Tank Versus Mage (in General)

No matter how I look at the two different strategies, it comes down to a simple fact.... Mages need a skill. An ED. An EO. SOMETHING trainable by other minions.

The argument, as I read it, was always that mages were cheap and used MPR, and tanks were expensive and ran more off PR. (Ignoring tattoos to a certain degree)

So why give tanks all the exp boostable bonuses? If mages are -cheap- and have few little ways to boost themselves, shouldn't THEY be the ones getting the equivalent of haste, or VA, or giant strength, or bloodlust, or archery, or UC?

Mages, right now, have 3 items/skills/enchantments for them to use. Tanks have (not including armor or weapons :P), 6.

Then someone will surely say that mages are all about avoiding exp dilution. Well... What do you call evasion? Mages are almost forced to dilute now. Evasion is -barely- an option. Teams that don't use it have multiple ways to deal damage.


Give mages a trainable endurance, give them a bloodlust or VA equivalent. Give them SOMETHING to augment their MPR. Because, in theory, that's all they do have.

Basically, keep it balanced. Don't say mages are cheap, but then say you can't let them make use of what they do have. And don't say tanks are expensive when a-lot of their power comes from their versatility and their skills.

Sorry. Maybe I'm just sick of looking at a skill slot on mage that's empty because being forced to use evasion is silly. Or maybe I'm sick of -every-, -single- tank in the game using a skill. Take your pick.

If there is anything I'm unclear about, let me know. I ramble alot in my thoughts during a post, and a simple question may save everyone a-lot of time.

Seems crystal clear to me, and I agree completely. More than completely, in fact, because I WOULD include armor and weapons in your argument -- tanks get to have all the choice there, too.

I'm sure you already know that Evasion was originally the Mage skill, until it became so necessary that every team uses it. While it might be interesting seeing a mage skill, I personally don't think it's necessary. And for exactly the reasons you've highlighted.

Mages don't need to eat up NW (usually) to be good. You can have a naked FB mage on your team, and it performs relatively well compared to a fully outfitted FB mage. Can you say the same for tanks?

The reason skills are as they are is due to the fact that tanks require so much investment to be effective. Mages can spend their experience on a DD or some enchantments, while tanks have to dilute their experience between typically four different stats.

Also, since tanks require such a ridiculous NW investment, I believe that the skills for tanks exist to make them effective without investing 50+ million at <100K MPR.

But that's my take on it. I've never had the option, or the ability, to invest that much into a team. I might be wrong.

Let me clarify this, because tanks have been using this for a long time.


Training bloodlust is NOT, I repeat, NOT NOT NOT, dilution. It ENHANCES your strength stat past the normal exp invested in the two stats. Same with archery.

These skills BOOST your tank. Not weaken. If it was truly dilution like it's commonly used, no one would use the skills.

Secondly, mages do use NW. My team would be severely weakened if I dropped my CoI and AG.

Lastly, I agree that tanks need NW. But mages need MPR, like anyone else. So why are we hampering them there when compared to tanks?

The reasoning, based on numerous past threads about this same issue, is that mages are for the cheap that do not want to spend too much $$$ (CB or USD) and tanks are for those who are ready to invest $$$ to be the best.

So that is why they are given more options.

When you reach 1M MPR, you better have at least $30M to $35M worth of weapons on you or you should not even bother. Yes, that is just for weapons.

I am not in agreement or disagreement with that mentality... I am simply restating the usual argumentation.

But Talion, when did Jon sit down and define those roles?

"Mages are for the cheap who don't wanna go anywhere, Tanks are for those willing to invest who wanna be at the top."

If you can find a quote from him saying that, then I'll be quiet. But I'm pretty sure there oughta be choice. After all, what if I'd like to be a Mage who is willing to invest $$$ to be the best?

Well it's not easy coming up with a viable way to boost DD, because it works differently from physical damage in that there's only one variable; damage. With physical attacks there's CTH/PTH, damage, and with UC even defense to consider. And it's also not easy to think of something that affects only mages (just like half the available skills and enchantments are only good for tanks), while not being good for tanks.

A skill that simply boosts DD damage isn't good, because either it boosts damage enough to make it a must-have, or it doesn't, which makes it useless. That doesn't allow for any more strategizing than there is now.

Though it's not impossible to think of a few things that would be nice for mages.


Maybe a "Spell Penetration" skill. If you train it, it allows your DD spells to ignore a certain portion of the target's AC (percentage based or not, I don't know what would be best balance-wise). It could even help punch through AMF like Noldorin's do.

Or maybe a "Magic Weakness" EO spell that makes targets more susceptible to offensive magic, kinda like the previous skill only in spell form.

And what about a "Magic Attunement" skill? When trained at a certain level compared to the DD (much like Bloodlust and Archery are compared to STR), it provides protection from that spell (so if you train FB and MA, you become resistant to enemy FB attacks).
For example if you have a 1.00 level MA skill, your full level of DD gets subtracted from the level of the DD striking you, and at 0.50 level half your DD gets subtracted (this to prevent people training a tiny DD and a tiny AM just to have a 1.00 effect all the time).
This could even be a sort of auto-balance to DD spells, since if one spell is used a lot, more people will be resistant to it, in turn making other spells more useful.


I'm just throwing out some ideas here without too much thought, just to try and think of some possibilities, but yeah I do agree it would be nice for mages to be able to have more choice and diversity in stead of just pumping EXP into their main DD, because it's the different ideas and strategies that make this game fun IMO.

A lot of help the mage concentrates on ways of boosting them. But if you take the opposite route...

A reduction in DD damage reduction.

Cut back on how much AMF can either reduce DD damage or reduce AMF backlash.

The RBF could certainly stand to lose some of it's DD protection.

Reduce the strength of mage shields somehow - yes they're rare, but they're just too good.

If you pull back on those you are actually increasing mage power.

And then add mage items that boost DD. And watch tank teams complaining that mages are overpowered.....lol ;)

*releases a new way to deal damage*

Meeges! DD that hits multiple times and can't be reduced! Muahahahahahahhahahahhahashadfuasdfjsabahahahahhaha

I reckon a couple of 'sets' of armour with DD mages in mind, both offering conflicting bonuses, would be very interesting. For example, what if you had armour that made FB and CoC more potent relative to the number of minions being fired at? Armour the boosts Decay, or confers a degree of Decay to any successful DD spell? I'm sure there's enough options - and no, I'm no thinking supporter items, more premium spawnables like the specialist UC equipment.

Now that I am playing a mage with a mini tank for back up, here is my opinion:

Since mages don't have to invest heavily (or at all in a pure mages case) in weapons, they can invest 100% into armor to improve offense as well as defense. My mini tank is on my team to clear out enchanters to get my CoC firing on as few minions as possible, so I am not really focusing on my weapons any more.

You know what that means? I just spent 40 mil on a BIG pair of DB, and I am pretty sure almost 100% of my investment is going into those boots. Why? Less experience into evasion, means a bigger DD and more HP. Since weapons no longer occupy the focus of my investment, I can concentrate all my money into keeping my mage alive.

A big pair of NSC, a big CoI, big MCM, and gigantic DB should all serve that purpose nicely.

And you're pumping as much NW into your mage as tank teams do their tanks ;)

But no skills. Or enchantments. Or items choices.

i want the CB-T back! 0.5% boost for DD a point!
so a CB-T +40 gives 20% boost!

Don't need them, have you seen the damage potential of the DD spells? They always hit!

Have you seen the damage potential of archers? They always hit unless you have Evasion! And if they hit at all, you die! Ranged, auto, FoD, FTW!


*grumbles at King of Pain* :P

@OB - regarding Jon stating the roles of mages

FAQ - FORS #9

Q: Mage staffs would be cool to augment magical power!

A: private explained why this is dumb with more patience than I would:

Tanks: Can become more powerful than mages, but cost lots of money to maintain. Mages: Tend to be cheaper than tanks, but also tend to be less powerful (and less able to deal with armor penalties)

I think this provides a nice balance between spending money on your chars and spending exp on them; I see no reason to change it.

Have you seen the damage potential of archers? They always hit unless you have Evasion! And if they hit at all, you die! Ranged, auto, FoD, FTW!

and when I have a massive DB, fair sized evasion and a good sized EC, how many hits are getting scored? Now how is he going to dodge my CoC when he has to use DM?

RoBF RoBF RoBF, mage do little against these and archer do massive damage against them, so what is this then? Another fine example of what not to do

See, horseguy, either way tanks are better off. The ONLY way to beat a tank is... NW. And mages aren't supposed to need NW. But they do. Fact. They just do.

Slayer, that answer went out with the linear 'x' upgrade cost.

The current answer on why no Mage weapons (And seeing as we got armour that does exactly the same thing when the changes to the CoI and AG were made) is purely that Jon doesn't like it.

That's all.

Even if a weapon for a mage does not enhance his/her DD, it should be available even if it was just for paltry AC or a semi-useful skill. Every time I think of a mage strat, I can't think of anything to buy because there ISN'T, aside from a cloak and a glove.

I don't count items that works for both sides because it would be retarded to argue that mages have plenty of options when tanks have the same options available and MORE.

I am a tank, and I would be fine if they released a Tank Shield that worked exactly the same as MgS but for physical damage, and nuked all STR/DEX.

"The ONLY way to beat a tank is... NW"

Ethereal chains works WONDERS. Evasion works well if you can concentrate it, and PL along with that will help it survive for a while in melee.

Aside from those generalities, you can't just say "It is impossible to beat ANY tank strategy without NW", as many tank strategies have their own susceptibilities. A 4-tank/enchanter GS/Haste/AS/VA/RoS team is weak to heavy DM, a decent-sized Evasion, and EC to some extent. UC is weak to EC (because they have to spend so much XP in UC, DX, ST, AMF/DM/EC, and Prot/VA) and damage reduction with PL, since they can't do very much damage to begin with. Yadda, yadda, yadda, yadda.

Tanks and mages are fine. Tanks have counters to mages, mages have counters to tanks. It's all about utilizing them effectively, and incorporating them well into your strategy.

List the counters to tanks

List the counters to mages


Seriously. Are you really saying those are equal?

I never said they were equal. I said they were fine the way they are.

It's not about the amount of counters that each has; it's about how you use them. Putting 1% of my team's experience into Evasion is obviously not going to do very much. But putting 90% of it is a MUCH, MUCH different story.

EC, Exbow, Axbow, and Evasion, the biggest counters to tanks, can COMPLETELY eliminate a tank's attacks if used properly. Now, I know Axbow and Exbow are 'tank-only', but nobody said a wall or a CoC mage couldn't use them. That said, you cannot lower a mage's damage to 0 (except with the RoBF, which I think is out of whack, and should [and hopefully will] be changed to a % reduction at best. Still, though, there aren't too many 'tank' teams that I have seen that use a RoBF). Mages cannot miss, and they cannot do 0 damage, ridiculously small DD spells aside.

Teams aren't (always) made of just one minion. There's a reason that you can have 4. Obviously, a tank TEAM will beat just a mage a good amount of the time. However, used properly, any mage team can beat any tank team. Also, don't forget that there are different kinds of tank and mage teams. Not all of them are the same, so you can't just say 'these are the counters to tank teams, and these are the counters to mage teams'.

Well,

My Ethereal Chains seems to do wonders to other tanks. In fact, it neutralizes all but 1. However, even with no str or dex, some exbows seem to drain my 3.5M str tanks strength down to a paltry 118k in 1 hit. Quite effective vs tanks.

The maximum effect AMF can have on giving backlash is only 40%. And to get a 100% AMF you need over 10x their AMF level. Except for the RBF, you cannot make magic damage 0. And let us not forget magic always hits. Evasion makes hitting as a tank difficult if not impossible without a super boosted weapon.

But if you want to give mages a skill to boost their magic damage, PLEASE! As long as they will have to drop evasion for it, this can only help me more.

Not against me :P

I wonder why the rbf was made the way it is? Perhaps as a counter to some of the many things called overpowered on here? AMF combined with DD reduction (esp MgS), large EC, the big Ax/EX bows, archery.

Anyway RoBF is probably a bit too good, so too MgS - could do with a reduction, maybe 2/3 of what it does now.

Whoops wrong thread

"But Talion, when did Jon sit down and define those roles?"

Where in my post does is specify that Jon came up with those roles????

Nowhere, but if they are player-made roles then changes can/should be made to change them. If they are Jon-made roles, then heck, it's Jon's game.

Either way, Slayer owns me, so I'm hushing. ~_^

"... if they are player-made roles then changes can/should be made to change them."

I totally agree, which is why I ended my post with this statement: "I am not in agreement or disagreement with that mentality... I am simply restating the usual argumentation."

According to the logic that seems to be floating around. Tanks are so overpowered.

Mages have it easier than Tanks.
Tanks have to defend against Mages and other high NW Tanks.
I have to pump NW into AC, Mage Shield etc to protect from Mages, then I must also pump my DB's to protect me from other tanks, then I have to pump my own weapons just to keep ahead of all evasions/DB's out there.

Mages: Sink some NW into your DD enhancement Items until you hit the ridiculous point of CB2 per point, then sink the rest into Evasion+DB's.

I would have +300 DB's by now if i hadn't been sinking so much of my money into keeping my character balanced.

Horseguy is the only Mage on the right track. Put your money where it serves you best against monster tanks. DB's. You can sink a ton of money into them and really be a pain for Tanks. They will miss and you won't.

Agreed, Mikel.

ONCE AGAIN, this gets rid of the entire point of mages! If the only way they can compete is GIANT DBs, they're just a NW dependant tank!

Finally a point well written and planned out!

mikel: to some of us this is carnageblender....not usdblender

And yet you expect to compete with USD players, HC?

"mikel: to some of us this is carnageblender....not usdblender"

Then don't be like GW and complain if you aren't willing to spend money like the other teams at the top of the pecking order. It's just not going to happen.

The High Evasion/AMF RoBF strat is about the cheapest strat you can do, but it'll only work up to a point vs USD spenders, then they'll just buy more to stay ahead of you.

Not willing to spend money? I'm 3.4 mil in debt and funneling money as fast as I can into my strategy. I miss very, very little BA and am even buying all my BA.

I spend money. And, ONCE AGAIN, instead of just a bunch of players debating a point, it's made personal. There are always insults. So, how about this.


You want to know the truth? The top 25 should get almost NO say in this game. They have too much vested in this game to give an honest opinion. What kind of archer (MIKEL) wants to see a boost to mages? None. So you'll do anything to stop these changes from happening.

The top players are jaded. Heck, I'm jaded, and I'm hardly competitive. You went through your NCBs so fast you didn't experience life grinding away.

Here is the problem, and none of you are answering it, that is, without insulting someone:

"Q: Mage staffs would be cool to augment magical power!

A: private explained why this is dumb with more patience than I would:

Tanks: Can become more powerful than mages, but cost lots of money to maintain. Mages: Tend to be cheaper than tanks, but also tend to be less powerful (and less able to deal with armor penalties)

I think this provides a nice balance between spending money on your chars and spending exp on them; I see no reason to change it. "

And this:

"According to the logic that seems to be floating around. Tanks are so overpowered.

Mages have it easier than Tanks.
Tanks have to defend against Mages and other high NW Tanks.
I have to pump NW into AC, Mage Shield etc to protect from Mages, then I must also pump my DB's to protect me from other tanks, then I have to pump my own weapons just to keep ahead of all evasions/DB's out there.

Mages: Sink some NW into your DD enhancement Items until you hit the ridiculous point of CB2 per point, then sink the rest into Evasion+DB's.

I would have +300 DB's by now if i hadn't been sinking so much of my money into keeping my character balanced.

Horseguy is the only Mage on the right track. Put your money where it serves you best against monster tanks. DB's. You can sink a ton of money into them and really be a pain for Tanks. They will miss and you won't. "


Make up your minds. Are mages going to use or not use NW? If not, admit they're not as powerful as tanks, as the first quote SAYS. Not hints at. It says it.

Or are mages going to need NW, and therefore should be given the items and skills to compare with tanks?

Stop giving conflicting ideas. Those two quotes cannot exist together on the same subject to defend the current balance.

Yes, they aren't as powerful as tanks, without the USD investment; that's a given.

So, if you're saying the only way for a mage to be competitive is with NW.... Then why are they being penalized by having less options?

Mages can compete fairly well with non-USD tanks IMO. And I think the lack of choices is what separates mages from tanks, basically. But I wouldn't and don't expect to be able to keep up with USD spending tank teams as a non-USD RoBF team.

GodWolf... hate to say it... but come back to me when your 40 mil in debt like me ^_^ Then and only then can you say you spend alot of money on your strat.

That's a lot of debt there, Monty. ;)

Well I'm aloud to be that in debt... I have the nw to back it up and to get out of it whenever I please.

"Mages can compete fairly well with non-USD tanks IMO. And I think the lack of choices is what separates mages from tanks, basically. But I wouldn't and don't expect to be able to keep up with USD spending tank teams as a non-USD RoBF team."

So what you're saying is that;

1: To be dominant in this game you must spend USD
2: If you plan to be dominant through spending USD you have to play a Tank

That's it really. That's the whole balance of CB right there?

If that's really the case, damn I open my arms fully to the overpowered RoBF. Hell give it more power. Make it even more of a one sided strat.

As long as there's a non Tank non USD chance to actually compete.

'1: To be dominant in this game you must spend USD
2: If you plan to be dominant through spending USD you have to play a Tank '

Considering USD is in the game, the answer to 1 is obvious.

The answer to 2 is not. You can spend USD and become a mage and do quite well. Example of someone with a lot of NW---Oxcha. He borrows, rents, and carefully buys. But he has not put any USD into the game.

Mages have quite a few places to put their USD if they want. Not just DBs but they can boost their EB's, McM, AoF, AG, COIs. They can also spend to try to insta their tattoo.

So PLEASE, stop this whining about mages being underbalanced. Their damage is CB2 free!!!. Tanks have to boost their weapons constantly to keep up with mages.

As I stated before, if not for the fine Mageseeker I would be a mage. It is so much easier to play and far cheaper to get the same result.

Fine.

Then get rid of linear 'x' upgrade cost.

DD XP spend isn't linear.

And while STR isn't either, the major portion of Weapon Damage shouldn't be either.

Or give Mages some way to get a linear upgrade to damage.

I hope your suggestion includes UC too, GL :)

"Then get rid of linear 'x' upgrade cost. "

I'll stab myself multiple times in the face.

Of course NK. ;)

I suppose UC weapons (Knuckle Dusters, Punch Daggers, Katars, etc) are in the same boat as Mage weapons. ;)

If a weapon is out of the question, then how about keeping it XP based.

A Mage skill. Doesn't follow the curve of every other ability in the game.

Let's say something like every 100XP trained gives you a +1 damage to your currently trained DD spell (Change the numbers to fit).

It would give no bonus to AMF resistance, but would be a pure linear upgrade to damage.

Oh and the PR this XP spend would increase is covered by the Weapon Allowance as well.

How does that sound?

I'd rather use Evasion.

I'll stick up here for the current weapon X upgrade model. The way things are currently allows non USD players to run a tank team and be fairly competitive.

It's the PTH that's the major problem these days because of USD input. If you didn't have the huge PTH's there would be no need for huge evasion (and possibly as an attempt by Jon to make it work where USD is involved) the huge bonuses to evasion too.

Anyway, back to topic.

I was playing a mage team when I started, it got boring fast.

Lets talk weapons-
Mages never miss, sounds even doesn't it.
I have to + my weapons up because of things like
evation, EC, RoBF, AoI
to even make a hit

Then there is the Exp dilution
hp,str,dex,skill, EO and ED

I also have to deal with DM and EC

And you can buy good armor
You can buy stuff that help increase or reduce damage, avoid damage and raise AC

Me I am looking for Explosive Shot for a weapon I am lucky to even hit with. Probably some mage wined about it, and Jon took it out, I hope not.

I would like to see it more interesting for mages.
Like fire ball hitting only two targets and
their targeting be random thru the whole battle.

I'll be looking for cheese, go with this whine.

A lot of discussion since my last post,

GW I agree with you, mages do need some NW to beat up on the big tanks. However, that does not equate them to tanks. Take it from me, who has actually played a tank his entire CB existence until now, its a nice feeling to put my weapons aside.

It is unrealistic for a tank to have crazy NW armor in addition to crazy NW weapons. That option is only available for a select few, for most its one or the other. Mages fall into the other category.

I am playing a mage now, and I am quite happy with not having to spend extra $$$ to get my CoC to hit. Getting my Exbow to +100 was very costly, and I still don't hit with it all the time. Once my NSC are bigger and I can wear the CoI AMF won't be a big issue anymore, and with my big DB and and a good sized EC I can give Ranger a good run for his money with those 2 archers. Mikel will still pound me into the dirt, so will Ranger's MH, but they have been around much longer so thats OK.

Anyways, back to the main point: As a mage NW investment in a weapon is not needed. You want a 100 mil NW weapon? How about an 75 mil NW pair of DB (~+190), 15 mil NSC (+16), and a 10 mil CoI (~+18). I'm sure that would nuke a lot of tanks out there, or at least that is what I am striving for :D