealth grps and was able to kill a Sin, while being shot from Archers and didn't care. Now, I have to try to interrupt or focus Archers because I know they are a threat.
The Archer population, or in other Words mostly Ranger population won't be lowered anymore. The high we had right after the archery buff is already down to the same amount of Rangers we had before the archery buffs. If Archery gets nerfed, they will just go back to melee if they have to. THe reason Ranger population is so high is simply back then when Phoenix changed the 75 value charges and made them to 50 to be on pair with Potbuffs, giving selfbuff classes like Rangers the upper hand. Since that day Rangers have been the most played stealth class. The only way to truely lower the population would be to give everyone the 75 charges again but that would be an overall change for the whole server.
As for the non paper DAoC. Pretty much everyone with a shield has a good go vs. Archers. Non spec small shield users like Shaman/Minstrel already have around 15% block chance. This is the reason why everyone should have a shield, Sins, Berserker etc. It is like you said on something else. They have the option and if they don't use it, they choose not to use it.
Every other that can spec into shield gets a higher bonus and if they have engage ability. Engage block chance is 95% vs. Archery, good luck trying to hit something through that.
That by itself could cut down the grouping of stealthers......and force groups to be more mindful. Just another though lol.
