PvP rant

Introdution to feedback:
{I play at lvl 40. In theory, nobody can upgrade character infinitely here, so fights should be more or less equal right? No. There are a lot of old low lvl accounts still, who have 120k Combat Value at lvl 40, when normal player in full event equipment and 2H weapon has max. 70k, thanks to mode 3. But that's not what I want to discuss in my post, which I hope will be helpful to DSO team. The class balance is completely OFF.

First of all, I hope everyone knows well that pvp at 55lvl is absolutely, totaly and fully different than pvp at lower levels, eg. 40.
Also to make it clear, since everyone tend to rise self esteem by preaching propaganda that dwarfs or rangers are balanced, and literarly laughing at other classes in game. I play all 4 classes around 40lvl, I know stats of players in team that I do PvE with so I know which class deals absolutely outrageous amout of damage while their character evades all hits safely, or deals even more damage.

I can't say what is the balance at 55 like, however it's childs play to analyse all skills to be able to say if there is balance or not.

Why imo there is no balance? Because of wrong assumptions, which is in pvp not every player can play in the possibly most efficient way. So class balance is based on unskilled players. But actualy most of the players are skilled, this game doesn't require much brain functions and after repeating a fight for milionth time it's not possible to play badly. This doesn't make any sense but it's the only imaginable reason of why Dwarfs have theoretical maximum percentage of damage per second 770% while 55lvl mage has 560% (assuming infinite mana), etc., or why Rangers have a gnob bow which increases Blade Dance by 200% and no other class has anything like this.}

Feedback:
If I understand right, before this update every dwarf could deal 600%-604% of base damage with single skill, almost no cooldows or steam usage. Plus 4-6 torrents dealing at least 400% damage. The change from 604% to 332.2% is very positive, though obviousely not enough of a decrease.

What pvp at up to 40lvl (and below) looks like:

dwarfs: as always, they just place mechanical torrents and go around. If they have good attack speed and HP, their opponent with the same stats (gradation of equipment) is unable to destroy any torrent in 10 seconds. After this r209, it's like to kill a dwarf, you need to kill him multiple times a fight (torrents). When attacking torrents you get destroyed by dwarf's 300% attacks. If you focus on dwarf, mechanical towers with good attack speed and 110% damge destroy you, while all you can do is 220% attack (DK) or 138%+burn for mages.
Furthermore, whenever you shot a missle directed to dwarf, they can just put a tower like a shield. Before r209 you could at least hit the dwarf. And infinite stun-free skill? Well...
Playing a 40lvl mage with very good stats (no exp block) I don't stand a chance against good dwarfs (ofc also no exp block for comparison) no matter if I use 2H build (trying to hit dwarf from distance -- they can just hide beneath towers which I can not destroy in 10 seconds) or 1H build (which allows to stun and use singularity -- infinte stun-free skill)

rangers: with good shield and attack speed they are good, balance is fine. Spamming blade dance vs DK - DK run out of cooldowns and can't hit but have a lot of HP and 3 good stunning attacks. Also dwarfs are unable to hit, blade dance grants immortality. With good attack speed, infinite immortality.
However.
lvl 45 skill, fire missle, is a disgrace. Highest range with such a high ELEMENTAL damage and destroying armor in one skill???
Even without armor break, it completely outmatches mages.
It would be true that mage has a lot easier below 40lvl (because no 45lvl rangers here) if rangers couldn't get Gnob bow. Against a ranger with the same gradation of equipment, but having this 200% blade dance bow, a mage can take max 30-60% of hp., unless ranger played really poorly.

mage vs dk is fine, because DK in 2H weapon and Dragon Skin is immortal for 8 seconds and one hit kills mages. However mage can use build with shields and then it's equal.

proofs: just go and watch videos on youtbe. this guy has probably similar gradation of equipment to those tanks he's killing. Can any other class with 47k CV at this level do the same? No. Lower HP, armor, block and no 200% damage increase. 119 kills 0 deaths in a 5v5 because of having Gnoob bow + good shield + Fire Arrows.
One thing is grinding a lot to get outstanding equipment, and other thing is when other players can not do the same, because of class "balance".

One thing is when Ranger player has "better" playing skills thank DK player, other thing is when DK is not allowed to be skilled, because of ingame abilities he has. It's sad to watch lvl 55 fights of rangers vs Dragon Knights. I don't play there so you can hear my honest opinion that I have after rational and impartial mathematical analysis. I highly recommend DSO team to let do the balance thing to people able to think in a "mathematical" way so you will see clearly and know for sure what the balance is.

some suggestions:
ranger:
A) FireArrow's breaking armor decrease
B) but instead, breaking armor 20%-50% from close combat abilities: Death Sweap (*almost* nobody uses this in pvp) or lower value but stackable. This way 3 problems solved: Ranger will have armor breaking at low lvl; Rangers won't be too op with spamming 1 skill; sum of total armor breaks will remain unchanged...
C) Gnoob's bow bonus to Blade Dance which is now upgraded to deal even more damage: Bleeding. 200% is old value.
Keep in mind that lvl 40 nobody has travel speed runes to catch ranger. For lvl 55 however this bow is very important. I don't know how to solve it: the same item exists for 2 completely different types of pvp (low lvl and 55lvl)... Maybe tier 1-2 should have 100% bonus as a maximum.. it still would be severly overpowered... And tier 3-6 with 200% as it's now...
D) Decrease range of Explosive Arrow 125%+250% so that Explosion would cover normal maximum range.
If the radius of explosion is 3.5m, then the range of this skill should be lowered by at least 3.5m, to give a chance for mages 138% ball but still it wouldn't help much...
If also A and B were tested, then Spellwaver is a mid-range class due to freezes. In mid-range, Archer can go to close-range to use close combat skills, or increase the distanced and use Explosive arrows, which is far superior to mages.

mage:
gnob weapons compared to Archer or DK, are completely useless. Meteor is funny, but very weak. It's usage is mainly for the good look. It's damage is lower than a lightning strike?! So gnob's equipment doesn't make much sense.
how about:
E) Metheor strike ignores 85% armor and resistances?
It's easy to evade and would add this flavor. It'd became a bit dangerous. Or a damage increase for this skill. Or additional item from gnob or event for lvl 40, that would increase it's damage by 200% for wands (1h weapon low dmg) as it's with Ranger's bow...
So that spamming Metheors in 1H weapon would actualy make sense and could be a bit dangerous if opponent got stunned nearby. Now if someone did this, opponent could be only confused out of laughter.
F) maybe a shield item that would further decrease damage taken from dwarf's towers?

dwarf: this is a complete disgrace right now and every other class at 40lvl will agree. Dwarfs have everything: regeneration, shield of towers, best dps, overpowered armor breaking skill etc etc etc. I don't know how to solve it. Maybe different stat scaling from equipment for low lvl, but it won't change the dwarfs that already exist right?

Maybe my opinion will be of use to make this game better.

 

Sorry to say this, but i think we can agree.
Noone give a flying damn thing about low lvl pvp.
They currently struggling with a tons of bugs..

 

And why are we talking about the future of the current pvp mode when they announced that pvp will be separated from pve as soon they are done with the pve balancing and can focus on pvp (which BTW, makes me think there is only a small team of one or two developers, which are actually working on this game).
The idea is that pve items and gems will be removed from pvp and also the levels won't matter (i.e. lv40 can play arena with lv10 and lv55)

 

Excuse me while I wander by and mention, yet again, that there is nothing wrong with any one of these classes.

The problem lies in DSO's inability to correctly match opponents based upon each opponent's skill level. When the algorithm fails to recognize the weight that runes, gems, crafting, and tiers have upon a player's ability to excel or fail in the PVP arena, then players are always going to end up one of two ways-- they go in and one hit kill their opponent, or they go in and get one hit killed themselves.

Nothing wrong with the classes-- the issue lies in the way DSO matches up players for matches.

Find someone who you know is very similar in gems, runes, and experience to your own toon, and go into the Royal Arena for some friendly sparring. You'll find out very quickly that you are pretty evenly matched. Levels are profoundly secondary to the way a toon is equipped-- run into someone who has spent the money (or cheated) for full runes, gems, and tiers, and you are facing someone who you can't beat in PVP, unless you too are maxed out.

Sounds to me like DSO's solution is going to be to just wipe all that out, leaving players relying solely upon their own abilities in the arena. IT wouldn't be my first choice for a solution, but at least it is better than the current situation, with the win/loss relying almost completely upon who has more 'stuff'.