Just a Rant about tanks vs mages (in General)

Sorry, but I'm having to get a rant off my chest then i'll feel better.

I'm starting to think that if you want to try a tank in this game it can work up to a certain point then you need to be a USD spender to have a chance. Without the USD you can't compete with evasion or RoBF evasion effect. If the evasion only made it so the + of my weapon went down that would be one thing, but to give it defensive dex also just makes it where I have 0 shot of hitting people. I currently have 2.3 mil dex and +150 or so with the effect of my ToA on my mageseeker and it's all pointless because with the advantage of evasion in range. I'm probably going to join the ranks of evasion mages or evasion RoBF people soon because there is no other option. I'm already slowing down my growth because of the fact my fight list is down to 6 people and they are -3% to -4% challenge bonus. I just feel that there should be a disclaimer at the beginning of the game.

It should say this. Go mage if you have no intention of adding USD to the game. Go tank if you have the money and desire to buy CB with USD. Anyone here that thinks I'm wrong try to prove it. The only tanks competing at the top are huge nw weapons. I add to my bow as fast as I can earn the money and it just doesn't keep up with the evasions out there.

Ok I'm done ranting. Thanks for taking the time to read thru this and any comments would be great. Hopefully comments that can help me not have to switch to mage or RoBF user as I love being a tank, but don't see how I can do it :)

i agree, but which came first the usd weapons or the evasion. they are but two sides of the same coin.

Maybe they are, but to make a skill specifically to counter a USD weapon basically means that if you don't have a USD weapon you can't compete. I understand the argument that somehow people should be able to beat a USD spender, but making it so that a specific type of char... The whole tank side of things.. is only available to USD spenders is a bit overboard. Evasion can be trained and doesn't need an influx of usd to make it viable and to make it viable against the USD weapons out there, but now what does that do to non-USD spenders. It leaves them with nothing to do but follow the group and go mage and use evasion also. Personally I think that the only way to beat USD is with USD. So if you want to beat a USD weapon you would need just as much USD added to some item to get the effec that will neutralize it. Yes that means there are basically 2 sets of people in the game. USD and non-USD, but isn't that really how it is. Only difference now is there is USD/evasion mage and then everyone else. Maybe that's just me though.

It's probably fairly cheap to upgrade your arrows to +2 or +3. With the naming, that will give you an effective 162 pth on your bow. It doesn't help with the unbalance you're pointing out, but it may help you keep up with people's evasions which you just recently stopped hitting.

i would hate to see usd being the only counter to usd. i would much rather see all transfers between players killed off so that usd is not an option. most likely though, neither will happen and we will have to make do with what we have.

evasion and robf really don't allow people to win against usd. it just lets us hang up at the top and not be beaten on so much. i think what you are looking at now though may be the worse case scenario. as we have more people come into the game, many will not be willing or able to invest real cash into virtual items and there will be more at the top that are normal players.

in the past people have gotten here, seen you cannot compete and quit or made ncb's. a few do stay at the top stubbornly banging their heads against the wall of cash.

Yeah, unless there was a spell called "Quicksand"...then again, you would still need an enchanter on your team to combat evasion, etc...woah where did that come from?

The evasions he can't hit are coming from N*Bs and it will be impossible to keep up with them at any rate...

Evasion is quite powerful... I can't say it is too overpowered, but maybe the defensive DX portion needs to be scaled back a bit... or increase the ranged multipliers and reduce its actual effect, so it can do it's job (countering massive ranged damage), without obliterating all tanks in general...

Well, we all know why it is the way it is...it's to give 'he is to remain nameless' and unfair advantage.

"Anyone here that thinks I'm wrong try to prove it. The only tanks competing at the top are huge nw weapons."

Tanks without USD will always result in Failure :P

dudemus said it best.

To sum it up, you need to ask yourself if you want to spend USD.

If the answer is no, make sure your main damage dealer uses a DD spell.

If the answer is yes, a tank as the main damage dealer is your best choice because you can make it as powerful as you like (well... almost).

In response to upgrading ammo. Yes I could upgrade ammo and keep up with a few for a short time, but at what point would I have to stop the upgrade.. like freed and hit +30 ... that would cost me more per day in arrows than I make. Unless I started fighting with 1 set of base ammo against non evasion people and +30 ammo for evasion. I could do that, It would cost me all my profit probably and end up stoping my bow upgrades. So it still boggs down. Sooner or later they would pass me and the upgraded ammo would be useless as my bow.

Then if that is true talion. Then someone needs to add that to the help section. Or even in the tutorial. So when a person like me starts the game and is asked by their mentor which do you want to be a mage or tank they don't decide tank when they know they won't be able to compete later with it.

That's my biggest gripe. I have done everything with this character to try to be a tank and now I have hit the point where I realise it won't happen and if I would have known from the start maybe I could have made a mage with evasion and done better, but now I have to take many steps back to try to make my character work, because it is starting to show it can't work as a tank.

Soxjr, you are free to update the Wiki anytime you wish to.

But I think it is just part of the CB2 learning process.

I was advised not to use a tank by my original mentor, but I wasn't ready to accept the advice yet. I spent my NUB and my first 2 NCB on tank strategies (the last one being a UC tank backed by a RBF EC enchanter).

Now I have learned my lesson and I am going with a DD damage dealer.

Live and learn... Live and learn.

How do the people who agree with Soxir think that my main character fares at this moment?

once you are into 6/20, I think any build is viable. including 4 AS enchanter with a base familiar!! (just hit low, really low)
I am really hoping tank can be viable near top. *finger crossed* so I don't need to retrain. Or borrow money to hire extra minions to bridge that gap?

Hmm... So you say no tank near the top can win or remain near the top without USD? I beg to differ... I can see one tank near the top... who is currently using a Robf but tends to change his tat alot. And While I was a tank I could beat him sometimes...

I have no USD invested in this game besides my Supporter items that I have bought... I have also beaten Ranger without the influx of USD...

It all depends on how well you strategize and how you build and change with what Jon gives you. More minions = more kill slots... Certain strats to combat others also helps in the USD war... You can't expect one strat to destroy everything unless you have a huge MPR advantage, huge Tat, and huge USD investment... otherwise it will always be rock, paper, scissors.

Your posts turned from a Tank vs. Mage rant into a Usd vs. Evasion rant... Evasion does need some tweaking... but then it is a skill that everyone can use... but wait, mages bypass evasion without as much as a twitch... guess there are ways around certain things. My Evasion is the largest in the game... and yet I am happy with my Exp investment and cbd investment on my Elven gears... I still get hit by USD weapons but thats something I have lived with ever since I started my slow run for the top.

I have slowly but surely rose through the ranks... aimed for the top... and I have strategized with some of the best... but even I know that I may not have a chance vs. some folks... mostly because they are More intelligent and better equipped for the long run. I.E. Money to invest in the game and the strategic knowledge to destroy any strat I put together. If you are having problems competing where you are... try new things... test different tats... there is always a wall that you will hit with certain strats... so roll with the punches and come out swinging ^_^

Sox -Your character is very strong for a 1 minion guy. I think if you would give him some help with another minion your frustration with the slow progress would subside. Patience friend. I do agree with you about having a VERY large weapon and not being able to hit someone once in 25 rounds!!Something wrong with that picture.

Soxjr wrote:

I'm already slowing down my growth because of the fact my fight list is down to 6 people and they are -3% to -4% challenge bonus. I just feel that there should be a disclaimer at the beginning of the game.


Your char is 2 mil score; so you'll naturally possess negative challenge bonus because the only ones above you are the really top chars who will be quite a challenge. But, you must already be in 7/20, which means you receive much the same compensation as you used to previously with 100 pc challenge bonuses.

At least that's what I have found with my char. At 2 mil score, the top of my fight-list is 0 pc bonus, and downwards is all negative bonuses, but the rewards I'm getting are as good as I used to get with 100 pc bonuses.

everyones mages now.....create a ncb and see O_O

I used USD in CB1; but when Jon announced CB2 I felt a bit stupid spending money that was just going to disappear that I decided not to in CB2. So I haven't. Namings I've gotten by paying other people; weapons and items by my fight rewards or in my current situation a pretty large loan. Big enough that I'm going to be paying it off for the next 4 or 5 months.

I'm not doing badly on it. OK, so I use evasion, but I'm also adding RBF/Evasion minions to my fightlist and still getting 30 or 40% challenge bonuses.

But that will slow; growth does slow over time. But if you invest intelligently so do weapons, with the opportunity to grow at a quicker pace than the XP based stats you're up against.

I wouldn't give up hope; be patient and stick with it would be my advice. You've done amazingly well as a single archer, starting from scratch as a NUB. In fact one of the best runs from NUB we've seen.

You_don't_need_USD_to_compete.

"You've done amazingly well as a single archer, starting from scratch as a NUB. In fact one of the best runs from NUB we've seen."

What bothers me is that -STILL-, even after an NUB adjustment, some of the best runs end up well under 1/2 Ranger's MPR.

And still, there is that bothersome score barrier, as well.

How long until rolling bonuses?

hiring a minion would help to break the monotony a bit. to add one minion to a team like yours and actually make a difference though is tricky... The only options that keep with your current strat are mage wall, or PL guy... perhaps a DM enchanter, but that's iffy...

One option could be to get a minion, train full AMF, drop the ToA and DM from your tank, replace with EC, TSA, and MgS (or BoM...), pump DX (with DM's XP), and go RoBF (might not be so useful against mages from the get-go due to low XP to spend on AMF from the hired minion. Training straight HP instead of AMF could be another solution to this...).

Another is to hire a Junction/AS enchanter, making the same gear switches i mentioned above, but using a DD familiar... as opposed to RoBF

Both of these will probably cost you your earnings for the next 3-6 months... But they get around evasion by offering a new type of damage ouput used in conjunction with your current archer. You will lose out on some ST/DX without the ToA (and some pth >.<), but you should still have more than enough to hit all minions without a good investment in evasion, allowing your alternate damage sources to pick up the slack... In either case, you will be weak against high evasion minions with a bigger RoBF than your own, and archers with USD-feuled bows...

excellent point ob, rolling bonuses would equalize so many of the imbalances in the game. if usd allows some to grow faster, then the rolling bonus each of us gets would increase as well to compensate. maybe i am missing something, but is there a downside to rolling bonuses for all?

"You_don't_need_USD_to_compete."

I like this line ^_^
It's very true. Little Devil, Atomicboy, PoisoN, DrAcO, and many others have proven this time and again... Even I've made top 10 with two different characters (Once even got to 6th :D)... Ranger, edy, NS, Mikel, and most others near the top with a good amount of money spent on CB would still be damn competative without their USD, as they don't lead just because of their massive net worths, they do so with solidly built chars.

USD is like steroids... Yep... it helps. But it doesn't remove the need for skill one iota.

"It's very true. Little Devil, Atomicboy, PoisoN, DrAcO, and many others have proven this time and again."

The use of rentals and having a clanmate or buddy with USD backed weapons does help.

However, if there was no USD in CB, I doubt more then 25% of players would be tanks. With evasion as it is now. But then again, if there was no USD, would evasion need to be as it is.

A vicious circle it seems.

if there was no USD intrusion, I do not believe evasion would be changed to what it is now :P Please do remember evasion had a sucky upgrade curve when it's first introduced

I thought Evasion was changed to what it is now because of ToA PTH...looks like I was wrong there, since the latter's been changed and the former hasn't.

Maybe Jon's looking to reduce ranged damage before he fixes Evasion? /shrug

We're talking about USD like it's used on 95% of tanks. How many people actually use USD? 5 or 6? Seriously, if there was a change based off 5 or 6 people, that's just silly.

Flamey, 8:43 PM EST
"We're talking about USD like it's used on 95% of tanks. How many people actually use USD? 5 or 6? Seriously, if there was a change based off 5 or 6 people, that's just silly."

And Flamey hit the nail right on the head... So we have 5-6 people that use USD on their tanks... how many people have used USD on their mages... or anything else for that matter... So don't strive for the top... strive for the top 20 thats a nice starting goal... if you set your goals for Ranger and his USD tank/Robf then you are setting yourself up for failure... And if your not willing to log in enough to burn 99% of your BA then your wasting your time trying to hit the top 10.

Me personally I took about 8-10 months off and forged my own gear to get me to where I am... I also bought bigger mpr chars when I could to keep up with the big guys... Now don't forget that most of us in the top 20 had to work hard for where we are now... I was stuck in that slump of 7/20 for the longest time as well... but I did what I could and worked on my equipment... waiting for that moment where I could rise to 6/20 and give everyone here a run for their money.

the difference is, you bought a character that got there with a bonus.

I think forgers should get experience from forging or add to their forging ability as a whole somehow. Woah, where did that one come from!? (Of course, what I think has no bearing on anything and never will)

Ok, I'm just bored.

Yes but look at NS... He took a char all the way through his NCB with an Roe and is still using one... He has already taken higher mpr than I, but he continues to use the Roe instead of a tattoo. Anyone can do this... its just most people rely on a tattoo to fight with... if those in 7/20 used an Roe to fight up then they would break 6/20 sooner than it would take buying a char. Yes I do feel that you get a choice of higher mpr or higher tattoo... but those that have been here long enough should already have a decent Tat to fight with once they hit 2 mil mpr or so.

been using a RoE for 3 months, starting at 50% of Ranger's MPR, now at 55%, now this is only because he hasn't trained in ages, when he does, it'll be down to 52-53%

"However, if there was no USD in CB, I doubt more then 25% of players would be tanks. With evasion as it is now. But then again, if there was no USD, would evasion need to be as it is. "

this is exactly why when people say to fix cb we need to nerf ranged damage and tone down evasion, i like to add to that a weapon cap. i understand that the uber weapons are aberrations, but if we ignore those then the game will be ruled by the aberrations and others will emulate them.

:) oh dear everyone is complaining about evasion again :) well... 1st off soxjr i have been advocating you sticking out with the single minion for a long long time... there are actually a few things you can do...
1st upgrade your PTH on your weapon to 134 to maximize your naming bonus
2nd insta up your tattoo or something (have a feeling its pretty small)
3rd name your tattoo if you cant insta it
4th trade in your bow for a melee weapon and switch archery to evasion
5th ask around and see what challenge bonus the people around you are getting (would make you feel better)

P.S. evasion is used by both tank teams and mage teams... but somehow mages + evasion seems to be what everyone is ticked off about... :) i mean look at freed (before he bought a minion)

super P.S. stay single minion or im so gona chop your head off ;)

i would like to add a 6th point... perhaps you should try fighting without some of your equipment... streamline your targets... might give you higher challenge bonus...
7th point (name everything)

A Tattoo of Augmentation lvl 2,938,617

The point about my tat being small.. I think you are mistaken. I have a top 30 tat last I checked. Not top 30 ToA, but top 30 tat in lvl. A lot of the things here are correct, but a lot also take a lot of cb to accomplish. Naming all my gear, that's about 6 mil or more, getting to +134. What do you think I"m doing, every chance I get 300k or more I add another +, but that's about 3 to 5 days of working, buying cb to get 300k, so it takes a lot of time. Don't get me wrong I'm not expecting to jump right there or be the top, but the point I started with in this rant was that I have no way to compete against some of the evasions and other things at the top without usd, if I plan on moving up. I can be stuck right here at 2 mil score and my pr and mpr keep going up and soon passing my score like most everyone else. The problem is I do think some of evasion was changed because of the damage output of the USD weapons. If the change was made without those then it was a way overpowered change. I have no chance to hit a person that even USD weapons can't hit.. EVER... Yes there are a lot of things I can do to my char and I probably will do them soon. This post wasn't to complain or demand change. I just wanted to vent off frustration because I feel that the time of me trying to make my mageseeker solo archer work has come as far as it can go. Maybe I'm wrong and I'll stick it out and be pigheaded and see if I can make it work and maybe I'll take the easy road and go mage with some evasion and a tat that helps blow stuff up. I don't know, but really this was just frustration of thinking that my time as a tank was over because I just don't see myself having the cb means to continue it. That's all. Thanks for all the great posts.

"Yes but look at NS... He took a char all the way through his NCB with an Roe and is still using one..."

Look at the NW on NS... please. Look at how high his items are ranked... please.

Although NS spends USD, but spends it to make profit. I doubt that he lost any money playing CB, but he does not hesitate to spend USD when profit is to be made. NS is not a good example.

"NS is not a good example."

Just to clarify, this means he is not a good example of a non-USD spender or low NW strategy user.

As an RoBF user, I definitely feel for your soxjir. I found out today that I can beat you about 50% of the time, even with you using a 2.9mil toa... My evasion is at 2.7mil level after boost. It is definitely a ridiculous skill. Hopefully you can still pick your targets though, ie mages without as much exp to concentrate into evasion. I know even this is difficult because you still have a very low chance of hitting in round 1 and 2. One can only go so far with one minion. Maybe it's time to add more and reconsider your strategy (which costs an astronomical amount of money, that you don't have). I don't see the current game dynamic being fixed very soon so you might be forced to adapt.

perhaps low in comparison to your max tatt :)
Max Tattoo Level: 3,595,922
and i was stating it might be more cost effective to name your BGs then upgrading the X on your bow :) just pointing out

More damage isn't gonna help if he can't hit. Of course, keep in mind that BG adds 7%+ per point to damage so it's a good idea if he's lacking the extra oomph. Whoever hits their max tatt anymore... A 2.9mil tatt is enough to make me green with envy. That's not something money can buy even because there is no supply.

I personally would like to see:

1) Rolling bonus. The current method does not take into account people leaving the game for RL issues, internet downtime, or just taking a break from online gaming for a while.

A rolling type bonus would let people take time off and then if they want to jump back in, have a chance at a top character (MPRwise).

Make it quick to about 1/2 MPR and then slow down but still help catch up.

2) Weapon cap. It would let people upgrade weapons to a point. Likely above the point of a similar DD spell, to give tanks a small advantage for spending money, but something to prevent the uber weapons out there from functioning at a godly level.

Then the effect of USD would be vastly reduced. One can still upgrade that corn to +11 from +12 for 9M CB2, but it will not likely change many battle outcomes. Armor still has a prohibitive upgrade cost past a certain level.

Something like a cap based on MPR for the x and + on both missile and melee weapons. Tanks wanting both can but have to spend CB2 to get there.

3) Non-upgradeable ammo. A cheap way to get massive PTH. In conjunction with (2) above.

Then things like evasion and damage can be better balanced.

These are my three top requests, in order, for the future of CB.

well he was adding x to his bow :)

I find it interesting, Ranger, that you oppose ammo upgrades. What other way is there to combat evasion?

It really should not be the way to beat evasion.

But if Jon wants tanks to spend more money on upgraded ammo and less upgrading their weapons, so be it.