Moon Dancer Combat idea discussion

Aeldra

As per tarketons post (see below) to pull it out of tweets, in case anyone's interested in further discussing this topic.

@Tarketon said:
I've never been concerned about a solo MD that wasn't the champ. They're more annoying than anything else because they can spam full and reset the fight.

Any buffs to moondancer would need a simultaneous nerf to full, like Celina said. That being a given, what do people think realistic buffs to MD combat could be?



Basically, I've heard a lot about the pet of the moondancers and can say for myself that in on itself they don't offer a whole lot that brings one down to business, so, are there idea's out there? and I heard about the need to adjust 'moondance full', I think.

Opening this thread, because I think good ideas can't hurt!

Everiine

I want to see Moondancers do this, unleashing the full power of the Moon!

Kalnid

They can already do that, it's in astrology. That's what happens when you cast meteor with eight negative spheres.

Nienla

I think what can easily be agreed upon is that Full would probably have to take a downgrade to give Moondancer other offensively oriented stuff.

I think the main issue is the prismatic barrier and the fact that full can reset fights without making the Moondancer sacrifice too much.

As for Moon, it needs another route that doesn't focus on mana. Toadcurse and Succumb are there and should stay. However, every class is deserving of a second reliable route. I'll think of a mechanic not in use and get back to the thread in a bit.

Lerad

Solution: Add an ego kill! As people have said, we're on low supply of that, so let's make it more abundant, one guild at a time.

In all seriousness, though, updating Moon's strategical playstyle is definitely a good idea. As it is, sleep mechanics have already been changed, and I'm not sure how viable the gimmicky moondancer sleeplock is at the moment. It is also ridiculously gimmicky to fight against. Literally, it devolves fight into, "kill the pooka -> run away to resummon it -> kill the pooka" repeat ad infinitum.

Mechanically, I would hazard that they were intended, and therefore would benefit from, a burst-orientated kill style, like the shadowdancers. Obviously, carbon copying shadowtwist is lame and unlikely to pass muster, but there're definitely other ways to implement a burst orientated set up. I might try to come up with something when I have the time.

Lerad

Also, late to the tweets derail, but Patchou definitely is not essential for MD combat. Having fought plenty of 1v1 MDs before throughout my career of oceania-time period raiding, the sleeplock is literally undependant on Patchou. I have never gotten killed by a sleeplocker simply because they had a Patchou put in a lucky aeon for them, nor have I ever escaped a sleeplocker simply because they didn't have a Patchou: everytime I was killed by a sleeplock, it was because they sleeplocked me, period, and everytime I escaped, it's because I countered their sleeplock. I've only ever bothered killing Patchou if they left him behind and didn't recall him after a fight or something, never in the middle of a fight.

Plenty of MDs have tried, and succeeded or failed, with sleeplocking me. Aeon is a HUGE part of sleeplocking, because it is such an extreme lock down ability, but Patchou's role in ensuring aeon in a sleeplock is hardly the important crux.

Saran

For some reason my mind is combing back to an idea of like... some sort of overcharge mechanic.

Like, we go in to some form of moon rage then consume that to empower our Fae to make a super strong hit which then requires them to return to ethereal to recover, preventing us from summoning them back for a cooldown.

Useless with how the mechanics of it would work, but an idea I guess. Full would be our "oh crap it didn't work flee flee til the fae are off cooldown" button.

Silvanus

After we successfully upgrade Moondancers like we did with Shadowdancers and twist, can we then upgrade Druids beyond Sap and Nihilists beyond ectoplasm? It would be nice if in 330 IG years that combat has evolved for those guilds.

You can even talk me into Celestines, but I'm still bitter about shackles.

I can't really offer too many opinions about Moondancer combat, as it has been a long time since there's been an effective one outside of a Sondayga sighting. However, I never really saw a Mugwump Hexen Moondancer like Kio did for SDs, so you never got to see someone completely abuse level 3 eq to show how unbalanced it can be. Knowing that's been nerfed, combat has to evolve beyond trying the same strategy over and over till it works (looking at you @sap and @sacrifice).

Also, Protip as @Lerad points out: Kill Guardian/Wiccan's ents. You will completely nerf their ability to continue the fight, and the more often you do it, the more you can change things to the better. If fighting an Illuminati, kill their spix than homonculus (homonculus is slightly tough but killing it does damage to the Illum). If fighting a Wiccan, absolutely kill their pooka. Doing that first before anything else. If fighting a Nihilist, they have to time their demon to be effective, even just attacking the demon ruins their entire offense now that mugwump isn't a thing. If fighting  Celestine, attacking their angel does the same thing. Oops, thanks shackles/kneel, they can just run say fuck it for 80 seconds and go ham. (Institute, you are not a real guardian).

Pooka is by far more important to a Dancer's kill strategy than Patchou or almost every other Moon skill outside of Toad and Wane, and it is so easily preventable. Upgrade ents in general, downgrade Moondancer defensive capability, and look for an upgrade in skill's outside of Wane, and you can see viability for one versus one return. However!

Being group oriented is far more effective and far easier to learn than being a flashy 1v1er which never happens in real scenarios that matter outside of personal gain. If I were looking for a new direction to the guild, I would aim for group synergy versus ganking viability.

Shuyin

BUT KILLING ENTS IS NOT A REAL COUNTER

Silvanus

Fuck your sarcasm.

Editted: Because I know some of you are testy about sensitive language, I will give you some background information.

The only member of Celest to give me trouble in killing them where I actually had to work for it and try new strategies was @Tridemon. Do you want to know why? Because he was the only one smart enough to attack my demon. No one else did it. I was absolutely amazed that I was able to sit there and count down in my head till six seconds and hit my ectoplasm alias to time it right before my shackles from demon and that kills 98.7% of you. Attack the ent. Please be part of the revolution to upgrade those classes.

Shuyin

You don't even have to kill the ents if you're in some sort of rush (got ganked, etc etc), just get them to shield. They'll stop attacking then too. Otherwise, make them waste the power or balance to resummon.

Silvanus

That's actually a better strategy, because it requires the guardian/wiccan to dismiss the ent and resummon it again before it is actually useful.

Nihilist/Celestine ents are on an 8s timer. If you get them to low enough health, they will fire their next attack, 8 seconds later, they will shield. 8 seconds later, next attack, 8 seconds later, shield.

Dancer ents on are a 12 second timer, and I believe Illuminati ents are on a 10-12 second random timer or some weird Gaudi thing. Same thing applies to them. They will alternate between attacking, shielding, attacking, and so forth.

You can eliminate an entire skillset of theirs by attacking their ent.

Saran

I guess a question I have for the envoy type peoples...is there a few small changes that could be made or would an overhaul/special report be more beneficial?

Are there similar issues with Shadowdancers and something could something be done with Wicca? I remember the thread by Celina a while back about just general issues with Wiccans, is this still the case?

Lerad

Uh, big special reports will need to be enabled by Estarra, but it's definitely possible to get a few reports made by coordinating amongst envoys. Most likely, one report at a time would be the way with the highest chance of success. Major reworks are likely to have less chance of getting an ok. Or at least, that's my personal opinion.

Saran

I know, but the questions still stand. Possibly because I'm a MD at the moment, I just kinda keep coming back to them. 

Because I suppose they really give a starting point. Is the best place to look in Wicca, maybe Moon needs the changes. Could it be all changed by adding in one or two abilities? Is there enough variability already there to allow this?

The "Why no one plays Wiccans" thread is nearing three years old at this point, has much changed, are the complaints still valid? It seems like the opinion was that there was a lot to do and that there was something coming. 

Of course, if the issue is more core. Maybe the fae work really well for what they do right now but not so much for something else? then we might need bigger reports etc.

Cyndarin

The complaint is still valid for MDs. I think it's been kinda resolved for SDs with shadow twist. SD isn't interesting per say, but it's certainly powerful now.

Ushaara

I always thought it would be cool if Moon had maybe a 'lunatic' type (masochism++, reckless, paranoid etc, attacks hit random person in room) mechanic dependent on the number of mental affs, that again probably would have only really worked with Hexes. But whether that would work now with overhaul system I don't know... Would have also been neat if the self-inflicted deaths had a few different methods, a la Bandrui's executions.

Aeldra

Just've read @Celina's old thread on wiccans and I think she's got some valid point over there, I suggest going and reading it. I can't say much on the issues with moondancer combat myself, as you know, still newbish to combat, but from my playing around, I noticed the following things:

- sticking anything as a moondancer alone is quite difficult, being that your aeon, the sleep or succumb. You have to time your fae and act in the right timeframe, which seems to be really short.
- If you finally got your target in aeon and succumb, there's literally nothing else you can do to keep that combination going, aside of relying on a tertiary or enchanted rings.
- a minor hickup in your combination (your target getting out of aeon) will allow them to cure basically all the mana damage done.
- The current skills don't seem to really allow much for 1vs1 at all.

Of course that's all looking mainly at 1vs1, group dynamics I leave to more experienced people to give their opinion on.

As to what possibly could be done, possibly?

- give us some afflictions to work with out of the main skillsets that help us actually hinder our target / get them into a state we can stick succumb with somewhat reasonable work.
- do something about full ( I read a lot of complains about it, and I guess it's just too powerful )
- maybe generally review the skills available in the main skillset regarding whether or not they are still fitting with all the overhaul that happened / is happening.
- if sleep / aeon lock is actually the way we are supposed to stick our succumb, give us an actual primary use of sleep? I don't know, but I have my gripes with this combinations, as there's so many ways to counter sleep and we don't even have a primary source for it (unless you happend to take the right tertiary ).


Please take with a pinch of salt, those are just observations from newbish from the top of my head.

Synkarin

The big problem with wiccan's (and druids to an extent) is that upgrading Moon also affects warriors. So anything that is suggested has to be considered for both MD's and Moon Warriors.

The second problem is that MD's are entirely dependent on the sleeplock burst. Until they hit that lock, they are just floundering, waiting for the burst to be set. Once they have pooka locked, then they need to hit prep affs (strip quicksilver etc) and then lay down the big metawake off/triple sleep followed by aeon, asthma/stupidity, succumb, luminosity all while maintaining sleep. As has been noted, this is pretty boring gameplay. If it fails, you start all over. The beauty of it is that it'll eventually work. You'll eventually get that lucky rng sleep tick that lets you build the lock up and you'll win. But it's still boring, rinse and repeat tactic, but it's definitely strong. So any additional kill methods/strategy will likely have to come at the expense of sleeplocks, because sleeplock is so powerful.

So it's great to sit here and throw out ideas, but you're going to have to give up something to get something.

Enyalida

Wiccan ents are not on a 12 second timer anymore, it's 10 now. 

Saran

@Aeldra, one thing I guess is that Tertiaries can heavily define your approach to combat.

The combat clan stuff says that sleep is the hexes way, Astrology seems to focus more on keeping them in the room and using meteor, while Healing seems to involve praying to the rng.

One change that would be amazing, making Snoefaasia permanent which could help with hindering, which could help with Astrology perhaps and would just be nice for all Wiccans

----

@Synkarin #1 thing that I hate about nature users. 

That being said I think @Estarra has said in the past that if necessary then additions can unique to a class. Such as the Moon fae requiring Moon. So if that's followed through on it shouldn't matter because Moon Warriors just... won't have access to it.

----

@Ushaara lunacy would be cool, though I guess my mind sees it more like a stacking affliction but we have a few of those and it'd probably need to be more about Mommy Moon getting more and more pissed off with you to differentiate from temporaryinsanity.

Enyalida

I personally wish that Wicca included more than just a pile of fae you can summon that (almost) all use the exact same mechanics. While that's generally  an opinion on the style more than the substance, I do think that a lot of the standard issues presented with the archetype would be more easily resolved if they weren't pinned to having a summoned, 10s ticking ent for everything in the primary skillset. 

Aeldra

@Synkarin I get  that sleeplock/aeon is quite dominating once you are actually locked in it, but it's also a lot of work to set up. I am not sure I would mind if MD weren't reliant on sleeplock but on something else instead, but then am one of the newest MD, so my opinion's likely secondary.

Non the less, how it currently goes is a little bland and as it was said somewhere else, MD hasn't really been touched for 6 years ( at least people keep saying that ) so maybe something can be come up with (which was what I had in mind when I took up tarkentons idea to make a new thread about this).

I have yet failed to get my system and aliases and setup to the point that I can pull off the sleeplock/aeon combo in a sparring, so till I actually get there, I don't feel like I can reliable make suggestions myself aside of what I already wrote, thus me hoping that some of you who have years of experience on this game come up with some nice ideas )

Synkarin

What work is involved in setting it up? You just need to draw hexes and wait for pooka to lock. Then prep and boom.

Aeldra

@Synkarin if your tertiary is hexes, maybe. Don't know. Mine's not hexes, mine's healing. I don't know, maybe the whole sleeplock only really works with hexes, am still trying and figuring, but that was kind of the point of my last post, saying I can't really say too much because I don't have it working yet.

Synkarin

The only difference for sleeplock between hexes and other terts is timing pixie/aura with sleep enchant

You can set your pixie up though to attack when you want (have it attack you, wait 9ish seconds and order passive). 

Neurosis aura strips insomnia as well, though I'm not sure the timing on that.

Riluna

The idea of giving up something in exchange for some offense, especially some of that great defense everybody mentions whenever the issue comes up, has been historically welcome to us. The only issue we have had with that has been touched on by Synkarin. Internally, the question has always been "well what can we even add or change that doesn't overpower somebody else?" We can't modify a single skillset without also buffing another class that doesn't need it.

We've been happily willing to forsake reliance on sleep entirely, too, if there were anything else that worked. It's been my understanding, at least, that the only reason people even tolerate sleep bursts is because we don't have anything less powerful that works.

Would it be more helpful to work backwards instead? Just brainstorm on ideas for what they could do differently, and then figure out what it will replace?

Riluna

Synkarin said:

The only difference for sleeplock between hexes and other terts is timing pixie/aura with sleep enchant

You can set your pixie up though to attack when you want (have it attack you, wait 9ish seconds and order passive). 

Neurosis aura strips insomnia as well, though I'm not sure the timing on that.

Healing auras tick every eight seconds.

Eodh

@Aeldra IIRC, healing auras tick on an 8-second universal timer. If you notice an aura on you ticking, you know the aura on another person ticked as well. Fae, on the other hand, tick every 10 seconds from when they last hit.

To time fae (pixie, in this case), have it attack you. Count 9-ish seconds from when it attacks, then order it passive.

When you head in for the actual fight, have all other fae except the pixie attack (something like SM INSERT FREE ORDER ENTOURAGE ATTACK TARGET|ORDER PIXIE PASSIVE; I don't know if this particular command stack will actually work, though, you'll have to test for yourself). While you're waiting for the pooka to get the command, shift the neurosis aura.

Because you timed your pixie, it'll hit your target with sleep <1 second after it's order to attack. Knowing this, and with pooka command available already, wait for the neurosis tick (keep in mind it's on 8 seconds, universal). You have to time it all together:

Order target metawake off 

Neurosis tick

Order pixie attack target

Beast order breathe sleepcloud

Those three sleeps strip insomnia, put to sleep, and then strip kafe. The problem right now is that sleep attacks no longer hit tiredness, which means that even with all of that, there's a high chance the target could just wake up again immediately on his/her next WAKE command. You'll want to add another layer of slowing that down -- aeon, probably.

Theorycrafting here, you could maybe Wane around 4 seconds before the Neurosis tick (depends on how long the bal/eq on Wane is) to strip quicksilver, then on your next bal/eq, do the above sleep combo + Wane (since all of them are free actions that do not use up bal/eq) to put them to sleep plus aeon to maybe slowdown the WAKE. I dunno.

Point is, Sleep as a Healer is definitely more fiddly than the more precise method of a Hexen, but it's doable!

Nienla

Spent some time thinking of a mechanic that Moondancer could do. Came up with this:

Moon - Shift

MOONDANCE SHIFT <target> <avatar>
MOONDANCE LUNATIC <target> <avatar>

In all of her forms, Mother Moon is a constantly shifting spirit of nature. By manifesting this concept, you are capable of demonstrating her majesty to your enemies.

Every time you shift your opponent, you will curse them in the name of one of Moon's Avatars. The shift message will be generic for every curse and the affliction hidden to your opponent. If you manage to hit an opponent with all four afflictions for a respective Avatar, you will be able to curse them in that Avatar's name and draw them into mad fixation with Mother Moon.

(afflictions per avatar can be worked out)

Luna - Hypersomnia, Stupidity, Anorexia, and Impatience
Selene - Pox, Sunallergies, Haemophilia, Weakness
Albion - Rigormortis, Vomiting, Dysentery, Justice

If a target has all four afflictions for an Avatar, you may curse them for 3p. Cursing a target will have the following effects:

(can also be worked out)
One curse - Your target will find that that Succumb is more difficult to cure
Two curse - Your target will find that they take more proportionally more damage from Moonburst/Moonfire attacks
Three curses - Your target will be overwhelmed by lunar energies and slain instantly.

Moon Shift will just give a generic message like: Moondancer begins an erratic, jerking dance and your body begins to glow with a light silvery sheen.

Curse will say something like: Clenching a fist before you, <target> levies the curse of <avatar> upon your head and your aura erupts in a flash of lunar energy.

What this does is actually make a class where afflicting is part of the normal course while providing a condition-based instakill that simultaneously allows the Moondancer to work towards Succumb/Toadcurse if they want. It makes sleeplocks still important and gives sleeplocks enough time to levy someone with these affs and curse them. Curses are uncurable for a length of time (this can be worked out). Shift will give these affs and they'll be hidden unless you diag. You won't know what specific Avatar affliction path they started on and it follows a pattern. If I hit you with Luna and you don't cure the Hypersomnia, the next Luna shift will hit with Stupidity and follow down the path. The message can tell the Moondancer what the target got hit with aff wise.

Anyway, just an idea to put forward and pick apart. I like to offer solutions instead of just complaining.

Edit: In regards to Full, I think just removing the prismatic barrier would remove most complaints. I remember the addition of the barrier being very contentious to begin with.

Qistrel

Riluna said:

We can't modify a single skillset without also buffing another class that doesn't need it.

There is a very narrow range you can alter without buffing anyone else. There are three skills that only Moondancers get - Maiden, Mother, Crone. If you could come up with an idea to alter those somehow. Do you really need the maiden defenses? Could it do something else?

Could they be changed to be internal switchable aspects that give you special abilities instead of summonable ents?