My TLDR version is a bleed rework wouldn't really require much work on any class except harbingers.
EDIT: It's why I said a special report on bleed and harbingers at the same time would let us work through any issues. Sure you'd need to change some non harbinger skills here and there but not a lot and not by a lot.
Noose is still on hold for the mage/chemwood rework?
"Oh the year was 453CE, how I wish I was in Serenwilde now... aletter of marque come from the regent to the scummiest aethership I ever seen, gods damn them all...I was told we'd cruise the void for auronidion and dust, we'd fire no turrets, shed no tears.. now I'm a broken man on a Hallifax tier, the last of Saz's privateers."
Just a concept on the idea of the bleeding rework.
On the bleeding point.
Shadowdancers have redcap but their kill revolves around aeon locking really. If you wanted you could swap the redcap bleed for some other effect without really changing how they work.
Monks are all about the hemo and afflictions just like every other monk. They don't care so much about doing bleeding or bruising themselves.
Druids are druids, up for a rework soon anyway so lets put a pin in them.
Warriors are warriors. Pureblade cares about bleed but can't really build it much on its own and they could do with a report on sorting it out a bit anyway. Bonecrusher cares about brusing which is sort of like bleed but again doesn't really matter. Anyway point on warriors is their bleed/bruise stuff is secondary to their other issues and lets not go into that kettle of fish here.
Shadowbeat is practically built around doing and buffing bleed. In a similar way that Mag bards are built around doing and buffing plagues. Being all bleedy and emo is Shadowdancers thing.
Just reviewing the classes and you really wouldn't need to make any major changes to any class or spec except for Harbinger if you did a total bleed overhaul.
If bleeding itself is the issue getting a special report in to rework harbingers and bleed at the same time would I guess in my eyes be the best way to look at this.
Correct me if I'm wrong, but don't bloodcap attacks build up to feed the barghest, which changes their dust based paralysis attack to an attack that causes damage and bleeding? Don't banshees either cause health or health and mana damage?
Don't harbingers have a songeffect that accelerates this process as well as a song that increases the mana used to clot this bleeding away, as well as a song that makes you develop hemophilia, another that causes bleeding as well as paralysis if your bleeding is over a certain amount? Crowcaw also drains mana and causes bleeding, which synergizes with everything else.
Monks use hemo, but unless this has been removed, also cause vessels (also passive bleeding), hemophilia and other afflictions which feed bleeding. Once again, it's been a while, but they also at one point had a kill based entirely on....bleeding. Run away from them? Damage from hemo/bleeding/what have you.
I'm not even going to touch warriors after hearing that at least one of you had Marcella at 24k bleeding after ten seconds using Pureblade along with other passives.
Crow causes bleeding via several skills, including a passive that follows the druid around and can't be stopped except removing yourself from their enemy list, which is easily fixable. Instakill? Mana based. If it doesn't kill you, it still drains mana and if I'm not mistaken, more bleeding.
Yes the redcap can be used to feed the barghest but all that does is it means the bargest does a tiny damage attack instead of its dust or stun. I don't know if the ability was never really looked at after overhaul but its never really worth doing. Part of why I said you could swap the bleed effect of the redcap out and it wouldn't effect shadowdancers really. Barghest feed is a bad idea and doing it just hurts your own offence.
Banshees do mana and health damage. Not related to bleeding. If you reworked bleeding the only thing you'd need to chance on Sd's would be the redcap.
Crowcaw doesn't drain mana itself it does afflictions, stun and bleed. It does health damage if the target is under 25% mana. The rough concept of harbingers is they do bleed to drain mana and then crowcaw is supposed to work as a finisher for if the enemy is low mana. This really doesn't work though. Not to go too much into harbingers because yes they have a bunch of stuff that either buffs bleeding or nerfs clot. Its why I said a bleeding rework would hit harbingers the most so any big bleeding change would probally need a hefty amount of work on harbingers.
Monks do a bunch of stuff that does cause bleeding but non of their instant kills revolve around it. That was an old thing. Monks are all: use afflictions to build haemorrhaging, get haemorrhaging to 750, burst then kill. The actual bleed or bruise they do is sort of irrelevant to their actual kill.
Pureblade twist was already changed from that situation with Marcella.
Yea druids have a bunch of bleed effects but they are up for a rework within a few months so not really sure what to say on them till that ticks though.
Crowcaw does stun and bleed. Bleed causes....mana drain, which is increased via other song effects.
Banshees do mana drain (and health), which also synergizes and helps every other class (besides tracker or night ebonguard, I suppose) get a kill. As does your passives and your active in Shadowbeat.
Everiine said: The reason population is low isn't because there are too many orgs. It's because so many facets of the game are outright broken and protected by those who benefit from it being that way. An overabundance of gimmicks (including game-breaking ones), artifacts that destroy any concept of balance, blatant pay-to-win features, and an obsession with convenience that makes few things actually worthwhile all contribute to the game's sad decline.
And while we're here, let's contrast Nightsweats (directly assists all your kill methods via adding bursts of bleeding when you damage someone) and:
Moonwater: next time you sip for h/m/e, cures an affliction.
Holywater: uh...blocks damage one time? Not sure here.
Unholywater: when you're dealt damage, deals half of it back to your attacker. Semi useful, doesn't contribute to much.
Firemead: does some fire damage.
Frost Tea: makes your pinky crook itself when you drink it from a cup. Also..I think does damage to an enemy who sips?
It just seems like anything put in place for Glomdoring "makes sense", but anything put in place for other orgs is 50% flavor text, or designed thematically as opposed to making sure it helps the org.
There was an envoy report put in and approved to give cloudberry tea timewarp and damage.
Don't harbingers have a songeffect that accelerates this process as well as a song that increases the mana used to clot this bleeding away, as well as a song that makes you develop hemophilia, another that causes bleeding as well as paralysis if your bleeding is over a certain amount? Crowcaw also drains mana and causes bleeding, which synergizes with everything else.
Monks use hemo, but unless this has been removed, also cause vessels (also passive bleeding), hemophilia and other afflictions which feed bleeding. Once again, it's been a while, but they also at one point had a kill based entirely on....bleeding. Run away from them? Damage from hemo/bleeding/what have you.
I'm not even going to touch warriors after hearing that at least one of you had Marcella at 24k bleeding after ten seconds using Pureblade along with other passives.
Crow causes bleeding via several skills, including a passive that follows the druid around and can't be stopped except removing yourself from their enemy list, which is easily fixable. Instakill? Mana based. If it doesn't kill you, it still drains mana and if I'm not mistaken, more bleeding.
I'm pretty sure crow swoop (the 25% mana kill) doesn't add bleeding but it does drain mana. It does however pull the target from the ground into the trees (and potentially out of the room where you're trying to kill them if the kill fails).
Which is easily fixed via shoving them out of the trees, possibly breaking limbs if they aren't levitating, and setting them up for another swoop as well as whoever is below you on the ground to drain their mana. Rinse, repeat.
As for monks, I'm aware that hemo doesn't cause vessels. I'm just saying that you've got yet another affliction that causes passive bleeding, and thus, mana drain.
Everiine said: The reason population is low isn't because there are too many orgs. It's because so many facets of the game are outright broken and protected by those who benefit from it being that way. An overabundance of gimmicks (including game-breaking ones), artifacts that destroy any concept of balance, blatant pay-to-win features, and an obsession with convenience that makes few things actually worthwhile all contribute to the game's sad decline.
Says you. I'm totally cool with a bleed rework, if it'll help level out their skills and reduce their synergy to acceptable levels with the rest of us.
Everiine said: The reason population is low isn't because there are too many orgs. It's because so many facets of the game are outright broken and protected by those who benefit from it being that way. An overabundance of gimmicks (including game-breaking ones), artifacts that destroy any concept of balance, blatant pay-to-win features, and an obsession with convenience that makes few things actually worthwhile all contribute to the game's sad decline.
There're a lot more I can say, but let me take
the obvious bait for you guys and provide some useful readings to show
you how baseless this following assumption is:
Deichtine said: And
people are leaving the game due to the negativity expressed by their
allies. This thread isn't about it Maligorn. Please stop trying to
disrail it.
"Shadowtwists
and you - A discussion" 2017 October by Kalikai, another balance design
admin. But I need to guide you through this one. Hallifax
represantative Falaeron comments, Celest represantative Kaimanahi
comments, then a Magnagoran Ascendant (And a former Glomdoring player)
Karlach comments and then, with no deleted comments or anything, I
ensure you, Kalikai is requested to close thread, by Glomdoring
represantatives. Because they do not believe a constructive discussion
is possible about their skillsets in public: https://forums.lusternia.com/discussion/comment/180412#Comment_180412
Late
edit: But if you actually take time to read that "Leaving Lusternia"
thread, there you can find many people from different organizations in
the game speaking up about combat imbalance, Glomdoring with their
frustrations, suggestions and whatnot. Along with many other threads and
comments those are buried on the forums that just wait to be unearthed.
...
It's honestly crazy how many threads there are with Glomdoring playing some sort of role in them. I'm not going to read them all again because I don't want my blood pressure to rise.
But this is a good chance for everyone, from the confused newbie to the jaded veteran to read player grievances and decide for themselves what the problem is.
My TLDR version is a bleed rework wouldn't really require much work on any class except harbingers.
Classes who get a rework are generally classes who need one. Aquamancers didn't get a rework because fire potion was put in a specific balance. Cantors didn't get a rework when aeon was changed, either.
Changes which incidentally may bring Harbingers down to the level of all the other bard groups aren't going to require it to have a rework.
Everiine said: The reason population is low isn't because there are too many orgs. It's because so many facets of the game are outright broken and protected by those who benefit from it being that way. An overabundance of gimmicks (including game-breaking ones), artifacts that destroy any concept of balance, blatant pay-to-win features, and an obsession with convenience that makes few things actually worthwhile all contribute to the game's sad decline.
Holywater is 1/7 universal damage resist now. It used to negate one instance of damage, but, uh... didn't work terribly well, to be honest. Having a reflection up alongside holywater and then getting hit would break the reflection AND spend the holywater charge. Discovered that one a long while back because cows hate reflections for... some reason. (Edit: I don't think cows hate reflections anymore. (Edit to edit: Cows still hate reflections. WHY.))
I'm Lucidian. If I don't get pedantic every so often, I might explode.
Holywater is 1/7 universal damage resist now. It used to negate one instance of damage, but, uh... didn't work terribly well, to be honest. Having a reflection up alongside holywater and then getting hit would break the reflection AND spend the holywater charge. Discovered that one a long while back because cows hate reflections for... some reason. (Edit: I don't think cows hate reflections anymore.)
I do remember cows hating reflections, on my alt, 2 months ago. Don't know if they still do. I very clearly remember reading the phrase "A cow rages" lmao
You are startled as a lemon meringue pie bounces harmlessly off you after being thrown at you by Mysrai.
I'm going to try and summarize my opinion on this, we had a long talk on the discord on the subject and I don't necessarily want to fully rehash without a chance to sit down and plan - but who knows when this will get locked so here we goooooooo.
When I say "Glomdoring" I mean exactly that, the organization as an institution. I do not mean "all of the players in Glom" or "Some notable players who play Glom". Not just to try and skirt forum rules or whatever, really: Glomdoring as a stand in for a culture exemplified there. I will specify when I'm talking about specific people or "those people" in a general sense, as culture is like the wind in that you can only see its effects as expressed by how it moves.
Glom has a culture that promotes certain types of rhetoric from its prominent players, that has spread through the Glom diaspora via players who would still be identified primarily as "Gloms" even after leaving to allied nations. It's one that ultimately is in ascendancy overall in the Real World as well, and has to do (I won't go into too much detail because it's long) with forced optimism and positivity as a moral stance.
Read the forums and you see prominent Gloms using rhetoric espousing this philosophy. In short I will try to sum it up:
-Remain positive -Even if you are presenting critique -Even if you are being attacked, take the high road -Success comes if you are positive, success in gameplay and in balance changes. -If you are failing therefore,it is (at least in part) because you were insufficiently positive
With the exception of the final point, these are all reasonable sounding axioms, and in general can be taken as a good ethos. The problem is that speech is not inherently neutral, it is an ACT embedded in context and inextricable with it. In other words: while possibly correct, bringing up an argument about the tone in which a position is being presented has a purpose, and that purpose in Lusternia is inevitably to pull the conversation away from the meat of the discussion at hand. An argument about pointing out the positivity or lack thereof of an argument is tone policing, a form of ad hominem... but ad hominems aren't bad per se.
Gasp, you read that correctly: Ad hominem's aren't necessarily bad... in fact, I think that they're necessary to some degree for a useful discussion! This is the case will all of the related fallacies, actually. A blind appeal to authority is bad, but at the end of the day it's not reasonable to explain to the degree of educating all participants to the same level, it's okay to have experts weigh in and appeal to their authority. Likewise, it's okay - necessary even - to invoke a genetic fallacy or two! In the thread about artifacts @Shaddusbegan interjecting with what (by their own account) were non-serious statements. From then out, it's probably safe to discount their statements: someone just wanting to stir the pot will say anything. The point of this digression is that you have to look at the impact of speech with an eye towards its utility, not just its form. Back to Glomdoring. Part of what riles people up so much are statements to the effect of: "Your points didn't have impact because they were so negative; don't resort to personal attacks." Which is an ad hominem tone policing argument against said points in practical terms, while at the very same time asserting avoiding ad hominem attacks as an absolute good. What is the utility of this rhetoric? Well, in a niche community with a statistically super high population of relatively outcast people, it's to jam a massive thumb in everyone else's eye, even while the last point on my bullet points slaps everyone around. We can see pretty categorically that the majority of threads that get closed, the beginning of the end starts when this rhetoric is trotted out, and ends with it from administration.
Which comes to administration. There IS a "Glom bias". What I do not think there is, is a system of "I like Glomdoring's lore/players/admins/skills/design/npcs, and this player is from Glom and so I will listen to them". Possibly in very isolated situations, but come on. What I think is a better lens with which to view this is to take the (shoddy) rhetorical analysis above and think about what its ultimate effects are. Basically, Glom players philosophical rhetoric ingratiates them (or better put, ingratiated) them with administration by aligning their goals with those of the admin team. Some mistake is made with the release of a thing, there is player outcry, some players come in and say something to the effect of "Well we should critique this, but why can't we be more positive and friendly about it". This does two things: A) has the effect of shutting down the content argument, shifting the conversation to a form argument, and mollifies the sensibilities of administration. After all, they aren't 'shutting down discussion', they're insisting on "doing it the right way", even if the net effect is still for the discussion to end.
How do we get from there to a systemic Glom bias instead of just a bias towards "some glom players"? Players with this sort of attitude pass through the ephemeral process more easily, while others become increasingly frustrated with the inherent contradiction even if, or especially if, they can't put their finger on why it bothers them so much. This, the makeup of the administrative team shifts. Just as players clearly self-segregate over time and form pretty resilient org philosophies, regardless of the generally shifting populations, the admin team too forms a general culture that persists and self-selects. That culture and Glom's align, thus the "Glom ethos" tends to 'catch more flies'. This isn't a natural and inviolate law of the universe, it's the direct result of choices made by individuals, and shaped by the constraints/policies provided. It's fixable, but you have to want to fix it.
PS: Positivity culture and corporate optimism overall is very bad and highly ascendant IRL too, which is part of why it's so dominant here. Google for articles or I can add them tomorrow, have a dinner date to go to.
This is so important. I think it's only human nature for people (and admins are people) to want to hear that they made the right calls, that the status quo is the correct decision, that they did well. And Glomdoring is positive in that sense, because it's a lot easier to be positive when things are going well and the status quo is to your benefit. And that's not Glomdoring's fault either, but it is a result of the system, and a result of the many factors which led to Glom being "on top".
Since everyone has been citing people who left - I am one of them. I stopped playing in February 2018, shortly after last ascension. I stopped playing for my own mental health, partly because I was being legitimately upset on an OOC level about things that were happening in a game. But I also stopped playing because of the Eight Deadly Words, which writers will be familiar with:
I don't care what happens to these people.
And by these people, I mean my character, other characters in the game with me, and my perception of my ability to make a meaningful impact. I was both a roleplayer and a pvper. I was a vernal ascendant. I fought in almost every domoth for the better part of a year. I experienced Glomdoring skills many times, first hand, when I would die in 5-6 seconds to Shadowdancers. I went back up and I kept doing it, because my friends were playing and I wanted to help them and be useful to them in a fight. I trained up at least five different combat newbs so we would have more bodies, even as I felt at a mechanical disadvantage against Glomdoring and their skills and synergy. I had hope that it would get better, and in the meantime I wanted to help my org and my alliance.
What made me quit playing was the realization that it wasn't going to happen, and one too many instances of bring an issue up on the forums and being met with deflection and told that I and my friends just needed to get good, by some of the usual suspects that others have brought up here in this thread. I quit because I became convinced that Glomdoring was on top, would always be on top as long as these players kept playing, that it had intentional or unintentional admin support to continue being on top, and that nothing I do could ever move the needle. I couldn't afford to care anymore.
And sure, the same people could say to me, "But it isn't like that, you are just perceiving it to be that way." I don't think I am. I really do think that Glomdoring skills are superior, and that's why my honest suggestion to the admin back in the day was that they should try to give every org the same skills, reskinned, and see who protested loudest - that would be the org whose skills were the most "overpowered" in the status quo. But even aside from that, a perception problem is a real problem. People leave and move to other games because of "perception problems". I was one of them. I was convinced to log in again last week, albeit with a resolution to avoid pvp, but many people, including most of my Lusternia friends from when I last played, are never coming back.
(clan): Falmiis says, "Aramelise, verb, 1. adorn with many flowers."
Every class being simply mirrored is just good game design. Wicca, Warrior, Druidry are largely ok. It's Night/Moon or the design behind monks/bards where problems really arise. It won't happen, and I understand it wasn't the point you were trying to make, but... good competitive game design uses equal availability for a reason. Imagine playing chess where only one black had knights, or like, I dunno, Overwatch and only one team can pick Widowmaker. Hell, even successful MMOs have mirrored classes (by and large), and they're hardly good competitive games. I can't imagine anyone who likes good competition arguing against mirrored classes.
Anyways, there was some traction earlier about bringing up the synergy of other orgs, I dunno why that discussion didn't take off.
Warriors are not okay, not even the tiniest bit. But that's a whole other discussion with plenty of envoy reports going in to hopefully make it okay.
I meant more like, in terms of inter-org balance. I thought that'd be obvious with my mention of druids, who straight don't work :P I guess I should've said Knighthood is a good skillset cause every org has it. Done and done. It's the rituals/totems specs that make it messy. Make Necromancy and exact mirror of sacraments, but you have batwings instead of angel wings - good design, no one is mad.
I do agree with Synl that intra-org imbalance ("bard is better than mage"), while bad, leads to less frustration than external imbalance ("Loralaria is worse than Harbinger"). I can easily choose to play bard instead of mage if I think bard is better, and if I still do badly, then that's on me and no one else. I can't snap my fingers and become a Harbinger unless I move to Glom.
(clan): Falmiis says, "Aramelise, verb, 1. adorn with many flowers."
I thought that'd be obvious with my mention of druids, who straight don't work :P I
An MVP candidate of 2017 Ascension was the Hartstone meld itself. While they will always have a special place in my heart, druids are lackluster, I agree.
"Oh the year was 453CE, how I wish I was in Serenwilde now... aletter of marque come from the regent to the scummiest aethership I ever seen, gods damn them all...I was told we'd cruise the void for auronidion and dust, we'd fire no turrets, shed no tears.. now I'm a broken man on a Hallifax tier, the last of Saz's privateers."
I can easily choose to play bard instead of mage if I think bard is better
(It does costs either 1-200$ or about 45 hours of grinding to swap classes, so it's not exactly a finger snap either)
I agree, and it's rough on newer players particularly - I was speaking from the perspective of myself as an established player who has sunk way too many credits into the game, and coming from the relatively privileged place of someone who has learned every class available to me (except warrior, but that's less for mechanical reasons than for RP ones).
Let's just say that I would be willing to pay significantly more than that to have access to some of the skillsets (Night, Nightwicca, Harbinger) that we're talking about in this thread as a literal money-where-my-mouth-is thing.
(clan): Falmiis says, "Aramelise, verb, 1. adorn with many flowers."
I've been listening to people talk about how much they'd love to have access to the MD skillset instead of SD for the last hour or so.
I don't personally think it's based on the skills, at least not solely. In that mindset, spending a lot of time revamping 2 to 5 org's skillsets is... a huge task for dubious gain (see: Researchers). At the same time, what if we just rethought things a little bit, in the manner of "steal from your enemy / use their tools against them"? Glom and Seren both get access to Seren & Glom skillsets. Celest & Mag both get access to each other's. Same with Gaudy & Hallifax. Since alliance shifts will generally tend towards each of these opposites opposing each other (though perhaps not always, it generally seems to gravitate back towards that), it would end up with everyone basically having access to whatever they want to try out.
I think it would be really weird RP-wise though, at least at first. A longer term project could be reskinning things so that they are more thematic (kind of like how Succumb and Lash both got reskinned when they swapped skillsets). But making the skillsets available to both opposing orgs seems like the least time consuming option that satisfies the request to mirror skills across alliances; skillflex is already a thing, after all, so it would just be flagging them to be accessible to both (and then figuring out how to make the power thing allow for power from either of the two nexii).
I think it would pretty neatly address the whole skill thing and allow for people to actually try out the skillsets that they are drooling over. But it would also need to require a bit of flexibility in thinking about things for a while until a reskin is even on the table, since I don't think resources for that would be available any time soon. (Maybe they could accept player-submitted ideas for messages though..)
That's really nice for those people who want to use Moondancer skillsets, but that really has nothing to do with the state of Glomdoring skillsets.
Give everyone the same skillsets with different skins if you want balance.
It also gives all of Serenwilde all of Glomdoring's skillsets.
Reskinning every skillset for every org is an even bigger task. On a meta level though, I really don't have an objection either. I'm mostly trying to keep things to a somewhat reasonable level for implementation & resolution. It just gets even harder to justify RP-wise the more you spread them around, but hey, maybe Kethuru breaks the world enough that everyone can learn anything they want.
@Xenthos I like the idea, but I do think that a skillflex available to all orgs is better than it coming in pairs, for the sole reason that a lot of people are very committed to their orgs and would be averse to moving orgs even within their alliance just to try out a skill. For example, Serenwilde right now has almost no active combatants at all who would be able to make use of what you suggested, and I think that telling people to move to Seren if they want access to <x> skillset is fundamentally no different from telling people to just go to Glom.
What I do think could work would be a "generic" or neutral version of each skill - potentially with player submitted lines if it's too much work otherwise - which you'd get if you aren't in the org. So for someone from Mag who takes Moon and uses succumb, their lines won't reference Moon but will have "a flickering light passes over x's face" (instead of a silver light) etc. In most cases it would be a change of one or two words. Eventually we might end up having enough player submitted lines to skin it thematically for all orgs (like goop arties), but it would be a stopgap measure till then.
OR, your idea could work if we could remove the nexus power alignment requirement entirely and allow skillflexing across orgs. So the idea could be that Glom stole Moon secrets from Seren and now can share it to their allies etc. Or, hell, do it the old fashioned way and have a player infiltrate another org and learn their skills and then quit with it and be able to teach it to other people - a lot of great RP back in the day came from people quitting an org and refusing to give up the skills.
(clan): Falmiis says, "Aramelise, verb, 1. adorn with many flowers."
I've been listening to people talk about how much they'd love to have access to the MD skillset instead of SD for the last hour or so.
Pull the other leg.
Everiine said: The reason population is low isn't because there are too many orgs. It's because so many facets of the game are outright broken and protected by those who benefit from it being that way. An overabundance of gimmicks (including game-breaking ones), artifacts that destroy any concept of balance, blatant pay-to-win features, and an obsession with convenience that makes few things actually worthwhile all contribute to the game's sad decline.
I've been listening to people talk about how much they'd love to have access to the MD skillset instead of SD for the last hour or so.
Pull the other leg.
Okay? I guess both your legs are pulled, doesn't make it any less true though. And hey, implementing the idea would actually let those people try it out and everyone would see the result either way.
I do think total equalization (everyone has access to everything) would be good for Glomdoring also. If one wins on an obviously and totally level playing field, it usually results in less complaining and suspicion about unfairness. And that's good for everyone, and the game as a whole.
(clan): Falmiis says, "Aramelise, verb, 1. adorn with many flowers."
"Dubious gain" Do you mean because not many people are playing Researcher right now? If they'd left it broken and unusable, what do you imagine would happen? I really want to know @Xenthos from your mouth before I answer the question for you.
"Dubious gain" Do you mean because not many people are playing Researcher right now? If they'd left it broken and unusable, what do you imagine would happen? I really want to know @Xenthos from your mouth before I answer the question for you.
Eadei is making Institute work and getting kills with it.
Comments
EDIT: It's why I said a special report on bleed and harbingers at the same time would let us work through any issues. Sure you'd need to change some non harbinger skills here and there but not a lot and not by a lot.
-Kilian
Banshees do mana drain (and health), which also synergizes and helps every other class (besides tracker or night ebonguard, I suppose) get a kill. As does your passives and your active in Shadowbeat.
Was implemented through in 2018-06-05
As for monks, I'm aware that hemo doesn't cause vessels. I'm just saying that you've got yet another affliction that causes passive bleeding, and thus, mana drain.
'NSB isn't a problem. Change aurics.'
'Glomdoring isn't a problem. Change bleeding.'
https://forums.lusternia.com/discussion/3355/problem-the-economy/p1
"Leaving Lusternia" 2018 march, a thread by Lilyin! 71 votes, 6 pages of comments:
https://forums.lusternia.com/discussion/3349/leaving-lusternia/p1
My personal tipping point for giving up on combat-related events. "Chaos Event Megathread", a thread by Ianir, the lead coding admin of the time. 2018 January:
https://forums.lusternia.com/discussion/3301/chaos-event-megathread/p1
And Glomdoring plays no part in any of it? Sure.
"Shadowtwists and you - A discussion" 2017 October by Kalikai, another balance design admin. But I need to guide you through this one. Hallifax represantative Falaeron comments, Celest represantative Kaimanahi comments, then a Magnagoran Ascendant (And a former Glomdoring player) Karlach comments and then, with no deleted comments or anything, I ensure you, Kalikai is requested to close thread, by Glomdoring represantatives. Because they do not believe a constructive discussion is possible about their skillsets in public:
https://forums.lusternia.com/discussion/comment/180412#Comment_180412
Another attempt to open Shadowtwists up to discussion by a Serenwilde/Celest envoy, I can not remember which org he was in back then, by Minkahmet. Shut down again, as you can see:
https://forums.lusternia.com/discussion/comment/180438#Comment_180438
"Do you feel that glomdoring skillsets in general and whole are superior to other orgs" by Yarith, January 2018. Just an opinion survey, which has a few noncombatant input in the votes in both columns and some unfortunate trolling attempts in the comments. But there it is:
https://forums.lusternia.com/discussion/3305/do-you-feel-that-glomdoring-skillsets-in-general-and-whole-are-superior-to-other-org-counterparts/p1
Late edit: But if you actually take time to read that "Leaving Lusternia" thread, there you can find many people from different organizations in the game speaking up about combat imbalance, Glomdoring with their frustrations, suggestions and whatnot. Along with many other threads and comments those are buried on the forums that just wait to be unearthed.
...
Changes which incidentally may bring Harbingers down to the level of all the other bard groups aren't going to require it to have a rework.
Since everyone has been citing people who left - I am one of them. I stopped playing in February 2018, shortly after last ascension. I stopped playing for my own mental health, partly because I was being legitimately upset on an OOC level about things that were happening in a game. But I also stopped playing because of the Eight Deadly Words, which writers will be familiar with:
I don't care what happens to these people.
And by these people, I mean my character, other characters in the game with me, and my perception of my ability to make a meaningful impact. I was both a roleplayer and a pvper. I was a vernal ascendant. I fought in almost every domoth for the better part of a year. I experienced Glomdoring skills many times, first hand, when I would die in 5-6 seconds to Shadowdancers. I went back up and I kept doing it, because my friends were playing and I wanted to help them and be useful to them in a fight. I trained up at least five different combat newbs so we would have more bodies, even as I felt at a mechanical disadvantage against Glomdoring and their skills and synergy. I had hope that it would get better, and in the meantime I wanted to help my org and my alliance.
What made me quit playing was the realization that it wasn't going to happen, and one too many instances of bring an issue up on the forums and being met with deflection and told that I and my friends just needed to get good, by some of the usual suspects that others have brought up here in this thread. I quit because I became convinced that Glomdoring was on top, would always be on top as long as these players kept playing, that it had intentional or unintentional admin support to continue being on top, and that nothing I do could ever move the needle. I couldn't afford to care anymore.
And sure, the same people could say to me, "But it isn't like that, you are just perceiving it to be that way." I don't think I am. I really do think that Glomdoring skills are superior, and that's why my honest suggestion to the admin back in the day was that they should try to give every org the same skills, reskinned, and see who protested loudest - that would be the org whose skills were the most "overpowered" in the status quo. But even aside from that, a perception problem is a real problem. People leave and move to other games because of "perception problems". I was one of them. I was convinced to log in again last week, albeit with a resolution to avoid pvp, but many people, including most of my Lusternia friends from when I last played, are never coming back.
Anyways, there was some traction earlier about bringing up the synergy of other orgs, I dunno why that discussion didn't take off.
An MVP candidate of 2017 Ascension was the Hartstone meld itself. While they will always have a special place in my heart, druids are lackluster, I agree.
-Kilian
Let's just say that I would be willing to pay significantly more than that to have access to some of the skillsets (Night, Nightwicca, Harbinger) that we're talking about in this thread as a literal money-where-my-mouth-is thing.
Give everyone the same skillsets with different skins if you want balance.
What I do think could work would be a "generic" or neutral version of each skill - potentially with player submitted lines if it's too much work otherwise - which you'd get if you aren't in the org. So for someone from Mag who takes Moon and uses succumb, their lines won't reference Moon but will have "a flickering light passes over x's face" (instead of a silver light) etc. In most cases it would be a change of one or two words. Eventually we might end up having enough player submitted lines to skin it thematically for all orgs (like goop arties), but it would be a stopgap measure till then.
OR, your idea could work if we could remove the nexus power alignment requirement entirely and allow skillflexing across orgs. So the idea could be that Glom stole Moon secrets from Seren and now can share it to their allies etc. Or, hell, do it the old fashioned way and have a player infiltrate another org and learn their skills and then quit with it and be able to teach it to other people - a lot of great RP back in the day came from people quitting an org and refusing to give up the skills.
Pull the other leg.