Mages, warriors, & balance

Hey, I haven't been playing too long, but I noticed that mages seem to be geared towards tearing warriors up. Which is fine. But who is there to well erm.. tear the mages up? If there was just one more class, we could have a rock, scissors, paper balance. And then, not only would combat get alot more interesting as you would have to form teams of three, cooperate, and depend on each other to be absolutely invincible, but you also wouldn't have as many people clamoring to get on the mage train just because they want to be PvP Master #1. Instead, you might get people who want to learn magic because it fits the story of the character.

The class I have in mind is one that would go through mages like mages currently go through warriors, but would have to contend with warriors who would tear them up in turn. By the way, has anyone read Wheel of TIme? If this class were created, there would be a place for a warrior-mage relationship like in that series. Warriors who are valued by mages as personal bodyguards. Anyways, mages as generally thought of as coming from the wealthy elite of society, so it would fit for them to have an entourage of followers.

As for this class, why not make them the Thief or the Archer class.

In my opinion and experience i have never seen any mages train for the purpose of pvp or wanting to "beat warriors".
Don't forget this game isnt about pvp...

Also it is still easy enough for a skilled fighter to defeat a mage.

Another point. There are also battlemages/warlocks that combine elements of both melee and magic but never truly being "the best" at either.

Many fighters do indeed take mages with them to hunt on occasions. As an example i'll point you towards Evie, Caldarion, Uhuru and Pierre (I'm sure they won't mind me using their names in this context).
3 fighters and a mage but they don't only use the mage merely as a bodyguard, they are also a valuable member of the hunting team.

In short there is balance wherever you look all it requires is that the players put the effort in

[Athian]

Warrior can take up the bow or the dagger or whatever weapon they like so they can already be archers or thieves if they want.

There are two real 'issues' though that make magical beings, warrior bane and they aren't about class:

Magical defense vs magical offense

The current way most warriors are set is geared so that they can be the best possible warrior, usually maxing out many physical attibutes and leaving magical ones at a minimum, this gives them poor magical defenses.

A warrior with 3 will/ess and 100 magic resistance(magic defense) vs a mage with 18 int and 100 commotio(magic attack) will stand little chance against a mage even with maxed skill. They don't have much chance even against a mage with less then maximum skill, but that is a problem produced by attribute choice and no 'class'.

Distance vs Melee range

The big kicker really. Proportionately speaking melee skills are capable of doing just as much damage as magic ones more consistently, just in smaller bursts. The problem in the PvP or PvE scenario that magic skills are able to inflict that damage at a distance and have tools that keep that distance. Warriors have few distance closing options when up against magical skills at a range. to note though, this problem probably will be greatly lessened after the VBU when characters can run can run.

A warrior can always arm himself with a few bombs and potions, and since that system has no requirements most warriors have alchemy powers anyway. As stated though the game does not center around classical PVP, we like our conflicts technical and Role played, sometimes both even

High end Warrior vs High end Mage

First strike wins.

End of story.

High end Warrior vs High end Mage

First strike wins.

End of story.

spoken like someone who has never fought a mage...I've never seen anyone being killed in 1 hit in this game(not even 1 of my former characters sparring against a former captain of Bane as a noob fghter with nothing but blue starter skills), pretty sure it isn't possible. if a warrior were to attack a mage the mage uses a spell(I have no clue what the spells are called I've never been a mage) that pushes the person back, they then heal themselves and cast attack spells on the warrior as the warrior again tries to close distance. even a medium tier mage doesn't really have a problem defeating a higher tier fighter.

That may be true but only if the mage is in the right position to cast otherwise you will continuously be interrupted.

Nikolaus never actually said 1 hit kill, he said first strike wins which could be correct in some cases

EDIT: Damn Typos

What Nikolaus meant was that if a high-end mage cast on a warrior first e.g. paralysis, the fighter is screwed and the mage continually casts and pwns him. If the high-end warrior manages to catch the mage off guard and strike him, and if he is fast enough, the mage will not be able to cast.

I think magic is probably a bit too strong in this game, in terms of being fair pvp. But that's just the way it is I guess.

And wether you like to admit it or not, the game might not be all about pvp but that certainly is a big part of it for alot of the player base. And there is nothing wrong with that, everyone has their reasons for playing just as long as they actually Role-play.

[Achae Eanstray]

Admittedly I have not done much PvP so by far am no "expert" however I have seen a few PvP's fighter vs mage. Among those I have seen there have been equal outcome i.e. fighter wins...mage wins. As to the original post, there is an archery class however due to the system in place now they are ineffective however hopefully this will be changed with the coming VBU.

I tend to disagrre with Necrals thought that magic might be too strong.

I think both might an magic are pretty much equal in terms of strength but the deciding factor for a fighter may be his magic resistance.

Athian previously highlighted the ins and outs of magic resistance so i won't repeat it but if a mage chooses not to increase their dodge and parry ratings then that would put them on an equal level with fighters.

What makes magic stronger than melee in this sense is that even mages have to train their melee defenses for those times when the opponent might get too close however some fighters may just choose to fight only opponents that don't use magic instead of having to train resistance.

I feel that is a choice made by the player and not the game

LOL. This is really an ANCIENT discussion. It's as old as illarion itself.
If you had read anything about the VBU, you'd not have started it again.
Athian and robert have some really useful hints there.

Summary :

As soon as a fighter gets close to a mage, the mage is down because he cannot concentrate on stronger spells when being hit.
Good mages with lots of mana, high skills and maxed mage attributes (which means they really suck at EVERYTHING else but magic, especially fighting and defense) can be able to outjump a fighter and trap or kill him when they don't have any lag.
But if you want to take down a mage, alone from arrows and throwing stars the mage won't be able to concentrate.

Consent:
A mage makes sense as a team supporter, in pvp a good mage can tare through one or two better fighters before his mana is out (but needs ten to fifty times more training time than a fighter does), and against three well-prepared normal skilled fighters with good equipment and perhaps a few potions a better mage has no real chance. Even IF the mage has good equipment.
A fighter may need an efficient mage as team partner for hunting bigger monsters, usually. But in player versus monster, the mage cannot carry much loot away, and fighters are closer to the valuables, so playing mages in pvm may end up annoying if you don't go with really fair people.
Anyhow, after the VBU, playing mages might suck even worse than it does now. Perhaps not. We'll see.

Read up the forums, re-starting ancient discussions that have been done over and over again doesn't make much sense.

and where is the place for peacefull crafters?

and how can they get all the things mages and warriors got from monsters?

basically Grim wrote something about the old days, before illarion was all a battle about skills, when you could roleplay a miner without mining, etc. Also something about a character wipe and stuff. Though CM Achae removed it as Grim is permabanned. so.. yeah.

My original post:

He has a point...

Can't you like.. go back on your promises and do a character wipe? :3 it'd remove most of the ooc grudges too as a bonus :3

I don't know, but it just seems to me that being a mage i.e. scholar, intellectual etc. is less about being da uber pwning badass and more about being a support character like the wise counselor Merlin.

Also, wouldn't it be nice to encourage more interdependence and cooperation among the players?

[Djironnyma]

It is common knowledge that the magic and fighting system need some balance. This will be done ith/after the VBU afiak.

the new doungens and monsters which come with the VBU will mostly not be solved with a single char anymore. it is planned that you need groups of players with a chars of different classes.