Knight in a nutshell (Warning : Spoilers)

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Comments

  • There's some confusion with termonology here. A focus lock is a situation where you softlock someone and they are unable to cure anorexia with focus. 0 mana is the "look what I can do" way, the more practical way for most people is additional focus buffer afflictions. Its definitely extremely viable, particularly for knights.
  • Also assuming your opponent is not hindering you at all, which if you are fighting any of the momentum affliction classes, increases that whole game by a lot. And that they have slower balance recovery than you plus your reaction time, plus your curing latency of they hit you with a hindering affliction. And of course if weaving, acrobatics, clumsiness etc are involved you end up wasting a lot of preps. 

    Bit as you have shown, even the best case scenario is horrible. 

  • Kenway said:
    @Terra
    ~7% increase per torso level.
    From my testing that's ~46% with a level two torso if I'm remembering right.

    @Mizik the point had nothing to do with throw mechanically. The point was that nobody used it, and then everybody did. In a similar fashion the ways to avoid parry bypasses are rapidly becoming more common knowledge, which makes slow prep slower.

    Tumble off impale no longer hits engage.

    DSB numbers as I recall them from the math post the OP refers to:
    18str = 85
    19str = 87
    20str = 90

    I'm really not worried about this all so much because I'm assuming the changes will come soon enough. But I still think a buff to dsb would be nice and would have a very limited effect on the balance of combat while just making things a little less frustrating for the average knight player.
    18str = 84%. 19str = 88%. 20sr = 93%. 21str = 97%. 22str = >100%. Presumably 103%.

    A buff to dsb is so unnecessary. It's already really strong for all three Knight classes. It's just that the excess of three minute to prep can be tedious, and by that point you've had to evade kill atempts three or four times. It requires a certain mindset to play as a Runewarden currently, but that doesn't mean their ability to capitalize off disembowel or the attempt to is bad or in need of buffing. Tumble damage buff alone was gross.
  • Arador said:
    Also assuming your opponent is not hindering you at all, which if you are fighting any of the momentum affliction classes, increases that whole game by a lot. And that they have slower balance recovery than you plus your reaction time, plus your curing latency of they hit you with a hindering affliction. And of course if weaving, acrobatics, clumsiness etc are involved you end up wasting a lot of preps. 

    Bit as you have shown, even the best case scenario is horrible. 
    If you're talking about my numbers, I increased the prep time from what is optimal/best-case by like 30% to compensate for having to play defensive. Those are an accurate reflection of what it takes to prep as a Knight in reality.
  • I know you put in a bit of a buffer, I just do not think it is big enough if you fight someone decent. A good afflict class will hinder and have you stuck with clumsiness most of the time, other prep classes will have prepped you a few times by then leading to you stopping your offence and playing dodge the quad break (minimum 20 seconds) 3-4 times by then. Hell, just someone whoring epteth/epteth like crazy with fast weapons or niarat has had me take about 6-7 minutes to a 3 limb prep, never mind parry bypass. 

  • Also, some testing on tumble damage with a broken torso.

    Max health: 4260.

    3626 to 2310. 12 str. (1316/4260 = 30.9%)
    3610 to 2090. 14str.  (1526/4260 = 35.8%)
    2834 to 1110. 16str.  (1724/4260 = 40.5%)
    3468 to 1438. 19str.  (2030/4260 = 47.7%)

    If they have sensitivity at the time of tumbling out (and they always should 100% should if you're impaling off tumble), then that damage becomes:

    12 strength = 41%.
    14 strength = 46.5%.
    16 strength = 53.8%.
    19 strength = 63.4%.

    That could stand to see a 10% increase across the board, imo.


  • WessuxWessux Chattanooga
    First over the staffstrike air thing that was my bad. Someone told me it ignored parry, but I didn't personally test it.

    Second I still don't see any of our famous top combatants using knight for more than a few days.

    Longest prep, easiest to dodge. A reliable parry bypass is more than reasonable to give knight. And the 1.6 cap on frenzy solves basically all its issues. I'm not asking for the complete overhaul, I'm asking to be treated fairly compared to other classes and to change two things that you've all agreed in other posts would be good to have. 

    I want runewardens and paladins to have fun too and I'm tired of infernal being kinda broken with ping battle vivisects. Everything I'm suggesting doesn't even help me as infernal. I'm asking for a small nerf and a little love for my other knight Bros. We could at least try it and if it is crazy bad we can just change it back. What's the harm in just trying it out?
    Invest in a 9mm retirement plan.
  • CaladbolgCaladbolg Campbell County TN
    I wouldn't bother trying to get knight changed or anything of the such right now. We all know Knight changes are coming eventually. and honestly what you said about a few good knights being around is likely correct, all the other ones are dormant (or basically dormant) Waiting for knight changes. I think people would feel better if they got a preview of what was coming with knight or some kind of update with it. I know I personally tried to hold out as a knight as long as I could but just couldn't take it anymore and went serpent.

    However while waiting for knight changes, I would suggest trying cleave and learning all the neat tricks you can do with it.
    Because in my 7ish months of playing knight.. Cleave was the best method for killing on most targets.

  • AerekAerek East Tennessee, USA
    I'm aware of the parry bypass changes in the pipeline, and I think it will help on this front when they arrive. It's just frustrating to fight until they do.

    The tumble change added a small amount of damage to the tumble, but still isn't remotely comparable to the damage of an actual DSB. The folks that were dying to tumble-off and subsequent damage still are, and the high-health targets that weren't dying to it still aren't. Personally I don't mind this because I've always felt Tumble was the logical and intended counter to DSB. What chaps me is the folks that don't tumble at all, and smile at you from the ground as they count and cure torso before anything else, or because they just have enough health to eat it. I've only got 4600, low by top-tier standards, and even after the algiz change I've eaten Kenway's 18-STR torso+DSBs and stood up.

    Perhaps buying strength gauntlets would solve this problem, but without them the only option is pre-damage, which is reasonable in a vacuum, but gets unreasonable in context. An 18-STR DSB does 84%, but because of the length of the impale, you'll get at least one free sip and moss before the big hit, so I need you at about 60% before I start my break chain. I don't let Kenway get me to 60%, and Twil never let me get him to 60%, because they know at full health they'll be okay. DSB effectiveness falls off increasingly the higher up the health spectrum you go, because the longer you have to work up that pre-damage, that 3-minute timer is still ticking. You could get someone 100% prepped and lose it because you get bogged down trying to get the pre-damage in place.

    I don't ignore advice from the other side. I try all the suggestions I read here on the forums, but what's stated here as fact usually relies on the opponent being ignorant or using sub-par priorities. The only folks I see excelling at knight are those who, no offense, are also banking on runed Soulpiercers, or Mizik/Kadin's 250+/250+ speed weapons. I can't remember the last time a Knight actually killed me with DSB, and I don't see people I respect dying to them either. Further, a lot of people I respect have been abandoning knight classes for a while. A mass exodus of combat-savvy players does not coincide with a class being "fine".

    If I'm ignorant, educate me. If it's some big secret, PM me. If someone went knight today and started kicking my ass with DSBs, I'd watch, I'd learn, and you'd never hear me complaining about it again, but no one has in the last year or so. Until that happens, I feel DSB proof, and I fight good opponents who I feel are also DSB proof, so I can't help but feel there's a disconnect somewhere.
    -- Grounded in but one perspective, what we perceive is an exaggeration of the truth.
  • Fight Jhui as knight.


  • WessuxWessux Chattanooga
    edited October 2014
    Dunn said:
    Fight Jhui as knight.
    Not scared. 

    Edit: Not scared of Jhui as a knight, but scared of Jhui in all other forms.
    Invest in a 9mm retirement plan.
  • A great combatant will do well in any class that is not mechanically broken beyond any recourse. Knight is not completely broken it is just boring as hell, frustrating as hell, slow as hell and while we see great combatants do well as Knights, why do they all change shortly after or go dormant.

    Riddle me this. Would you think Jhui as Knight is scarier to fight than Jhui as Monk? Or Mizik as Knight scarier than Mizik as BM? Also, good weapons should be there to make you better or make your life easier, not be required to make you viable.

  • WessuxWessux Chattanooga
    Arador said:
    A great combatant will do well in any class that is not mechanically broken beyond any recourse. Knight is not completely broken it is just boring as hell, frustrating as hell, slow as hell and while we see great combatants do well as Knights, why do they all change shortly after or go dormant.

    Riddle me this. Would you think Jhui as Knight is scarier to fight than Jhui as Monk? Or Mizik as Knight scarier than Mizik as BM? Also, good weapons should be there to make you better or make your life easier, not be required to make you viable.
    This, this sums it all up. No one stays knight because they know other classes are better. To disagree with this is to be in denial.
    Invest in a 9mm retirement plan.
  • Figured I'd drop my two cents here, as apparently there's some misunderstanding regarding limb prep abilities (and, according to OP, I copied these from someone)

    Runewarden has tools that make limb prep very doable. (Even if you have slow weapons) If you haven't figured that out, that's on you as a player and not the class itself.  I showed @Kadin this morning, for instance, how to get around it.

    You don't need OH MY GOD fast rapiers to get around parry. I did it with a set of 227's on a target KNOWING I was trying to get around it. 

    The ONLY issue that I currently have is with the finisher options, and most SLC (Self Limb Counters) these days. If someone is able to automatically cure a torso break immediately when it happens, this vastly limits Knight's disembowel ability, as it's no longer a torso break DSB, but rather a basic Disembowel.

    This wouldn't be an issue if things worked as Achaea designed, for torso to be a silent break -- but with the advent of modern SLC coding, its no longer 'silent', and completely is negated by skillful coding. 

    The only counter to this is by advancing burst damage to a point where it offsets the damage addition, but that's telegraphed with a 10 second long chain of pre-sketches that is very easily avoided at the mid and upper tier combatant levels.

    Prep time and all that's associated with Knight is part of the cat and mouse game you must play, as the class is built around it.

    "You have to learn the rules of the game. And then you have to play better than anyone else."

     -Albert Einstein

  • Infernal Wessux vs Runewarden Jhui.
  • WessuxWessux Chattanooga
    Jovolo said:
    Infernal Wessux vs Runewarden Jhui.
    The Viper of Dorne vs The Mountain?

    We could probably sell tickets. 
    Invest in a 9mm retirement plan.
  • Buy some Asprin.....

  • AerekAerek East Tennessee, USA
    Dunn said:
    Fight Jhui as knight.
    I'd like to.
    -- Grounded in but one perspective, what we perceive is an exaggeration of the truth.
  • Kenway said:


    Tumble off impale no longer hits engage.


    I said Disembowel + Engage.
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  • Wessux said:
    Arador said:
    A great combatant will do well in any class that is not mechanically broken beyond any recourse. Knight is not completely broken it is just boring as hell, frustrating as hell, slow as hell and while we see great combatants do well as Knights, why do they all change shortly after or go dormant.

    Riddle me this. Would you think Jhui as Knight is scarier to fight than Jhui as Monk? Or Mizik as Knight scarier than Mizik as BM? Also, good weapons should be there to make you better or make your life easier, not be required to make you viable.
    This, this sums it all up. No one stays knight because they know other classes are better. To disagree with this is to be in denial.
    To think that Jhui and I quit any class because 'other classes are better' is a perfect example of flawed logic. Let's be honest, I go whatever class I feel like fighting as, and Monk exists as the uncontested best class overall.

    Knight is one of my most brutal classes. Blademaster doesn't have the pressure that Runewarden has, it just suddenly kill you to a tertiary damage (bleed vs health/afflictions).

    Runewarden hurts, hurts, hurts then explodes you to Disembowel or runes. It is THE go to pressure class. Teams? Totems, smudging, runes.

    Paladin is an inescapable nightmare of fighting at 0 mana while taking massive doubleslash damage, burst Purity/Arc damage, and parrying legs vs head because either means death by Disembowel/Damnation. Defensively, Peace, Force, Arc eliminate timed instant kills (aka Jesters), Healing/Fitness nullify afflictions, and Battlecry/Piety + Tumble eliminates an opponent's offense after a double break takedown - which is pointless anyway because Fullplate + Tower + Toughness + Revitalization is God. Teams? Resurrection, Deliverance, Hands, allied Rites holy shit.

    Infernals have Frenzy for bursts, Taint/Arc for more burst, Vivisect/Disembowel for parry dispute, Battlecry/Gravehands/Vigour for prone defense, but who cares, because Fullplate + Tower + Vigour + 20% Putrefaction exists for some reason. Timed instant kills? Arc/Screech. Teams? Infiltration, most comboable insta kill in Vivisect, Transverse.

    There are those who complain, and there are those who dominate. Not everything needs to be a re-written hardcode change. When given a problem, create a solution. That is the difference between the Tiracs, Jhuis, Tynils, Carmains, Miziks. 

    If I were to start up a thread like this during the stints where I am Runewarden, I'd have been laughed out of the game. Nothing has changed with Knights being Achaea's cookie cutters. I wish there were anyone here who has seen me play Paladin - it is the most powerful class I have ever played.

    Now watch Jhui have his turn as Runewarden.
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  • AchillesAchilles Los Angeles
    Mizik said: Stuff
    You played Paladin pre-trait system, pre-race changes (RIP Rajamalan balance bonus) pre-weapon rune nerf and against older curing systems.  Most Paladins dsl at the 2s mark unless they acquire some really good forged ones (and sacrifice to hit for it) making it hard to drain mana.  The new changes (especially to targeted arc and hellsight) might make damnation more viable now, it still requires a lot of kelp stacking and a defensive fighter (and realistically anyone fighting a knight right now should have a 3 minute timer running anyways) will be able to stop that many afflictions from piling up.  

    That said, bring back Paladin Spire, we only hear about it but all I saw was Spire getting destroyed by Nemutaur 3 times in 10 minutes.
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  • Jovolo said:
    Then you break while they're off balance and drop their rebound. Regular left arm break, right arm break, hit parried leg with delph/delph. Hit it again with whatever mending salves they cure. They should catch up at this point and stand if they prioritize leg cripples, at which point they still have a broken right arm/crippled left arm. One more dsl before they fly, or mending arm/shield, etc. after this rebound comes up anyway. That's roughly 3 dsl's. Let's say you do this in one rebound cycle, so 8.5 seconds to bypass parry with 3 dsl's.

    So they're off balance for more than 3.8 seconds, allowing you to break two arms and a leg before they fly? Paladin and Infernal have Piety/Gravehands to deal with that, Runewarden doesn't. Nobody who is worth fighting and has access to fly is going to let you do that as a Runewarden, unless they're feeling charitable and consciously decide to let you prep them.

    The only real issue with Paladin right now is the availability of top tier rapiers. @Tecton @Makarios Buff Soulpiercer speed please, no reason a 3200 credit investment is still so damn slow.
  • Why buff Bard weapons? That won't help Knight at all.
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    Cascades of quicksilver light streak across the firmament as the celestial voice of Ourania intones, "Oh Jarrod..."

  • No Bard who wants to seriously compete picks a Soulpiercer over a forged rapier right now because of the stats, and Knights are, last I checked, still using rapiers. That sort of suggests that Soulpiercers aren't "Bard weapons" currently. It would benefit Knights and Bards, likely increase credit sales (or at least artefact weapon sales) and is an easy fix with relatively minor consequences.

    Solving the problem for every Knight is a project that we all know is in the works, but it's not as simple as just rearranging the stat placement on artefact rapiers. This can be done right now.
  • Rapiers are -becoming- bard only weapons, though. I think that's what he was getting at. Duality's completely removed on Anarchaea (which is currently being used to test said changes) and replaced by Weaponmastery attacks. Doublewhirl, for example, with double flails.

    No points buffing Soulpiercers, since these changes already looking pretty solid. Wouldn't say they're too far off being implemented on live if they're smoothened out. (double flail is insane damage for bashing, with solid speeds)

  • @Cynlael I know what's happening with Knight changes, having been (a small) part of those discussions in the ACC from the start. However, since we're not supposed to talk about ACC stuff with the wider playerbase, and I didn't know that they were on the Anarchaea server so the cat was already out of the bag, I didn't want to be all "I know rapiers are getting removed from Knights, but..."

    That said, Soulpiercers should be buffed for Bards anyway to make them an attractive option, and they'll look remarkably similar to the level three stats duality knights will be getting. Just do it now, rather than when the Knight changes are actually released, is what I'm saying.
  • But as he pointed out, So is too slow for Bards too. So speed then up a bit, that will help both classes right now and later when Knights move on,  they will still be viable for that class that will continue to use them. 

  • Weaponry solutions are  up. Just waiting spec balancing before going live. Hopefully partaking in Anarchaea test run will give a taste of appreciation for how difficult it is to  make each spec unique, competitive, and not insane  mixed with skill 3 - especially when considering how powerful doubleslash is, currently. 

    Don't forget  offer your suggestions from your experiences. 
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