I think yes, the stats table at the end gives some bias to striker (You'll get more damage if you spend less time traveling and more time near your enemies, you'll get more caps if you can stand on the point as it's almost finished, you'll get defends if you just run up and take the last hit). Stats are pointless though, in the context of winning. But as I said in another thread, IMO, the lack of diversity is partly due to a lack of role models. Newbies get killed by striker swordsmen, then they assume that's the best and, wanting to take the route to be the 'best', they become striker swordsmen. It'll take a lot more people who are good with recon/guardian to inspire more recons/guardians. The people who are good with them are harder to find (so they influence way less people - and strikers have been breeding clones for way longer), but they're very different playstyles/mindsets/gear sets.

But really, the other classes have quite a bit going for them - mind you, with different weapons and different focuses. There isn't any need to nerf striker or buff the other classes (I still think the recon shield change was uncalled for XD), especially since there's a huge lack of people who are good with them in the first place. Balance discussion in competitive games are usually done assuming the highest levels of gameplay, and honestly, most recons/guardians I meet aren't that good, but when they are, they're a huge pain for at least one person on the enemy team.

It's funny - each class has boosts that act as "developer hints" on what kind of weapons can do well with those classes:
- Striker as a swordsman : penalties to bomb charge and health. Chases after enemies.
- Guardian as a hybrid sword-bomber : penalties to guns speed and heavy movement speed penalties while shielding (but hey, knockback immunity and invincibility and healing!). Waits for enemies to try to hit first, but is great when followed by teammates.
- Recon as a hybrid gun-bomber : penalties to sword speed and movement speed while cloaked. Waits for enemies but hits first.

Trinkets are actually good in that you can use them to make up for your class's penalties or lack of bonuses (and then 'max' out other stats) so you can play more diverse mixes of classes/weapons, but for some stupid reason, people have only picked up on doing that for striker. Add attack speed/damage to guardian/recon and you have formidable classes with invincibility and invisibility as their super powers.

When I play guardian, I use sword speed trinkets because it makes counter attacks out of shield so good, but I also add on gun speed trinkets if I want to play tank.

I love invisible classes in games, so I originally set out in Lockdown to become a master recon. Eventually I went with the gun-recon route because the stats were right for it (and then I used damage trinkets to make up for its lack of damage boosts) and I guess I got some notoriety for it, but when I play sword recon, I use sword speed trinkets for mobility's sake. HP trinkets are a disgusting waste for recons unless they're UV'd.

---
Edit:
@Gianor:
True that recons can turn invisible, but you need to be truly unpredictable in order to dodge the million polaris bullets people will launch out in attempts to find you
Yeah, being unpredictable works, but you know, you can:
1) Bait the polaris users to approach you / enter the range of better weapons like valiance/alchemers/swords by showing yourself and baiting them to come.
2) Stop moving towards bullets when you get hit (I cringe when I catch myself or other recons autopiloting towards the center of it after getting hit - it's never good).
3) Outrange/take shots in between their timing.
4) Approach from the other side or go elsewhere - Most maps are designed with multiple points of entry. If you're playing to win, someone standing at a point with no enemies is a waste.

@Holy-Nightmare:
This leaves the other two classes often neglected as the strikers can quickly kill the other classes (if they have no support) and rush back to spawn to heal
Killing or not is an issue of experience and weapons.

Let's take swords for an example: What's the difference between a striker attacking with a flourish and a recon attacking with a flourish?

Nothing.

Well, maybe the striker has a little more inherent ASI, but when it comes to it, it's contact between two people using swords. Even strikers have to deal with having enemies with different ASI, so there really isn't any difference once the approach happens. If we take that to Guardians, they even have an extra option to shield+counter instead.

But sometimes, the options do need to be known.

Sometimes, people pull off autopilot moves without realizing they can take other options. You know, like:
- Recons capturing points can stand in places other than the direct center of the point.
- After cloaking, you don't have to keep moving in the same direction (...or even keep moving, at all) to get away from someone who's chasing after you.

Letting those options be known can only be good.

When I was trying to pick up sword recon again, I was in this mindset that I needed to keep trying to keep moving all the time. It took something someone mentioned in public chat to remind me that not moving could be just as tricky as moving.

If that sort of thing is limited to the "7%" then it's only because those things aren't been seen by others. Some of them aren't actually too technical, but are examples of things that any serious recons should learn to pull off (visibility bait being one of them). Each class has its set of "basics" - kind of how striker has its "hit then circle" movement.

Make it so strikers cannot capture points.

Currently they have raw offensive power and the mobility to capture points efficiently. Eliminating the ability to cap will force people to play other classes if they want to win.
Plus, it will also foster teamwork. A striker fighting alone would be wasting time since he can't win any points for his team. He will have to protect his teammates if he wants to do something productive. Guardian shield and recon skulls also help the striker do his work well.
Basically this will make the strikers offensive in combat, but defensive in the overall game. The reverse becomes true for guardians and recons.

Unfortunately OOO probably won't be implementing this any time soon, so it's all hogwash.

I don't even..

Striker was the class designed to go out and cap points. Guardians and recons are way to slow to do it on their own.
If you want to turn striker into even more of a class just farming damage by all means make that a suggestion.
I'll make one that says guardians and recons can't deal damage anymore..

If you have everyone go guard on a team, it's ridiculous. Even with just two-three guardians the healing is so rapid, and with bombs you're nearly unkillable.

"Is a little balance too much to ask for in PVP?"

@OP
The short answer is yes, since we've been railing on the forums about some sort of balance between weapons, classes, maps... basically everything and anything with little to no response.

Speaking of maps... I think it's been over a year since we've had a new one. If there is any chance they could delete the stage Avenue it would be an improvement. 90% of the stage is below the point, which means you die to camera angle advantage strikers if you try to cap (and to me that's just a highlight of many reasons). Making any sort of comeback on that stage is near impossible.

@Auto-Target:
Has it occurred to you the only reason recons/guardians are too slow is because strikers outpace them? If strikers can't cap, everyone will be using recon/guardians to cap.
...
Under this system, damage farmers are punished because they won't be able to cap and end up losing the game.

If you're suggesting the following changes as a deterrent to certain behavior, you're probably making a very wrong assumption:
That people are playing to win in the first place and that removing their capability to cap with that class will discourage them from doing whatever they're already doing.

But... damage farmers aren't playing to win in the first place. They're playing to get "higher score" (damage). It's a sideeffect of the "damage" being the highest number shown at the end. If the scoreboard at the end showed Kills/deaths instead, you'd bet more people would be going on about killstealing and 'unfair deaths'. Another factor of course is that some people just prefer a deathmatch kind of playstyle. You know, those people who always have 0 caps and just camp the other base's spawn all game.

The current state of game demonstrates strikers have an edge when fighting recons and guardians. Thus, they will still be useful for defending points.

...What edge exactly does Striker have over Recon/Guardian in actual combat? When it comes to the moment any character starts a weapon attack, all classes are pretty much the same. The main advantage I noticed for striker is that it gets in combat earlier due to its traveling speed with boost. That's pretty much the only reason strikers usually outdamage an equally-skilled player using a different class.

@Holy-Nightmare:
"Why not have an assist count on the board that shows how often a recon breaks defenses or how much damage a guardian tanks for his team? "
Those are really inconsequential stats. All the current stats in the game are achievable with any class. Damage isn't striker-only; why should we have stats that are only achievable for other classes? In the context of winning, at least showing # caps/defends/damage are at least (in a shallow way) related to the goal.

"Why not create a LD in which players can't use trinkets or weapon slot upgrades in order to provide a balanced game?"
Thinking trinkets/weapon slots imbalance the game is kind of naive. If anything, they allow for more diversity because then you can equip trinkets that make up for your classes' lack of bonuses or weaknesses for some interesting combinations. The only reason it seems this way right now is that so many people pick Striker (HP weakness) and wear HP trinkets to counter that, then assume that HP trinkets are good for the other classes (hint: They're not).

And weapon slots... so what if they can carry another weapon?

Wtf why would u remove health trinkets. People worked for it and u can get your own. It's not pay to win

Trinket slots r cheap, and people buy them for like 9k crowns. As for the health trinkets, it's easy to get the five star, the only hard thing is elite orbs. Strikers use health trinkets so it gives as much health as recon. I already know what u wrote up there on the Wiki.

/sigh.

I think I'm getting too old for The Coliseum when I'm annoyed by the fact people don't seem to know anything about Lockdown.
Kudos to you Seiran for putting up with it and actually trying to learn people something.

"These people will be more likely to play guardian/recon if strikers can't cap." -Auto-Target

"Oh hey, look, us strikers can't even capture points any more! But we sure can kill! And now we don't even need to worry about capturing any more! Yay!"

*Strikers frolic in the blood of the ensuing murder sprees and starts circlejerking harder than ever before with their damage scores 'cause awesome damage scores are now only attained by strikers.*

You must be a special individual if you don't understand that people that go for damage, don't care about capturing, they care about damage.

> people try to play recon/guardian like it's a striker
> doesn't work
> IMBALANCED!
___

And no, I'm not against diversity in Lockdown: I just think people should actually push the limits of the classes' playstyles and abilities before they give up and start asking for developer intervention.

@ Seiran
I don't disagree with you that guardians and recons are viable in combat. The question is, if they are just as useful as strikers, why are strikers so popular? New people often start out as guard/recon, but later switch to striker. Either the striker class is easier to master or it's inherently better.
Neither you nor Glitter have provided a reason for why eliminating striker capping would encourage damage farming. You can't assume most people will still play as striker, because that's the whole point for the change.

Are you arguing the change will make strikers underpowered?

Again, nobody is putting down guard/recon, quite the opposite. Guardians and recons are powerful in their own way, yet they aren't being used as much. Why?
Are you saying the reason is solely player preference?

@Feyi
I like how you correlate different opinions than yours with ignorance. Seiran (and myself) are giving different perspectives in the hope that they will change opinions, not arguing about testable facts because we are too lazy to look them up.

Regarding "forcing"
My proposal is under the assumption that we want to make fewer people play striker (implied by OP). If you think it's fine that so many people are playing as striker, there's really no point in discussing my proposal. The situation is similar to that of AT. There's really nothing wrong with the classes. It's just that the game has evolved into a state where strikers are very common.

So, assuming we want to reduce the average number of players that use striker, we encounter the three problems you listed.
1. Strikers are good with swords, which appeals to most players
2. Strikers are more exciting to play
3. Strikers are popular (bandwagon effect)

What is the simplest thing to do that will address those problems?
1. We can play around with bonus-balancing, but that is messy and one class will always have to get the sword bonus.
2. We can't change the shields, because that will change the class dramatically.
3. The only way to make striker less popular is to make it less appealing relative to the other classes.

I proposed eliminating striker's ability to cap, which will:
1. Make the other two classes necessary for winning a game.
-->Prevents strikers from dominating matches.

2. Preserve the defining attribute of the striker class ("ability to deal high damage and harass people")
-->Remember the point is not to eliminate damage farming, it's to provide incentive for not using striker without completely revamping the striker class.

3. Reward teams that have a nice balance of classes (cooperation) and punishing those that don't.
-->Lockdown is supposed to be a team game, not "group of people fighting for the same score" game. A team with a nice mix of classes will win. A team full of strikers will not. A successful team should have someone who can harass and break enemy defenses (striker), but also people that can heal, capture, and stall (guardians and recons).

4. Make the striker class a glass-cannon, not a super-soldier
--> Currently, it has a super-soldier status. Strikers storm through, destroy resistance, capture, and repeat the cycle. Eliminating capture abilities will make them just firepower. Glass cannon breaks the resistance before dying, then more sturdy teammates come in and secure the point.

5. The current metagame centers around a see-sawing Blitzkrieg strategy.
This is why damage farming can actually help a team win. The more kills you perform, the more momentum you give your teammates who actually do capture points. The reason this highly offensive strategy is popular is because the only way to counter it is itself.
If we remove striker's capping ability, points will not be able to change sides very quickly. This will shift the metagame toward something more defensive. Will there still be damage farmers? Of course. But those damage farmers will lose more often because damage-farming is a less favorable strategy. If a team full of damage farmers manged to kill off the entire enemy team, they won't be able to capture the undefended points with the momentum (free time on the field) they gained. A successful team must have enough firepower to steal momentum and enough capturing power to profit from it.

"I don't correlate your opinions with ignorance because they differ from mine, I do because they show a lack of understanding of meta and mentality in current lockdown."

Translation: "I don't think you are ignorant because I disagree with you. I think you are ignorant because you are ignorant about the metagame."

That is a very valid explanation if you provided some objective way to measure the metagame. Unfortunately you did not, so the two phrases are saying the same thing.

Anyways...
This is a forum. We have discussion/debates.
1. I made a comment that was relevant to the post. It was not a suggestion, just a thought.
2. You felt that my comment was unreasonable and explained why you thought so. (Which you totally have the right to do)
3. I felt your critique was flawed and explained why I thought so. (which I also have the right to do)
4. You said the people who disagree with Seiran are ignorant.
5. I stated my disagreement with what you said in #4, and gave what I believe was a more accurate description of what is taking place.
6. You just voiced your disagreement with my description, saying your description is actually accurate because I am indeed ignorant.

I think these 6 points summarize our interactions (so far) on this thread.
If you think the above 6 statements are not an accurate description, please give specific explanations of why that is.
If you agree that these 6 statements are an accurate description, we can drop the matter.

Seiran you're in charge of making a special brief summary of what's going on every 5-6 posts :D
I liked the last one!

Best summary 2014

Seiran, am I understanding you correctly?

My premise was that change is needed. You agree with that. However, you disagree that the simplest and most effective solution requires OOO to act. You believe a better solution is for players to encourage each other to use guardian and recon.
I agree with you that it would be a simpler solution (since it doesn't involve OOO), but how effective would it be? How do you implement something like "grassroots effort"?
I'm asking because that is a very vague idea. Is grassroots effort already happening? If so, why do we still have threads like this?
If such grassroots efforts are not happening, how do we get it to happen?

===============================================================================
My summary was directed at Feyi, focusing on the interactions between us. Seiran's posts are irrelevant to the issue between us. This is because Feyi is not part of that debate. Feyi is a spectator who has made what I felt was an unreasonable judgment of other people. Am I offended? Yes. Not by the insult, but by the arrogance I perceived in the comment.
It's like a rich guy and his lawyer. The lawyer is actually debating, while the rich guy watches and tells the opposition "You guys have no logical grounds for arguing". The opposition asks "What do you mean? Please explain?", and the rich guy is silent again, letting the lawyer do all the talking.

My premise was that change is needed. You agree with that. However, you disagree that the simplest and most effective solution requires OOO to act. You believe a better solution is for players to encourage each other to use guardian and recon.
I agree with you that it would be a simpler solution (since it doesn't involve OOO), but how effective would it be? How do you implement something like "grassroots effort"?
I'm asking because that is a very vague idea. Is grassroots effort already happening? If so, why do we still have threads like this?
If such grassroots efforts are not happening, how do we get it to happen?

Oh, having OOO remove cap ability from strikers is effective in solving the issue of "lack of recons/guardian". I just think it carries way too much extra weight for a small issue.

What I'm thinking of is more like people actually giving tips/training sessions to people who use recon/guardian. I know a bunch of guilds/individuals do "training sessions" with newer players, but they usually involve training them to do things as striker. I'm saying people who are good with recon/guardian should do the same. And if not, then when you play, just encourage other people to use them with you. Recon and Guardian actually have a lot of potential with team strategies too (involving other recons/guardians), and you can give them a taste of that if you play with them (ex: one recon stays visible while the other one attacks, then switch). Even if it doesn't "convert" them to main those classes, it'll show that they have other options instead of staying as striker, trying to be a solo hero and getting spawn camped all day.

But to answer your questions, no, I don't think such an effort is happening. I do little things towards it when I play Lockdown (heck, anyone on my team instantly gets a recon/guard), but it isn't my sole mission to spread the good news.

I have been wanting to make a recon/mindgames guide for a while (+ videos! ...or pictures, cause I hate having to deal with videos) but w/e, still in the planning stages. I figure since recon isn't something you can easily show people in-game (and you can't spectate), it's easier to learn from if you can see it in first-person.

And then it hits you... Zave (recon) and Very-Cherry (guardian) just brought stranger danger in to lockdown

Seiran and AT are 2 leaders of demonstrtions...having a big debate.
And OOO is the president and won't probably do a thing.
GET REAL GUYS! THERE IS NO POINT OF DISCUSSING THINGS!

OP: Yes striker is a bit overrated but instead of 'nerfing' strikers, lets rather 'buff guards/recons.
Guardian: the shield should protect IMMEDIATLY. it only protects you after 2 seconds letting a GF ASI MAX combo hit you.
Recon: remove the ASD on swords, maybe MSI med would help too
Cheers

you know that flinch that happens when a guardian walks into a bomb? That flinch happens whenever a guardian takes any hit to their shield. I feel like it was probably added to help guardians,but it means that strikers with high levels of asi can flinch-lock you. In general this makes the tap-counter very dangerous against experienced strikers. It's probably because guardian was not designed to be a dueling class that can go toe to toe with strikers , but it's pretty frustrating when you have only a .5 second period to counterattack

Not if it takes 0.5 seconds for the server to respond.

Krakob 1 - 0 Auto-Target

Just because you're named after a stupid feature it doesn't mean you have to say stupid things.