Those Crazy Mystics.

[Stalkerr]

Assuming that our goal is to make mystics balanced at 250% chart, and assuming that we all agree that they were broken how they were before.


Should our goal for mystics be to give them;
1: A strong late game, which they will either struggle to get to or need to be carried there.
2: A strong early game that falls off toward the end.
3: A high tier standing at all level ranges, but not 1st seed in high tier during any level range.

I believe these are the best 3 options for Mystics but I'm open to other options if someone sees one. 

I'm pretty well aware of the differences between gmud and mmud that cause them to be so strong, and while we can and will go into the depths of the formulas and math that cause the issues, I'd like to identify what other people think mystics should do.

[y2duhh]

at its highest level what does jumpkick, kick, punch max out as damage wise?

[Torque]

Option 3. The reason mystics are so overpowered is because they don't have to worry about gear, and they can superstealth anywhere with 1200 hit points while quad critting for 1000 damage. That's like a paper rock scissor all in one.

[Vile]

They are OP between the mid to high level ranges, around 40-55. At the high high levels they aren't as overpowered damage wise when other classes start being max qnd with big weapons.

1. Jumpkick is really fast. Gmud's combat formulas let them sit around 60% crits with ease.
2. Their damage scales faster than other classes (this is the main one). 1.66 ju damage for every 1 max damage. The +40 to max stats in only puts them further ahead.
3. Gear isn't as much of an issue as it is with other classes.

My idea would be to make them mid range damage wise, but give them killer curses which proc off their attacks - the way the sickle used to rip when a mystic punched. This opens the door for a variety of items for them to wear on their feet/hands, differentiates the attacks between mystics and makes them unique from any other class in the game.

[Vitoc]

We'll work with you all to implement whatever we decide on.  :)

[signalSalute]

Maybe get rid of stealth, go from combat 3 to 2, or maybe make them "heavier" by having a neg enc % for being mystic (to deal with extra swings from being none)?  500% table is just ridiculous.  Just some ideas....

[y2duhh]

I like dropping the combat, basically just slowing them down should do the trick.  They have 3 attacks yet their most powerful attack they start to get qnd with at like 25? maybe they shouldnt be qnd with it until 50+? perhaps a mystic should be punching for the first 25 levels instead of the first 5?

[Gardner Denver]

What about raising the energy per swing required on all 3 attacks?  That could help balance them out some.  Also maybe things like the bonuses everyone gets for being < 32% enc could not be applied to mystics.

[Stalkerr]

There are all kinds of things we could do, but we need to decide on an experience modifer to balance the class for and how they should play out over time.

[Zetetic]

Might as well try to balance them for their standard exp table of 250%.
Moving them to combat 2 would probably be the simplest, and make them a bit harder to use in those initial levels. It would affect both their speed to q&d and their ability to hit in combat, hopefully by just enough.

--> Vitoc, is this something that you could easily change in the current realms for a week or two just for testing purposes? Just drop them to combat 2 and put their exp table back to 250%. I'd recommend that people don't go and level their character with the now left over exp, as if it needed to be changed back you'd have one heck of a slog for the next level.

[Gardner Denver]

The decision to raise mystics to their current level was made because when we announced the reset over 1/2 the realm said they were going to come back as mystics.  That would be counter productive to say the least.  I've said all along as we work on mystics and see that they being to balance out combat wise that we could start to lower their exp chart back down towards normal. 

[Teferi]

The best idea I heard back in the day was to randomize the attacks.  So instead of ju,kick, pu, you get a random assortment of each during each round.  That would also require balance in item placement and the need for gear (+pu over +kick, etc etc)

I think this was Angruin or Cornellian's idea.

[Stalkerr]

The effect of changing them to combat-2 would lower their damage output early game considerably.  It wouldn't change their maximum damage output at all(lategame) although it would lower their average damage output in certain areas and in pvp vs some high defense characters.

Randomizing their attacks wouldn't effect their maximum damage output, but would significantly lower their average damage.


In common both these attempts would leave mystics with random chance at extreme damage output but lower average rounds.  In essence these are both an attempt to balance mystics by effecting how reliable they are.  This makes mystics reliant on luck to excel, and leaves them at the mercy of the RNG.  Is this really a good approach to balancing a 250% chart?

[addycorp]

I've heard ppl say many times that mystics were OP on GMUD.  How were they different here to normal MUD?

[Stalkerr]

I've heard ppl say many times that mystics were OP on GMUD.  How were they different here to normal MUD?

Because of the crit cap being different in gmud, they continue to scale their damage at a high rate longer(in this case i'm using levels as a unit of time) in Gmud than they do in Mmud.