Jon/NS Please fix this extremely broken item... (in General)

I've been using A Bolt of Nether [4x5500] (+150) for a decent while now, and I just can't help shake how dirty I feel. The exbow change awhile back was a change that I feel was almost personal.

I was the only person in the game with a huge exbow on an enchanter, (and that enchanter was owning face.) Whining ensued and bam the exbow was changed to prevent that "abuse"

But the problem with the exbow wasn't fixed. (At all.)

What was implemented was more of a temporary fix, and really doesn't prevent the same abuse from happening (at all)

For a mere 91 million investment, and NOMINAL XP investment (500k to 1m STR is plenty) This bow STILL in one hit completely kills most tanks... (Yes I currently have 4m str on my tank, but I was achieving the same drain for every tank besides ranger at 500k str)

Point being: The top two tanks in the game... (Unless I'm mistaken) (Yes I realize I cannot beat Zenai's tank, but this isn't due to the exbow, this is do to the exbow being unable to hit him consistently)

Ranger's tank:
Hit Points: 11,359,631
Armor: 165
Strength: 6,880,000
Dexterity: 3,416,000
Archery
Net Worth: $421,759,697
The Lunatic [6x22000] (+220) worth $279,856,085 owned by QBRanger (Heroes)

In a few hits, all that investment is GONE... Completely... GONE... (Granted I have to use EC to hit Ranger's tank due to his large DBS, but it doesn't change the effect the bow is achieving..)

The Legend of Jiraiya defeated Heroes (Battle Royale) after 12 rounds of combat

Ranged Combat
RAISE hit Dog with A Bolt of Nether [179682]
Dog looks weaker!
Hal struck deep into Check [554745]
Hal skewered Check [360024]
Hal struck deep into Check [547190]
Hal skewered Check [359716]
Hal cries "I can't let you do that, Dave!"
Dog skewered Check with The Lunatic [469167]
Dog skewered Check with The Lunatic [298660]
Dog cries "Ha Ha Charade You Are!"
Dog regenerated 179,682 HP
R.I.P. Check, Check

RAISE shot Hal with A Bolt of Nether [272135]
Hal looks weaker!
RAISE hit Hal with A Bolt of Nether [250996]
Hal hit RAISE [21]
Hal shot RAISE [13]
Hal hit RAISE [57]
Dog shot RAISE with The Lunatic [289128]
RAISE regenerated 90,000 HP

RAISE's shot went wide of Dog
Hal hit RAISE [87]
Hal shot RAISE [54]
Hal shot RAISE [21]
Dog shot RAISE with The Lunatic [337084]
RAISE regenerated 90,000 HP

RAISE hit Dog with A Bolt of Nether [241729]
Dog looks weaker!
Hal hit RAISE [24]
Hal hit RAISE [103]
Hal hit RAISE [100]
Dog shot RAISE with The Lunatic [529]
RAISE regenerated 90,000 HP Dog regenerated 241,729 HP

RAISE shot Hal with A Bolt of Nether [247375]
RAISE shot Hal with A Bolt of Nether [246563]
RAISE shot Hal with A Bolt of Nether [264635]
Hal shot RAISE [31]
Hal shot RAISE for no damage
Hal hit RAISE [96]
Dog shot RAISE with The Lunatic [235]
Dog hit RAISE with The Lunatic [364]
RAISE regenerated 90,000 HP

RAISE shot Hal with A Bolt of Nether [222856]
RAISE hit Hal with A Bolt of Nether [247310]
RAISE shot Hal with A Bolt of Nether [250266]
Hal shot RAISE [51]
Hal hit RAISE [137]
Hal hit RAISE [120]
Dog shot RAISE with The Lunatic [467]
Dog shot RAISE with The Lunatic [399]
RAISE regenerated 90,000 HP

Granted it's not a complete reduction to Ranger's tank in one hit due to his excessivly large HP, but lets look at the number 2 tank in the game...

Vectoidz:
Hit Points: 8,855,346
Armor: 24
Strength: 9,389,099
Dexterity: 4,396,436
Archery
Net Worth: $387,725,128
DMON BOW OF POWER [6x13000] (+281) worth $300,803,887 owned by Dark Dreky (Vectoidz)


The Legend of Jiraiya defeated Vectoidz (Hidden Agenda) after 13 rounds of combat.

Ranged Combat
RAISE's shot went wide of Hot
Hot struck deep into Check with DMON BOW OF POWER [1246020]
Hot skewered Check with DMON BOW OF POWER [1559771]
Hot struck deep into Check with DMON BOW OF POWER [1514730]
Hot struck deep into Check with DMON BOW OF POWER [1468704]
Hot cries "chow-bye!"
R.I.P. Check

RAISE hit Hot with A Bolt of Nether [199289]
Hot looks weaker!
Dog absorbs damage [10931]
Super undershot Check
Hot shot Check with DMON BOW OF POWER [562]
Hot hit Check with DMON BOW OF POWER [364]
Hot hit Check with DMON BOW OF POWER [573]
Hot shot Check with DMON BOW OF POWER [551]
Hot shot Check with DMON BOW OF POWER [353]

RAISE's shot ricocheted near Hot
Super overshot Check
Hot shot Check with DMON BOW OF POWER [429]
Hot hit Check with DMON BOW OF POWER [524]
Hot shot Check with DMON BOW OF POWER [480]
Hot hit Check with DMON BOW OF POWER [545]
Hot hit Check with DMON BOW OF POWER [575]

RAISE shot Hot with A Bolt of Nether [306206]
Dog absorbs damage [10931]
Super's shot ricocheted near Check
Hot shot Check with DMON BOW OF POWER [583]
Hot hit Check with DMON BOW OF POWER [523]
Hot hit Check with DMON BOW OF POWER [361]
Hot hit Check with DMON BOW OF POWER [541]
Hot shot Check with DMON BOW OF POWER [429]

RAISE shot Hot with A Bolt of Nether [270264]
Dog absorbs damage [10931]
Super overshot Check
Hot hit Check with DMON BOW OF POWER [555]
Hot hit Check with DMON BOW OF POWER [442]
Hot hit Check with DMON BOW OF POWER [379]
Hot hit Check with DMON BOW OF POWER [516]
Hot shot Check with DMON BOW OF POWER [566]

RAISE shot Hot with A Bolt of Nether [228021]
Dog absorbs damage [10931]
Super undershot Check
Hot struck deep into Check with DMON BOW OF POWER [378]
Hot struck deep into Check with DMON BOW OF POWER [553]
Hot struck deep into Check with DMON BOW OF POWER [578]
Hot struck deep into Check with DMON BOW OF POWER [476]
Hot skewered Check with DMON BOW OF POWER [360]

1 hit = game over... as is the case with most of my fight list...
It's still too powerful, The Damage/HP ratio was at best a temporary fix, and I don't see it working for the simple fact that it's too tangible... Hp can be increased/decreased too easily, investment can improve damage too easily.

I opt that the Exbow be fixed now as opposed to later, because with what I've got planned I KNOW in my heart a hotfix will happen and I would rather the problem be addressed now so that the fix isn't a hasty one.

There are lots of options regarding the exbow... I know a few people are going to /facepalm this thread, but I assure you those people have large exbows themselves.

I will offer only one possible Fix... Have the Exbow drain the + from opponents equal to the + on the exbow... Which still might be too powerful, but at least it would be a step in the right direction.

Discuss...

For the sake of argument: (And so Zenai doesn't feel left out!)

Zenai:
Hit Points: 3,941,916
Armor: 72
Strength: 13,288,966
Dexterity: 6,891,373
Archery, Dispel Magic
Net Worth: $351,239,548
Chainfire of Truth [6x30000] (+0) worth $233,946,277 owned by Zenai (FuerGrissa ost Drauka)


The Legend of Jiraiya defeated FuerGrissa ost Drauka (The Knighthood II) after 8 rounds of combat

Ranged Combat
RAISE overshot Richard Rahl
Richard Rahl skewered Check with Chainfire of Truth [1788961]
Richard Rahl struck deep into Check with Chainfire of Truth [2778084]
Richard Rahl struck deep into Check with Chainfire of Truth [1842200]
Richard Rahl cries "In the End Truth is All!!"
R.I.P. Check

RAISE hit Richard Rahl with A Bolt of Nether [225366]
Richard Rahl looks weaker!
Richard Rahl hit Check with Chainfire of Truth [769]
Richard Rahl shot Check with Chainfire of Truth [835]
Richard Rahl hit Check with Chainfire of Truth [724]

RAISE undershot Richard Rahl
Richard Rahl shot Check with Chainfire of Truth [796]
Richard Rahl shot Check with Chainfire of Truth [743]
Richard Rahl shot Check with Chainfire of Truth [757]
Richard Rahl shot Check with Chainfire of Truth [608]

RAISE hit Richard Rahl with A Bolt of Nether [219193]
Richard Rahl hit Check with Chainfire of Truth [650]
Richard Rahl hit Check with Chainfire of Truth [673]
Richard Rahl shot Check with Chainfire of Truth [653]
Richard Rahl hit Check with Chainfire of Truth [599]

RAISE shot Richard Rahl with A Bolt of Nether [200976]
Richard Rahl hit Check with Chainfire of Truth [902]
Richard Rahl shot Check with Chainfire of Truth [629]
Richard Rahl hit Check with Chainfire of Truth [572]
Richard Rahl struck deep into Check with Chainfire of Truth [826]
Richard Rahl cries "In the End Truth is All!!"
R.I.P. Check

RAISE undershot Richard Rahl
Richard Rahl hit RAISE with Chainfire of Truth [318]
Richard Rahl hit RAISE with Chainfire of Truth [298]
Richard Rahl hit RAISE with Chainfire of Truth [403]
RAISE regenerated 1,019 HP

I saw this coming.

*strolls along*

If this is "working as intended" that's fine too. I would just opt for the inevitable nerf hammer now as opposed to later so that I can plan accordingly...

I completely agree. At the very least, spread out the drain curve. The fix to make it be based off the target's HP was actually an OK idea (though STR might be better to use), but once the exbow damage starts reaching the point where it drains, it still drains it all. That doesn't make sense. If a function has been put in place to represent different levels of drain (and to make sure anything below a certain amount of damage drains practically nothing), why not spread that drain out?

The low end is fine...any damage below 10% of the target's HP (or whatever) should still do nothing. But don't have a 15-20% damage hit drain it all. Spread it out:

10% damage and below = no drain
15% damage = 10% drain
20% damage = 20% drain
25% damage = 30% drain
30% damage = 40% drain
40% damage = 50% drain

And cap it there. That way, successive hits still do more and more drain (assuming the target isn't regenerating HP).

Make the curve whatever you want, but:

-- Still have slight hits do no drain.
-- Spread out the damage/drain curve.
-- Cap the max drain. I don't care if you make the cap as large as 75%, at least that would mean it would take a couple hits to completely nullify a tank instead of one. I think 40% or 50% is even more reasonable.

Anyone else care to weigh in?

I still say we need a strong counter to a strong strat. The ex does one thing and it does it well. Without it there is nothing holding back the DM Archer. With it they actually have to invest in defense (dbs).

Sut: a tank with 12m STR does around 100k with a nearly x3000 ex... it will never approach 40% of target HP.

third posts the charm...

X-Wing shot Hal with wooden cane [196323] a bit more than 100k.

Make the exbow and axbow 5 modifier instead of 4, and make them work as follows:

The exbow drains target's + for each + on the exbow, and 25% of str if the damage is over 3% of target's remaining HP...

The axbow drains target's X for each X on the axbow, and 25% of dex if the damage is over 3% of target's remaining HP...

or something to that effect...

Still a hard counter to tanks, without being TOO over the top...

- Flat 1/33 stat drain off the top.
- 20 drain for each x on the crossbow
- Small % drain based on damage inflicted.

There it is.

a x5000 ex would drain 100k str + 1/33 + whatever "small" is... how is that even remotely useful?

Nov, I kept saying "or whatever" in my post -- I don't know the numbers. That, however, has nothing to do with widening the curve.

Choose whatever numbers you like, just widen it out. What is the point of saying a 2% hit drains nothing and a 3% hit drains 100%. That's silly and binary.

Jiraiya,

I'm glad you made this post. I don't think it will change much, but I still think it's nice.

But you're also one of the reasons I'm glad I went with a three-pronged attack team. You can consistently eliminate my tank, but my other guys clean you out. :)

if they had more dex, would that help them?

is this a trade off for the, throw more xp into strength to get uber damage numbers?

Um yay? I was ExBowed!!!.....lol Yes in some ways I totally Agree a better fix "Should" be implemented. Ranger myself and a few others said the same thing when the Change first happened. Althought adittedly we were all glad that at least something happened. If someone would pull that link back up and filter out some of the better ideas from that thread it would be beneficial to this on I think.

Yes,

It is a very stupid item.

I know tanks can use DBs to protect themselves, HOWEVER, one needs to take into account Leadership in the fact ones DBs can never really take away all the negative PTH one can accumulate.

My DBs are +30 over novice's exbow and yet I get hit due to leadership more than 50% of the time.

And I have more than a 2:1 dexterity advantage.

When it takes just 1 hit to drain most of a tanks strength, and all of a HF's strength, how exactly does that help the game?

If archers are so all powerful, then do something else.

But archers do have a great foil, GA. It eats me alive.

And to have a high enough DM I would need a lot more MPR.

Even Sut, with all his DM, would not have a minion large enough to use my ELB under ENC load without a ToA. And the ToA has negatives associated with it.

So let us please, pretty please finally fix this item.

Or give me a missile salvage yard to change to a SoD, which obviously nobody believes is all powerful like the ELB.

Or better yet, give me a mage seeking xbow that does the exact same thing as the exbow!!!

"Or better yet, give me a mage seeking xbow that does the exact same thing as the exbow!!!"

OK, so the Mage would get DB versus PTH (with your point about Leadership/ToA still standing).

What about DEX hits? One hit from DEX (which the Mage can do nothing about) would drain then entire DD in one hit.

At least Tanks can play the DEX versus DEX battle...

so if they trained more dex and less strength it would help against this?

"a x5000 ex would drain 100k str + 1/33 + whatever "small" is... how is that even remotely useful?"

I've explained this several times before.

A crossbow should NOT deal 100% stat drain easily. Certainly not in one hit. Not even by the end of ranged in my opinion.

It should drain enough stat to -reduce- the offensive power of a tank by the time melee hits. It should NOT neuter a tank entirely by melee round one.

Weakening the crossbows in this way is exactly what I am trying to do here. This is, in a way, a form of offensive damage reduction rather than removing one minion's attack capability from the battle entirely.

Now for the numbers:
Take a 5,000,000 strength opponent vs. your x5000 Exbow example.
5,000,000 * 1/33 = 151,515
5000 * 20 = 100,000
(assuming damage of 100,000) * 50% = 50,000

151515 + 100000 + 50000 = 301515
..but because I hate uneven numbers, let's round it down to 300,000

Assuming a single hit on all five rounds of melee:
300000 + 5 = 1,500,000
This of course increases with multiple hits.

5000000 - 1500000 = 3,500,000

Yes, that looks to me like "weakening" a tank and not rendering it helpless at the end of ranged, which is where I've ALWAYS been going with this.

Now of course, if you want to weaken the opposing minion further, you can always do what I do and keep a dedicated Exbow user during melee, stripping the tank of it's offense throughout the battle instead of just in ranged.

And once again, these are sample numbers here. I wouldn't be opposed to strengthening it a wee, tiny bit, but not back up to tank neutering levels.

I think it might actually be bugged...

140k is around 2.5% of my tanks HP

RAISE shot X-Wing with A Bolt of Nether [136899]
X-Wing looks weaker!
Master Yoda absorbs damage [136899]
RAISE hit X-Wing with A Bolt of Nether [215469]
Master Yoda absorbs damage [215469]

Then you disagree with everyone who says that we need a strong counter against massively powerful ranged... and that's fine but it's an outsider perspective.

LB, that's still too weak when you wont survive until the end of ranged... 8m damage a round is what you're looking at with your formula...

Your first minion would die round one, and you would reduce Ranger's str by 350k? 7.9m damage the next round would still own your face :(

I understand that some ranged damage is still too powerful.

However, completely destroying an entire minion type's offensive power is not the correct solution.

*coughelvenshieldthatreducesrangeddamagebyonepercentper+cough*

/me looks at this thread... sighs... walks alone... only saying: multiple damage types, no real PTH counter?

Thank you, I'm out.

We do not need a PTH drainer. We have DBs and Evasion, which was thankfully toned down to where it needs to be.

We have a Dex drainer in the Assassin's Crossbow. We do not need anything else - at all - that cuts into a tank's accuracy.

Cap EXBow drain to 40% of ST per round. End of story.

Hard caps are rather un-CB like.

You mean unlike the complete randomness that is the new and wonderful drop system?

Yeah, I don't think history means much at this point.

Fair.

Bah, not really... You are right, hard caps aren't really the way. But specialty exbows are already different, so maybe a hard cap on the drain could work... Lots of water under the bridge.

Nov, I'd be pushing myself to the front of the line to say we need a strong counter to Archers. We definietly do.

Thing is, the XBow in that role is then too powerful versus Melee Tanks. If we keep it as the counter for Ranged, then we need to vastly lessen its impact versus Melee orientated Tanks.

As to what GL said,

You could just have each bow with a decaying effect?

As in, think of it like a poison bolt shooting crossbow, each poison (Assassin's/Enforcer's) reducing a different stat.

So what you would structure it as would be a sort of thing where each hit with the bow, based on it's damage, would give a certain drain to your target's stat. For ease of math, let's say it reduces their stat by exactly 100% per hit.

So if you hit an opponent in the first round, they'd go down to 0 strength for that round.

But the next round, the poison fades from their body, bringing them up to 20% of their total strength (Or 1/5th of the effect of the drain fades) With this, they gain a 10% immunity to the effect (The poison, get it?)

So for the next round, the blow would reduce them again, but only down to a minimum of 10% of their original stat.

And every round you gain back 1/5th of the effect, and gain 1/10th of an immunity, making the bow effectively worthless by round 10, and weakening as the fight goes on.

These numbers should OBVIOUSLY be tinkered with, but I thought it made a lot of sense. Consider it the reverse of DD scaling, as in it gets weaker instead of stronger as the fight progresses.



As a comment, you could look at this in two ways. 1) Consider the poison just a justification for my idea. 2) Consider the poison an introduction of a new aspect of play, with skills/enchantments/items that could mitigate or enhance the effects (Or add it to a weapon. Think of this. A Vorpal Blade with it's current effect AND with a poison that slowly dissolved armor, 1.5% per hit.)

Just an idea. Poorly thought out, obviously, but I liked the idea myself. And it seemed to suit what the Ex/Ax were designed for, but limited their "HAHA YOU GOT SHUTDOWN BY AN ITEM" feel.

"Thing is, the XBow in that role is then too powerful versus Melee Tanks. If we keep it as the counter for Ranged, then we need to vastly lessen its impact versus Melee orientated Tanks."

Um, yes please. Speaking as somebody who walks a fine line between being ranged based and melee based that would work just fine for me. Cheers. ;)

Having it Decay might be an answer, but it would be difficult then not making the special XBows useless in Melee (and the only items in CB as such).

I understand that for Ranged, it needs to hit close to the start of Ranged to have any effect, and hit for a lot of reduction.

But that then just gives it 6 odd rounds to neuter Melee capability (in only a single hit needed) before Melee starts.

Maybe we need something else to counter Archers (and anti Ranged damage Shield?), and not try to crowbar the special XBows into that role.

"Cap EXBow drain to 40% of ST per round. End of story."

Still doesn't stop it having 'free' rounds to neuter Melee though.

Oh the problems that having seperate Ranged and Melee rounds. ;)

"Still doesn't stop it having 'free' rounds to neuter Melee though."

Well, it could get capped to just 20% max drain in ranged rounds against characters with a melee weapon but no ranged weapon... then go back to being capped at 80% once melee starts to compensate for the PTH/DX loss... characters with a ranged weapon would suffer for up to 40% drain in ranged rounds and same 40% once they get to melee :)

There are three counters to the exbow that tanks can use, I think the reason they are unpopular is the all or nothing nature of the ex.

AC can lower damage to the point where it doesn't do enough damage to drain significant amounts

EC can keep it from doing any damage period (really helpful against low str chanter tanks)

DB keep the ex from hitting at all completely preventing it from working for even the largest of tanks (mine!)

--

I think it's reasonable to ask tanks to invest in defense, mages have had to spend hundreds of millions of CB not to be slaughtered by AMF and bows, why should tanks be exempt? Hard caps on drain will make it useless as a counter, cutting a tanks str in half doesn't come close to cutting damage in half. I do think the recent buff/nerf (more buff than nerf as far as I'm concerned) needs adjusting, but allowing tanks to continue to focus solely on offense isn't balanced either.

Increase the percentage of HP required for "normal" drain (which is still very binary, a x5000 ex drains my 13m str in one hit 140-200k damage against my 5.5m HP) to say 10%, forcing people to actually up the damn things.

Novice is 100% correct in that there are counters to the exhow as he stated.

However, x5k is large enough on a decent str tank to drain over 13M strength in 1 hit.

Nothing in CB is as +/- as this.

I would not care if I were hit from another archer 2 or 3 times, however, getting hit 1 time from an exbow scares the crud out of my tank.

While mages do have to worry about AMF and "huge" bows, one has to think about 1 hit decimating a tank.

Nothing, I mean nothing does that to a mage. 1 hit = essential death.

That I still cannot wrap my mind around it being fair.

since no one is answering my questions, ranger has bigger db's than zenai, so it is zenai's higher dex that makes him less susceptible to the exbow?

Yes,
It seems novice hits my tank via a smallish dex CTH combined with Leadership.

so dex has a binary nature still. it works for both offense and defense. if used offensively, you can train a smallish dex and put more xp into strength and do more damage per hit rather than more hits and also open yourself up to the exbow.

you can train a higher dex as a more defensive set up and not have as high a strength perhaps hitting more often. you would be less weak to the exbow in this setup.

classic rock, paper, scissors no?

Certainly classic R/P/S

However I have to avoid being hit just once. 1 freaking time and my tank is essentially toast. It then becomes nothing more than a wall.

How many things in CB are of this binary nature.

So a tank should have to train high dex, use massive DBs and sacrifice HP and strength all to not be hit ONE time?

That seems a bit too much to ask any minion to do.

Especially when mages have nothing like this.

They even have PL to help vs the mageseeker. Yes, tanks can use PL, but it saves them 1 hit if they have a multi minion character to use it.

And the top mageseeker damage is about 700k a hit. Not nearly enough to compare to the exbow's crippling effect from 1 hit.

"That seems a bit too much to ask any minion to do.

Especially when mages have nothing like this."

i am not asking your minion to do anything. you are the one unhappy with being hit and complaining that the four counters you have are inadequate.

i remember someone saying mages should have to train dex to make evasion work. mages do have that mechanic now to get the full effect so they do have something like this.

in effect, tanks will benefit from dex in two ways:

avoiding hits
dishing out more hits

mages will only be able to get full use of xp already spent by using dex as they really won't ever put enough in it to reduce hits.

they both suffer the same xp dilution with the tank benefiting more though.

I thought quad/quint hits are about the maximum at tank can get? Never seen a hex shot before

Please let me explain again.

I do not care that I get it. Other tanks, esp ToA ones frequently hit my tank for 2-3 hits a round.

I care that I have to try to prevent ALL hits vs the exbow or lose. If I get hit 1 time = lose. No times = win. Too binary for a game like CB. And really nothing like it in CB.

If mages want to prevent ALL hits, then they should train dexterity. Along with evasion and/or DBs. Like the old evasion was when it gave defensive dexterity.

However, mages prefer to put their xp into their DD spell and/or HP. Understandable since they have ways to mitigate the damage. Including PL and kill slots.

Tanks have no way except for 1 round of PL to mitigate the 100% drain of the exbow that occurs in 1 hit.

Yes, Jon and NS closed the loophole of an enchanter using a relatively low NW exbow (compared to the weapons now available) draining tanks in 1 hit.

However, that still does not help when being hit 1 time makes my tank useless.

While dex does help me dish our more hits and prevent tank hits, dexterity does nothing vs mages.

I would get the same benefit with 100k dex as I do with 3M dex.

So while dexterity helps vs tanks, it does relatively little vs mages.

likewise, dex does nothing for mages against other mages.

Henk,

I think we have seen a few hex hits with UC trained at a very high level only during free retrain times.

Most tanks with the massive weapons now can at best get a guaranteed quad vs 20 dex minions without evasion/DBs. With occasional quints.

But what does it matter how many times I hit if one hit from an exbow makes all my hits do 300 damage?

Might as well put my ﾀ0.02 in here as everyone seems to want to do that.

I'm not affected by this.

i do understand your point ranger, i just disagree with the assessment that it is wrong.

for it to be a counter against archers, doesn't it pretty much have to work extremely fast, especially against archers who have chosen to put so much nw into the damage mod of the bow and who have spent so much xp on strength to also add to damage.

to reiterate, that is my point. you have a choice and choose to do more damage. the game needs a counter to that choice and this works.

jon did say it wasn't the ideal counter. if someone wants the exbow to not be the counter for that strategy then they would probably be wise to offer an additional counter?

We do have counters to archers.

We have PL/TSA/Revive.

We have HP and AC and the ToE. The ToE works extremely well vs physical damage.

We have GA which destroys my team.

Why do we need an item that with 1 hit destroys a character? That I never understood.

Especially since we have no such mage counter.

I have stated this before, imagine if we had a mage seeker xbow that did this exact same thing.

However, let us make it 0 BTH with NO additional BTH from dexterity. It only will hit via PTH.

Then mages have to use evasion or DBs to prevent being hit. And have to get their DB/evasion well above that of the PTH of the xbow due to Leadership.

Leadership is nice, however in these cases of +/- effects, really hoses things over greatly.

"in effect, tanks will benefit from dex in two ways:

avoiding hits
dishing out more hits

mages will only be able to get full use of xp already spent by using dex as they really won't ever put enough in it to reduce hits."

:D <ﾣ I've been trying to make that point since CB1! ;)

Henk, I landed a 7 hit with the first iteration of Junctioned UC on a Jig.

It was promply nerfed. >;)

"Then mages have to use evasion or DBs to prevent being hit. And have to get their DB/evasion well above that of the PTH of the xbow due to Leadership."

Dex hit Ranger. I'm sure I mentioned this above. :/

all of those aren't specific to archers or the massive damage they can get given multiple shots though.

i would take your idea for the mage killer if ya also make archers shoot once per round and give them the mages options for damage boosts.

actually i wouldn't even want to see that happen as now we have more choices. if you turn archery into magic spells with another name or turn mages into archers with specialty crossbow counters then you really are just watering down the game and taking away choices.

Dude,

I can see you will not see eye to eye with me on this one.

Fair enough.

However, I fail to see how an item that in 1 hit can completely drain a stat that is essential to a character is a good thing for CB.

And I fail to see how dex hits vs mages make any sense in this discussion.

Mages can take multiple hits from 200M+ NW ELBs and still live for a few rounds. I can give you many examples of my battles to prove this case. Mages can use DB/evasion to decrease those hits from 4 to 2 or even less. And they can use dexterity to reduce BTH if they so desire.

Tanks can take 1 hit from a 50M exbow and be crippled. Tanks can use more dex and DB (evasion is not possible due to archery) to lower hits. But with Leadership, it is almost impossible to prevent ALL hits.

I see no equality with that.

You keep talking about being 1 hit destroyed... and yet the log at the top shows your HP keeping you from being drained in one hit. My ex certainly doesn't drain all your str away in one hit... where is this mythical bow?

Increase the percentage to drain "normally" to 10% and you'd be sitting pretty.

Nov,

Your exbow drains my tank from 6.88M to about 2.1M in 1 hit. To negative in 2.

It drains my 6.7M strength HF to negative in 1 hit.

Jir's exbow takes my tank to negatives in 1 hit as it is combined with a large 3.5M effect EC.

Your exbow vs Suts HF takes it to negative strength in 1 hit.

Your exbow is near the critical line for my tank. A bit more on the x and it would take be well below 0 in 1 hit.

However, should we wait for that to occur before we fix this stupid stupid not equal item?

I've suggested an adjustment twice now and you've yet to comment on it.

Raising the percentage of HP to normalize drain would be both fair and effective, and make AC and HP as a counter more effective.

Invest in defense, and win!

Yes, novice, that is what I said from the start. Simply adjust the curve.

You didn't seem all that keen on it further up, but now you are? This thread is getting muddled.

You suggested hard caps based on a curve, very different.

I am sorry novice, in my discussion with dude I overlooked your point.

As Sut states, increase the curve and thats fine.

I would however, prefer to have the ratio be damage vs strength of the minion rather than HP of the minion.

That would also give a nice boost to EC, which needs one.

But I think one fact that does get overlooked is that even if you drain 50% of a tanks strength, that still is a reduction in damage of over 25%. Which is nothing to be overlooked as to get a similar DD reduction you would need a fairly large AMF.

"I would however, prefer to have the ratio be damage vs strength of the minion rather than HP of the minion."

i dislike this idea strongly.

the current system is kinda balanced around dex and strength more than i gave it credit for since the evasion change. i do not want to see it tip too far in the favor of strength being the main stat for physical damage dealers.

that is why i actually like the current set up, you choose strength, great but watch out for those specialty crossbows.

A 25% percent reduction in damage does very little to counter quad hits that often approach 2m.

Making STR the stat to measure against would make the ex far too easy to counter.

Hal hit The Force [553389]
Master Yoda absorbs damage [553389]
Hal hit The Force [556432]
Master Yoda absorbs damage [345457]
Hal shot The Force [506984]
Hal hit The Force [619627]
Dog hit The Force with The Lunatic [1306038]
Dog shot The Force with The Lunatic [1233271]
Dog struck deep into The Force with The Lunatic [1443101]
Dog struck deep into The Force with The Lunatic [1164647]

No where near 2M hits. Vs a moderate amount of AC 110.

Yes, they are quad hits, but 25% less is still 1.25M HP less damage.

Equivalant to an AMF of .25, no? And we all know how hard it would be to get even that AMF vs the top tattoos especially with NSC out there.

"i do not want to see it tip too far in the favor of strength being the main stat for physical damage dealers."

*laughs*

That's like saying I don't want Direct Damage Magic being the main stat for mages.

The best part of this is how many people beat you Ranger... 1 (four if you count the occasional losses to exbow users).

The only person who beats you doesn't use an exbow, all it's going to take is two minion hires with DM and I suspect you'll be able to at least keep them from fighting you.

The exbow isn't even effective enough as it is to allow people to actually add you to their list and you still complain.

I'd like to see the number of ranged rounds returned to 4 and then we can talk about the exbow being turned into something comparable to the MsK.

Nov,

A few can beat me.

Elite can some of the time. Rawr wipes me up. You beat me with the exbow as it is. Jir does, even without a 200M BoNe. Sut did occasionally until he sold out (wonder why he did).

However, no other item is this skewed.

Jir with his MPR and NW should in no way be able to suck so much score from the game. However, with an exbow and EC he can.

I see other posts about score sucking and just laugh. Those other posts are dead on accurate, however we have an item that lets us see a similar effect that people just overlook.

novice, I proposed a cap as an idea. I didn't say it had to be part of final solution.

Please try not to throw out the baby with the bathwater. It leads to polarization and off-topic straying.

Let's focus on the parts we all appear to agree on, starting with the fact that the damage-to-drain curve should be more spread out. That alone would probably be enough to satisfy me, for example.

I have to say I am leaning more toward keeping the damage/drain ratio something against HP, not STR, as long as the curve is adjusted. I like the HP idea, because then the exbow has an increasing "decay" like aspect. The harder you hit, the more drain you will do NEXT time.

Or, to help the poor melee tanks (since I think they have a good point), turn that off and just go by starting HP always when calculating the damage/HP ratio.

And not having caps is fine with me. If you can hit hard enough with an specialty xbow (meaning you are REALLY using a tank behind it), let the drain be mighty. The whole point of this thread is that an absolute wuss tank (1 million STR is paltry) can nullify a monster tank. with one hit. That is essentially what the problem has always been, so let's focus on fixing that singular aspect and then see where we are.

And novice,

Out of all the tanks in the game using this item, you're using it as it should be. That I completely respect yet hate in the same breath.

However, my defense against it is impossible as I would need to spend a lot more on my DBs, which are already +30 over your exbow, to compensate for the Leadership bonuses you get.