Overall Battle System Adjustments for the Future

[Yinnyth]

To be completely honest, I don't care either way if they nerf Twilight Scythe or not. I can see where they're coming from when it comes to this topic, so there is reason. But it has not yet grown to the point where it's a major problem with the game. I do, however, take exception with all the people popping out of the woodworks claiming the scythe really isn't all that powerful so it shouldn't be nerfed.

As for whether or not this is a waste of time, sometimes you've got to just let the dog chew his bone. There are ALWAYS better uses for your time. No matter how good the thing they implement is, there is always something better they could have implemented.

[raps1355]

Can the scythe even proc on NM?

[Rustic]

I know exactly why the devs are making these changes - they have absolutely NO 1st hand knowledge as to how these items are being used by the actual playing customers at all. The new producer has admitted that he barely plays the game and he's not even cap on his main job. So how do you think he knows how items are actually being USED by the players in real game situations and not what's on paper at all or just listening to what 'some players' are complainting about on this forum.

My suggestion to SE is to assigned at least 1 in game-job per developer/QA/internal testers. required them to become expert in that job in real in-game (end game situation as well as non-end game). They have the ability to just assign whatever weapons/levels/skills/armors their char needs so that shouldn't be hard and they wouldn't need to go through the grind to level/skill up and instead can just use these gears in real game situations.

Until then, my opinion is that they will keep doing adjustments that makes absolutely no sense at all.

In fact, I'd happily suggest that devs get a decent "native guide" to the endgame (Oh, look- BlueGartr right over there on the Internets!) and ride-along for some actual gameplay time on the stuff they're considering nerfing. I'm sure there's a TON of Twilight Darkles out there who'd be happy to show them the actual useful/uselessness of the weapon.



Most probably look less silly than this, but you never know. I've seen people doing Dynamis in opaline.

[Quetzacoatl]

Why are you adjusting niche weapons that most people don't care about when you have literally thousands of requests for changes to mythics/Relics/Empyreans that actually matter?

I say leave it how it is and fix some more important weapons / weapon skills instead.

This, this, this, and this. I really see no reason to nerf Twilight Scythe at all...it's a balanced Scythe that doesn't encroach on Apocalypse, Liberator or any other niche scythe in the game. What's the actual complaint about it anyhow? The death proc? That only just works on normal enemies, it would be overpowered if it worked on any NMs. And if we're worried about how much damage it deals per swing, I can guarantee that something like Nirastamo or Wroth Scythe have a higher DMG rating and would out-damage Twilight Scythe pretty easy.

[Earwig]

I think what SE is trying to get at is the fact that DRK can do too much stuff, so their solution is to cut off some of the less-used tools that drks have and let other jobs shine, and the non-elemental damage is one of the things that they don't really wan't drks to be able to use as efficiently as other jobs. It's not so much about the scythe being OP as the drk being OP.

[Yinnyth]

This, this, this, and this. I really see no reason to nerf Twilight Scythe at all...it's a balanced Scythe that doesn't encroach on Apocalypse, Liberator or any other niche scythe in the game. What's the actual complaint about it anyhow? The death proc?

The fact that its damage ignores all damage reduction which increases the utility of DRK and decreases the need for jobs which specialize in magic damage, including DRK's own magic capabilities. It detracts from build diversity as well as their new talking point: "fostering skillful play". Why would you nuke when you can just keep swinging when Ultima puts up energy shield?

To your credit, there are other, more obvious issues contributing to the same problems. To SE's credit, they are examining revisions to be made to those issues as well. Just because one thing is not the biggest contributing factor does not mean it deserves to be overlooked.

[Metaking]

well the problem is twilight scythe isnt even the worse offender Murasamemaru is yea its only restricted to weapon skills, but sam doesnt really need to melee to gain tp. Now unless drk somehow gets a powerful magical weapon skill, or se fixes infernal i dont see twilight as broken, i mean common its a dot weapon on those mobs(Cerberus ext) for a job that sucks at dot. Also personally i see war as having more flexibility as they can use just about any melee dmg type, and use it well, its really se's fault for not using a rock paper scissors (blunt > slashing > piercing >) type set up for monsters pdt, and probably should give monsters with strait -pdt a similar amount out of +mdt.

[Calamity]

The fact that its damage ignores all damage reduction which increases the utility of DRK and decreases the need for jobs which specialize in magic damage, including DRK's own magic capabilities. It detracts from build diversity as well as their new talking point: "fostering skillful play". Why would you nuke when you can just keep swinging when Ultima puts up energy shield?

The problem is: what magic capabilities? SE has it in their head that DRK is this tremendously versatile job. And while, yes, there are a number of different things we can do, how many of them are useful? We have a whole series of absorb spells with dust resting on them, elemental nukes, which under the very best of circumstances, are worthless. Really the best of our magical capabilities lie in Drain, Drain 2, Endark and Infernal Scythe. Pretty sad. And this is why we use twilight scythe. It gives us the capability that we seem to have been initially intended to have, the difference being, the scythe actually works. So what's the deal SE? Are we supposed to be a multi-talented, versatile job, or just another mindless DD?

[Yinnyth]

The problem is: what magic capabilities? SE has it in their head that DRK is this tremendously versatile job. And while, yes, there are a number of different things we can do, how many of them are useful? We have a whole series of absorb spells with dust resting on them, elemental nukes, which under the very best of circumstances, are worthless. Really the best of our magical capabilities lie in Drain, Drain 2, Endark and Infernal Scythe. Pretty sad. And this is why we use twilight scythe. It gives us the capability that we seem to have been initially intended to have, the difference being, the scythe actually works. So what's the deal SE? Are we supposed to be a multi-talented, versatile job, or just another mindless DD?

The Twilight Scythe does nothing to decrease how mindless DRK is. I'm not sure if that's the point you're making or not, but I personally don't think any job should be mindless. Yes, DRK's nukes are underwhelming. Partly because the nukes suck overall, partly because DRKs never carry around nuke gear, and partly because there's hardly any good nuke gear available for DRKs. Even if they boost DRK's magic, even if DRKs are given access to more nuke-boosting gear, why would any DRK bother to gear up for nukes if they can just keep hacking away with the gear they already posess?

You are correct that the system does not work like it should, but there are several factors leading to this and Twilight Scythe is one of them.

[FrankReynolds]

The Twilight Scythe does nothing to decrease how mindless DRK is. I'm not sure if that's the point you're making or not, but I personally don't think any job should be mindless. Yes, DRK's nukes are underwhelming. Partly because the nukes suck overall, partly because DRKs never carry around nuke gear, and partly because there's hardly any good nuke gear available for DRKs. Even if they boost DRK's magic, even if DRKs are given access to more nuke-boosting gear, why would any DRK bother to gear up for nukes if they can just keep hacking away with the gear they already posess?

You are correct that the system does not work like it should, but there are several factors leading to this and Twilight Scythe is one of them.

Here's a fun analogy for the current situation.

There are two restaurants. Let's call them restaurant A and restaurant Z. They both have the same 20 items on their menu. The managers of restaurant A and Restaurant Z both notice that only two dishes on the menu ever sell in any substantial numbers, while customers tend to dislike the other 18 dishes. Let's say it's the chicken and the fish.

In order to fix this problem and get some action on the 18 other menu items that are constantly going bad and having to be thrown out:

Restaurant A decides to Make the fish and the chicken taste like crap.

Restaurant Z decides to remake all the other menu items so that they are of a similar quality and diversity as the fish and chicken dishes that are so popular.

Which restaurant do you suppose manages to keep it's doors open longer?