Thread title, I'm curious to see whether there is a prevailing opinion that the three classes in Lockdown are not currently balanced. Particularly since all of the top players play Striker, does that mean Striker is undisputedly the best class? And if the classes aren't balanced, do you think Lockdown would be more fun if they were?
Are the classes in Lockdown balanced?
Sun, 01/06/2013 - 12:33
Sun, 01/06/2013 - 13:35
#2
nope,
SSC(striker skolver clones) can swoop in and destroy guardians and recons if they are skilled enough with a mere hit or two,
Sun, 01/06/2013 - 13:35
#3
But
Lockdown and balance shouldn't be in the same sentence.
Sun, 01/06/2013 - 13:37
#4
You Must Be New Here
The answer is, sadly, the classes/kits are unbalanced.
Striker is your popular kit due to its Sword Speed AND Damage bonus. The weakness is less HP but most strikers get heart Trinkets (More HP) so that really doesn't help in balancing the class out. Also, a striker sprint bonus does not break like the Recon's cloak or Guardian's Shield. Any one can pick up the striker set and get damage easily.
Your guardian is a easily defeated tank. It has Heath Generating Boost but its too slow. Guardians have extra HP but a striker can come in, swoop in, slash and back out instantly. The only way Guardians are strong if they group up.
Recon is arguably the worst kit. You have the ability to go invisible yet if you get hit while cloaked, your dead. Recon does get Bomb Charge MAX yet as a bomber spamming a VT all match long, it gets boring. There is a few hipsters who have found luck with Recon yet thats rare.
Essentially, if you dont have good UV awesome gear to balance out the recon or guardian class, Striker is the best class.
Sun, 01/06/2013 - 13:43
#5
It really matters about
It really matters about teamwork.
A team working together would have optimally 2,2,2 each working in groups of three. Recon to mark and cause status (secondary is gun and sneak hit with slow swords), guardian to heal and protect (also secondary is provide dps or bomb if recon is gunning), and the striker is there for the main damage. Since most people don't work together and like seeing high numbers they go striker.
The really unfortunate things about recon are the shield break and the visible footsteps. If they fixed it so the shield was only temporarily disabled when hit and not drained along with taking away the footsteps would make recon many times more viable.
Guardians main problem is that it doesn't scale well with tiers. At T1 the three extra health is a huge boost while in T3 it is less than half of a pendant. The same applies with the shield. It's been a while since I've played T1/T3 but if I remember correctly using the most powerful weapons it takes 4,3,2 hits to break in respective T1,T2,T3. That and the team delay. To be a support guardian you need to have almost no latency in order to predict and preemptively raise your shield. IMO for guardian to be more competitive the shield needs to be raised instantly, be beefier in T3 (and to a much smaller extent T2), and the bug where if two guardians have their shields up at once covering the same person if that person gets hit both the shields take the hit need to be fixed.
Sun, 01/06/2013 - 14:05
#6
On the surface, I think the
On the surface, I think the classes are actually quite well balanced. The various weaknesses/bonuses inherent to the classes themselves point toward answers for many of the problems people mention (i.e. recons have med asi penalty on swords, true, but that's because the class was clearly intended for bombers/gunners based on the specific mix of bonuses/penalties). However, ultimately I agree with Aumir: when you consider UVs and trinkets in the mix, there isn't much point in even discussing balance in regard to LD: it just isn't balanced.
I know many people have brought it up before, but I think it would be very interesting to see some new game modes added, and specifically a scaled-down mode that would give the same build to players based on their choice of class. The really good players would still win out in the end, but without the drama that comes with one-sided matches, etc. Granted, I don't think we will ever see something like that actually implemented: the UV arms race encourages people to drop money on equips, UVs, slots, etc., and a mode in which the classes have a standard kit does not.
Sun, 01/06/2013 - 14:09
#7
For the most part I think
For the most part I think they're balanced, but I think maybe strikers should have one or two less hp than they do now.
Sun, 01/06/2013 - 16:09
#8
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Classes itself are balanced. At least thats what I think.
Strikers: Low HP, Offensive class, Striker booster
Guardians: High HP, Defensive Class, Protecting Shield
Recons: Not-So-High-But-Still-High-HP, Support Class, Invisibility
Sun, 01/06/2013 - 16:28
#9
I can only speak of T3, that's where every minute of my LD experience is.
Striker
Strikers can kill an opponent in a 1v1 fight easier than the other classes. I've seen people say this means it's overpowered and this fact alone makes Lockdown imbalanced. If Lockdown was a free-for-all deathmatch, I'd be inclined to agree. I rarely play striker, and I never don't bring bombs so I'm not very qualified to come with input on strikers apart from all the fighting I've done with them. I think strikers are a tiny bit overpowered, mostly because of heart trinkets, but I have a simple solution!
In addition to the currently existing penalties, put a negative medium resistance on all statuses as if the striker was using mad bomber or chaos cloak. Striker is supposed to be a glass cannon just like those armours, so why not emulate them?
With this slight negative resistance on striker shields, skolver strikers would be forced to get freeze UVs and wear a pendant on top of their double max vs shock in order to walk safely inside a voltaic tempest and shivermist busters. By giving strikers weaknesses in multiple areas, it's ensured they can't safeguard themselves against all the weaknesses of the class as is the case right now. Meanwhile, people who don't want their double max UVs and heart pendants to be wasted can simply try out a different class.
Recon
Recon is pretty nice, it just needs to work as advertised. Remove the footsteps I think it'd be pretty golden. Losing all your shield when you get hit kind of sucks, but I think that's just a bit of the charm of the class.
In addition, I think walking through a haze bomb you're immune to should not break the cloak. Notice how my previous suggestion with strikers would've made haze bombers into gods of the battlefield? This gives a counter. Recons are supposed to be the counter for guardians, not strikers.
I would also like to see recon shield to inherently come with MSI: Low. I don't know how balanced it'd be or not, but I feel like the class should have a slight speed advantage over Guardian. Cloaking could proportionally slow the user down a bit more so that cloaking speed would be equal to the current situation.
Guardian
The shield is pretty thin, but I think that's as intended. Just as people die faster in T3, so too does the shield break faster. The only buff I'd like to see is for stacking guardian shields on top of eachother to actually be a viable strategy. I also think guardians need a bit more resistance to flinching. Maybe even let them charge up their weapon while under fire completely uninterrupted.
Sun, 01/06/2013 - 17:01
#10
The main imbalance is health;
The main imbalance is health; if you hard-capped all health to a class-dependent maximum, I think almost all of the balance issues would go away. High mobility will always be extremely powerful (especially because Striker boost cannot be broken unlike Recon or Guardian powers), and was intended to be balanced by lower health. However, heart pendants basically blows this out of the water, hence why Lockdown is dominated by Strikers.
Some other interesting tweaks that might be interesting are as follow:
Change Striker bonuses to global ASI, DMG low (retain the bomb charge penalty though)
Add MSI medium to Recons; allow Recons to see enemies on minimap (and warning/death-marked enemies appear on all friendly players' minimaps).
Make Guardians no-flinch (uninterruptable while attacking).
Sun, 01/06/2013 - 17:26
#11
pretty much,
Down in writing, it seems balanced.
But when your playing it, you find these "legal exploits" such as HP trinkies or overpowered weapons which then makes it completely different then it should have been.
Sun, 01/06/2013 - 17:27
#12
The problem lies around certain combinations. The basic concept of classes is balanced.
Sun, 01/06/2013 - 18:51
#13
The real problem in lockdown
The abilities balance themselves out however there are full teams of just strikers, recons, or guardians. The perfect lockdown team would consist of 2 guardians 2 recons and the rest is striker however people usually like seeing high damage total so striker is thought to be overpowered. that is just my experience with lockdown classes
Sun, 01/06/2013 - 19:43
#14
NOPE
Most balanced as well as the cheapest LD there is is T1 LD. I still don't understand why people don't play in this tier more often. The queue is just too darn long. T3 is only somewhat balanced if you have the $$$.
T1: Most balanced LD there is. Damage is pretty low in this tier, so it's like killing each other with Nerf guns and plastic swords. Plus, you get free awesome UVed up weapons from mission rewards, unless you threw them away. There is also only 2 types of damage in this tier, normal damage and elemental damage. Plus, 1 bar of health is as substantial as you can get it. The tradeoffs between survivability and damage actually exist. Cheap equipments and the heart pendants don't take too much money to craft.
Here's a rundown of the classes in this tier:
Guardian: Guardian is at it's most powerful here. It is in fact the most powerful class in this tier. Forget Striker. You get massive sustain because of that shield regen as well as a nice heal for your allies. Since damage in T1 LD is almost negligible, you can pretty much tank and still manage to dish out a lot of damage. As a guardian, it's best to use anything that gives you elemental resist. Having a heavy sword and/ or a bomb will help smack people off. You may also opt for some fast weapons. Shield canceling makes a guardian shine in this tier. Guardian is really good if you're a noobie since you can protect your teamates and be super tanky without that much skill.
Recon: Recons are pretty much as balanced as can be. Thanks to the CTR med for any weapon, it's now a popular meta to charge stuff up like bombs and guns. Works well with Fractured mask of Seerus. Recons work as a sneaky way to cap points or even to assassinate someone. It's really hard to hit a good recon. Recon might need some survivability on the line so they don't die too fast if their cloak gets broken. When gunning or slashing, use a fast weapon so that you can shield cancel, thus rendering you unseeable by your opponents. You can recon mark them faster this way as well.
Striker: Strikers are at their weakest in this tier. You need like a fencing jacket or a cyclops cap, depending on what you're doing, to actually do some real damage. Because of this, you lose 1 health as well as any possible elemental resist. Strikers dish out a lot of damage if they got the Prototype Rocket Hammer, as well as an added dash. However, the -3 health debuff is very debilitating for this class, so it's important to be careful. Many gunners also opt to go striker and are incredibly hard to hit and kill. In short, Striker is still powerful in terms of damage, but it's much more leveled off and somewhat more balanced than the other classes.
Sun, 01/06/2013 - 20:23
#15
:l
Each class definitely has strengths that they should each try to take advantage of due to their natural boosts and weaknesses that they should cover with gear.
Swordsmen --> Striker
Gunslingers --> Recon
Bombers --> Guardian
It's pretty much common knowledge that Skolver+Striker takes swords to max damage, and adds medium ASI to swords. The low health/fragility is their weakness, covered by health trinkets.
Recon is a weird jack of all trades class, easily giving max bomb CTR but adds med gun ASI. IMO gunning is at its most dangerous as recon: Guns have a higher potential for first hit due to range, and (depending on choice), have the ability to cause statuses with normal and charge attacks. Recon increases first hit ability with cloak and and CTR bonus (charges have longer range), and with deathmark, status guns become usable on a wider range of armors, and normal guns (hi Valiance) get a much-desired damage boost. Recon's weakness is in mobility and offense, and that can be made up with ASI gear and damage trinkets. Health trinkets are a waste for recon. Bombs are commonly-used for recon as well, but bomber gear's boosts tend to be wasted (overkill) with Recon.
I think Bombers work best with guardian. Status bombs, vortex, nitrome are very useful and can work well in conjunction with shielding teammates. Guardian's resistance to knockback lets a bomber place bombs with accuracy, regardless of things like sword/gun knockback. Similarly to recon, its weakness is mobility and offense, so those can be made up for with sword ASI or bomb damage gear.
Now, as far as balance between the archetypes fighting each other in a solo situation, it might not be balanced, but I think as far as benefits to certain weapon types, they are balanced.
Of course, there are more inefficient uses of the classes, like gun striker, sword recon, bomb striker, where they make use of the classes' skills more than the bonuses (ex: dashing to keep distance or chase with guns, or using cloak+deathmark to have ultra-powerful sword attacks, or even dashing to have a longer reach of bomb placement), but these either have a lack of or negatve stat bonuses.
Sun, 01/06/2013 - 20:33
#16
I think making the classes as
I think making the classes as direct counters to others (a la rock paper scissors) is a great idea.
Ergo I think the Guardian shield should maybe get a small buff, or better yet, how about INVERSE it, so that STRONG attacks (DA, BTB, GF, etc) do nothing and WEAK attacks (sentenza, DVS, status bombs) go right through it?
Sun, 01/06/2013 - 20:44
#17
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No offense, but I dont see a point on playing T1 lockdown to be honest, on T3 you have access any gear, You could use Full Vog to get ASI on swords, or Full Shadowsun to get Damage on Guns, or Mercurial to get Movement speed increase, You can get Brandishes of different kinds, and access to shadow weapons, wich you cant get on T1. And T2 is pretty much Duskers using hammer.
@Djoshman
"The perfect lockdown team would consist of 2 guardians 2 recons and the rest is striker however people usually like seeing high damage total so striker is thought to be overpowered."
A team with 2/2/2 would get completly dominated against a team of full strikers to be honest. Strikers move way faster, and it could send the team to capping points faster, and leading the team to victory.
A perfect Team (for me) : 1 Guardian Bomber , 1 Recon swordsman and 4 Strikers Swordsman.
Sun, 01/06/2013 - 21:21
#18
Eh...
I find it kind of sad that your ideal team consist entirely of Striker swordsmen, with a Guardian bomber and Recon swordsman seemingly slapped in there for variety. If that doesn't scream imbalance, I don't know what does.
Sun, 01/06/2013 - 21:56
#19
Honestly, I think a team with 3 guardian bombers, each with a recon to assassinate anyone that's actually a threat to the bomber would work out pretty darn well.
Hell, the bombers could probably be recon too.
This way 3 points could be held down at once. A striker could boost between points and reinforce anywhere that's in trouble, or the last man could also be a recon.
Sun, 01/06/2013 - 22:09
#20
One of these days someone should just do a full bomber LD team with everybody spamming bloody hazes everywhere.
Perfect setup is probably one/two bombers (doesn't really matter class) and the rest striker, sadly.
Sun, 01/06/2013 - 22:10
#21
In my experience as a guardian...
Guardian needs a Sword damage med or low, and a charge time increase on swords to balance it and prevent charge spamming. The lack of mobility is a big enough obstacle for a guardian. I play full Vog, no trinkies, and primarily use a Barbarous thorn to smack things to death with shield cancelling. Definite increase of healing speed, even if only in t3. Shield needs either more invulnerability time after being hit, or higher flinch resistance. Getting staggered to death by some striker with a toothpick or an antigua gets annoying and boring quickly. Remove flinching from haze bombs, but still keep the shield from regenerating if it's not at max while in a standing in an enemy haze, for same reasons. Possibly improve regen rate on shield's bar as well.
Having not used bombs in LD, I don't know how they could be balanced. Possible a damage up to scare them Skolvers away instead of just tanking nitros.
Don't have any "real" gunslinging equipment, so I have no opinion on recons either.
I like the status weakness idea on Strikers. Possible additional status resist for other classes to cement the status bombs as intended for halting them zippy strikers.
It is sad though that people who play good gunners play Striker, and not recon.
As a guardian, it's the same game strikers play: predict the enemy's movements and attack before they get there, watching them run into your sword.
That's about all I got to say.
Sun, 01/06/2013 - 22:43
#22
Sadly, only Almost
My life's story:
I started Lockdown in T2, when I though "gee I wish I could do something while waiting for my mist bar to recharge."
I wandered into the battlefield completely clueless about how the classes worked. Fortunately for me, the first class I picked was guardian.
When the first aggressor came along, I shielded, as I would have done in the clockworks. To my surprise, the shield was FREAKING HUGE, and barely took a scratch at that hit. I was mystified, and quickly disposed of the threat with a combo with my Nightblade. Half a minute later, I lay slain on the ground, and was teleported back to base, where I noticed the 3 pads. I stepped on recon, and then tried out the "shield". I could actually tell, even without seeing it combat, that it made me invisible, since the transparent knight seemed like an obvious indicator. The radar was what confused me; it took a few games and a bit of reading up to realize that it would eventually turn red/purple/deathmark-esque and strip my opponents of their defenses. I played striker, ran out, and died almost instantly. Didn't play that again til i got trinkets.
Long story short,
GUARDIAN is most likely the most "player-friendly" class in the game. It has a shield, just like in normal clockworks, and give a massive health bonus. The offensive bonuses are also not shabby. While a lot of skilled players move on to Striker for the sake of moving faster, dodging, and chasing, I learned in my (long) time as a guardian that even without moving at breakneck speeds, a knight can skillfully dodge aggressors and counter with good timing.
STRIKER is the go-to class for most aggressive players, who have trinkets which significantly extend their life. Strikers can capture points with lightning speed, and can come in, hit, and get out almost as stealthily as recons. They deal massive damage, and killing them is hard, since they can run away whenever they like. In T2, Striker is the most used class, without a doubt. Regular 6-man teams will bolster 4 strikers and 2 other classes. NOTE THAT THIS IS ONLY TUE FOR T2. (My guide to thinking like a striker, Taming the Wolver Clone can be found here.)
RECON is brutal and can come out of nowhere (if played skillfully). I took an (Accidental) trip to T3, where I found myself heavily under-equipt (Full Duskers, 2 3* hearts, a Faust, a Boltbrand, and a Kilowatt Pulsar). I immediately disregarded the thought of playing striker; I had watched matches in T3 and knew that I'd be minced meat in a matter of moments. I was then presented with the options of Guardian or Recon. Guess which one I chose? (hint, look at the CAPS in this section.) I surprised myself that game by scoring THIRD top damage in a game of 12-players. I was flabergasted. My Faust can actually kill things? I recalled sneaking up on other recons, who had just finished killing a teammate, and then quickly dispatching them with a Faust to the back. It was amazing how many kills a Dusker-punk got against Vog and Skolver-bearing T3ers. Recon can turn under-armored players (with strong weapons) into stealthy killing machines.
The classes are not balanced. This is my answer:
T1 favors Guardians, since the Shield and the Health is a HELUVALOT. While Strikers with Prototype Rocket Hammers are still terrifying, Guardian shield is tough as steel.
T2 undoubtedly favors Strikers, who can chase and capture with near impunity. 3* trinkets boost health to extreme levels, and the weapons to choose from are limited, yet highly effective.
T3 ties between Recons and Strikers (it seems to me that Striker is a bit more popular). For the same reasons that Strikers are deadly in T2, they are in T3. However, a Gran Faust to the back after a Striker runs out of dash is exactly what a Recon needs to get massive damage. Specialized defenses in T3 makes a Recon's job relatively simple; If the foe is in Vog, switch to a GF. If he's in Snarb, switch to DA. Skolver? Do as you please!! This makes SMASHING FACE for an invisible recon just a matter of switching a weapon, coming in real close, and swinging for a kill. However, recons need beware of crowds, which can destroy frail cloaks after getting 1 kill.
That is my (big) 2 cents. Apologies for the wall of text.
-The T2 Lockdown Fiend
Sun, 01/06/2013 - 23:10
#23
LD used to be balanced until
LD used to be balanced until heart trinkets were made craftable.
Remove these and it's balanced again. Simple.
We are in a situation were most people only pick guardian or recon because they don't have heart trinkets (I said most, so please spare me the usual 'no i don't u wrong'). Only making their HPs even with Strikers Pendant wearers. Thing is, strikers have far more advantages with their shield. Guardian shield dies in two hits, a recon's in one, both are pretty much dead once they got hit one or twice with their shield on! A striker despite beeing hit can still use his shield.
Strikers should trade their bonuses and boost for less health. They should die in one or two hits like it was in the first days. That's how it was supposed to work in the fist place.
Basically, give 300 hp to a Scout in TF2, and see if the classes are still balanced...
They should fix this, but I know they won't, for odd reasons. You would think they don't wanna make people mad, because so many people crafted those now. Though, this perspective didn't stop them from making a radical change to a certain bomb before. They could just give a compensation to those who own pendants. This time with some control though, to avoid abusers, only up to two compensations per knight or something like that.
I believe what really stopped them from removing pendants in the first place, was the fact that they were so rare before, and the few rich players who got one paid a lot to get them. They didn't want to irritate them I guess. They should just have forbidden the use of pendants in LD. That would have been a solution. But making them accessible to everyone was just a terrible idea that completely broke LD.
Maybe it's time to make a new mini-game now, it has been more than a year we didn't get a new coliseum game...Or the fact a lot of players buy ce solely for LD gear slow them down somehow...
Mon, 01/07/2013 - 09:38
#24
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@Urgandpa
Title says "Are the classes in Lockdown balanced", clases itself are balanced, OBVIOUSLY any extra trinkets or UVs will affect the balance. And if you remove trinkets, that would be like saying a big @#$! you to the people that spent a lot of energy of their ASI UVs in their swords, wich some people even spent hundreds of dollars on getting this UVs, and there are a lot of Lockdown dedicated players. Lockdown is a big outcome of money for OOO, Thats why they never will remove trinkets.
Spiral Knights is an RPG game anyways, Spiral Knights =/= Team Fortress 2. You have to work on your gear, I guess some people forgot this.
Mon, 01/07/2013 - 11:12
#25
Zeddy, I love you! Mohandar
Zeddy, I love you! Mohandar too :p
" I also think guardians need a bit more resistance to flinching"
YES, that's exactly what we guardians need. Being overwhelmed by a Swordsman Striker that attacks too fast to let me retaliate is my main grip. Remove that flinch and now, if they attack my shield, they will get a hit back in their face before being able to flee, or at least we will trade hit since they can't interrupt my big slow sword with their tiny toothpick, which is to my advantage too. Seriously, guardians are weak enough to long range. Strikers can poke me to death with any guns. They should be forced to at least break my shield before attacking. The shield is thin already (I don't complain about that, it's enough for me).
"In addition to the currently existing penalties, put a negative medium resistance on all statuses as if the striker was using mad bomber or chaos cloak."
YES again, most people are relunctant to get their heart trinkets removed. Well, to be honest, going back to pre-heart trinkets would make things too easy for me, strikers would die way too fast. This is a very good suggestion to keep heart trinkets while still making striker glass cannons.
Overall, for the balance question, no, class aren't balanced at all in current meta-game. Strikers dominate the ground. They can have Max:Max sword, double or triple immune, and enough health to not die in 3 hits, all the while having a special skill that do not break when they are hit, and is the most effective to capture faster. I mean, other class have their advantages, but Striker advantages are overwhelming.
The stats talk for themselves : apart from a few guys who can play another class and noobs that don't have a clue, most LD players only play Striker, all the time. This would not be the case if the game was balanced. At least not in those proportions.
Mon, 01/07/2013 - 12:36
#26
@Canozo I don't recall asking
@Canozo I don't recall asking for removal of UVs...While they do change the course of things in LD, they don't impact it as much as pendants do. Not dying in two hits as a striker is way more broken than having VH ASI. I also understand people have been investing tons of money on UV's, I know that very well as I've been selling LD gears for a long time, it would not be fair to remove them now, so that's why I didn't ask for it. On the other hand, pendants are cheap to craft, as cheap as an old RSS was, it should not be a problem to remove them. It would greatly improve the variety in LD. Or we can just keep playing a completely unbalanced PvP, I'm fine with that too.
Mon, 01/07/2013 - 13:58
#27
My take on the balance of lockdown
I'm no expert on anything, but it seems to me to be more about teamwork than anything else. An entire team of strikers isn't likely to succeed without having a guardian or two to heal them and a recon or two to mess with the other team. In that regard, it is balanced to allow a space for recons and such.
The problem, is that it is frustrating to play as a recon/guardian, due to how strong the strikers are offensively. If your shield breaks as a guradian, you're at the mercy of the opposition, unless you've got your own strikers to back you up. Do your strikers back you up? Not always, or even usually. Likewise, if you get discovered as a recon by a striker, then you're going to be screwed over big time by the simple fact that you don't have amazing sword speed, cannot get away and cannot hide. Being able to drop bombs is nice for a getaway, but doesn't exactly solve all of your problems due to the use of guns, and due to the fact that it takes a while to charge and drop a bomb, and its hard to do this when you're being mauled to death by a toothpick.
This means that the success of your team relies on having a good striker, and a couple of mediocre "others" to back them up... which leads me to my last point- "good" strikers will always be better than the rest of us at playing striker. If I'm new to lockdown and am playing as a striker, I'm going to have to VERY good to out-strike people who play lockdown all day every day, have heart trinkets and max/very high uvs etc. Not even because they have heart trinkets and stuff, but because they have "skill" and I don't, because I'm new to lockdown.
If I were to change one thing, it would be to give strikers something like negative gun attack speed: Med
Mon, 01/07/2013 - 14:26
#28
You are experiencing a PICNIC ERROR!
Depends on tier. Speaking of just T3, you have strikers as the "best". I find this hugely untrue, though, because I have sometimes dominated as a recon. I can't speak much for guardians, but recons have the ability to scrap all your defense, leaving very little to bring a swift death even if you have triple max UVs. The lost time makes up for better assistance and better assassinating power. Heck, when I see a striker fight with about 3 participants, I usually death mark the whole enemy team before even dropping a bomb or slashing. The enemy team disintegrates by the time my first bomb detonates.
Mon, 01/07/2013 - 15:38
#29
The idea is balanced, but the implementation is not.
The ideas for the classes is balanced on paper, but the way it was done is not.
Striker is obviously supposed to be glass cannons. With the booster they can zip in, do their damage, and zip back out when things get dangerous. The problem is that with health trinkets their inherent weakness of lower health becomes more than negated. As already mention, with this and avoiding bombs they can essentially have no weakness, which is not balanced. Sure, a good recon or guardian can 1v1 a striker and win, but that does not make it balanced, that simply means they outplayed the striker. A striker can outplay a guardian or recon in the same manner. Assuming equal skill levels, the striker will win almost every time.
Guardian can be really good when played well. the main problem I see with them though is that the shield breaks too easily. A single AP or Sentenza can easily dismantle a guardian shield in reasonable time. If the shield were made a little tougher, we may see more guardians appear.
Recons might be fine as they are, except for the initial warning of the deathmark. Now, I know why it's there, to prevent insta-kills that are impossible to see coming. But it gives too much of a warning, enough for anyone to retreat to a more strategic location or take action to prepare for the inevitable death mark. It also gives away the recon's current position if he's trying to sneak by someone, defeating the purpose of the stealth.
There is a reason why striker is by far the most used class in LD.
Mon, 01/07/2013 - 17:44
#30
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@Urgrandpa
You see, if you remove Heart pendants, then you could easly get a full skolver set, and two ASI Trinkets, and then you have DMG Max/ASI Max, by just spending 2400CE.
Mon, 01/07/2013 - 18:56
#31
@Trollingyou
Eh, deathmark pings give warning if you hang around. You do give a small amount of warning, but less then a second's warning if you don't stop running. This isn't much time when your target can't see it coming.
Footprints are a minus, but more often then not they don't see anything because they are always tripping speedily.
Mon, 01/07/2013 - 19:33
#32
@Autofire
True, the average striker will probably ignore it and keep flying at the speed of sound looking for kills, but any good player will take notice and try to stop you. Also for me that first ping is more than enough of a warning to find the recon which usually happens before the actual deathmark comes.
I never notice the footprints much, maybe it's cause I run on low graphics. But from what I read it would be nice to see them go while cloaked.
Mon, 01/07/2013 - 20:46
#33
ugh
. i forget i don't want to post in forums.
lol.
Mon, 01/07/2013 - 21:26
#34
T2 Recon reporting
I kind of like the warning mark. Yes, it will get you killed every now and again, but it's a great psy-ops tool. Rational people do ridiculous things when they know there's an enemy... Somewhere. Ping them, back off, wait for the mark to drop, and ping them again, and you can pin down an entire team just as good as if you had frozen them. Death Mark isn't for 1 on 1 fights, it's for boosting your team's Strikers during a battle where everyone is too busy to fight you.
Lockdown isn't a game about getting kills; it's about controlling territory. As nifty as the Pulsars are, nothing contests a point like the Lightning Capacitor. Strikers are hands down the best at dealing damage, but Recons lead assaults and Guardians throw them back.
Tue, 01/08/2013 - 09:50
#35
@CanozoEquipment, pretty
@Canozo
Even with Max DMG and ASI, a striker without HT is still gonna die in two hits. Like I said UVs and offensive trinkets do influence the game but no as much as having roughly twice the health you're supposed to have. This can be simply verified. Organize a match between two teams of Skolvers Strikers Clones equally skilled, one with no extra ASI (since they get med ASI anyways) bonus but with double pendants, the other one with Max ASI but no pendants. We both know who will win this hands down.
I dunno if you were there the first days LD was implemented, I was, it was quite broken at first, since Guardian and Recons had the same health as Strikers I believe. Some days or weeks after, they decided to buff Guardians and Recons HP, there was no pendants yet, but offensive trinkets were available. This was the moment when LD was ideal. Close to a perfectly balanced Pvp classes wise, as you could attest from the equal repartition of the three classes. Rarely would I join a game where a class would be overrepresented. Then HT were made craftable, slowly and strangely, the games were not balanced anymore, strikers started to be the most picked class, by far ;( This attests that Health trinkets did break the class balance in a big way.
I personnaly don't care since I barely play LD nowadays, but the class problem basically resides there, it's factual, anyone who has been playing LD since the start will confirm you this.
Tue, 01/08/2013 - 04:54
#36
I'm not sure......
From my experience NOPE .
Striker:I try it not my taste but i do notice if backward sprint it tend to be slow tell me if i'm wrong it tackle the front sprint speed if he want to backward but i didn't see much player backward. Since i haven't use striker much so i',m not in position to critic about striker much.(i wander if striker been hit when sprintt it lose its sprint abiliy untill it regen back)
Recon:not sure if balance since it favor 2 user bomber and gunner with its bonus,but it can be use by swordsmen just have the penalty atk speed.you can cloaked but 1 hit your cloak broke which tackle your advantage of cloaking ability
Guardian:mostly focus in its shield,T2 i see it can hold several hit ,but in T3 its like just to prevent your 1st hit dmg rather then to defend your team i mean it can defend your team just not much.
I'm still not sure if its a perfect imbalance,but if you talking about balance NOPE!!!!!! want balance PvP? arena brawl(or at least it only unbalance with your equipment ) .
Tue, 01/08/2013 - 05:23
#37
The papaya isn't quite sure
Well, a lot of people have asked this question before. Personally, I don't think any of the classes are outbalanced. The only reason people think a class (usually the Striker) is over powered, is because they don't THINK of a way to overcome the challenge.
Lets talk about their weaknesses and strengths (sorry that I'm boring you to death with another long paragraph DX)
Strikers: Their speed and ASI make them the fastest damage dealers in lockdown. They can strike you down a second (kind of like Slags, you know, those big fat ones with a shield and spear) Their main weakness is their low health, but that can be easily solved with Heart Trinkets. You better watch out! Those Strikers are after YOU!
Ok, ok, in all seriousness, they aren't THAT scary. The problem isn't that Strikers are too strong, it's that people just don't think of a strategy to overcome the challenge. There are a lot of reckless Strikers in the game (no offense intended), charging in to battle without closely looking at the situation. Next thing they know, they are dead, and then they start raging about how the person who killed them was a "sissy" because he/she used a Polaris, etc, etc, etc. For all those Strikers out there, THAT'S YOUR OWN FAULT.
I'm pretty sure the most commonly used strategy, is to approach an enemy, and keep on dashing clockwise/anti-clockwise around them, striking them with your sword (usually the Final Flourish). That way you won't have the time to attack back, and you'll be dead before you know it. The problem is not that you are unable to do something when they are attacking you, its that you don't do something BEFORE they start.
If there are any fencers out there, think of this as fencing. You have to make the first strike, and then you will (usually) have the upper hand. If you manage to striker a striker (repetition ^^) first, he/she has lost her/his element of surprise, not making them as efficient.
Recons: Sneaking around, watching your every move, aware of every breath you take. Recons' will slowly sneak up on you, and before you know it, BAM, you are dead.
Recons aren't as popular as Strikers. This is because they lack a Strikers speed and ASI. They have to rely on their Recon Cloak to Deathmark their opponent, and strike first. Otherwise, they are (usually) as good as dead. The problem is, (usually) the instinct of people is to run into the battlefield with their cloak/shields up, thinking that they can deathmark an opponent and kill him/her like THAT. It's not that easy! The moment someone realizes they are being followed by a Recon, they will start searching for you, and in most cases, they manage to find you.
Does anybody play TF2 (Team Fortress 2) here? I'm pretty sure you all can agree that the Recon shares a lot of similarities with the Spy. Both of them rely on the cloaks as a method of sneaking in, attacking, and then sneaking out. The only difference is that you can do those fancy backstabs (Jump stabs, stair stabs, drop stabs, etc), while recons, can't.
I've probably drifted off topic...............The point is, to use the Recon efficiently, you have to know what time to strike, when to cloak, and when to get the [pellet] out of there.
Guardians: I shall protect you, with my life. For as long as you stay beside me, all will be safe.
Don't ask, randomly made that up XD Guardians, guardians, guardians..............They lack the speed and ASI of Strikers, they don't have the unique deathmark ability of recons, and they can't go invisible. They are the only class in Lockdown which can use their shields, like actual shields (with the exception of the healing ability, and the fact that you can shield bump). A Guardian should usually be teamed up with a few Strikers. That way they can attack rapidly without losing too much health in the process.
But once they are on their own, they can pretty much only rely on their shield to keep them safe. They don't have the ASI and speed of strikers, and they don't have the CTR of Recons (and the cloak ability). Guardians are called guardians for a reason, they protect (Rise of the Guardians ^^).
Although I haven't seen this strategy used before (not very often at least). It is possible to get 4 Guardians, and have them all corner an opponent. When one Guardian attacks, the other 3 shield. This way they will be able to kill the trapped opponent quickly and efficiently........
I hope I helped ^^ I'm not a big fan of Lockdown :P
Tue, 01/08/2013 - 09:19
#38
I am not alone!
@Taisthyr
It's true LD is about controlling area, but that can't be done without some form of force. You can't simply waltz up to a point and say, "This point be mine". If you do that, the other team will try to kill you and you need to be able to defend yourself from that. If you can't contribute to a fight, you're just another source of damage for the clones to feed off of.
The main issue I have with the ping, as stated before, is that it gives away your approximate location. To deathmark someone standing on the middle of a capture point, you must stand close to the very edge of the capture point, providing they don't move. also, you cannot safely ping someone standing in the middle of a mist bomb's mist (assuming 5 star) cause the radius is too big. Taking this into account a person can easily find a recon once they get the warning ping. I have done it so much to the point that the recon will switch classes. It takes away the element of stealth that recon is supposed to give you.
@Xxpapaya
Countering a common strategy used by a class does not mean the class is balanced. Sure, you can get the first hit on the striker, but he can in the same manner get the first hit on you. What do you do now?
You see, the problem is that Guardian and Recon have inherent weaknesses that cannot be mitigated. There is nothing you can do about Guardian's slow mobility (Mercurial doesn't do much at all for it). There is nothing you can do to make Recon's shield not break in one hit. However, there is something you can do about Striker's health penalty, which is to get health trinkets. Once striker's health penalty is gone, What's their weakness? A good UV can solve the bomb penalty, or they can simply avoid using bombs and use the gun-bomb instead, like most do. On top of this, their "bosster" does not break when they get hit while using it. The simply have inherent advantages over recon and guardian and there is nothing you can do about it.
Tue, 01/08/2013 - 10:45
#39
@Papaya
There are a few flaws
@Papaya
There are a few flaws in your arguments, let's analyse that.
"The problem is not that you are unable to do something when they are attacking you, its that you don't do something BEFORE they start."
Please explain how you do something before ? My take on it :
- as a guardian, bombs will get countered by Polaris spam, or even any gun. Guardians aren't really good with guns, but if I do they will just close the gap very easily anyway. And then, their dreaded sword. It's more difficult for me to hit them than them to hit me. Why ? Try to poke a snail, then try to poke a rabbit IRL. But more, each time they hit me, I flinch into a spiral of death. As I argued before, removing the flinch would be a great way to make guardian more effective.
- as a recon, the moment I mark them, they will start swinging at random, and close the gap ultra fast once I appear (I'd better not miss any attack). Again, see the snail vs rabbit poking example.
"A Guardian should usually be teamed up with a few Strikers. That way they can attack rapidly without losing too much health in the process."
Except Strikers can just run back to base once they are hit, which removes a lot of the value of Guardian's shield healing. Other class can't do that as much since they don't have the boost : it makes them loose to much time (longer than just dying and waiting for respawn timer).
"Although I haven't seen this strategy used before (not very often at least). It is possible to get 4 Guardians, and have them all corner an opponent. When one Guardian attacks, the other 3 shield. This way they will be able to kill the trapped opponent quickly and efficiently........"
4 people to kill one is a loosing proposition. Plus, overlapping shields BOTH get damaged, which grealty reduce the value of stacking guardians in a team.
I agree with Trollingyou with the mitigating weakness part.
Tue, 01/08/2013 - 12:18
#40
--
@Urgrandpa
"Even with Max DMG and ASI, a striker without HT is still gonna die in two hits."
I know, but you dont see my point, if you remove Heart Trinkets, every Sword UV with ASI turns Useless and the Lockdown market just dies. Just think how will this affect players that spent hundreds of dollars in their swords UVs. (Im not one of them, but ive spent close to 40,000CE on my UVs)
"strikers started to be the most picked class, by far ;("
Strikers were always the most picked class, and its because strikers are like minions. Have you ever play Tribes: Ascend? The Pathfinder looks a like a striker because of a lot of things, and IT IS the most picked class in that game too. If your team doesnt have a lot of strikers, and you are fighting a team with a lot of strikers, the chances of loosing are pretty high. In Spiral Knights, you have to capture points, and so its faster capping points with a strikers thanks to its movement.
The truth is that a GOOD Guardian is able to take down a striker with Heart trinkets in a 1v1, and so its a Recon Gunner, or a recon swordsman. (Bombers are heavy support so IDK).
Tue, 01/08/2013 - 13:24
#41
@Canozo
If you are going to
@Canozo
If you are going to compare with Tribes Ascended :
- ratio of health in tribes is : medium (recon) get half of heavy (guardian), light (striker) get half of heavy (guardian). Guess what ? That's more than the ration BEFORE heart trinkets : before, striker get half of the health of a guardian. With heart trinkets (for both), they get 75% of the health of a guardian. Can you see the huge change it makes ?
- in Tribes, light will get sometime OS, almost always 2 shots. Guess what ? That's closer than LD BEFORE heart trinkets than anything.
- in Tribes, I doubt you'd often see much more than 50% of light. In SK, I'd say about 90% of players play striker. It's not rare to see teams with only strikers.
By the way, I do like that comparison with Tribes Ascended.
"The truth is that a GOOD Guardian is able to take down a striker with Heart trinkets in a 1v1, and so its a Recon Gunner, or a recon swordsman. (Bombers are heavy support so IDK)."
Huh, no. I consider myself a good guardian, but no, there is no way to land 3+ hits on them before dying of the flurry of their attack. Sure, I can kill bad strikers any day, everyday, several at a time and get 15K damage. But good strikers with max/max and shock immune ? No way, unless I get very lucky. They don't even need max/max and shock immune actually, only max ASI.
Tue, 01/08/2013 - 18:54
#42
Lets not forget the pure
Lets not forget the pure trolling power of a team a recons. You just capped that? Jk!!
And there was tht one team that went all recon and just chilled in their locker room. We won (duh) but it was wacky.
Tue, 01/08/2013 - 23:34
#43
@CanozoI'll admit you got a
@Canozo
I'll admit you got a point for ASI UVs. So I guess there are even less chances they remove pendants, not that I believe they would ever do it.
As for Tribes, never tried that game yet.
Wed, 01/09/2013 - 04:51
#44
well sort of... :/
In T3:
Guardian = two swings from striker sword, your shield will break, need to wait for charging time as the shield will instantly go to zero and you'll probably be dead before that :/
Recon (In all tier) = 1 hit and you'll be exposed, need to wait for charging time as your invisibility cloak will instantly go to zero and you'll probably be dead
Striker = can the boost go instantly zero when being hit by an attack? :/
Wed, 01/09/2013 - 13:48
#45
It really is about the health
@Canozo: Removing heart pendants does NOT make UVs useless in any way. In fact, beyond the initial shock of realizing you can't just charge in like Rambo, I think removing heart pendants would improve the metagame for wealthy Strikers. Since you can't have heart pendants, you could go for Vhigh Gun damage, or Vhigh Bomb CTR, or even resistance trinkets. Strikers may initially feel de-powered due to lower health, but over time the availability of these meta-game options would still make possibly them the best class. However, the overwhelming advantage of heart pendants right now prevents these new interesting playstyles from being used.
I would have to vote against increasing Guardian flinch resistance if fixed health maximums were implemented for different classes, because at that point, a few wild swings is sufficient to take down a Striker. Skilled Strikers should be able to flinch-lock an opponent since they would now be taking an equivalent risk- one mistimed toothpick could allow the opponent to swat them down fairly easily.
A similar argument against buffing Recons can be made if fixed health maximums were implemented, because a decent Recon can usually land the first strike, and with the lower health cap, Strikers would now be at an extreme disadvantage following that hit. The Recon health bonus even might have to be reduced to compensate.
Wed, 01/09/2013 - 16:47
#46
My opinion on LD balance.
The classes are balanced, in a basic way (no p2w/2notgrindforever nonsense). The problem really is from the equipment.
For starters, the heart pendants. The strikers are meant to be glass cannons - offensively strong, but easily breakable. Heart pendants compensate the strikers' flimsiness, being capable in turning them into real killing machines. And it's not hard to see that, since a couple of health bars makes a significant difference between glorious slaughter and being embarrassingly beaten up to death. Sure you can also get buttloads of health on Recon/Guardian, but then you won't get your precious ASI/damage bonus on your lovely toothpick. And it would be pointless since they can hitlock you as long as you are alive, so it would only serve to bring more pain to yourself for the same result.
Now the weapons. There are at least 2 weapons that you will always see in a lockdown because they are always OP compared with others: A polaris, and a flourish of the person's choice (normally the final flourish because it's easier to ragecraft and buttloads of dps). The problem with each is the following:
- Polaris' shots are too easily spammable. Not only the bullets explode everywhere and cripple players with shock, but also can be shot at the speed of a blaster gun. Either allow only to shoot 2 bullets at a time instead of 3, or reduce its base attack speed and/or status inflicting chance.
- The flourishes combine the range of a heavy blade with the swiftness of a spur, specially with the 1st attack. And to make it even more ridiculous, max up the ASI, and you got something that can easily hitlock anyone, even a guy with a CUTTER. Best solution for this, and without making everyone cry, except for the skolverbabies, make the stupidly long range 1st strike the LAST hit of the 3-combo. Also because it makes no sense that, given it's a PIERCING weapon, the 1st attack SWIPES instead of STABBING like it should.
I didn't putted Faust because it's a sloth compared with other melee weapons, except for the troika lines (they could use a damage/range buff if you ask me) except for when they have HIGH ASI UVs of course, and the haze bombs can be easily nullified with either guns or max status resistances.
And of course, some of you will mention about less wealthy players being able to get max asi toothpick/faust too with Vog. But guess what?
- Vog doesn't have piercing resistance, unlike skolver.
- The skolverbabies usually have a v.high ASI on their blades, meaning they're free to use damage buff from their armor, meaning less time and effort to murder, compared with a vog striker.
Not to mention the wealthiest ones could get a max resistance on both shock/stun, making haze bombers completely useless against them as I mentioned above.
God, I wrote too much...
Wed, 01/09/2013 - 21:43
#47
Well
I believe that the striker is in fact at it's seat of power at higher tier lockdown. A probable way to mitigate this is a scaling health debuff. Here's how it will work:
The health debuff will be applied to every piece of equipment that provides any health bonuses, so it should affect heart trinket users to some degree, but enough to make them in line with the other classes.
Let's do an example from t2 lockdown. If a striker has maxed out 3* equipment, as well as 2 3* heart trinkets, the total health would be 19. However, if there is a -2 debuff on each piece of equipment, including the trinkets, it should subtract a whopping 8 bars of health, giving them only 11 bars total. Now before you scowl at me, note that this idea applies only to equipment that has a health bonus, so people who don't have any trinkets on as we'll as people who have other types of trinkets will be mildly affected.
Thu, 01/10/2013 - 00:01
#48
Balance?
Given the current stats on the classes... sadly not. We've got our intended 'glass cannon' class, the Striker, as the 'hey I'm gonna use my very high stats to polaris/poke/[female dog]slap you!'. We've got our intended 'best offensive class' (Chris was a recon before the Heart Trinket update), the Recon, as a rarely-played class because everyone and their mother prefers Polaris walls and high ASI to sneakiness and twoshot kills. Then we've got the Guardian, which takes the Recon's other niche as a bomber, and has a health regen shield to boot.
Basically, the implementation of Heart Trinkets is what causes this main imbalance. If it was back to the old system of Love Puppy drops, we'd most certainly see a greater increase in victory due to skill and not victory due to money. I mean sure, if you have ASI VH Flourishes anyways that's going to make a difference, but if you don't have the skill to back it up you're toast. The Heart Trinkets provide a buffer for those less skilled Strikers with UVs, whereas the other classes have to sacrifice their Heart Trinkets to match the ASI or lose their ASI/DMG for Heart Trinkets.
Other than that, the only other issue I can see are UVs; again, without Heart Trinkets those are not much of a problem. I use my UVs to walk through bombs, which helps as I play the Recon Class, but in exchange I lose valuable defenses I could be maxed against. Again, it's that tradeoff, and for some reason there is an imbalance in the tradeoff for say, shock resist vs. pierce max resist vs. ASI+ trinkets. If OOO finds a way to balance the tradeoff, there may very well come a balance to the classes.
Thu, 01/10/2013 - 00:05
#49
No.
No.
Thu, 01/10/2013 - 02:27
#50
-
Sadly, no. I personally don't enjoy LD (I call it lag-down) at all as my ping is usually high and LD is a total lag-fest. Anyways, I play as a Guardian Gunner :P (I call that gg)
It's pretty easy to explain from the surface, the majority of LD players play as Skolver zombie clones. The typical zombie loadout (Skolver set+toothpick+GF+polaris/hammer) gets the most love and also most hate from other classes.
Guardian shields are very thin, they can heal and take sufficient damage, supportive class.
Recon Cloaks break upon one little touch, usually recons creep around and do all caps.
Strikers are the most popular class in LD. They have that use-it-if-I-like Striker boost, asi and dmg med on swords. Unlike recons where their cloaks break with one touch and guardians become a moving punchbag after taking one GF combo; strikers can use the boost, dash around, dash away and pull out the most annoying trollaris and then dash back and poke you again. Some hardcore (or just rich) players have asi VH on each weapon and max UVs on their zombie armour that grants immunity to movement-restrictive bombs (VT and Stagger, the zombie set itself gives shiver immunity already)
4+3=7 points of defence will grant you immunity to haze bombs (which are minor status) This means a MAX shock+High shock will give you VT immunity, max stun+high stun for stagger and so on. The ideal zombie set will be like max shock+high stun on one piece and max stun+high shock on the other - which is not that hard to obtain. Also IQ set with shock high+max also give immunity, that will thus explain why people spend like 20k CE on a max shock jelly piece.
OOO should make an LD mode where all UVs are disabled, no trinkets as well.
I really suck at explaining stuff :P, but yeah I don't think LD is balanced. Either recons and guardians need a boost or strikers need a nerf (Like only allow one trinket to be equipped, or remove that sword damage bonus)
I'm not actually sure...
All of the classes have inherent weaknesses.
For Strikers, it takes the form of bomb charge time increase, and reduced health. These weaknesses are incredibly easily to compensate for: you don't use bombs, and you get Heart Trinkets. Strikers however get massive boosts to swords, which are the main source of damage.
For Recons, the main weakness is the slow sword speed. You need either Unique Variants or weapon trinkets. However, you need at least ASI high to be on par with the Striker, else you'll still be at a sword disadvantage. Recons also have the most fragile shield ability. It lasts for a surprisingly long while actually, but one chip of damage and it's gone. Guns and Bombs aren't adequate sources of damage, so the Recon relies on being able to sneak onto a point, then stay on said point with massive AOE bombs and long range guns. This is a really hard factor to quantify though. Another hard thing to quantify is their Deathmark ability in 1v1 and group battles.
For Guardians, their weakness is their lack of mobility and lack of long range abilities. Recons are just as fast (Or just as slow), however they can move unseen, which lets them maneuver undisturbed. Guardians have to rely on being... well... defensive. They rely on counter-attacking anyone who charges in melee, either with bombs or with a well timed sword swing. However, they only have an ASI low compared to the Striker ASI med, which already puts them at a slight disadvantage when up against Strikers. The biggest problem though is when someone doesn't want to come into melee with them. If a Striker pulls out a Polaris or even an Antigua, the Guardian is going to have some serious problems... unless they get allies which is another thing that's hard to quantify.
Strikers are really good/common because they work best on their own, without support, and can hold their own in solo fights. Most pubs dont have any sense of teamwork, which is why the Striker thrives. Even in GvG, very few teams have good team strategies beyond "every man for themself."