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Earring of Sinope - discussion
I wanted to submit a classlead about this, but could not come up with a good enough solution. I'm also not confident that I'm not missing something here. Could we discuss this and see if there's a solution in-game that we might not know about (I've asked maybe 40-50 people about this hand haven't found one yet).
I'll state things as I see them - and would welcome any corrections or additions.
Assumptions / things to note:
• Earring is stopped by paralysis, prone, or a writhe affliction (bound, web, impale, transfixed)
• It is not stopped by broken limbs (of any level), or stun
• Most people who have earrings and would be using earrings mid-combat have buckawns amulet artefact
• There is no cooldown on earrings whatsoever
• With the vicarious sigil you can actually earring to anyone in the game, instantaneously (although this does have a cooldown).
Problem:
Only two classes in the game (that I know of!) that can stop Hangedman on their own, and even this only works some of the time. No class can actually just stop earring travel, solo - which I do not thing is intended.
Occultists & Jester have the only ability in the game that stops earring travel that cannot be instantly cured: Hangedman - however now hangedman can fail so repeated use of the above alias is guaranteed to work. Also, this doesn't count for Bards who can Dwinnu / earring.
Bard can stop it using Tremelo + paralysis a single time, but cannot stop a second use.
Shaman and Sentinel can stop it once, but only if they are on balance when earring starts, as their counters (prone/disrupt) both require two attacks during 1.5s window.
Several classes have abilities that can stop it in 2v1 scenarios - namely Impale.
If you're not one of these classes, then even if you have 3 or 4 people in a room, all all balance, all ready to attack, you cannot stop earring travel, against this macro. Even if you kill them with 5 simultaneous damage attacks their earring will presumably complete post-starburst, allowing them to escape alive.
Conclusion:
The "nerf" wasn't really a nerf. Even a novice can copy/paste the above alias and can act like the windup time and limitations do not exist.
Solutions:
There are many possible solutions. The key is to do something that threads the fine line between making the item no longer viable for escaping (and angering the huge number of players who own them) - while still making. I will list out some of the ideas I have heard or come up with, for consideration.
Best solutions:
• Make the 1.5s windup a channel.
• Initiation of the earring windup disables the buckawns defence for 10s (this has a bonus effect of giving Web tattoo a reason to exist).
• Give the item a 1-hour cooldown, across all earrings you own, unless you are 95% health/mana and have no afflictions. For consideration, wand of reflections is FAR less powerful defensively than earring, and has a 1-hour cooldown.
• You have the aeon effect during the 1.5s windup. This would effectively allow someone two stop travel with TWO of the hindering afflictions (you cannot eat bloodroot AND stand).
• Require 100% health, mana, and no afflictions for GLOBAL travel. If not perfectly healthy, restrict it to AREA travel only.
Good solutions:
• Make earring respect room hinder / movement abilities like gravehands, piety, distort, hamstring, pinshot, etc. This is not great for two reasons: 1) You can still RNG out on first or second try too easily, and 2) Many classes have no such ability.
• Require 95%+ health and mana and no afflictions (at initiation and at end of windup) - just like all the new fast-travel artefacts do (hints that admin know this is broken)
• Travel fails at initiation and windup in any room where anyone has you enemied (may sound too harsh, but all you have to do is move 1 room).
You place your hand over an earring of Sinope, and it begins to warm beneath your palm.
An earring of Snipe loses its warmth as the feelings of hatred from those nearby drown out the thoughts of your true love.
Not so Good solutions I've heard - and why they're bad -
• Make the windup long enough for it to be realistically possible to stop it with an affliction. I would think this would be around 4-5s. (only reason this isn't great is because it'd unnecessarily affect use outside of combat).
• Simply require no afflictions. This is not great because some classes (notably, monks), don't have a reliable way to stop it.
• Attempted movement (including forced movement via Force abilities or Beckon) and forced movement (boomerange, yank, barge) stop it. This is bad because not all classes have a way to force movement, and most of them are completely countered by adding mass or shackle to the above earring alias.
• Prevent ring travel to anyone in a city, ship, or private property. This would at least allow chasing them, in theory, but doesn't really work for numerous reasons, and would also dramatically reduce the value of the item for people using it outside of combat, so should not be considered.
• Make monolith stop it (with no other change) - this does nothing, it is not a solution. Mushroom sigils (and Fire Tanks) exist. Also, placing a monolith doesn't prevent the person from just going to the next room and using earring - and not all classes have a way to prevent this.
Opinion time:
As a person who owns many earrings, it's my personal opinion that they're just bad for the game. Fast travel makes so many things in this game pointless, and ruins conflict as said conflict can almost 100% be eliminated by use of earrings, especially coupled with all of the other fast-travel items that don't have wind-ups, like wings.
While @Makarios and team are, I am sure, worried about upsetting people who bought earrings, they should keep in mind that people who own earrings are also getting a bad game experience from this too, from other people who have earrings. Despite owning multiple earrings (on multiple characters) I would consider a nerf to earrings a good thing for me, for three reasons:
1) My personal opponents would be able to abuse it less, which would mean 1v1 combat against people with earrings is no longer 100% pointless.
2) I would not be able to abuse my own earrings, which frankly removes the consequences of any actions (e.g. solo invading a city with confinement up) or tactics (e.g. not getting bottlenecked into a dangerous position within an area) from the game for me, making it less fun.
3) Team / city-vs-city conflict would be a LOT more fun for everyone, without earrings. Things like guards, city geography, orbs of confinement, shrines, would actually matter if earrings didn't permit near-instant and unstoppable fast-travel in and out of cities on a whim.
I'll state things as I see them - and would welcome any corrections or additions.
Assumptions / things to note:
• Earring is stopped by paralysis, prone, or a writhe affliction (bound, web, impale, transfixed)
• It is not stopped by broken limbs (of any level), or stun
• Most people who have earrings and would be using earrings mid-combat have buckawns amulet artefact
• There is no cooldown on earrings whatsoever
• With the vicarious sigil you can actually earring to anyone in the game, instantaneously (although this does have a cooldown).
Problem:
= Alias = curing afflictions off travel to X with earring (wait 1.40 - 1.45 seconds) smoke valerian dwinnu (if bard) / shrugging (if serpent) eat bloodroot / magnesium stand curing afflictions onThis simple alias 100% bypasses all of the restrictions on earring, plain and simple, and I know for a fact that some people, myself included, are actively using it.
Only two classes in the game (that I know of!) that can stop Hangedman on their own, and even this only works some of the time. No class can actually just stop earring travel, solo - which I do not thing is intended.
Occultists & Jester have the only ability in the game that stops earring travel that cannot be instantly cured: Hangedman - however now hangedman can fail so repeated use of the above alias is guaranteed to work. Also, this doesn't count for Bards who can Dwinnu / earring.
Bard can stop it using Tremelo + paralysis a single time, but cannot stop a second use.
Shaman and Sentinel can stop it once, but only if they are on balance when earring starts, as their counters (prone/disrupt) both require two attacks during 1.5s window.
Several classes have abilities that can stop it in 2v1 scenarios - namely Impale.
If you're not one of these classes, then even if you have 3 or 4 people in a room, all all balance, all ready to attack, you cannot stop earring travel, against this macro. Even if you kill them with 5 simultaneous damage attacks their earring will presumably complete post-starburst, allowing them to escape alive.
Conclusion:
The "nerf" wasn't really a nerf. Even a novice can copy/paste the above alias and can act like the windup time and limitations do not exist.
Solutions:
There are many possible solutions. The key is to do something that threads the fine line between making the item no longer viable for escaping (and angering the huge number of players who own them) - while still making. I will list out some of the ideas I have heard or come up with, for consideration.
Best solutions:
• Make the 1.5s windup a channel.
• Initiation of the earring windup disables the buckawns defence for 10s (this has a bonus effect of giving Web tattoo a reason to exist).
• Give the item a 1-hour cooldown, across all earrings you own, unless you are 95% health/mana and have no afflictions. For consideration, wand of reflections is FAR less powerful defensively than earring, and has a 1-hour cooldown.
• You have the aeon effect during the 1.5s windup. This would effectively allow someone two stop travel with TWO of the hindering afflictions (you cannot eat bloodroot AND stand).
• Require 100% health, mana, and no afflictions for GLOBAL travel. If not perfectly healthy, restrict it to AREA travel only.
Good solutions:
• Make earring respect room hinder / movement abilities like gravehands, piety, distort, hamstring, pinshot, etc. This is not great for two reasons: 1) You can still RNG out on first or second try too easily, and 2) Many classes have no such ability.
• Require 95%+ health and mana and no afflictions (at initiation and at end of windup) - just like all the new fast-travel artefacts do (hints that admin know this is broken)
• Travel fails at initiation and windup in any room where anyone has you enemied (may sound too harsh, but all you have to do is move 1 room).
You place your hand over an earring of Sinope, and it begins to warm beneath your palm.
An earring of Snipe loses its warmth as the feelings of hatred from those nearby drown out the thoughts of your true love.
Not so Good solutions I've heard - and why they're bad -
• Make the windup long enough for it to be realistically possible to stop it with an affliction. I would think this would be around 4-5s. (only reason this isn't great is because it'd unnecessarily affect use outside of combat).
• Simply require no afflictions. This is not great because some classes (notably, monks), don't have a reliable way to stop it.
• Attempted movement (including forced movement via Force abilities or Beckon) and forced movement (boomerange, yank, barge) stop it. This is bad because not all classes have a way to force movement, and most of them are completely countered by adding mass or shackle to the above earring alias.
• Prevent ring travel to anyone in a city, ship, or private property. This would at least allow chasing them, in theory, but doesn't really work for numerous reasons, and would also dramatically reduce the value of the item for people using it outside of combat, so should not be considered.
• Make monolith stop it (with no other change) - this does nothing, it is not a solution. Mushroom sigils (and Fire Tanks) exist. Also, placing a monolith doesn't prevent the person from just going to the next room and using earring - and not all classes have a way to prevent this.
Opinion time:
As a person who owns many earrings, it's my personal opinion that they're just bad for the game. Fast travel makes so many things in this game pointless, and ruins conflict as said conflict can almost 100% be eliminated by use of earrings, especially coupled with all of the other fast-travel items that don't have wind-ups, like wings.
While @Makarios and team are, I am sure, worried about upsetting people who bought earrings, they should keep in mind that people who own earrings are also getting a bad game experience from this too, from other people who have earrings. Despite owning multiple earrings (on multiple characters) I would consider a nerf to earrings a good thing for me, for three reasons:
1) My personal opponents would be able to abuse it less, which would mean 1v1 combat against people with earrings is no longer 100% pointless.
2) I would not be able to abuse my own earrings, which frankly removes the consequences of any actions (e.g. solo invading a city with confinement up) or tactics (e.g. not getting bottlenecked into a dangerous position within an area) from the game for me, making it less fun.
3) Team / city-vs-city conflict would be a LOT more fun for everyone, without earrings. Things like guards, city geography, orbs of confinement, shrines, would actually matter if earrings didn't permit near-instant and unstoppable fast-travel in and out of cities on a whim.
0
Comments
dsl delphinium delphinium
bard has jab martellato
psion can prone people easy.
magi can prone people relatively easy, iirc.
dragon can prone people
BM can poke you prone.
Druid/Sentinel can prone you super easy.
Monk can prone you.
There are probably a ton of other classes that can prone you super easy.
Vicarious sigil is 8 mayan crowns for 1 earring only, and has a fucking 300ish hour cooldown on being able to swap partners again. (Note: Partners are ONLY those mutually allied. No lusty bois).
I am really not sure what you mean by "You can just stand after touching earring." Because you can't. My C/D on touch earring is about 2.2 seconds (with diadem). It completes in 1.5 or so. Maybe as a class that has EQ gem + quick witted + diadem?
I really messed up by forgetting that using earring consumes balance, so you cannot stand during the windup. This hurts the argument quite a lot, however it does not end the discussion as many classes cannot prone a target, or cannot do it fast enough to stop repeated earring. In theory as long as your prone attack takes longer than 1.5s, escape is 100% guaranteed.
Also, it's a simple matter to just earring immediately after someone attacks you. As long as their attack uses more than 1.5s balance, you have a guaranteed unstoppable escape, as they cannot prone you while off balance.
Thanks to @Adrik for pointing out the obvious, here.
You can't stand up after using earring, you're off EQ. Almost every class in the game can easily stop earring.
Pazuzu cards also stop earring (and all "magical" travel).
I would like to see the list of the 40-50 people you talked to, name and shame! Hard to believe that 40-50 combatants would all have thought you can stand up off EQ like you do.
A debate about whether or not earring should be a 100% guaranteed escape (provided you are on plane), or even a viable mid-combat escape in any capacity, is a separate conversation, but it is a base assumption of my post that this detracts from the game for both parties in 1v1 scenario, as well as in group/raid scenarios. As I mentioned already, it's absolutely untrue that nearly every class in the game can stop it. Only classes that can prone repeatedly in less than 1.5s can do it or classes with Hangedman (although it's RNG if it fails or not), and even then are barred from using anything other than that, as if they use any balance over 1.5s earring becomes 100% guaranteed.
I've laid out some reasons why I do not think guaranteed global fast-travel while afflicted, mid-combat, is good for the game or gameplay experience in general - including from the perspective of the earring owner. You're entitled to disagree on that design philosophy if you want.
It's my understanding that Pazuzu stops magical travel INTO a room, not out of it (as this is specifically what it states in-game) - which completely removes it from the scope of this discussion. If that's not the case, I'd definitely like to know.
Personally I don't see what the point of having a Mark system (or really any 1v1 interaction other than a duel, really) is in a game where you can instantly teleport out of any 1v1 fight that you don't elect to stay in, voluntarily, even well into mid to late stages of a kill path. The entire continent is a safe space - and the only counter is to gank with a group.
Put another way, I think it has always been broken and bad for the game, but was never a huge problem, for two reasons:
1) They were pretty expensive (earrings used to cost roughly $250)
2) You had to link them with someone semi-permanently, which was risky
The result was that not a lot of people bought them.
However, neither of those is true anymore. Earrings are like $80-90 thanks to these wonderful new promotions (via talismans) and it's far easier to farm 800cr than it used to be making gating broken things behind a paywall no longer very effective, which is why there are now now dozens, if not hundreds of them on at any given time, nowadays.
This is, in my view, why they got "nerfed" in the first place. I'm just explaining why the nerf really wasn't successful as it used to be guaranteed escape, and still is.
Achaea provides a lot of travel (escape) routes via a second person, whether actively on your side or via trigger on theirs. It's never been meant to be balanced 1v1 in favour of an attacker being able to kill you if you're trying to get away, and a whole lot of class skills and arties reflect that.
ETA: A person who has evade complaining about people getting away in 1v1 is some kinda irony, too.
More classess than ever have a way to prone
More classess than ever have a way to push hinder affs
More People than ever have talismans, cards and arties of numerous kinds
If -anyone- of nearly any class doesn't want to fight you there is a chance they will get away. This is a Good Thing. Some of those can be countered at the time and some with prep, this is also a Good Thing. Counter play is extremely important.
Earrings are totally fine as they are, open up so many more people to raiding and interaction and allow those classes with no instant travel a way to move around.. with ONE OTHER PERSON for 800cr a pop.
Penwize has cowardly forfeited the challenge to mortal combat issued by Atalkez.
Penwize has cowardly forfeited the challenge to mortal combat issued by Atalkez.