"There would be room for greater variety in armor and shields, if more of the game forced us to adopt defensive postures."
"* Currently the game is too offense-oriented. I'd like to see more enemies that force you to take a defensive stance. This could make many more armor sets desirable, heavy swords more desirable, etc."
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What would you do if you were put in charge of designing a new set of levels to address this issue? You can come up with whatever you need to.
Do you prefer monster UV's (Damage bonus versus Beast Very High!) or ASI/CTR?
Hey, sometimes a Very High can be better than a lower end CTR/ASI (although that makes it a non-equal comparison).
Brother-Zeke, I get your point, but I still strongly prefer ASI and CTR. All of my important UVs are those. I usually play with only one weapon type, because I find that limitation enjoyable. Then, armor, shield, and sprite perk are enough to max out damage bonus against all monsters with some room left over for MSI or ASI. Also, Chaos has made CTR UVs less valuable, ASI more valuable, and Swiftstrike more valuable.
Fehzor, I think it's a more an issue of redesigning the damage calculation, than redesigning the levels. There is simply not a big difference between weak normal+piercing armor (Skolver) and strong normal+piercing armor (Ice Queen). In fact, Chaos arguably has all of the piercing defense you need in PvE (i.e. none).
As a compromise between your question and my response: Keep Tier 3 as it is, but make Tier 4/Core have really different damage level adjustments, to reward strong armor and punish weak armor.
Wouldn't be more appropriate T2 and T3 and hypothetical T4 work on the same way? Have a place for defensive armors and strategies?
Do you ever design loadouts to work against the people wielding brandishes everywhere? i.e. reduce the effectiveness of their sword via manipulating the mobs using your weapons
What about some of the more defensive sets I can use in Danger Missions?
Trats-Romra, I agree that all tiers could be retooled. I restricted my comments to Tier 4 just because I always go for the smallest changes possible, because those seem more doable. Of course, none of these suggestions will be implemented by Three Rings anyway, so maybe I should just let my imagination run wild.
Fehzor, I don't try to counteract or troll my team, if that's what you're asking. Sometimes I teasingly try to kill monsters before my teammates can, to show them that weapons other than brandishes (WRH, DBB, DR, Nova/Umbra) are also powerful. Do you have an anti-brandish strategy? Polaris/Nitro knockback? Or were you talking about Lockdown?
Sonosuke, here are the ideal defenses, as far as I can see. (I'll omit normal defense, although it's always important --- although to be honest I'm not totally sure how important it is on Tier 3 Elite anymore.)
* Compound 42: Dragon Scale! also Fallen, Arcane Salamander, Deadly Virulisk (fire, then poison, piercing, and elemental)
* Ghosts in the Machine: Grey Feather, Divine, Perfect Seerus, Mercurial Demo (shock, then elemental, then shadow)
* Heart of Ice: Black Kat, Dread Skelly, Ice Queen, Kat Claw, Nameless (freeze, then shadow, then piercing)
* Legion of Almire: anything with strong shadow defense (there is almost no status)
Naw, PvE. Gotta use as much knockback as possible, take things out of clusters so that the brandish users can't deal insane damage on their charges.
I think in a past arguement with Draycos, I analysed the utility value of valkyrie set and Chaos set, and my conclusion is that Chaos is the superior in terms of utility. Mean by Utility, I mean just how useful a set is and how many different clockwork levels can it be used in.
Here is how the utility calculator work, before you use it, there are some assumptions to be made:
1. This calculator assumes that a player will always dress correctly to the party, that means, a fallen set doesn't give you bonus in fire deconstruction site, since Gremlins are elemental.
2. Sleep is a dead status, hence the jelly set will not gain score for the sleep resist.
3. UVs, Health bonus and MSI are not accounted in the calculation due to it is really up to a player to place him/herself in the right palce during battle and manage their health accordingly.
4. All gears are measured at their 5* or final version, this calculator only applies to shields and armors.
Here is how you calculate the utility value of an armor:
+0.5 if the armor has a resistance to any of the three types of damage (piercing, elemental and shadow)
-0.3 if the armor doesn't have normal defence
+0.3 if the armor grants a med CTR to one type of weapon
+0.3 if the armor grants a med ASI to one type of weapon (and vice versa if there is a med ASD)
+0.3 if the armor grants a med damage bonus to any of the monster race (and vice versa if the armor offers any penalties)
+0.2 if the armor offers a status that is resistance to a particular clockwork level with a monster type that the armor is resistant to(and vice versa if the armor has a weakness)
So what do you think of this calculator?
What,in your opinion, are the best Mineral/Rock Block breaking weapons?
Also, would your guide start to include advanced tactics such shield switching which the swordmaster guide is sorely lacking?
Midnight-Dj: Quantifying the relative merits of armors would be nice, although players will disagree about the particular weights that you choose. And there are many details. For example, freeze protection is often not valuable at all, until you have tons of it. The utility of offensive bonuses depends on the mix of weapons that you use. I'd say that the most important features for experienced, skilled, and non-laggy players are (1) offensive bonuses, (2) shock, freeze, and fire protection, (3) damage protections, and (4) poison protection, (5) other status protections. For lesser players, I'd have to think harder.
Newbyboy: Among swords, Warmaster Rocket Hammer, Dread Venom Striker, and Wild Hunting Blade are the kings of breaking minerals and blocks. (Some people also like Winmillion.) In guns, Argent/Sentenza may be best, because of their high speed and long range. In bombs I like Dark Retribution.
My sword guide doesn't offer any advice on technique. I've been thinking of adding it, but then the guide would get too long. So I would probably split the guide into three parts (loadouts, swords, techniques). I don't have time right now to do a good job of that, but you're right that it would be valuable.
Many loadouts work, some of the best involve super-specialized gear (Dragon Scale), and Chaos outperforms all other armor under the right conditions (status UVs, skill, fast computer and connection). And it all varies by character class and who is in your party. So, to narrow down the task, I'll restrict myself to hybrids, using fairly common armor and weapons, including appropriate defense, not including Chaos. Also I'll use only two weapon slots and no vortex bombs. (A vortex bomb is almost always useful. Consider it my third weapon, if you like.) Barbarous Thorn Shield and Swiftstrike Buckler are options in all of these loadouts.
* Legion of Almire: Black Kat, Snarbolax, or Shadowsun. Combuster and Blitz.
* Ghosts in the Machine: Divine, Perfect Seerus, or Vog Cub. Grey Owlite. Combuster and Nova/Magma Driver.
* Compound 42: Vog Cub, Perfect Seerus, or Volcanic Demo. Any fire shield. Gran Faust/Acheron, Umbra, or Dark Retribution.
* Heart of Ice: Black Kat, Snarbolax, or Shadowsun. You want tons of freeze protection. Dread Skelly or Crest of Almire. Final Flourish/Barbarous Thorn Blade, Blitz Needle, Dark Briar Barrage, or Combuster/WRH.