>I don't know that I agree with this, especially when considering the OP post about backstab as an example.

I admit to not knowing much about backstab.. If thieves are happy with backstab as a damage output, and feel they're putting out damage in line with MUs, then I would suggest giving barbs access to some a similar feeling system, i.e., a command/damage output that isn't dependent on TM that increases damage output. If we're looking to just get onboard with Paladins/Rangers (who I truly don't understand how they claim to lean on TM as a damage output of merit, given all the Paladins and Rangers I know), and have a handful of roars that use TM and do some template of TM damage (e.g., impact/fire, or AoE cold/slice!), then I think it'd be pretty boring and ineffective, and ultimately a waste of dev.

Since afaik, backstab is not doing anything remotely like 'just being a TM for thieves', I'd love to see barbs get an expansion of abilities that rely on Expertise, Weapon Skills, etc. Which is I believe the point you were making?

>I'll just come out and say that yes, opening TM to Barbarians is almost certainly going to involve training a Tert skill.

Ah, whelp, there you have it. Is this the Expertise/crazy kungfu you were talking about earlier?

>>I am trying to figure out why we have to have a TM ability. Can't we just do something with our damage generation, why does it have to be TM like. .... Now, to have an ability that works the way a TM spell work.. You guys are gonna be standing around going .. Ahaha I have a TM spell.. while magic users are laughing at your dumb self cause you can't use it.

To be fair, that's the spot the other magic terts are in. I was just talking with Squanto this morning about this topic and made the comment along the lines of "Hopefully you end up with something more useful then my unimpressive light show" while sharing a log of a capped SMH cast in my hunting area (12 glorious glancing/shield blocks).

Now, all that said, what I would be a fan of is an additional damage channel based on a tertiary skill, in conjunction with Expertise based Maneuvers or special attacks that are used in place of normal attacks. These would draw upon your primary skillset for power, and scale accordingly. Akin to current Maneuvers and Whirlwind/Dual Load.

Samsaren

>>I think this is going to force barbarians to make a tough and honest call. If Barbs need a TM like damage stream, I think many will be sorely disappointed by what they get. If they want further development of Expertise, maybe that would be enough.<<

I am OK with having both of these options on the table. I understand if something is tertiary it is going to take extra time for us develop and I am fine with that.

"Brace yourselves, Squanto is going to bleh blah fart fart bleh.." -the player of the character formerly known as Pureblade

>if we're just getting gimmicks that we will never use at level it doesn't do much to repair the damage generation void, which is huge.

But that's what 'Barb TM' would be. Giving Barbs access to TM, a tert skill, to do damage with. I encourage you to ask more Paladins and Rangers what they think of their TM damage output. I also encourage you to ask more Moonies, Necros and Empaths what they think of their weapon damage output relative to their other damage abilities.

>Now will all barbs that have progressed to any point be required to essentially do the same, again?

Yes, that's the point/problem I'm getting at.

>Backstab and snipe both rely on stealth as well as the appropriate skills (backstab and weapon skill for stabbing and ambushes and such, ranged skill for snipe). Both backstab and stealth are contributing to the damage generating abilities. They are magic tert and do not rely on a tert skill for their guild based damage alternatives.

And this is precisely why I was suggesting we emphasis an expansion of Expertise, not 'Barb TM'.

> If we're going to call Tert TM a gimmick (and yes, I'm actually quite sympathic as I started at a whopping 40 ranks at 155th), then Barbs aren't far behind at all. Middle of the pack, easily.

Isn't that like calling tert evasion or tert parry or tert weapons a gimmick for magic primes.

Honestly, until a name in red makes a proposal even at a concept stage this is all just fluff. However, I think this thread is useful and should be kept open not only as a place to propose ideas but as a record keeper to show the GMs that we were agreement at this point in time and now it's (heaven forbid) 2017 and absolutely no progress was made.

>>(and yes, I'm actually quite sympathic as I started at a whopping 40 ranks at 155th)

I mean, you had the option and ability to start training it up long before then, and quite a few did. This was a choice, not by force, to be fair. And, we're looking at this to address a huge damage void in an offensive guild. Do I feel Barbarians should be as defensive as Paladins? Absolutely not. Do I feel they should be as offensive as a frothing, berserking Barbarian? Again, nope.

I do understand where you're coming from on a purely skillset based conversation, but we've tried to handle this as a skillset discussion before. You've been there. They're not willing or able to bridge the skillset perks over to weapons to balance things out. (Sorry lore prime, you genuinely are screwed worse than us, here, but this isn't your folder.) Whether it be from skills, from just flat out increasing the damaging capabilities with weapons overall, we are unlikely to see changes come to weapon primes to even offset the insane disappearing hindrance and large arm-worn shields of paladins, or the many survival perks related to stealth and perception (lower RTs, passive boosts that stack with buffs based on location, longest hunt ranges, among others). That already puts us a step behind in survive-ability before even addressing the damage void.



Thematically, barbarians are weapon prime. Historically, the most offensive:

>>The Barbarian's life is a simple one, but not an easy one. The field of combat is our crib; the blood of foes is mother's milk to us. Stand with us, and flesh your sleepless sword in training in the field.

While War Mages are described more universal, and as protectors.

Why should we pale to them in damage generation, especially as horrible as we do now? What real reason is there for forcing outside of our primary skillset for generating said damage? As Samsaren quoted, relying on TM or a tert based skill for the application of this damage will result in development hours not even worth spending, as it will make zero progress in bridging the gap that grows larger with every magic update. The weapon skillset is a damage generating skillset already. Weapon and expertise ranks must be gained by learning in combat (or classes as anything else, of course.) I personally would like to hear why we are being forced to take a scooby-doo bandaid on a broken arm.

>>A little while back, I proposed a new approach to weapons. Primaries deal out the most damage with weapons, secondaries the next most, terts the least. The idea was to give us damage production with weapons that put us on par with MUs ability to manufacture damage with magic.

That's neither an answer nor consistent with how TM works (Ranks are ranks in TM. Secondary and primes just have a lot more of them and the secondary/primes have more... weird spells.) If the problem is the comparison of traditional TM + cyclics + weapons then I'd place the blame squarely on cyclics.

-Raesh

"It was wise enough to know itself, and brave enough to BE itself, and wild enough to change itself while somehow staying altogether true." ― The Slow Regard of Silent Things

I personally dont see a large difference between weapon damage for my barbarian than say my cleric or my bard. Our weapons will certainly outpace other guilds on rank basis and I'm sure a GM could see what the damage difference of lets say 800 ranks in 2HE is versus 725 ranks of 2HE.

The problem is that gap and damage advantage is very slim. Then when you add in what a mage can do with spell damage we get blown out of the water.

---

Don't forget to vote for dragonrealms:

http://www.topmudsites.com/vote-DragonRealms.html

>>That's neither an answer nor consistent with how TM works (Ranks are ranks in TM. Secondary and primes just have a lot more of them and the secondary/primes have more... weird spells.) If the problem is the comparison of traditional TM + cyclics + weapons then I'd place the blame squarely on cyclics.<<

Let's put it this way. On this end, I see no difference on the weapon damage output of my different characters (barbs and not barbs). So if nothing is done to consistently beef up each swing, I don't know what to say other than let us hit harder as the most simple fix.

"Brace yourselves, Squanto is going to bleh blah fart fart bleh.." -the player of the character formerly known as Pureblade

While you guys are discussing how unfair it would be to have to learn a new skill to have TM like abilities, lets just take this moment to remember that magic defense spells have no affect on your roars and they are pretty powerful. Before you start complaining about how green the grass is on the other side just keep that one in mind. There are no checks and balances in place when it comes to your BMR beyond simply overwhelming it, it cannot be dispelled like other defenses. They are very powerful in and of itself.

It would also be pretty unfair to guilds like paladins and rangers who had to do their TM the hard way if they wanted to start doing Direct damage spell-like affects.

That aside I think this is a cool concept.

Also for the double post, as to breaking wards: spell stance-ing properly makes your ranks and mana go a long way.

>>Uhm, wrong? What it takes to break is a check and balance in itself, and based on ranks. Also, when serenity is forced down, our primary ward, it tanks our inner fire, removing all our buffs. And we roar at like half strength with it up. Those are considerable balances, in my opinion.

Vs equal level barb/spellcaster with similar ranks, you wont get past the ward. I've seen people with ranks near 1700's in their magics and 120+ in mentals fail to get through the resists of someone who doesnt even have 1000's in weapons and not a single stat over 100.

>>Yeah? Stand in a room for 5 pulses of Faenella's Grace. I think that still works? Or get spam located (which some people have definitely taken to doing) to safely drop our inner fire, wards, buffs, all- from a safe distance.

There are 2 wards you can stack, one of them drains IF when spells are cast, doesnt it? Then theres another one thats just a static buff. The fact that you are indicating that spam locate works to reduce your ward doesnt exactly mean its functioning as a dispel. Spells like Rend dont work on your wards, which makes them pretty darn powerful, that was my point. Thats a pretty exclusive benefit to barbs (not sure if thieves get one too but i dont think they do?)

>TM design is based on skillset placement, more potent spells going to the primaries.

That hasn't really been true since the spell tier system. All TM spells are basically identically potent in terms of damage output, they only differ in which two damage types they use, and which of the templates they use (Single target, AOE, Multistrike, DFA, Heavy, and AP). As a rule, single-target TM does (significantly) more damage per strike than the others except AOE TM, which was increased last week, and Heavy (which has its own issues).

A fake-ish example for the sake of explanation: Assuming they have the same damage weighting between their two damage types (they probably don't) the basic Bard spell Breath of Storms and the intro AP Strange Arrow would be functionally the same attack with different messaging.

---

Re: Life mana Spell preps

You raise your hands in the air. You wave them like you just don't care. Somebody says, "Hey!" Somebody says, "Ho!" Somebody screams.

>>That hasn't really been true since the spell tier system. All TM spells are basically identically potent

Ehh, agree to disagree? Show me a secondary or tert with a spell like fire rain, BG, new DB, SA, HE and HH. Spell design for a prime guild definitely seems better than that for secondaries, and again, this is as someone who is currently playing a Cleric.

>>A warmage at young wyvern level magics was ripping through the wards of barbarians that hunt drakes and moths. Your info is old. And probably not spell stance'd properly. At level, most every MU I fought was able to wear them down, it became a damage race to try and get them before they did, because once my wards were gone, it's over.

Not old info at all, if barb used serenity instead of tenacity (getting nerfed in barrier rewrite anyway) and stacking it with the other barrier, youd be pretty surprised what you can stop. I've watched Korutu do it several times vs people much higher than him with some pretty impressive results.

>>Not old info at all, if barb used serenity instead of tenacity (getting nerfed in barrier rewrite anyway) and stacking it with the other barrier, youd be pretty surprised what you can stop.

You walk into the barbarian folder telling barbarians how to barbarian. This is mistep one.

You assume one needs to sacrifice tenacity to use serenity. Wrong, and shows you aren't really 100% on what you're talking about. Mistep two.

>>I've watched Korutu do it several times vs people much higher than him with some pretty impressive results.

I am the one that gave Korutu the method and breakdown on how to apply his wards when he came back to a changed system.
As that was just him that posted himself getting blasted through two wards by a storm bull, Im sure he can confirm if you require.

And pre 3.2- before things just got easier- Fahijeck (who is lower than korutu) was able to spell stance properly and break his wards any time he wanted. Like I said, it is knowing what to do and properly applying it that was lacking on the MU's side, and thus making things look a bit more unbalanced than in truth they are.

>>All that confirms is that Aftermath apparently cant

Or wasn't stanced properly to break the wards, something you continually avoid. 85% somewhere vs 130% is a big difference. Even 115%.

>>Or wasn't stanced properly to break the wards, something you continually avoid. 85% somewhere vs 130% is a big difference. Even 115%.

I really think you are severely underestimating how big Aftermath is compared to Korutu, or 99% of the rest of the game for that matter. If an extra 30% in potency is strong enough to factor for that, I'd say you are making my own case for me.