Mages need boost (in General)

I looked on the character attribute in Gondor to find opponent, and surprised to find out that the first page already gives me people in 1m score. I think mages just can't work in the later stages and need some boost. when comparing with the massive USD tanks spend on weapons.

oh yes please...please give mages a boost :)

Seriously though, some rounds my CoC blasts 2.5 mil damage on one minion, or as much as 3 mil spread over 5. For FREE. Frees up a lot of cash to pump AC on all my minions and get that + on my DB up.

Mages are fine the way they are.

mages got a huge boost when the exp rate went down to 12 per point

+ Evasion.

Case closed.

Needless to say, for the xp, evasion is quite the counter to archery/NW.

Another slight edge for mages as a lot of tanks use archery now.

then why is there so many good tanks, and so little mages. I checked the character attribute and find some in the low 1m on the FIRST column of the FIRST page.

then why is there so many good tanks, and so little mages. I checked the character attribute and find some in the low 1m on the FIRST column of the FIRST page.

Because the tanks have USD put into them. Why should characters that do not have USD put into them be on the same level as characters with USD put into them.

If you're willing to put USD into a mage, I'm sure it'll be just as viable as a massive USD tank: use your USD to pump up a major set of DB, perhaps a major pair of NS/AG, and USD your way to buy a huge ToE/RoBF/Whatever tattoo you would like.

top 10 is evenly split basically right now, 4 pure tanks 1 RoBF tank and 5 mages...

I'd really like people to knock off the evasion is the answer crap. There are MULTIPLE tank teams using evasion on a purely evasion minion. There are multiple mage teams who don't train evasion. Those are the ones you need to be looking at. EVASION is overpowered. Mages are not. If the case is going to be that a mage is considered any minion with DD and evasion, then get rid of evasion and make the DD include evasion.

And, for mages not to be used on NW, check the NW of the gear the mages at the top use. Quite a bit. So there goes another argument. It's not a mages fault you only give them basically four options on how to spend their money.

I honestly wish this "mages don't use NW" stuff would just end. Make mages and tanks equivalent. Teams with less NW aren't winning hugely just because they use mages. I mean, yes, characters like NWO are miracles in the game of CB. But even they break large NW.

Another problem is USD, of course. It allows tanks to grow faster than should be allowed. Then the USD spenders say that, well, we have to, because you have evasion. Nerf evasion, and start putting caps on things.

No single skill should be the key to a strategy. Not ever. And mages need to have their random damage limited. 50-100% is bull. Try 80-100%. Or 70-100. My damage ranges over a scale of ONE MILLION. That's such a huge difference it's not even funny. It's annoying.

*rant ended*

"No single skill should be the key to a strategy. Not ever. And mages need to have their random damage limited. 50-100% is bull. Try 80-100%. Or 70-100. My damage ranges over a scale of ONE MILLION. That's such a huge difference it's not even funny. It's annoying. "

hehe... 75-100% sounds fair... But if you're going to reduce mage damage randomness, tanks should probably get the same benefit... RoBF too... This would allow people to more concretely judge who they can/can't beat...

"Make mages and tanks equivalent"

Then why have mages and tanks? Do people really have a preference to seeing their minion 'eviscerate' an enemy as opposed to having their minion's magic missile hit it? Making them "equivalent" is silly...

There are still huge strategic differences. But having one use money and another not is ridiculous.

aside from MM attacking from the back, what really is the strategic difference?

How they're countered, how they deal damage, oh, I don't know, the entire always hit versus multiple hits?

Really, spread damage too, but it seems the game is determined to take every cool thing from mages away, and exshot are now commonplace.

Mitt to go with your pumping up or AG/NS... AG's are pointless as AMF beats the crap outta mages...so we are forced to wear NSC if we want to live.... Also, the curve on NS...to go from +16-17, you would have to be out of your gourd ....

As for the DB's ...they are hardly as good as Eb's for various reasons im sure we know why...and they get costly to upgrade after about +30 or so...

So where should i slap my 20m ?

"Because the tanks have USD put into them. Why should characters that do not have USD put into them be on the same level as characters with USD put into them."

so we should give up and just admit that usd trumps all? in this game you can buy your way to the top? dedication and strategy do not matter as much as the ability and desire to spend cold hard cash? it really would be much easier to compare bank balances or income and declare a winner in my humble opinion.

i really thought this was a fighting / strategy game, not a fiscal competition.

furthermore, why exactly would or should characters who are unwilling or unable to spend real money on the game stick around if usd is required to play on the same level, just to be fodder for those who are silly enough to spend real money on virtual items?

Evasion can be used by anyone. Saying mages benefit more from quelling archers -- that's deficient. Why would mages benefit _more_? Learn Evasion on whatever you want? What is stopping you, exactly? I'd love to have a bigger Fireball, but oh yeah, I invested in Evasion. And last I checked, anyone can. Call Evasion overpowered all you like. But say it benefits mages more -- that's disingenuous.

And the 12 scale didn't benefit mages either. It benefited _anyone_ with any large stats. Period. Damn, some of those big AMFs knock the crap out of me! How'd they get so BIG? Oh yeah, same way ALL the big stats got bigger.

I really wish that "12" misconception would go away, or at least get more accurate. It's simple math, after all. Hell, I think I was one of the first to say it before my head got on straight, but tell me why the straight 12 would benefit mages more than anyone else? It also benefited huge tats as far as I can tell, yet I didn't see anyone say a word about the huge inks worn by some, did they? I sure didn't. It is what it is.

I don't think mages necessarily need a boost, but to turn it around to say mages have gotten benefits lately -- that's ridiculous, and it really sticks in my craw.

*choke*

Yes all huge stats got larger, but weapon damage did not go up nearly at much, heck I can survive a whole hit from Mikel...

ST from 4m to 5m = 3-5% increase?
DX from 4m to 5m = nothing, since other DX's and Evasions got the same boost
DD from 4m to 5m = 25% increase


Stack this with the fact that most BLs, Archerys, and VAs (tank things) got *harder* to train.


AMF did get easier right along with DD, but so did EC along with ST/DX... HP got easier to train, but mages still take just as much out of it (relatively) as they always did, while tanks take less...

I'm not complaining. Even as a tank, I feel the change was fair to give DD a much needed boost. But to say it didn't help mages at all... THAT, my friend, is disingenuous...

So where should i slap my 20m

Maybe be like ABoy's Conundrum and get armor for a PL wall or an AC wall? 20M into instas will get you over 350 AC, which is about 73% damage reduction from melee attacks; not to mention any ToE aura that may come from a tattoo on another minion.

Just an idea.

(<^>_<^>)
Kirby-san gives his approval to the above mentioned idea!

ST from 4m to 5m = 3-5% increase?

Of 5 million? 4 times a round? BIG deal.

DX from 4m to 5m = nothing, since other DX's and Evasions got the same boost

Untrue. If someone ISN'T using evasion or DX (walls, some mages) Then it's an extra hit.

DD from 4m to 5m = 25% increase

Too bad random damage barely makes it noticeable. And, random damage doesn't affect tanks as badly. They hit more times than mages do, bringing the average to a more reasonable level.


Stack this with the fact that most BLs, Archerys, and VAs (tank things) got *harder* to train.

Harder, perhaps, but still more efficient. The higher ST, then the higher the skill, and the more efficiently it's being used at.


AMF did get easier right along with DD, but so did EC along with ST/DX... HP got easier to train, but mages still take just as much out of it (relatively) as they always did, while tanks take less...

Yeah. So AMF and EC are equal. One point you. But... Heh.. MgS... No points you ;P

And how do you figure tanks are dealing less damage? I'm already finish fights -10 million HP. What more could you possibly want!? -15? -50? Give Mikel a week... Or Freed two...Itll happen... Oh... Wait.. Mikel's already bringing me down -20 (on a serious note, nice Mikel, really)

I'm not complaining. Even as a tank, I feel the change was fair to give DD a much needed boost. But to say it didn't help mages at all... THAT, my friend, is disingenuous...

And he didn't really say it didn't help mages. He said it didn't make a difference to how things were. Which is true. Tanks got the same boost. And, heh, even if it was COMPLETELY balanced, tanks still win. Because they were already winning.

Ok. I have to chime in here, because people keep talking like every tank out there has USD on it. I for one don't and guess what. I usually can't hit a nice evasion ever. Oh and the "12" out there helped mages a bit more than it helped tank people. My damage didn't go up that much based on the change and your thing of 4 mil to 5 mil dx would get an extra hit is wrong. If I already had a max dex advantage at 4 mil then i get the same % chance to hit at 5 mil as i did at 4 because I'm still at the same dex advantage. So no help there. As opposed to the much bigger DD damage which actually at the time of the change made a DD person I could beat easily all the time to a person I have never added back to my list. I think the damage got a fine boost it did.

I know I have rambled a bit, but it is 4am my time and I needed to sleep but after reading the rantings in here figured I would speak my mind also. When I wake up if I feel this post was very messy I will try to post again and fix and reword things as needed. Thanks

That's a good point, novice, so I will amend my statement.

Non-tanks got a bit more of a boost than tanks from the flat 12, with larger minions benefitting the most.

That is still a VERY different statement than, "mages got a huge boost when the exp rate went down to 12 per point."

And since the NW portion of weapons is linear to start with, and that PR can even hide in the weapon allowance, you will excuse me if my heart doesn't begin to instantly bleed for the plight of the poor, poor tanks out there.

"So where should i slap my 20m"

Maybe be like ABoy's Conundrum and get armor for a PL wall or an AC wall? 20M into instas will get you over 350 AC, which is about 73% damage reduction from melee attacks; not to mention any ToE aura that may come from a tattoo on another minion.

Just an idea.

Thank god. Spend it on a WALL.

There are still huge strategic differences. But having one use money and another not is ridiculous.

That is what Jon intended. Read the FORS about mages spending money. Jon wanted the main difference to be one to use money other to not use as much.

Also, points that I have not covered were already covered by Hatch. He is brilliant, seems to think what I do :D

Also, the reason USD teams win a lot isn't just because they use USD. You need to have some strategy before you use USD and would you look at the people who use USD, are you going to tell me they have crap strats? no, they have good ones, with USD helping it.

So people who don't put in money and have a good strat should beat people who put in money and have a good strat?

And since the NW portion of weapons is linear to start with, and that PR can even hide in the weapon allowance, you will excuse me if my heart doesn't begin to instantly bleed for the plight of the poor, poor tanks out there.

Tanks already wear more armour than Mages do, which means that their PR would be higher anyway, that's even with the WA, without the WA or weapons adding PR there'd be no point in playing a tank unless you were in 6/20.

Why would a pure tank be wearing a lot of armor? A ToA tank usually keeps it light, only wearing armor special to doing damage (elven gear, BGs, etc.), just like a mage wearing AGs, CoI, or MCM.

I see no reason to accept the statement, "Tanks wear more armor so have higher PR because of that" as true.

"That is what Jon intended. Read the FORS about mages spending money. Jon wanted the main difference to be one to use money other to not use as much."

"So people who don't put in money and have a good strat should beat people who put in money and have a good strat?"

i just reread the fors to make sure it was as i remembered. it sounds to me like jon actually wants the mages with xp to be equal to the effectiveness of the tanks with money. so jon's answer to your question appears to be yes.

when that fors was written we were in cb1 and just didn't have as much of a usd interaction in the game as we do now. after much thought i have decided that all of us starting over at once with cb2 is what brought about the influx of usd we have now. all vets were using pretty good strats and people were looking for any advantage they could get. cash seemed to be the answer.

i don't think jon foresaw this and i know i didn't even really realize what was happening at the time.

the downside of the cash influx is that people who have bought cb do still expect an advantage and that is not really what it was ever meant to be, but there is a very fine line between levelling a playing field and creating a required advantage.

remember that the opposite side of your question about people with no usd input beating people who have that is then that usd is required to compete. if that is the end all be all of cb, then it can be a game that is fun for only a handful of people. those willing to spend outrageous amounts will be the ones competing for the top spot and everyone else will just be spectators.

Amen, brother dudemus. Everyone on CB1 was clamoring for a new, fair playing field, and then many got over here and went wild with CB1/CB2 exchanges and USD. Really baffled me at the time. But I think your analysis is dead-on. The allure of getting that edge is just too much to turn down sometimes! I gave into it myself when I hired my three minions after running up a single minion through an NCB... In retrospect, the money probably would have been better spent building an empire from the start. :\

But I love my Hubbell! All you can eat, baby!

Ok,

Take USD out of the equation.

Can a non USD tank compete with a non USD mage?

NO.

Why? Evasion. A mage can pump up evasion as high as they need/want, while if a tank does it, he still gets hit by that FB/CoC/MM/RBF.

So where is the equality in that?

All this USD talk.. seriously which players use USD? Ranger, Mikel, Freed, G Beee? I don't think buying a few mil counts as a USD influenced team.

Sut, I was assuming fully equipped non ToA Tank including a shield. It would add more PR than wearing CoI/AG wouldn't it?

My 2 minion team, weapons aside thanks to the WA (can I hear an amen for the WA??!??AMEN!) is fully equipped with all sorts of armours, bonus giving items. No tattoo. Only 177k PR addition. Not much at all.

Johnny that's how much my equipment, stripped down to the minimum, no added leathers or tattoo gives PR to me.

I'm not trying to construe that mages are at an advantage because they a little less PR. I'm saying that if you couple that with weapons adding PR then it would be hard for a tank to stay positive. If you were to make my 46.6 mil MH give me PR, then shoot me now, I'm already in the negatives for challenge bonus.

Good night.

Wasn't arguing with you Flamey; hence my little comment about the WA. :)

I do not disagree that Evasion looks overpowered right now.

It also happens to be just one part of many related things that need tweaking.

And if a non-USD tank cannot beat a non-USD mage, all other things being equal, then that's easy to fix -- buff tanks. Problem is, the huge weapons and NW-based qualities already exist in the game, and they never go away.

Characters change and morph due to boredom and attrition, but big weapons just keep getting bigger. Regardless of where they came from, they are here.

Do away with transfers, however, and it would solve the USD and uber-weapon hand-offs in one fell swoop. It would also kill the economy. :\

Poor Johnny.

PR / MPR: 1,642,303 / 1,477,066

Oh, wait, never mind. That's with no tat. And 1/3 of your NW in gear.

Mages still have it worse *smile* And most of my gear ain't doing crap. With less gear, I get a higher PR. Uhh... Fun!?

Not complaining GW, sorry E-Pip. Personally I don't find mage teams to work as well as a buffed up tank team. Which is why I've run nothing but tanks since 2005.

The WA is a big part of the problem. All that power under the hood with no representation in PR. Two teams, 1 mage, 1 tank. Same MPR, but all the tanks MPR can go to boosting his tank, adding on AMF. Chuck on armours, bonus giving items on both teams. That's it for the mage. But wait, here comes the tank's weapons...nice big bow and what's that? Oh a Morg. Nice. Not only does it do some nice damage, thanks to that nicely built ST/Dex, but it gives a nice free ED as well. VA for free. All of that under the WA.

Yes, evasion can reduce all that NW to nothing. But still....



See, although I get some more advantages as a tank, as a NON-USD tank I still feel the pain of that USD spend that some opponents have.

What I want is a level playing field, not a game where the biggest is the best. Thanks to some of our strat choices that isn't always the case, which is why I'm still here. But sometimes it's all CB comes down to.

Currently I can take a lot of mage teams who are bigger than me. And that's without AMF, and without a mage shield (although there's one there now). So yes, mages do need a boost.

And I didn't mean to sound hostile. This topic is getting old though. Mages are underpowered. Evasion is overpowered. Ranged damage is overpowered. These 3 things should be looked at seperately and at how they affect the game, not as they affect each other.

To me, this feels an awful lot like the cold war. Two basic sides getting strong as fast as they can. You're getting + and DX, they're getting evasion. No one is going to win. But the people with neither DAMN well aren't getting involved...

To conclude this horrible analogy...


I feel like Poland in WW2... Or Chile in the Cold war.... Or Mexico in WW4.... ^.^

Why is evasion constantly toted as the be all/end all for mages. It is an overpowered skill that anyone can train on any team. It doesn't have to be on a tank either, you can stick it on an evasion minion in front of your tank (thats what I used to do on my old NCB for last year).

Look at mages and tanks in terms of investment. Tanks have much more items at their disposal, but that means they have to spend a lot more as well. For me, mages are the RoBF of the NW world, as they allow for concentration into a few items. I used to have 50 mil + of weapons on this team, now I can turn around and put that into DB, NSC, CoI, which will maximize the massive damage I can do with my NW free DD.

tanks need a boost

Sure, of course, certainly, without a doubt tanks can train evasion just as well as mages.

However, one cannot dodge a FB, but one can dodge a 200M NW MH, on a 3M dexterity minion. In melee rounds no less.

Give me a skill to dodge a FB that I can pump up, to levels that almost no amount of NW can penetrate and I will shut up about evasion.

we are out of whack and we do need some balance. as i stated in another thread though there needs to be 3 parts to it. the first two most will agree on, tone down ranged damage and evasion. the third part that has to be done in conjunction with the first two though is capping weapons so that no matter their worth, they only help a fixed amount.

without the last step, then we will truly be handing the game over to those who have the "aberrations" out there.

evasions effectiveness is only in place because of how ridiculous ranged damage is. Not to mention bows which directly target mages. If ranged damage were to be reduced I would have no problem with less effective evasions.

i agree mages get overpowered with evasion and tanks just fall short without USD. I've been remaking my ncb char over and over again to find that tanks are useless without a good amount of usd theres so many mages with evasion i just cant hit them, my clan char gets destroyed by mages and everyones pretty much a mage.....cuz its easy and you don't need any gear....now im a mage too!

Game's already handed over. Just look at the top.

Non-USD mage v. Non-USD tank, no Evasion/AMF/etc.

Tank wins, no problem. Easy triples, loads of damage (yes -gasp- even without USD) Mageseeker if there's multiple minions.

Throw Evasion into the picture, and the mage wins because the tank can't do damage.

Throw USD into the picture on the tank side, and everything evens up a bit more. There's a 50 billion NW weapon on the tank and it adds no PR.

Now that assessment says to me that the game is screwy.

"There's a 50 billion NW weapon on the tank and it adds no PR"

Not exactly true.

There is a weapon allowance that will raise ones PR if you go over it.

One thing I have noticed in this dialog is that there appears to be two sides in CB. I am not sure that the rules that apply for the top players are the same as the rules that a majority of the community play under. It is similar to the way that quantum physics and mechanics work. The size of the minion team describes more then anything. At my size challenge bonus is still a factor. I do not want to put huge NW into armor. Doing so will hurt my challenge bonus. People at the top have little to no challenge bonus so PR is not as large an issue. I am attacked on a regular basis by people with over 3.5 mil PR. I have less then a 2 mil score. I do not play in a system where it makes sense to fight down. Therefore, the fact that mages have no way of improving their team other than adding PR seems unfair, when theWA is available to others.

All I want is some way to use the huge WA that other teams use. I have an enormous pool of MW that I could tap into but goes unused. I would enjoy the game more if I could sink money into weapon. Something to distinguish my strat more and not nerf my rewards.

Lastly, and most importantly, if the game is based on rock, scissors, paper then it stands to reason that not all teams of equal NW, PR and MR are going to be equal in a fight against each other. Some strats are strong against others and week against others. Therefore, people talking about who should win in a fight is a but ridiculous. The person who runs a better strat and is more efficient with their xp should win regardless of strat.

Here's what I don't get...

"WAAAAAHHHH!!!! I don't have to spend money for my success!!! Everybody else does, and in the midgame, they become better! I don't care I am more successful in the short game AND in the long game (we haven't hit the long game just yet, but wait until 5m MPR is even somewhat common (like 2m is now), and we'll see how much mages are whining...)!! I want to be free/cheap on my way up, then be able to boost with money! when things get slow!!! WAAAHHHHH!!"

Mages dominate the mid range......lol

I thought that was RoBF teams

"Ok,

Take USD out of the equation.

Can a non USD tank compete with a non USD mage?

NO.

Why? Evasion. A mage can pump up evasion as high as they need/want, while if a tank does it, he still gets hit by that FB/CoC/MM/RBF.

So where is the equality in that?"

MGS.

Can't dodge that FB?

No, but you can reuce it by 50%. All the time.

MGS.

Where's the Tank equivalent?

Fine,

You do 50% damage to me with my MgS equipped and I do 0% damage to you with your supersized/supereffective evasion.

Not even an apples to apples comparison.

300k a round adds up, 0k a round does not.

And last time I checked, one cannot use the MgS with a tattoo, or with any spell.

However, evasion can be used and boosted by many minion types and by many items.

As a single tank, MgS is simply out of the question, seeing how I'm using a tattoo and all. It also completely obliterates any sort of enchantments that I have. AMF is simply impossible to use well thanks to NSCs. On another note, I do about 1.2M/hit in ranged vs. unarmored targets, assuming I even hit. I get hit by CoCs for over 2M. Even some FBs hit me for over 1.5M in the first round, onehitting me. Tell me, how do I counter this obviously "overpowered" damage, seeing how it does more damage than my 56M bow, which has been universally agreed upon to dish out unholy amounts of damage?

So what am I hearing? Nerf evasion, nerf ranged damage, nerf multiple hits, nerf RoBF, nerf melee damage, nerf everything.

I think the status quo is fine. As novice said, there are 4 pure tanks, 1 RoBF tank, and 5 mages in the top 10.

I think that goes to show the great amount of diversity and how many different strategies are truly viable in this game.

Keep the status quo is what I would like. While I may think it kind of pointless to keep pushing and pushing to change the dynamics of this game so that YOUR strategy or strategies like yours are the only viable strategies, and everyone but you and those using similar strategies have to scramble to figure it out, by all means, keep complaining.

then why is there so many good tanks, and so little mages.

because mages need more strategic attention, for tanks, having DD, EO and ED is optional, and you don't need to worry about DDs being x% of str/dex

Top 10, By score:

Koyaanisqatsi (4813981) RBF tank
Edyit (4132536) RBF tank
Oxcha (3749838) Mage
King of Pain (2736051) Archer
NWO (2660569) Mage
Conundrum (2659736) Mage
Hubbell (2642309) Mage
Black Sophist (2640273) RBF mini tank
Violent Femmes (2624037) Mage
The Lega (2562485) Tank

I get 3 RBF, 5 mages, 2 tanks (1 archer/1 melee),

So we need to boost mages?

Of the 2 regular tanks, 1 has a massive ELB to hit evasion, 1 has a large EC to try to hit evasion.

Generic tanks are falling off the face of CB at the top, why? Evasion anyone? 30% are $BF characters, why? Always hit, no GA or AMF to worry about.

"All I want is some way to use the huge WA that other teams use. I have an enormous pool of MW that I could tap into but goes unused. I would enjoy the game more if I could sink money into weapon. Something to distinguish my strat more and not nerf my rewards. " I heard what dudemus said before, but Jon still wanted Mages to not spend that much money. If you want to deal damage via cash then go tank. Even if the effectiveness of mages is skewed, he still wanted one basically to be low cash input and another high cash input.

I hardly see how the stats of the top 10 are useful in describing the overall electiveness of a strat. There are no UC teams on the top 10 but there are some that have a 2 mil or so score, and do win battles. Please do not let the focus of what the top ten do be a guideline for the bulk of CB.

Flamey
I am not talking about US$. I assume I will make about 50 mil or so a year, there is little I need to finish my strat. Then what do I do, spend 10 mil to get one more % of DD damage.

6/20 by MPR/Top 23 (Where NW Doesn't matter)

Koyaanisqatsi (3400085) - RBF Tank
Oxcha (3299971) - Mage
NWO (3178933) - Mage
Hubbell (3064088) - Mage
Edyit (3002635) - RBF Tank
The Lega (2976286) - Tank
Dixie Cousins (2954580) - Mage
Failure (2920320) - Tank
King of Pain (2916115) - Tank (Archer)
B Ark (2900871) - Tank
Xanas (2844370) - Mage/Tank
Conundrum (2648780) - Mage
Black Sophist (2553111) - RBF Tank
The Iconics 3e (2532585) - UC Tank
Violent Femmes (2406825) - Mage (Via IF)
igot noname (2310826) - Mage
Reda Luu (2307643) - Tank
Oliver Thrace (2304692) - Mage
Nemesis (2246193) - Mage/Tank
Vistek (2154806) - Tank (Archer)
Godsend (2149433) - UC Tank
Giggety Giggetty (2131863) - Mage
Classic Gaming (2081153) - Mage

top 20 by score

Koyaanisqatsi (4813981) - RBF tank
Edyit (4132536) - RBF tank
Oxcha (3749838) - Mage
King of Pain (2736051) - Archer
NWO (2660569) - Mage
Conundrum (2659736) - Mage
Hubbell (2642309) - Mage
Black Sophist (2640273) - RBF mini tank
Violent Femmes (2624037) - Mage
The Lega (2562485) - Tank
Failure (2284871) - Tank
Vistek (2261730) - Tank (archer)
Dixie Cousins (2249763) - Mage
pffff (2235821) - Tank
Tank Killer (2231886) - Tank
The Iconics 3e (2219967) - UC Tank
Anbhas (2210771) - RBF Tank
Reda Luu (2204842) - Tank
Oliver Thrace (2196736) - Mage
Xanas (2194171) - Mage/Tank
Nemesis (2181296) - Mage/Tank
Zandagarth (2179578) - Mage
MI5 (2153822) - RBF chanter

Summary, 6/20 by MPR:
Tanks: 9
Mages: 10
Hybrid: 2
UC Tank: 2

Summary, top 23 score:
Tanks: 11
Mages: 8
Hybrid: 2
UC Tank: 1
RBF: 1

yoyo, invest in wall gear, or invest in DB.

Should you be spending your money on upgrading gear massively before hitting 6/10? The current game dynamic says no. This is especially true for items with heavy PR cost. Your goal before 6/10 should be dropping as much PR as possible while beating a similar list to get maximum Challenge bonus. Stacking heavy PR will slow your growth. It's a good idea to level your tattoo though as soon as your max tattoo goes over 2mil. You won't find insta targets at that range very easily in the game.

That being said, mage's lack of need to pump nw is really not a disadvantage in the growth stage of a character. You always have the option to use RoE and I can't do that with RoBF chanter. Tank can do the same thanks to WA. At high PR, you can always invest in DB. It's not like there is lack of use for cash as you need a lot of cash to start an ncb, buying minion and actually make it to 6/10 where you can blow your cash all you want without negative CB impact.

i agree that we are pretty balanced as it is. what i was saying earlier was basically that if you start nerfing things then you will have to keep going and nerf many aspects of the game to keep balance. while it is not perfect now, it is probably as close as it has been and all strats seem to think everyone else is overpowered.

why r there no/few archers near the top? Maybe archers need a boost.

Somehow, someway, Little Devil, novice, krasko, Bast, PoisoN, sutekh, horseguy, Atomicboy, and Dolphin have all managed to use a mage-based team, and still have higher net worth than me - A tank user... Many of them with very little (if any) USD involvement...

Looks like they've found places to put all their money...

Nobody can say that mages and tanks do not have a balance of sorts. Looking at the top teams, and the general scope of teams in general (if mages are so weak and disadvantageous, why are they so commonly used?), it would seem things are pretty well-off... If you're insisting on something else to spend money on because you can't come up with any ideas of your own and don't like the way the names I mentioned above have done it, i can only assume you would want this money sink to boost your abilities... This would throw off the balance a bit, no?

Basically, giving mages a weapon with which to augment their power with money would also require reworking Armor Class, physical damage, spell damage in general, HP, and likely the entire XP system as a whole...

Tell ya what... I'll push to give mages weapons when Jon moves the site to www.mageblender.com

What if multiple items were bought in. I do not think mages need a boost. However, I would still like a place to spend money that does not hurt rewards. DBs do not qualify.

A pikeﾗtwo-handed weapon that gives a base 20AC (or something like that) It can have a low base damage. A bonus to the wall players.

A staffﾗreduces the amount of AMF backlash damage by 1 % per enchant. Does not reduce the affect of AMF. Great item for mages who do not wan to pwn themselves.

A wandﾗreduces the affect of all damage mitigation for DD by the 1 % per enchant.

An orbﾗreduces the affect of DM on all of the minions casted spells by 1% per level of enchant.

A melee weapon that increases the + to hit on all ranged attacks-will help equal out evasion

A ranged weapon that increases the + to hit of all melee attacks.--see above

The problem with these types of weapons is how they would fit into WA. I think there would be a way to use some kind of NW multiplier for so they would be useful but not too overpowered. The mage/enchanter items would also give a mage team something to spend WA on

Not all mage weapons need to increase spell damage or decrease AMF to be useful. I came up with 2 rather quickly, and I am sure if more people thought about new mage type weapons more could be generated. Moreover, an enchanter weapon would be very useful to a mage team.

The more types of items there are in the game the more depth there will be to game play and I think that would make most of the CB community happier. I think adding weapons that are enhancement based will an incredible amount of depth to the game and allow for even more strats.

Thanks for your time.

--part of this was taken from an earlier post I did.

Hatch, I spent 90 million on minions. I do what I do mainly with MPR. Just FYI.

"There's a 50 billion NW weapon on the tank and it adds no PR"

Not exactly true.

There is a weapon allowance that will raise ones PR if you go over it.


------- I think you must've missed my sarcasm, Ranger. My point was that the WA is too high. If you disagree, check what yours is and tell me if there's any way you'd be over it without putting your own United States Dollars into the game.

sut: regardless of your MPR vs. nw abilities, you *do* have higher nw than me, that's how you made the list. I'm pretty sure the only USD you spent was for the minions, so I don't exactly qualify you as a "USD spender when that debate comes up.

yoyo: why do your items end with ïﾾ?

OB: At Ranger's level, I doubt he'd ever exceed his WA even if he used *more* USD than he already has. WA is too high and right where it needs to be at the same time... It needs to be huge so tanks can have huge pth to counter those massive evasions. this hurts all non-evasion teams/minions, because now, tanks are not only allowed, they are all but required to have much higher pth...

Idea: If evasion is supposed to counter massive physical ranged damage, lower it's effect, raise it's ranged bonuses. This allows it to counter hefty ranged damage, but doesn't require +10k on a melee weapon. With this, we can lower WA. With that, everything is working as it should...

Or we could just lower WA and lower Evasion, each accordingly. That way they can't have a weapon that is super-enormous and doing way too much damage for the game to handle, and Evasion can safely be lowered. Ranged damage could remain high in comparison to melee, as well.

As far as Sut's NW...you know how much a tattoo his size adds to NW? It's hardly a fair comparison to someone at 1.7M MPR...

CB1 never had a weapon allowance, nor did it have MPR.

the WA was implemented (I reason/believe) was so characters that have 20k MPR can't beat characters with 500k MPR just by attaching a majorly huge weapon.

and if wa is exceeded, it just adds to pr. that is all fine and good in the lower echelons, but in the upper area it means absolutely nothing.

the poll that i have linked many times shows that most of us think weapons should be capped in their effectiveness much like max tat level. this is why i say that if we do anything, ya gotta nerf ranged damage, lower evasion effect and cap weapons in general. if all are not done, then we are better off now.

I can tell you exactly how much NW my tattoo adds, if it helps: 85.6 million. I can assure you that the rest isn't much, since I kinda sold out, then spent a lot of cash on NCB BA, and then 90 million more on minions (most of that via various and sundry USD means). The rest of the cash is just kinda leftovers. I never used any USD before Hubbell, and never got any money from CB1-to-CB2 trading. I took the whole "clean slate" idea almost to fanatical levels when CB2 first started, but since so few joined along in that, it was pretty pointless (both in implementation and philosophy...).

heh... I knew a lot of your nw was tat-induced... but WOW! I forgot how big your tat really was :P

So did I, Hatch, so did I! *smile* If if weren't for OddBird making his point, I wouldn't have realized how much of that was tattoo...

Ranger. Reread your own post.

"Why? Evasion. A mage can pump up evasion as high as they need/want, while if a tank does it, he still gets hit by that FB/CoC/MM/RBF."

So we have a Mage with Evasion, dodging all tanks.

We have a Tank with Evasion, dodging all Tanks. In addition, this Tank also has a MGS and is reducing ALL magic damage by 50%.

See?

The Mage can do nothing to mitigate other Magic damage, if they're dumping XP into Evasion. As they can't use that super duper MGS, even if they wanted to.

While the Tank can use the MGS to take care of it. While dumping XP into Evasion.

No, you can't use a Tat doing so. But you can use a wealth of STR/DEX boosting items to make up for not having that ToA. Plus there's your WA hidden Weapon.

Also, I doubt anyone would complain that Evasion doesn't need to be toned down (yes it would require other changes to happen as well).

Where's the Physical damage reducing Shield that reduces STR to zero instead of DD?

Then I'll drop this.

'Where's the Physical damage reducing Shield that reduces STR to zero instead of DD? '

Who needs one when you have evasion?

For a bit over 36M xp, Black Sophist has 5.5M defensive dexterity and a minus PTH of 212.

Who can hit that except for the highly USD backed weapons?

Who needs a MGS when you have AMF? Let's just throw them out. Seriously.

Ignore Evasion for a second. We all know it's busted.

Assume you'll get hit. Even if it's by a Massive USD monster PTH weapon.

Where's the Mages non XP based shield, that will allow you to reduce the incoming physical damage by 50% for every single hit you take, no matter what the stats or weapon size of your opponent is?

"Where's the Mages non XP based shield, that will allow you to reduce the incoming physical damage by 50% for every single hit you take, no matter what the stats or weapon size of your opponent is?"

AC + SC + CMLs + TGs + HoD + MS = 40 + 11 + 18 + 6 + 9 + 20 = 104 / 477 = 21.8% physical damage reduction using six inexpensive base items. No XP needed whatsoever.

You are right JS, but that's _six_ items, and not just one as MGS. And they come with much higher negatives to stats then the MGS to.

Cool JS.

Give the MGS a -37% (lets call it -35%) reduction to physical damage and make it stop you equipping all other STR/DEX boosting armour and I'll call it even.

Right?

Tanks can't exactly train much Evasion, xp dilution for one and lacking BL and Archery. if You're saying train it on another minion, get another minion with AMF, and if you have another minion, you can use a mage shield too.

Besides, without the ToA, you get the TSA and the EC, 30% gain to ST and 10% gain to DX, that does not make up for the ToA much at all. It's not a lot of items, it's two more.

Flamey, it's all equivalent.

The Mage trains x HP and y DD.

The Tank trains x HP and 1/2y STR and 1/2y DEX. So they're both equivalent to each other. The smaller STR Dex is made up by;

1: beating the Mages 20 Dex anyway
2: The Tanks weapon.

Now both minions can equally train z Evasion, and still remain equivalent.

We are assuming that the amount of Evasion trained is enough to negate all physical attacks.

Next, the Tank above can slap on a MGS and gain a 50% damage reduction (OK, it's not quite that much, exageration for empahasis) to all magical damage taken without malus.

The Mage does not have that luxury.

in your example GL your explaining the other side also. Yes as a tank if they train just like the mage with the evasion and all that jazz. Your DD is 50% less because I have the Mgs, but your DD still hits.. 50% of something is better than my 100% of nothing because I couldn't hit you.. See the problem.. What good is all this extra armor and reductions when I can't hit you? Your DD always hits. Not sometimes, not 1/2 the time. Not 30% in round 1. It ALWAYS hits every round until your dead, and seeing how I can't hit you I guess your 50% of damage will still slowly kill me while I'm swinging and missing the whole battle.

Hope I shed some light on things a bit there.

Yes and AMF always hits back. I know, I know GA does, but over half of the teams out there have AMF. How many really have GA. Additionally, GA takes 2.5 times the size of the damage to return the 60% back and physical damage is so high that GA needs to be ridiculous in size to me 2.5x.

Yoyo, in the equivalent example above;

The Mage takes zero Physical damage from opponents and 100% Magical.

The Tank takes zero Physical damage from opponents and 50% Magical.

That's the difference.

GL

Between AMF, MgS, armor, and a mitigation tat, all of the damage can be mitigated and a mage can still take some damage back from AMF.

Not sure why I am keeping this alive, I was just blown away by my fight log today when I finally read ranged damage:

1/2 7,768,954

Freed's SoD hits my team for around 8 million damage when he gets lucky and hits my lead minion. The whole team dies except for a bit left on my FF.

So, take massive Evasion away, and he would get two hits, probably, if not three. Whole team dead. In one round.

Is his SoD an aberration? Sure. Does that matter? Will the aberration ever not be in the game? No. It will always be there, and will only get larger, in fact. So, if you tone down evasion (alone) that will mean whomever holds that one item will be able to beat everyone (probably) unless an opponent puts a LOT into something like EC or has an aberrantly large ToE to reduce the damage.

Beyond that, GL has already said everything I am thinking. Anyone who thinks Evasion is a mage-only thing is consciously choosing to only see half the picture (usually their own half). That's kind of sad, because instead of the Evasion issue causing any sort of divide, it should actually be UNITING everyone since we can all see how big it is in the game.

"The Mage trains x HP and y DD.

The Tank trains x HP and 1/2y STR and 1/2y DEX. So they're both equivalent to each other. The smaller STR Dex is made up by;"

Who does that? Mages will train 1/4 or 1/3 of their total exp, this is only equal or less to a Tank training all stats equally. Evasion means that the tank can't use Archery (no ranged for them) or Bloodlust (significantly reduced damage when it does hit). I just don't see how you can say that Mages have the same exp to spend on Evasion as tanks do.

Tanks need that skill so they're already sacrificing that, plus they use more exp into HP/ST/DX than mages do HP/DD, because what does it matter how high your DD is if you've got 25 rounds to kill them? Get your Evasion high enough and your DD only needs to be at a semi decent level.

I would think the problem with the SOD is uber upgraded ammo, not the SOD itself in its entirety. How much damage do other SOD's do to you Sut? Or do they even hit you at all? If Freed did not use +30 ammo, would he hit you?

I think the community voted on the upgradeable ammo situation and nothing was done. However, I still believe ammo should NOT be upgradeable with only naming as giving a small plus to it.

Now back to evasion. How can it UNITE CB when tanks cannot hit it? Mages always hit. Your FB's always hit. My MSB hits 1 time in all of missile vs the 3 highest evasions. This with over a 4.6M effective EC (more vs AoF minions) and a +212 MSB/+5 arrows.

There is such a thing as balance, but when most tanks cannot hit evasions of equal MPR characters something is wrong.

And while any character can use evasion. It is far easier to mages as they only need to train HP/DD/evasion while tanks have to train HP/evasion/Str/Dex. AND, if tanks decide on training evasion, they can kiss the first 4 rounds of combat goodbye as any chance to hit even low level evasion/DB wearing minions is impossible.

So while tanks certainly can use evasion vs other tanks, they give most mages 4 free rounds of always hitting spells. Or if the opponent uses CoC, they give them the ability to start to use CoC before they can even get 1 hit off as the HoC does not help melee based tanks. Yes, melee tanks can use the MgS, however they still take damage vs mages taking NO damage using evasion.

So, tell me again how this is supposed to UNITE CB?

Just to stray off target and take a tank's point of view to Sut's last post:

SoD of Dee's Pair [5x6800] (+195) worth $144,187,647 owned by Freed (pffff)

There's also boosted ex shot with that - they were named the other day, they're not now so I can't check, but they're pretty big - - x30 +30 or so.


So yes, that particular SoD is unusual, but even with all that PTH, he can barely get past your evasion. Nearly 150 mill NW made meaningless.

Still, it's kind of nice to be able to dodge some of the huge weapons.


Tank + evasion + fun :)

Flamey, we can only ever discuss equivalent things with any sort of non bias.

Otherwise we open the gates to the 20HP FB Mage with 100% xp into DD ruling because he insta kills everyone that doesn't train AMF or use a Ranged weapon.

We also compare equal potential size, so XP doesn't muddy the water.

And if we start shfiting the amounts both the Mage and Tank spend in different attributes, we get into Strategy and strategic strengths, over equivalent power.

Is the tank who trains a fraction in HP (just enough to let him live past one round) more powerful than the tank who trians 90% into HP (to live more rounds, but deal less damage, as he has therefore a much lower STR...). If you don't like the 50% 'y' split above, change it to however much Jon balanced Tanks versus Mages on. There *must* be a direct relationship between STR/DEX and DD. I just don't know what it is. ;)

The *only* way to objectivly discuss balance issues is to use equivalence.

Strategy isn't balance. ;)

Again,

Give everyone 2 free retrains and we shall see how high evasions will go. And even the highest USD backed weapons will miss all the time.

I say 2 free retrains since everyone will be forced to go back to what they were once evasion gets its proper nerf.

Give me a free retrain and I wlll have over 7M defensive dexterity in melee rounds and about a minus 250 PTH. Using the multipliers in missile rounds, I would never be hit unless Freed uses +100 ammo. Without the quick pth of ammo, I would never be hit in melee as well.

I can then change my other EC minion to all AMF and be completely immune to most damage. This a UNITING factor?

It's uniting because *everyone* can use the uber powerful Evasion.

Everyone knows Evasion is uber powerful. I don't think anyone could, or would ever try to deny it.

Tanks can use it.

Again and again you say they have to train more. This *is* balanced versus Mages by Weapons. X for STR. + for DEX. It's how Tanks and Mages are balanced.

Mages train DD. Tanks have to split between STR and DEX.

I would say you have a point if X and + never ever effect Damage or Chance to Hit.

with the largest mpr in the game why are you waiting for a free retrain? i have retrained twice in the last six months and taken the xp hit. sure i would've liked to have had free retrains, but jon has pretty much said that isn't going to happen again.

instead of dire predictions of doom and gloom, just do it! show us how overpowered all of these things really are. i am not sure how dramatic it will be as no one actually beats ya now though.

Yes,

Tanks can use evasion but then give up the ability to hit in missile rounds (archery) or the ability to maximize their damage in melee (bloodlust).

So it is not really comparing things equally. Of course, any character can have the classic evasion wall.

Now if mages got a new skill that adds 60% to their damage, forcing them to choose, things may start to become equal. With the balancing of current damage to account for the new skill of course.

But the current problem is not that mages and tanks can have evasion. It is the evasion skill, in its current form, can render most tanks obsolete.

Just looked at Koyaanisqatsi fight log, and I did not see a loss in the last 1000. However, in active win streaks I did not see him. Why is that? Is he not allowed to hod that position because it might deflate everyone else.

"Yes,

Tanks can use evasion but then give up the ability to hit in missile rounds (archery)"

Archers. That's different. Not Tanks. They are designed to kill everyone else before they are killed. I'll not cry they can't use Evasion.

"or the ability to maximize their damage in melee (bloodlust)."

So it's a choice of do more damage, or last longer versus other Tanks. Hey at least Tanks *have* that option.

Where's the Mage's BL? I see you cover that below.

"So it is not really comparing things equally."

Yes it is... Please actually explain how it's not.

"But the current problem is not that mages and tanks can have evasion. It is the evasion skill, in its current form, can render most tanks obsolete."

Again, I don't think anyone would dispute that.

i see a 5k plus win streak for him now.

While its true you can never nullify a mages damage completely (well unless you wear an RoBF, but thats a whole other 200 post thread in itself), there are many tools to render mages ineffective. Look at my team, I don't even need AMF, and in a couple weeks should be able to overcome every pure mage team in the game thanks to the potent AC/ToE/PL/MgS combo.

However, I have a very easy foil - AMF. Hatch recently retrained to have a very large one, which means I had to rearrange some items on my team to bring about stalemates. I am not going to be able to beat him again for awhile. Mages can die very quickly from AMF if it is sufficiently trained. Not to mention if it is layered with the aforementioned damage reduction layers.

I may hit every time, but it can be for hardly anything that is absorbed, or be a lot and take a massive amount of AMF damage myself., or even worse, for not a lot and I can myself in the castings.

to further clarify my point, you are probably not the best example ranger. if you are saying that with a free retrain you would become unbeatable and that means evasion is overpowered then we would logically say that you are unbeatable now, so that is also overpowered. you were also unbeatable before and that makes the prior strategy overpowered as well. so we are left with you yourself being overpowered or high net worth being overpowered. i tend to believe it is a bit of both! :)

"Yes it is... Please actually explain how it's not. "

Because a Tank is crap all without Archery/BL. A Mage still works without a skill, a Tank is hindered. Tanks need a skill significantly more than Mages do.

No. A Tank is not crap with BL.

And a Tank with Archery is an Archer, designed to kill everyone before they get hit in return.

BL went out of 'favour' quite a while ago after its much nerfing.

I seriously totally doubt Jon balanced Tanks versus Mages taking trained BL into account.

If he did, I take it all back. But recalling the testing for the first major weapon X change, trained BL had nothing to do with it.

"i see a 5k plus win streak for him now."

Only doable due to the RBF (which I pointed out in numerous posts in the past) or with my 205M MH/82M DBs/32M ELB and a host of other items.

Also, there are at least 5 characters that can double/triple tap me easily. Yes, I have a high MPR so I skew the results. But I see what I can see quite easily.

Let me retrain with evasion and I will become completely invulnerable to all attacks, even quadrillion taps. One minion with pure evasion to stop physical damage and 2 minions with AMF to stop magical. Keep the RBF on an AMF mage, and I will be all set.

Right now I have far too much xp tied up in EC, over 90M. While 1/3 that can do the same function in evasion.

Right now the top effective evasion is Draco with Black Sophist. He is immune to almost all physical attacks bar those with over +170 PTH weapons. And these weapons cost close to 100M NW if not more.

If someone cannot see 5,500,000 (212) evasion with all its ranged multipliers as not being out of whack, I cannot see how you can rail about the MgS being too powerful. At least damage does get through the MgS, baring a HIGH USD weapon, no damage gets through that evasion.

No tank can ever think of having 5,500,000 dexterity with xp left over for HP/Str/skills. Then you have to have a +175 or more weapon to hit, given the smallish dex chance to hit. How many 175 weapons are there? 12? 13? Then take out the missile weapons as they have to face boosted evasion. So there are 5-7 melee weapons that have any chance to hit that evasion.

What more to type?

"If someone cannot see 5,500,000 (212) evasion with all its ranged multipliers as not being out of whack, I cannot see how you can rail about the MgS being too powerful."

LoL.

Seriously.

I'm the one who bought up the MGS in this thread. I've also mentioned numerous times about how I feel that Evasion is uber and broken.

So I guess that makes me railing against both.

What's your point Ranger?

Yesterday I nearly made a post about how I thought we need CB3 (especially with Facebook incoming) as CB2 was so utterly broken, and doesn't really perform to the design wanted (apart from being easier to manipulate, gamewise I mean, not mechanically), that I doubt it can be fixed within its current incarnation.

But I decided against it. Maybe I will...

Evasion, MGS, Ranged Damage, Ex Shots, Junction, RBF, Bonus Times, Ammo Ammounts, Clan Points.

All things off the top of my head I think could and should need to be changed. And I'm sure I've missed stuff out.

GL, I don't think the game is out of whack as all that.... You have to compare it to other games... Warbook? Please. Once I hit level 50 I will be randomly fireballed to the stone age and all fun will be lost. Battle Stations is fun (thanks, JW!) but doesn't have the depth of CB. And nothing has the community.

Yes, things need to be changed, and some of the quagmire is quite intertwined... But I don't think CB can reset itself every time things look a little complex. This game is deep and varied.

I would agree, though, that it would be neat to truly make CB be what CB2 was supposed to start as -- a level playing field. But to do that you would need a lot more than some game dynamic changes. As I have said before, I would be 100% onboard with a restart where there were no transfers (thereby eliminating uber items of all kinds). Then, get the bonus in shape to truly make PR and NW attainable (I still like my straight BA pool idea as opposed to some percentage bonus).

That's a huge leap, though, with the very real risk of having a failed economy and thereby taking away a great part of the community. That's where my idea is too flawed to even try...

Short of that, no reason to start CB3. Just fix what's broken and let things level out on their own. I don't see the advantage of a reset button otherwise.

;) Sute, that's exactly my thoughts. ;)

Thos exmaple (and I missed MTL and WA) are just endemic to the problem.

I'm sure we can tinker and change the things that are out of kilter, to get CB2 working evenly.

But it won't be the level playing field it was designed to be. We'll need a total restart for that. ;)

I'd be totally up for that. A reset across the board, just let us keep our CB-Ts. ;'D

Qualifier - I was agreeing with Sut's proposal. No more transfers.

Agreed with OB, a reset BUT we will have our t-shirts left! ^_^

>Sure, of course, certainly, without a doubt tanks can train evasion just as well >as mages.
>
>However, one cannot dodge a FB, but one can dodge a 200M NW MH, on a >3M dexterity minion. In melee rounds no less.
>
>Give me a skill to dodge a FB that I can pump up, to levels that almost no >amount of NW can penetrate and I will shut up about evasion.

i agree with ranger on this because its true and if u disagree ur wrong

I disagree.

You can get a skill to dodge Fireballs, the moment Fireballs can hit you multiple times.

As long as FB's need a massive NW/xp to hit the new dodging ability, your on!!!!

Then we're just back to my STR zero Physical reduction Shield, and your 60% DD Damage increasing skill.

Also, if you consider dodging two out of four attacks as a 50% damage Reduciton, then a MGS already lets you dodge fireballs.

If you can dodge a wrench, you can dodge a fireball!

homing fireball anyone?

There's no need for a reset and cause 3 years of playing to go into the dust. Yes you say that other games have resets, but they're every 6 months and guess what? They knew it was like it when they signed up. It'll cause many a people to grow into a frenzy about it.