General Suggestion

Strong words, indeed.

Say, if a Ninja magic build were just as strong as a Wizard, wouldn't then the Ninja be always preferable? I mean, I imagine the other ninja skills would let them survive much better than wizards would. Or not? I can see the Wizard always having a range advantage, though (the AoE of their spells is better).

Perhaps ninjas can be just as strong as wizards if their shortcomings compared to them lies still elsewhere (such as having to stand in the middle of the enemies for some spells).

Skotlex wrote:Strong words, indeed.

Say, if a Ninja magic build were just as strong as a Wizard, wouldn't then the Ninja be always preferable? I mean, I imagine the other ninja skills would let them survive much better than wizards would. Or not? I can see the Wizard always having a range advantage, though (the AoE of their spells is better).

Perhaps ninjas can be just as strong as wizards if their shortcomings compared to them lies still elsewhere (such as having to stand in the middle of the enemies for some spells).

That if you're thinking that Ninjas are Mages with nice accessory skills, I hope seriously you aren't just thinking about that. What I'm trying to say here is that Ninjas aren't Weaker-Mages with survival habilities. They have too many skills, and most of them are overwhelmed by others, or should I say, Magic skills overwhelm all throw and melee skills.

Anyway, I am the only Hybrid Ninja I know in this server. People either go Togatana (suck) or Ninjutsu (nicey), so I will talk from the perspective of someone who actually uses all skills in battle, and I will first say WHY I actually do that: Cause it's cool.

Yeah, that's the only reason. Using all skills is FUN, and that's what I only seek when playing a dead server. It's a lot better than just spamming one shit.
But except that, I don't have a reason, for example, to switch between shurikens and kouenka, since I could just spam kouenka forever and that's that (wich is what I do when shurikens are over, and it works very well). Give me a reason to switch them.

Give me a reason to hide and go Kiri-Kage, since I could just spam kouenka.
Give me a reason to bash someone with envenom, push it with tatami gaeshi and use some shurikens after, since I could just spam kouenka on it.
Give me a reason to use Throw Huuma Shuriken, Kunai or Zenny Nage since I can use anything else.

And from all those examples you can just put Bakuenryu in kouenka's place if you're hitting more than one enemy, and to complement the damage use Kaenjin.
That's how a hybrid is.

Now let's talk about someone who focused on a branch:

Taijutsu: Envenom, Sand Attack, Kiri-Kage, Shadow Leap, Kasumi-Kiri, Tatami Gaeshi, Issen, Cicada-Shell and Busying-jutsu.

Envenom is your bash, but doesn't stun. (...). Sand Attack is useless after you get Kasumi-Kiri that blinds enemies. Kiri-Kage costs serious mana, does a decent damage (maybe) and is slow. Tatami Gaeshi pushes enemies and let you evade ranged attacks, usefull for the second effect. Issen costs your life to cause serious AoE damage, sucks at higher lvls. Cicada-Shell is the most annoying shit for melee, as you keep going back, useless. Busying-jutsu is usefull for some serious evasion. Well, sounds balanced, but doesn't work. Average damage is ridiculously low, all based on "they can survive well". It's annoying, just that. You can't level by surviving. You can't help party by just surviving. It's useless.

Togatana: Shuriken, Kunai, Huuma Shuriken, Zenny Nage and let's put Cicada-Shell and Busying-jutsu too.

Shuriken is your only skill. Spam it and you win. Kunai got elements and statuses but sucks, they are too heavy and slow for their damage, you can just switch elemental weapons and spam shuriken and it's better. Huuma Shuriken is just useless, low damage, slow as hell, and you need a Huuma to actually use it, it would be completelly useless for a Togatana focused character who would switch between elemental daggers. Zenny Nage... why spend 5000 zenny to cause 5000 damage when you can just spam 2 shurikens with a Togatana build and you get around 6000 damage, and that's with ONE shuriken (cause you can attack 3 times with one) that costs 40 zenny? Cicada-Shell and Busying-jutsu are both usefull for surviving on this one.

Taijutsu + Togatana: Why not? Stats are so similar!

Shuriken. Nothing else.

Ninjutsu: Kouenka, Kaenjin, Bakuenryu, Fuujin, Hyousensou, Suiton, Iceberg (forgot the name), Fuujin, Raigekisai, Kamaitachi, Nen, Cicada-Shell and Busying-jutsu.

One target ranged spells: Kouenka, Fuujin and Hyousensou.
Ground damaging spell: Kaenjin.
Area ranged targeted spell: Bakuenryu.
Area close quarters spell: Iceberg (Freezes), Raigekisai (Silences).
Corridor like damaging ranged spell: Kamaitachi.
Edit: Area Slowing spell: Suiton

All right, you got lotsa tools for the trick, but you skill lack damage. It's a matter of:
- Mages attack from affar with damage X
- Ninjas attack at closer quarters (see Kouenka, Iceberg and Raigekisai), but they have survival stuff, so it's ok, but with damage X-Y.
Now tell me, is it balanced?

"The Hell Ninjas Are" is what I'm asking, cause I can't see what they are when comparing your answers with an analisys of the class here.

If they are Hybrids give me a reason to switch between skills based on each situation, give me bonuses for situations, bonuses for sequences or combinations of skills. If they are 3-2 classes in one, make each branch actually work accordingly to it's role at the same level as the others who share this role. And if they are just Mages with survival stuff, go to hell.

That's my message about this class, thanks for reading.

"Mages with survival stuff" is made even more absurd by the fact all the other full casters (HW, Prof and HP) have better survivability options than the Ninja.

Except maybe the HW, but still, between Safety Wall, E-Coat and the sheer volume of super long range AoE status effects you should be dealing, the HW stands ahead of the Ninja's diluted mix of a slightly bigger health pool and either Shell or Illusion (Tatamigaeshi has just enough delay to completely hamper your offense, IIRC).

Having to use Catalysts is one of Ninja's shortcoming IMO

It was not my intention to make it sound like "Ninjas are just wizards with stuff", though... sorry for the confusion. I was referring to "Ninjas played as Wizards", as in, focusing entirely on their spell-casting tree.

Lothar, you made a very good post explaining how the ninja's different paths behave. However, all this information just leaves me more confused than ever before because I don't know how to fix the class. It seems like it requires a lot of fine-tuning as it currently stands.

Things like making Throw Fuuma more useful, Throw Shuriken less so. And then their spells which are stronger than everything else, but still weaker than a wizard's.... when explained this way, it's like everything is wrong @_@

I'm sorry too if I sounded harsh in any moment, but I guess that's how I wanted it to sound... anyway, Ninjas are like that unfortunatelly.

I love this class, it's fun, really fun. You know, you see an enemy, then you throw some shurikens, then when he get close you kasumi-kiri then kiri-kage him, then kasumi-kiri again and shadow jump somewhere far to spam some other shurikens and then finish off with a kouenka.
Or you see two enemies coming and you walk far from them while crowd controlling with shurikens to cast a Kaenjin and then a Bakuenryu.

This is the kind of shit this game needs, but the numbers and gameplay just don't make you wanna do that. I just know that I could just spam one thing and get a little more damage with less work, but that isn't fun... at all.

Could we open a thread to discuss them in details? Not that I have solutions right now, and I know you won't fix them so early, but if we consider then that they are all messed up, we can at least prepare the solutions until then.

Skotlex wrote:However, all this information just leaves me more confused than ever before because I don't know how to fix the class. It seems like it requires a lot of fine-tuning as it currently stands.

You could start with an objective, largely-math based analysis of the pros and cons of each Ninja build and classes with similar roles. Then, adjust each Ninja build to be roughly even with each other (making sure each build has a tradeoff or meaningful decision behind it), while adjusting their overall power to be on par with other classes' abilities to do those roles. Test in-game to see if the results are actually practical, then adjust as feedback comes in.

...But since when has game design been a part of MouRO development? Let us instead go with what feels like MouRO.

i suggest that skot actually do something about the server

That'd be neat, I should finish my thesis before I can really spend time on the server, though.. not to mention RO itself is totally broken and won't run. Grr, it's like I'd have to take several days off from my work to... work on the server x_x'

You can make a new thread if you want to discuss more in detail the ninja class, Lothar, but I think I got an idea of what needs be done. It's just gonna require me to actually play-test the game, which is no small obstacle as things stand in my laptop x_x

It has been like forever since you started on your thesis. Would be cool to have a server admin that has a Masters/PhD though.

Skotlex wrote:That'd be neat, I should finish my thesis before I can really spend time on the server, though.. not to mention RO itself is totally broken and won't run. Grr, it's like I'd have to take several days off from my work to... work on the server x_x'

You can make a new thread if you want to discuss more in detail the ninja class, Lothar, but I think I got an idea of what needs be done. It's just gonna require me to actually play-test the game, which is no small obstacle as things stand in my laptop x_x

I will just wait then. May ninjas not be fixed or the solution doesn't satisfy me, suggestions rain may fall upon this forum.

Without a single trace of sarcasm in me, I would be entirely willing to attempt at least partially continuing MouRO development while Skot is busy.

I certainly don't have much practical experience coding in whatever nonsense RO private servers have decided to make themselves out of, but I would hope the programming sense I do have (and enough skill at butchering code I just read into new parts) would do the job fair enough until our glorious leader gets his spare time back.

Yes, I'm mainly here to troll and provide good points that I feel get ignored, but certainly more than one person could vouch for me on a more serious matter.

It would be entirely his server to take back when he wants to, of course, but I feel a year in the past and future of non-development is obviously not part of the Intended MouRO Vision (tm).

This is, in fact, not a joke post. Skot is free to PM me about the finer details.

Failure wrote:/edgeworth

I'm willing to help with the code part if this ever happens. Ought to be fun!

I need to think about that. Unfortunately, I was already quite some way into migrating MouRO to using rAthena, so the code as it currently is is quite far from working. It'd be messy just giving you that and asking you to fix it.

It'd be a lot more feasible if I had the code in a working state already, at which point you could just maintain it and try to tweak/balance things.

How long has it been since I really started working on my thesis? All I know is that my contract expires at the end of January, so I better finish everything by then or else...

So what have you been doing then?

Skotlex wrote:I need to think about that. Unfortunately, I was already quite some way into migrating MouRO to using rAthena, so the code as it currently is is quite far from working. It'd be messy just giving you that and asking you to fix it.

Remind me again what the benefits are from switching from eA to rA? We really don't stand to gain much from either third jobs (still a buggy mess and the official skill changes aren't even in, I believe) or renewal, the biggest pull to it. I suppose active development is nice while the staff continues to extremely slowly get things done.

It's certainly a GOOD move, but a cursory examination isn't giving me a top-priority compelling reason, either.

Failure wrote:/edgeworth

Remind me again what the benefits are from switching from eA to rA? We really don't stand to gain much from either third jobs (still a buggy mess and the official skill changes aren't even in, I believe) or renewal, the biggest pull to it. I suppose active development is nice while the staff continues to extremely slowly get things done.

It's certainly a GOOD move, but a cursory examination isn't giving me a top-priority compelling reason, either.

rAthena is actively maintained. eAthena isn't. So if Mou sticks to eA we're basically never getting any sort of updates, not just new episodes - no bugfixes, no new engine features, no nothing.

New content is needed.
I know Thirds sucks (from what I've heard since I've never played them), but it's new content, wich is the only thing we can't do, or Skotlex can't do. Everything else like fixing them can be done, so why not?

But yeah, we already have problems with the classes we have now... imagine with Thirds.

Lothar Axe wrote:New content is needed.
I know Thirds sucks (from what I've heard since I've never played them), but it's new content, wich is the only thing we can't do, or Skotlex can't do. Everything else like fixing them can be done, so why not?

But yeah, we already have problems with the classes we have now... imagine with Thirds.

Thirds have reintroduced the joy of strapping bombs to yourself, suiciding and killing lots of people, so they're pretty much the best.

No no no, Mechanics are the best.

drag queens > all

since the eathena code is going to be scrapped once the rathena transition is complete would it b feasible to hand editing/maintenance pwr of the eathena version over to chosen forum ppl for balance testing? o.o

rathena isnt going anywher so we can wait awhile >.>

when the transition is complete the changes we still remember would be presented to u as suggestions agn >.>

Isn't eAthena pretty much dead already? I stopped visiting their forums when I realized pretty much NOBODY posts there anymore, everybody moved on to rAthena.

So yeah, there is hardly a reason to stick to eA, unless you wanted a stable server code that never changes.

moving on to rAthena will need to be done eventually but thers no rush >.> the server works fine for now and itll b crucial when 3rd job gets polished but that wont be for a long time anywayz o.o

being able to hav sum1 fire experimental changes on the server while ur busy for a few months til rAthena is ready would b nice and u could focus on wateva knowin the server is being looked after til u return with rAthena and a nerfd to hell 3rd job or sumthin til we figure out wut 2 do with it lol new toys r nice >.>

Experimental server was suggested so many times, and ignored so many times, that I think the answer is: "Nom. -_-".

skot currently needs to focus on his thingy, which means the servers wont be as well tended to for several months

suggestion -> skot should put sum1 up to tending to the current eAthena servers while skot is busy(the current running server would be the experimental one), skot is open to passing on maintenance duties to sum1 after rAthena is fully up, so passing the eAthena maintenance duties would be like a little training run o.o

That's one way to look at it. I'd have to place the source code for the server somewhere online (a distributed system like subversion or git) to then enable others to have access to modifying it.

Though, considering that the server config files shouldn't be exposed to the public (due to things like the inter-server/mysql) perhaps only the src directory would be posted there, not the other directories.

how about reducing the level of difficulty on guild dungeons? on your own it's already pretty hard, but with lvl 180 mobs its overkill or to be more specific it's a big "fuck you if you wanted those materials so bad" to be fair, you can farm the money over time but trying to farm the materials, is really hard, to be reasonable you could reduce the level to a fixed 150 or allow a way to trade mithril with gold or other stuff.