Here I am again.
I have edited my previous posts to fill in some new/complementing ideas, but I'll make a new post once again, as I'll touch a very heavy and detailed subject that many people have already given their own opinions about:
Melee Fighting Styles BalancingWelp. Without further ado, here's my two cents.
SummaryHere's the main topics to change with the additions/changes I'll propose down below:
- removal of chained skill necessity to use next skill
- skill damage formula changing to include "skill proficiency"
- normal melee equipment(non power/shade) receives a new "skill proficiency" attribute
- overcharge percentage not gained from "normal" attacks while spirit stance is on
- several changes to the current fighting styles(both nerfs and buffs)
- weapon elemental strikes scaling with magic proficiencies
- weapon elemental strikes having a chance to proc their respective status effects
- drainning weapon suffixes procs(Vampire, Illithid and Banshee) scaling with deprecating proficiency
- bonus fighting styles that don't necessarily need to be added to balance the game, but would still attract people that are into them.
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Viewing the Current Melee Fighting StylesFirst of all before talking about nerfs and buffs, it's necessary to look at the current situation and compare the existing fighting styles to see what the problem with them is.
One-handedEquipment-any one-handed weapon teamed with a shield in the off hand slot
-works with both heavy armor and light armor, but teamed better with heavy due to condition for counter-attacks to proc
-no major differences with chosen weapon during low levels and low difficulties
-practically a requirement to use a rapier to deal with monsters' health on higher levels and higher difficulties
-existence of the META rapier of slaughter + force shield + power armor, not giving much freedom for playing with other equipment on endgame, with "niche" styles existing, but not being anywhere as effective as the META
Characteristics-possibility to remain in a permanent spirit stance
-overwhelming strikes buff
-counter-attack procs that can stun up to three enemies when proficiency >200 and grant a percentage of overcharge only once per turn if procced more than once
-tankiness dependent on supportive buffs, mitigations and block and parry chances
Survivability-good crowd control, with counter-attacks leaving most enemies stunned during the entire round
-overwhelming strikes giving 10% parry bonus per stack according to wiki, up to 50%(not sure if this is a thing, as the icon in-game doesn't describe this)
-block and parry chances, high mitigation and many layers of supportive buffs make it rare to die in battle from a tough situation
Attacking Power-high accuracy, almost impossible to miss with overwhelming strikes buff on
-counter-parry given by overwhelming strikes buff
-100% damage bonus from spirit stance usually always present
-decent crit chance and crit damage
-max possible damage obtained on a single turn = spirit stance 100% bonus + overwhelming strikes 75% bonus when having 5 stacks + getting a crit for +65% damage(my own rate as an average player to be fair) + monster having 3 stacks of PA for a total of a lot of damage + max of three counter-attacks(basically a smaller AoE effect than Two-handed splash damage), with this same damage being able to repeat itself every single turn with enough luck.
Skills-no incentive for class skill usage other than when fighting boss class monsters
-more effective to use overcharge for spirit stance and OFC
-first skill gives an effect that counter-strikes is able to give at a rate three times higher for no overcharge cost
-second skill somewhat decent, but existing mostly to lead to third skill
-final skill used mostly against boss class monsters to save time
Dual Wielding
Equipment-any combination of two one-handed weapons, being more beneficial to use two different weapons for different weapon procs
-works with both heavy armor and light armor, but teamed better with light armor to get the benefit of more layers of defense(evade and resist)
-no major differences with chosen weapons during low levels and lower difficulties
-some differences with weapon usage on higher levels and higher difficulties, which usually includes having a rapier be one of the weapons, but still has a decent selection of options to play depending on the player(weapon choices for the procs and prefixes and suffixes for extra benefits and playstyles)
Characteristics-no possibility of remaining in a permanent spirit stance
-no ways to gain overcharge while in spirit stance
-no specific style buff(like overwhelming strikes)
-style focused on dealing as much critical hits as possible
-tier 3 skill causing AoE damage up to 5 targets, dealing massive damage(I actually never DWielded much, so please correct me if the skill isn't as good as it used to be mentioned in the past)
-many layers of protection for the playstyle if using leather armor(evade, resist, parry, mitigations and supportive buffs)
Survivability-no good class specific way to crowd control(iris strike costs 50% overcharge for an effect that can be obtained from a spell that hits up to three targets instead of only one), able to rely only on deprecating spells if stun procs from clubs(if used) aren't enough to keep mobs at bay
-no style specific buff to aid in survivability, depending only on supportive spells
-many layers of protections, from evade, to parry and resist to the mitigations and supportive buffs, but gets hit harder than heavy armor users when an attacks goes through due to the mitigation differences
Attack Power-accuracy dependent on main weapon, armor and PABs, but usually not being an issue for endgame players with highly forged gear
-attacks still get parried if the weapon(s) item world potencies don't include overpower for counter-parry small bonus
-no style specific buff to aid in attack power, attack accuracy, parry-chance or counter-parry
-100% damage bonus from spirit stance being related to each player, as some might desire to use their overcharge for Frenzied Blows or OFC, but if not, spirit stance cannot be maintained permanently like usually with One-handed.
-great critical chance and damage, possibly being the style with the highest possible stats, but doesn't have a big difference with other styles, as the rate is added multiplicatively, so the higher it is, the harder to make it higher, with other styles not being too far behind of the class that should be the specific one that depends on crits to be on par with these same fighting styles
-max possible damage obtained on a single turn = spirit stance 100% bonus + getting a crit for +80% damage(considering a pretty good shadowdancer set) + monster having 3 stacks of PA for a total of a lot of damage + use of tier 3 skill Frenzied Blows, dealing AoE Damage to the 5? target limit monsters(according to wiki), which can be used every 10 turns, needing to wait for cooldown for Frenzied blows, with this only considering having somehow obtained enough overcharge percentage to get on spirit stance again and have enough left to chain all three skills for a total of 175% overcharge for the three skills.
Skills-tier 3 skill Frenzied Blows has an effect decent enough to consider using if the player doesn't have OFC
-if there's the choice for an OFC strike, there's not much incentive for use of any of the skills, as it's only 25% overcharge less to use than having to chain all skills together and hits all targets in the round
-first skill gives an overkill effect that lasts a lot, but doesn't make it any better than the normal blind spell, which can hit 2 more targets for a decent amount of turns as well
-second skill seems a bit more interesting, but I never heard about a poison effect around very often(is this a thing?)
-third skill real cost is 175% of overcharge, as it can't be used apart from chaining the two prior ones, giving an effect completely unrelated to previous two skills and being less useful than an OFC strike
Two-handedEquipment-any two-handed weapon
-works with both heavy armor and light armor, but teamed better with light armor to add the most layers of protection available for the fighting style
-no major differences with chosen weapons during low levels and lower difficulties
-best possible weapons to use on higher levels and higher difficulties being the mace to hope for mass stunned monsters or the estoc to try and kill them as fast as possible hoping they all get PA stacks or even proc it at all
Characteristics-no possibility of remaining in a permanent spirit stance
-no ways to gain overcharge while in spirit stance
-no specific style buff(like overwhelming strikes)
-style focused on dealing AoE damage on mobs, with splash damage resulting in extra 500% damage in total if hitting the max of 7 monsters with proficiency being >100(not including the initial monster)
-tier 1 skill can be used relatively easy for additional damage, with tier 2 and 3 skills allowing a player that uses a longsword or a katana to get procs of stun and PA
-very few layers of protection available, depending mostly on evade if using light armor, or if that fails in a half-decent resist chance, a parry rate depending only on primary attributes from XP and armor and half-decent mitigations as a last resort
Survivability-no good class specific way to crowd control(only crowd control skill available is Shatter Strike, which has a real cost of 150% of overcharge to be reached, while FUS RO DAH costs only 100%, has the same cooldown and hits all enemies on the round), with only other choice being deprecating spells, using a mace hoping for mass stuns or using FUS RO DAH if available
-no style specific buff to aid in survivability, depending only on supportive spells
-very few layers of protection, with the most decent one being evade, followed by half-decent resist, a really low parry chance(considering that Two-handed even has a 2H Parry ability), and half-decent mitigations from leather armor
-needs to use crowd control spells relatively more than style skills to hold monsters back, only to attack every so often, sometimes even using more mana than mages to fight at a rate many times slower
Attack Power-accuracy dependent on weapon, armor and PABs, but usually not being an issue for endgame players with highly forged gear
-attacks still get parried if the weapon item world potencies don't include overpower for counter-parry small bonus
-no style specific buff to aid in attack power, attack accuracy, parry-chance or counter-parry
-100% damage bonus from spirit stance being related to each player, as some might desire to use their overcharge for Great Cleave, FUS RO DAH or OFC, but if not, spirit stance cannot be maintained permanently like usually with One-handed.
-splash damage on adjacent mobs, causing max 500% extra damage if hitting 7 monsters, but depends on having the monsters not parry the attack, being effectively just twice the splash damage one-handed can do with a permanent spirit stance and max of 3 counters per turn while having many layers of protection to make up for it.
-critical chance and damage almost on par with one-handed, which has more layers of protection and is able to survive for longer than the style that is supposed to kill mobs fast to make up for the lack of defenses
-max possible damage obtained on a single turn = spirit stance 100% bonus + getting a crit for +??% damage(I don't have a decent 2H set, sorry) + monster having 3 stacks of PA for a total of a lot of damage + use of tier 1 skill Great Cleave, dealing AoE Damage to the 7? target limit monsters(according to wiki), which can be used every 10 turns, needing to wait for cooldown for Great Cleave again (Imperil can more likely be added here as well, but I'll leave it out of this because of the amount of mana needed for other cc spells)
Skills-the tier 1 skill Great Cleave can be used every 10 turns for 50% overcharge for more damage
-tier 2 skill is decent for players that don't use an estoc, but worthless for estoc users, being just a way to get to the tier 3 skill if desired
-tier 3 skill is decent for players that don't use a mace and don't have access to FUS RO DAH, but worthless for mace users
-with access to FUS RO DAH, the tier 3 skill becomes worthless, having a real cost of 150% overcharge to try to hit at most seven monsters, while Fus RO DAH has the same cooldown, needs 50% less overcharge to use and deals some void damage while stunning all mobs on the round
Niten Ichiryu
Equipment-specific style which requires the use of a katana and a wakizashi slotted in the Off Hand slot, bypassing the two-handed nature of the katana
-works with both heavy armor and light armor, but teamed better with light armor to add the most layers of protection available for the fighting style
Characteristics-no possibility of remaining in a permanent spirit stance
-no ways to gain overcharge while in spirit stance
-no specific style buff(like overwhelming strikes)
-style focused on dealing AoE damage on mobs, with splash damage resulting in extra 500% damage in total if hitting the max of 7 monsters with proficiency being >100(not including the initial monster), also benefitting of the off-hand strike chance from dual wielding
-player can't earn weapon proficiencies while using this fighting style
Survivability-no good class specific way to crowd control, with only choice being deprecating spells or using FUS RO DAH if available
-no style specific buff to aid in survivability, depending only on supportive spells
-very few layers of protection, with the most decent one being evade, followed by half-decent resist, a really low parry chance(considering that Two-handed even has a 2H Parry ability and the style doesn't get the parry bonus from the off-hand weapon like in DW), and half-decent mitigations from leather armor
-needs to use crowd control spells relatively more than the only available skill to hold monsters back, only to attack every so often, sometimes even using more mana than mages to fight at a rate many times slower
Attack Power-accuracy dependent on weapon, armor and PABs, but usually not being an issue for endgame players with highly forged gear
-attacks still get parried if the weapon item world potencies don't include overpower for counter-parry small bonus
-no style specific buff to aid in attack power, attack accuracy, parry-chance or counter-parry
-100% damage bonus from spirit stance being related to each player, as some might desire to use their overcharge for Skyward Sword, FUS RO DAH or OFC, but if not, spirit stance cannot be maintained permanently like usually with One-handed.
-splash damage on adjacent mobs, causing max 500% extra damage if hitting 7 monsters, but depends on having the monsters not parry the attack, being effectively just twice the splash damage one-handed can do with a permanent spirit stance and max of 3 counters per turn while having many layers of protection to make up for it, also getting only 1 extra hit from the off-hand strike and still not being able to be double the one-handed damage, with total max normal damage obtained in one turn being 680%(initial 100% + 500% splash + 80% off-hand), compared with one-handed that can counter up to 3 times, having 400% total pure damage in a single turn(if elemental strikes are added, the situation might change, but this is the poor state of niten and 2H currently).
-critical chance and damage somewhat on par with one-handed, which has more layers of protection and is able to survive for longer than the style that is supposed to kill mobs fast to make up for the lack of defenses
-max possible damage obtained on a single turn = spirit stance 100% bonus + getting a crit for +??% damage(I don't have a decent niten set, sorry) + monster having 3 stacks of PA for a total of a lot of damage + monsters having 5 stacks of bleeding, which can be used every 10 turns after Skyward Sword is used and getting procs on all monsters, needing to wait for cooldown for it again (Imperil can more likely be added here as well, but I'll leave it out of this because of the amount of mana needed for other cc spells)
Skill-has a single skill
-skill has quite a good effect, being able to be used every 10 turns when off cooldown if the player has enough overcharge/managed to get enough during the cooldown
Final ConsiderationI apologize if I added some wrong arguments, numbers or anything to the comparison above, but I'm pretty sure on what I'll say now:
One-handed is without a doubt is the most viable and effective melee fighting style currently, not lacking anything from survivability to damage, with Dual Wielding following next, only behind it pretty much because of the existence of Overwhelming Strikes and the counter-attacks from blocking and parrying.
Unfortunately Two-Handed and Niten style aren't viable fighting styles nowadays, as you might spend more time ccing monsters than hitting them, or might just be building overcharge for OFC, not even touching the available skills.
Of course there are some available niche "styles" that can include FUS RO DAH or some spells, giving these classes actual gameplay and micro management, but it becomes tiresome fast doing the same style over and over while being less effective than others if you are fighting to grind credits or for other reasons when there's much more effective fighting styles that don't require micro management at all.
The StartNow, before continuing to compare melee fighting styles between themselves, we need to compare melee vs mages.
Everyone should know that mages are the fastest and most efficient fighting style right now, but why is that?
Other than their greater mana pool, giving more access to cc spells if necessary, there's a very basic reason that many people might not realize:
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Mages use their three skills freely!!!Which skills? Do you mean spells?
Yep, but if you look again, all three available spells for mages should be pretty similar to the three available skills for each melee class(excluding Niten).
The major difference is in the resource cost, where melee uses overcharge, which is passively gained by attacking, while mages theoretically would require micro managing ether taps, drains, focus or draughts and potions to sustain their mana pool, which is the source of all their spells, but reality nowadays is pretty different.
Endgame mages have unlimited access to draughts, potions and elixirs of all three kinds since the change in consumables, not even needing to touch focus or ether tap other than for nostalgia.
Only stingy mages(like me) actually still do all the micro managing to avoid wasting potions, relying on draughts, ether tap and focus to get mana back, but at that point it's better to go to one-handed if all a player wants is to conserve credits, spending as less as possible.
Getting back on track, melee and mages are very similar in their basics.
-both have a normal attack
-both can defend
-both can trigger spirit stance, but it's more focused for melee
-both can use focus, but it's more focused for mages
-both can use items
-both can use skills
This has been the basis of the system since forever ago, where one could say that mages can use skills freely because they have to manage their mana, where meleers can't because they gain overcharge passively and don't need to use consumables for it, but unfortunately it's very different.
It's not that meleers don't need consumables for skill resources, we do need them, a lot, maybe even more than mages, but consumables for getting overcharge aren't a thing, and they shouldn't be, as they would break the game horribly, making it FUS RO DAH OFC Spirit Verse, where you can perma cast them and eventually attack here or there or cast a spell for fun.
Right now the only melee fighting style that can generate enough overcharge for decent skill usage is one-handed, but no one really uses the three skills other than in an eventual boss fight, or not even then, just to not go through the trouble of possibly interfering with spirit stance, or because OFC or FUS RO DAH are more effective.
Finally, we reach the start of the rebalancing, not just between melee fighting styles, but between meleers and mages to put them on par with each other, getting rid of the long existing META that makes many players give up, as they are forced to play a certain style if they want to be effective instead of being able to be effective and have fun playing what they want at the same time.
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Overall ChangesHere are the general non-specific fighting style changes I believe would give a complete overhaul to melee.
Removal of chained skill necessity to use next skill tierSimply remove the chain condition, because as of right now, all meleers have a single skill, which you can just choose if you want to interrupt in the middle or not.
Removing this will encourage the usage of more skills for melee players, but of course changes in them are needed, like the abolishment of tiers, some tweaks(buffs/nerfs), to avoid worthless skills left to dust while others get overused on cooldown refresh, as well as making changes to the overcharge gain rate for each fighting style
Normal melee equipment(non power/shade) receives a new "Skill Proficiency" attribute, included in the Skill Damage FormulaOne thing which I read recently was related to how normal melee gear is worthless in comparison to phase/power, while normal cotton equipment can still be used for elemental proficiency, so here we go.
It's a new universal attribute for "Skill Proficiency", as there's no real way to separate melee skills in categories between light and heavy equipment, which is included in the skill damage formula, or somehow affects the skill effect.
Overcharge percentage not gained from "normal" attacks while Spirit Stance is onHaving new/changed ways to generate overcharge from all fighting styles while still getting it form simply attacking feels like it would buff melee too much, so unfortunately at least this nerf seems necessary to make things fair, as melee still would get it's resource passively, while mages have to use consumables to restore their mana pool.
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Specific Melee Fighting Style changesNow here we go.
Yes, it touches One-handed.
One-handedBuff "Overwhelming Strikes" changed to "Precise Control"Currently Overwhelming Strikes increases attack damage by 15%, attack accuracy by 50%, parry chance by 10% and also gives plus 20% counter-parry chance per stack.
Accuracy already seems overkill with +250%, but it's complicated multiplicatively math together with the +50% parry chance, but the +75% attack damage and 100%(80%???) counter parry are closer to absolute numbers and are way too overkill for a fighting style that is supposed to be a tank instead of a DPS.
New buff "Precise Control" provides:
+5% attack damage per stack
+15% attack accuracy per stack
+10% parry chance per stack
+20% counter parry-chance per stack
Basically taking title of tanky DPS to a more moderate tank
Counter-attacks happen only when an attack is blockedCurrently counter-attacks can be chained with both blocking and parrying attacks, which is certainly overkill, and sometimes even influences the overcharge gain rate of the style, so I believe it would be best to limit the gain rate to the class specific central point, which in case of one-handed, is blocking.
This change would limit the rate of gained overcharge though, so following it, other changes would be:
-new limit for max counter-attacks procced after a block
-no limit for overcharge gained per turn
-the counter-attack doesn't give a fixed stun effect, but instead inflicts max stacks of the one-handed weapon proc used(max bleed, max PA or simply stun)
For the max number of counter attacks that can be performed per turn, it's just necessary to add two new tiers to the proficiency(one-handed proficiency, not related to "skill proficiency"):
<100 - one counter
100-199 - two counters
200-299 - three counters
300-399 - four counters
>400 - five counters
Following this, if a player blocks and counters 5 monster attacks, he/she would get 5~10% overcharge per counter, with the natural max per turn being 25~50% rate.
Skill ChangesShield Bash cooldown reduced to 5 turns
-as players that don't use clubs might miss the stunned mobs, using this skill might become a thing, as it becomes accessible at a fast cooldown and rather cheap cost
Vital Strike deals extra damage to stunned, asleep and/or blinded targets, giving max bleed stack and also max PA stack
-just a tweak to an attack that is supposed to destroy a defenseless target
Ability Changes1H Damage
+20 | +25 | +30
Sorry, but 1H just isn't supposed to be a major DPS class(these additions are higher than 2H btw)
1H Accuracy
+0.15 | +0.3
Goes along with other styles balancing
Dual WieldingNew buff "Battle Flow"The thing which currently makes one-handed damage far superior overall to the other melee fighting styles is the overwhelming strikes buff, which doesn't even combine with a class that’s supposed to be focusing on defense rather than wrecking everything in it's awake(what 2H should be doing), so all fighting styles should have a proper buff.
"Battle Flow" provides:
+10% attack damage
+10% attack accuracy
+15% attack speed
+15% counter parry
Like "Precise Control", the total percentages add up to 50%(my humble try to make a balance between them), but gives attack speed instead of parry chance, as that's what's DW is aimed towards(giving crit chance/damage would be way too overkill at max stacks).
Off-hand weapon damage reduction by 50%Instead of the current 80%, a new player would start with 50% damage on their off-hand strikes.
The catch is to increase the damage percentage with skill proficiency(simply DW_prof/10)
If you are a person using two arms to hold weapons and go on battles everyday, it should be obvious that you will learn to use your non-dominant arm to fight for your life until you eventually master it, also giving more t=damage that DW should have.
New functionality for off-hand strikes+parryingOff-hand strikes work in a new additional way similar to one-handed block counters.
Adds a chance to give an off-hand strike to a parried enemy.
The number of off-hand strike counters that can be performed each turn depends on DW proficiency.
<100 - one counter
100-199 - two counters
200-299 - three counters
300-399 - four counters
>400 - five counters
Additionally, overcharge is gained with each off-hand counter, for the same 5~10% per counter for a max of 25~50% overcharge per turn.
I thought about a counter whenever evading an attack, but it would completely exclude heavy armor DW, so parrying seems reasonable. There's also critical hits, but they are too easy to score in comparison to 1H and DW counters.
Lastly, for high evasion of shade gear, some normal leather can be included like mages 4+1/ 3+2 styles.
Skill ChangesIris Strike causes Blind and Confuse for 10 turns(scaled with "Skill Proficiency", up to double duration)
-effects affected by Better Blind and Mind Control
-cooldown raised to 10 turns
Backstab deals extra damage to blinded, stunned and/or asleep enemies
-giving a "casual" skill for great usage during battles(like shield bash for 1H tanks), which is one thing that a class that represents leather, like an assassin, would do for days
Frenzied Blows gives weakened and slowed debuff to player for 10 turns after use(reduced with proficiency following "Skill Proficiency"/100)
-simple way to prevent over usage of the skill without any downsides other than the 75% overcharge cost
-quite reasonable thinking about a fighter stamina usage attacking frenzily from 10 to 20 times wrecking him after the skill stops, like any frenzy/berserk state should be.
Ability ChangesDW Damage
+20 | +30 | +40
Quite reasonable, considering currently abilities go as DW > 1H > 2H, which is... weird... so second place at least in the abilities additional damage shouldn't be such a nerf when there's still crit and free skills.
DW Accuracy remains the same +1 | +2
Two-handed"New" old buff Overwhelming StrikesAs weird as 1H Damage abilities being higher than 2H ones, I believe this is the right place for this buff.
"New" Overwhelming Strikes provides:
+15%attack damage
+5%attack accuracy
+30% counter-parry
Truly showing the meaning of Overwhelming Strikes in my humble opinion.
Overcharge gained with every killed enemyAs much as I thought, there isn't really a good catch on 2H like block or off-hand strike, just murdering everything, so there we go.
No limit to overcharge gained per turn, being whenever an enemy dies, adding 5~10% per kill.
Skill ChangesRending Blow inflicts weakened and slows debuff on enemies hit(effect scales with better weaken and better slow)
-giving 2H the necessary cc skills, instead of 3 stacks of PA, which would be pretty useless for an estoc user
-combines better with style and name, rending enemies weakened due to a strong hit
Shatter Strike instantly kills any enemy slowed and weakened under 10% health
-should be a fair skill to finish off weakened enemies, with one-handed one being more powerful because of precision, while two-handed just wrecks everything, cleaving for days
Ability Changes2H Damage
+30 | +40 | +50
Highest DPS with lowest defenses should have highest attack to make up for it
2H Accuracy
+0.05 | +0.1
Point of two-handed isn't mainly accuracy, but to AoE monsters, so accuracy is something that needs to be made up for the focus on AoE on the equipment/attributes
Niten StyleNew buff "Ancient Technique"This should be the fighting style that takes the most time to achieve proficiencies, so it should be rewarded for it and for the core of the style as well
"Ancient Technique" Provides:
+20% attack damage
+15% attack speed
+15% counter-parry
Offers attacks damage and speed to the style which is the fusion of DW + 2H, supporting the hybrid cores, making up for the necessity of a katana + wakizashi combo, which only offers bleeding wounds procs.
Overcharge gained with every off-hand counter and enemy killedBasically joins both DW and 2H ways of generating overcharge, which should be more than enough to use the single skill, which doesn't give much crowd control, so the style still depends on other spells to make up for damage boost and free flowing overcharge.
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Additional weapon changes to support fighting styles
Elemental strikes damage scaling with magic proficienciesFollowing a simple formula of prof/10, effectively doubling strike damage at max prof getting +50% damage
This is to make elemental weapons more competitive with ethereal(as there would be no proficiency to increase ethereal damage) and also stimulate proficiency grinding
Elemental strikes have 10% chance to cause the status effect the element is tied toA simple 10% base chance, scaling with proficiencies, following prof/10, with max prof effectively doubling chance for a status effect proc
Draining weapon suffixes procs scaling with deprecating proficiencyCurrently any legendary weapon that drops with a draining suffix(Vampire, Illithid and Banshee) is already taken as trash.
With a revamp of the fighting styles, giving these weapons a buff can make them popular and effective again, specially for DW, 2H and Niten users
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Bonus Fighting StylesThese ideas don't necessarily need to be added to balance the game, but I'm quite sure they would still attract people that are into them, or bring back people that were turned off when they found out they weren't in the game
Ranger-available weapons are bows and guns
-bows use iron arrows and guns use iron bullets
-arrows and bullets can be bought on the bazaar
-rare weapon types are magic bow and magic guns
-these use MP as fuel to fire and deal magic damage(giving a niche style to arcanist shade)
-requires new set of abilities and proficiencies
-skills like projectile rain, headshot, knee shot
-fighting style dependent on attack speed above all, with possible buff being "Fire Rate" adding on attack speed mostly per stack
-paper thin defenses, so relies mostly on evasion
-bow can slot dagger/wakizashi on off-hand slot without bonus parry rate
Proper Unarmed-attacks with own body using unarmed fighting styles
-three different sets, changeable with hand slot
-cloth gives martial artist skills(I'm bad with martial art techniques without looking some up on Google, so I won't even try)
-leather gives street fighting skills(sand throw etc)
-heavy gives MMA/ring fight skills(Lariat etc)
-new set of abilities and proficiency necessary
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Final NotesI made two other posts previously, so check them if you haven't yet.
I talked about player debuffs previously, so for anyone who saw the debuffs from Frenzied Blows and was wondering what I was talking about, be sure to check that post.
Other than this, please make sure to read everything before saying that I don't know what I'm talking about, that 1H doesn't need any changes or that the numbers and arguments I provided don't have reasoning.
I took quite some time to write all of this, so please at least read everything if you are going to show some constructive critique so I can improve/change/correct anything that I find necessary.
Other than this, wow, hope this doesn't break the thread.
[Screm edit]: just a bit of delimiters
This post has been edited by Scremaz: Mar 22 2017, 12:47