Parry Balance Discussion

Mariah · December 2018

King_Greg said:

Mervyn said:

JoaT doesn’t calc bushido.

I would like for them to add this to the Wiki for Joat and parrying if it is true. The only references i've seen is players talking about old five on fridays, but no one who could link to it, And someone quoting a book in game.

I have done some research into this, and have found a reference to it in the UOHerald Archive Bushido page. I can not find any reference in publishes to a change relating to it, I am working on the assumption that Mervyn's information is correct and will update the description on the Bushido page accordingly.

King_Greg · December 2018

Thank you thank you.

Paithan · December 2018

Have they decided which terrible idea they are going with that will make this dexer online?

Cookie · December 2018

Paithan said:

Have they decided which terrible idea they are going with that will make this dexer online?

It pretty much already is dexxer online.

I've been pvping pretty solidly over Xmas, for up to 12 hours a day the last few days, actually had a good time - so feel in a very good place to comment right now.

This idea cannot really proceed as it is.

If they do anything to nerf parry mages, they really have to buff non parry mage defence by quite a lot.

I personally don't mind parry being nerfed in itself, if they want to redress the fact that too many players use parry, but, it's certainly being used for a reason.

My personal pet hate, I'm going to say it again, way too much dismount going on (half the reason everyone has parry is the relationship between topics), whilst I've had a really good few days, and there is a lot of balance in a way, the dismounting is what is ruining the flow. It's got to be the crutch everyone uses, the must have. You cannot have a sensible fight. I get why the dismount is there, it's almost the only way players can stop other players, there is so much healing and running involved, but, this volume of dismount certainly isn't the way. Stealthers/archers on foot using dismount, fair enough, mounted dexxers using it whilst running and using lightning fast macro's - not really cool, they take no disadvantage using it, and turn the tide of battles way too unfairly - OR give dismount to mages as a spell (whilst on foot), and see how the dexxers feel then at this one sided skill being used on them.

Ezekial · December 2018

The sad part is, The Main reason mages will run Parry is for the fact they have no real way to put distance between themselves and a dexxer. Paralyze and Sleep are spells they use for that purpose. Now if a warrior has Resist and it's ineffective that's great! that means the warrior actually dedicated skill points to handle that! However trapped boxes are another story.

A Mage should NOT want to be up close and personal with a warrior. They honestly shouldn't have to. Getting close to a mage should be a difficult thing but rewarding once you do. I LIKE the idea of penalizing a mage to have parry, But I think in order for that to be fair then mages need to have some way of being equal to the Dexxer templates they are going to face. Do not just nerf a template/skill without having a plan to make the caster balanced with the dexxer.

I for one enjoy playing a caster class, But in UO it's gotten to the point where I end up not being able to keep up with Dexxers. I don't even mean just in PvP either. Gathering up Spell Damage gear is tedious and honestly even with every artifact available(which creates a rather hideous looking outfit I must add) I am still not able to keep up with a Dexxer's damage.

PvP.. I mean.... I am okay as long as no one hits me in the face.

So yeah, A mage with a shield looks pretty stupid, But it's just what it's come to when dealing with templates that maul your face and prevent you getting out of the face mauling by clicking a box.

@Bleak Please Please Plleeeeaaaaseee If we are going to do this change, Then let's have a plan for balancing Dexxers and Casters so one isn't just overpowering the other.

cobb · January 2019

Cookie said:
I personally don't mind parry being nerfed in itself, if they want to redress the fact that too many players use parry, but, it's certainly being used for a reason.

Yeah nerfing something just because lot of people are using it is a really bad idea. Just because lot of people use it does not mean it is overpowered.

Why not nerf Magic Resist as well then? Lot of pvp characters have it. Must mean it is overpowered as well .....

Seth · January 2019

Once again, this thread is dedicated to discussing 'basic' pvp templates. I do have the so called old pure mage with parry and 80 Dex template.

It is probably effective against another Pure dexxer. But frankly speaking, who on earth uses Pure pvp template for 1v1, mass war, or arena?

If your objective is to make Pure Dexxer viable again, there are many other templates that will toast the pure warrior without parry.

For one, the pure Dexxer is not popular as well not because of parry mage alone.

And parry mage isn't the king because there are any other templates that kill it.

At the very least, it is a viable template for me because it protects my template from the "Dexxer" part of the Dexxer/Archer Hybrids with Mage/Ninja/ Bushido/Mystic/Necro. Every experienced pvp uses some hybrids.

If mages don't need shields, then warriors don't need spells. Please nerf all the other hybrids as well....

...and kill UO finally and forever!

If your PVM dexxer gets strucked down by a Parry Mage, it probably isn't meant for PVP, like a Sampire. Please upgrade to a hybrid warrior mage.

The parry mage is just one of such PVP templates that is defensive. In war, my team mate makes me do utility like healing, cast invisible, bless and run away or everyone targets me.

By the way, when I just started out with the basic Parry Mage, my friend can kill it with his sampire because of evasion and bokuto nerve strike.

It is a beginners template, not useful for pvm but good defense against weapons in pvp. Against other hybrids, it was toasted many times.

amit · January 2019

All you have to do is make shields disarmable.

You guys have all these ideas and theyreally all great. But I think that is the simplest fix by far.

Paithan · January 2019

amit said:

All you have to do is make shields disarmable.

You guys have all these ideas and theyreally all great. But I think that is the simplest fix by far.

There have been really terrible ideas in this thread. Devs don’t understand how OP dexters are if you don’t have parry.

The_Higgs_1 · January 2019

Its like I said, the global loot change has lead to all these issues in todays pvp. Question is how do you fix that? I don't think there is a way without causing a lot of people to either quit or get upset. Id like to see either stat caps or skill point caps. But how do you put something like that in without affecting the pvm side of the game, base it on being flagged in combat or just in felucca? Pvp may just be too far gone to even attempt to fix it without a major overhaul, which would cause more people to be upset. There is a chance if they take a hard route to fix it, but they would have to endure losing people in order to eventually gain people in the long run. In its current state pvp is incredibly boring and just stupid, there really isn't any skill in it anymore. Refined resists, massive consumables, lots of running, evasion spam, and zerg ganking. At the very minimum, id remove refinements from pvp period. Lower parry chance by like 5-10% for a patch and see how it goes. Add some kind of penalty for combining bushido with chiv and magery, casting or long cooldown on evasion. Let it run for a patch and adjust if necessary on next patch. If I was a dev, I would grow a set and delete the global loot upgrade including all items already farmed. Only way back to any sense of normalcy in the game, but that's me.

Guerry · January 2019

If parry is 35% now, lower it to 25%(For PvP).... BUMMM So easy to balance stuff with out breaking the game.

NamelessJourney · January 2019

I don't combat pvp, (as in not intentionally as the primary aspect that I enjoy of this game, I get attacked and do my evasives or die lol), but I do enjoy the pvm and crafting aspects of this game enormously. I even roll with the changes even though I'm quite behind the times in what is current or "most effective" even in PVM. But I do have the suggestion that it is thoroughly tested and please try to keep these changes away from the PVM aspects of this game. In terms of super bosses, it's hard to find parties on some shards so we solo/duo (at most most of the time) what is "current" and without the way things work as they are I can forsee much frustration and probably just avoiding that as content I log in and enjoy.

I am seeing little spurts of more players on the "Dead" shards I play on (non-atlantic) so I'm hopeful some of the things I've done on the ones I do play on have positive impact on the community or stir interest in people that just sit on like 5-6 active accounts so they don't lose things they hoarded over the decades. I'm in the process of leveling 2nd account for my main account to have a bro at all times when doing "high end" content. I'd despise seeing a poorly implemented "update" destroy many hours of work I'm investing just to have some fun. I try to positively support this game everywhere I go when I'm talking to people that are disenfranchised with other more modern MMO's, and I genuinely believe that there are things in UO that keep it relevant or possibly relevant for years to come. Housing and the plethora of "trammie/ laid back" content is enough to keep older less intense attitude players (intense attitude not something I'm trying to say is bad at all mind you) plopping along for who knows how long. I enjoy Ultima Online and many of its features immensely. Please try to do a better job of forseeing the consequences of changing mechanics so that it doesn't cause other segments of the game to leave. I'm not threatening to leave if something changes, but I will say some of the things that change do aggravate and annoy me, and other times I literally have to be told or know something changed to even notice it.
Thanks for your time.

Seth · January 2019

Paithan said:

amit said:

All you have to do is make shields disarmable.

You guys have all these ideas and theyreally all great. But I think that is the simplest fix by far.

There have been really terrible ideas in this thread. Devs don’t understand how OP dexters are if you don’t have parry.

Agreed, that is why I asked for tourney worldwide and see the templates that come forth to battle. All these theories... I used to doing these thinking until I see the really good fights. Then all these doesn't matter anymore.

Sometimes in a war everything happens so fast we dont even know how one dies. Try to study YouTube UO mass war and see if you can catch up and understand how each toons in there die from a fight. How many times do you need to rewind and replay?

They already agreed, originally they wanted to nerf the Parry + Pure Mage template. But they agreed this is already an outdated template. It is effective against dexxers, probably some old school pvper as well which is not popular.

Try the pure dexxer against other warrior mage template (non parry mage) and see how they die.

Just because one's pvp skill and experience is poor and lose against an old school pure parry mage and want to nerf it, is laughable.

amit · January 2019

Paithan said:

amit said:

All you have to do is make shields disarmable.

You guys have all these ideas and theyreally all great. But I think that is the simplest fix by far.

There have been really terrible ideas in this thread. Devs don’t understand how OP dexters are if you don’t have parry.

I was trying to be nice

The_Higgs_1 · January 2019

OoOOh Those "dex-ters" are sooooo scary man. LOL

Seth · January 2019

Pure dexxers are also outdated, even PVM like Sampire uses some other magic schools.

If they nerf the parry, it will only benefit pure dexxers which virtually no one would use.

The really powerful one is the dexxer-mage or other magic schools with 840 skills.

Parry mage is only a basic defensive, those dexxer magic hybrids are the real champion and expensive to fit one up.

Tail · January 2019

I just can't believe the options on the table in regards to parry. It's like you guys have never pvped before. The problem with the parry skill is you don't have to sacrifice anything to have it anymore. Is it possible you still guys don't realize this?

With 80 Skill points on each ring and bracelet (A fact that boggles my mind) you guys just need to do 1 of 2 things either:

A) Lower the effectiveness of the Parry skill across the board. (Then perhaps a 1v1 won't last 1 hour)

If you insist to make parry less useful for caster types you MUST also add Chiv to this list. 4/6 Chiv is silly enough . . . why allow them to have that much defense? To annoy your players?

Kel · January 2019

Paithan said:

There have been really terrible ideas in this thread. Devs don’t understand how OP dexters are if you don’t have parry.

I feel like this whole conversation has been overcomplicated. After reading through all of the posts up to this point I think it's fairly simple. Splintering caused mages to NEED parry to survive, let alone compete. Ever since the dawn of this game "better" pvpers played mages and "worse" ones played dexxers. When really good players play dexxers parry doesn't seem to be as big of an issue, if any. If you nerf parry for mages even the best mages will probably struggle even vs the crappiest dexxers. This isn't complicated. Parry isn't strictly overpowered itself. So many mages build templates around parry because it's a necessity.

Whatever though. This game has been beat into submission. May as well proceed with silly changes like this and kill it off for good.

Paithan · January 2019

Kel said:

Parry isn't strictly overpowered itself. So many mages build templates around parry because it's a necessity.

That is stated perfectly imo.

Seth · January 2019

Paithan said:

Kel said:

Parry isn't strictly overpowered itself. So many mages build templates around parry because it's a necessity.

That is stated perfectly imo.

Aye, they should just leave this alone for good. You just need a mix of magics and weapon to kill in pvp. You can't kill a Parry Mage, or ANY experienced pvper template with just handheld dexxer weapon Alone. Even if I dont parry I can still run, evade, try touch me Dexxer.

And as I have said before, it's different fighting in the wild va inside a 7x7 house.

I hope the proposition can understand why the strong opposition. Parry is already a focus spec, don't have to make it totally useless and ineffective.

The_Higgs_1 · January 2019

Literally the only templates being played are either evasion temps or temps with people carrying a shield. The only common denominator is parry, it has to be the issue in the current awful meta. Simple logic is all it takes to determine this. Unless they put in a lowered skill total hard-cap, parry has to be adjusted down.

Seth · January 2019

The_Higgs_1 said:

Literally the only templates being played are either evasion temps or temps with people carrying a shield. The only common denominator is parry, it has to be the issue in the current awful meta. Simple logic is all it takes to determine this. Unless they put in a lowered skill total hard-cap, parry has to be adjusted down.

I don't see anything wrong with defensive skills. Parry requires to hit, evasion is against All hitting and spells or archery. If anything, evasion is more powerful than Parry.

Why not talk a out nerfing evasion first. For this, Dev please post in all languages and make sure all the pvper know. See their response.

Bilbo · January 2019

So if they NERF ParryMages what will become the new OP PvPer

The_Higgs_1 · January 2019

Seth said:

The_Higgs_1 said:

Literally the only templates being played are either evasion temps or temps with people carrying a shield. The only common denominator is parry, it has to be the issue in the current awful meta. Simple logic is all it takes to determine this. Unless they put in a lowered skill total hard-cap, parry has to be adjusted down.

I don't see anything wrong with defensive skills. Parry requires to hit, evasion is against All hitting and spells or archery. If anything, evasion is more powerful than Parry.

Why not talk a out nerfing evasion first. For this, Dev please post in all languages and make sure all the pvper know. See their response.

Umm without parry you cant evade! So how is evasion more OP again? If parry is fixed right it will lower peoples chance to evade. Man im tired of being right

Seth · January 2019

The_Higgs_1 said:

Seth said:

The_Higgs_1 said:

Literally the only templates being played are either evasion temps or temps with people carrying a shield. The only common denominator is parry, it has to be the issue in the current awful meta. Simple logic is all it takes to determine this. Unless they put in a lowered skill total hard-cap, parry has to be adjusted down.

I don't see anything wrong with defensive skills. Parry requires to hit, evasion is against All hitting and spells or archery. If anything, evasion is more powerful than Parry.

Why not talk a out nerfing evasion first. For this, Dev please post in all languages and make sure all the pvper know. See their response.

Umm without parry you cant evade! So how is evasion more OP again? If parry is fixed right it will lower peoples chance to evade. Man im tired of being right

I am not sure, it did not occur to me parry skill is related to evasion. From Uo guide chance to block is based on bushido, tactics and anatomy only. This is the reason why my parry is 60 for my sampire but my evasion timing can be max up to 8 secs.

Not sure if i missed anything.

CovenantX · January 2019

Bilbo said:

So if they NERF ParryMages what will become the new OP PvPer

Mages - any variant, would still be the best.

I wouldn't say they'd be OP at that point though. Let's just say they won't be the best by the same margin that they are right now.

CovenantX · January 2019

Seth said:

I am not sure, it did not occur to me parry skill is related to evasion. From Uo guide chance to block is based on bushido, tactics and anatomy only. This is the reason why my parry is 60 for my sampire but my evasion timing can be max up to 8 secs.

Not sure if i missed anything.

the duration is affected by tactics & anatomy (no evade/mage has anatomy mind you). the block chance is affected by Parry, the chance to 'cast' evasion is based on bushido.

your parry skill has to be equal or greater than your bushido skill to have the maximum attainable block chance with a weapon, adding bushido+parry together reduces your overall parry chances if you hold a shield. (no one in pvp would have both hands occupied, because they'd be giving up potions).

UO-guide might be wrong in their write-up... there are many little things that are wrong on uo-related sites. (even official ones) at times.

PlayerSkillFTW · January 2019

Paithan said:
Evasion is overpowered. That is why literally everyone uses it when group fighting. The 12 second cool down on 8 seconds of evading 60% of spells? That is a joke.

You only get 8 seconds of 60% Evasion if you have 120 Bushido AND 120 Parry AND GM+ Tact AND GM+ Anat. No Parry Mage has that. Not to mention, Parry Mages that use Evasion, are wielding a Wep , therefore being vulnerable to Disarms.

Evasion used to be overpowered, back when it had no CD, had no skill requirements other than Bush+Parry, and only Mages had the MR to keep it up 24/7. Hence why they added the 20 sec cooldown to it, and made it require Warrior skills for the max duration.

Cookie said:

Resist Spells = not required due to orange petals, trapped boxes, and cleanse.

Learn to Mana Vamp. Watch people without Resist crap their pants and run. 1 Mana Vamp basically neuters them.

Cookie said:

Dismount is the most unfun part of pvp, it just kills the vibe. It is certainly overpowered. Running is just an essential part of current pvp, used by all classes. Dismount prevents running. Of course, I personally would prefer everyone was on foot chained to the same area. But nah, I also like using different terrains.

Dismount actually puts a Dexxer at a bigger disadvantage than it does a Mage in a 1v1. If a Dexxer gets on foot and Dismounts you, just Teleport away from him, and proceed to nuke his ass. Him taking longer to get to you, or to run from you, buys you more time to unload on him with spells. Just keep interrupting any Ethy attempt, and you have him. Teleport is a third level spell that can be quickly cast to create an up to 10 tile gap between you and the dexxer, where you can hit him with spells, and he's gotta try to slog his way to you. The only time this doesn't work, is if you're Yew Gate fighting near a crapload of houses that block Teleport. Mages can dismount others as well, from range, with a Bola.

It seriously sounds like you need to take a look through your spellbook, and realize just all the tools that Mages have at their disposal. This combination of utility tools (Bless, Teleport for gap open/close, Wall of Stone for LoS, E-Field to block passage, Dispel Field to bring down Wall of Stone/E-Field/Gates, Invis to break targeting, Greater Heal for 10 tile cross heals, Arch Cure for ranged/AoE cures, Reveal, Gates) is something that no other base skillset has. Mages also have a good amount of burst and healing capability. If you combine that with Parry, you get not only even more defense on the template, but by extension, you also get more offense out of it due to more uninterrupted casts, not to mention the burst of mixing in a Shield Bash with a Exp+FS. No other template has that degree of versatility.

Seth said:

By the way, when I just started out with the basic Parry Mage, my friend can kill it with his sampire because of evasion and bokuto nerve strike.

Mana Vamp his Sampire, and watch him be unable to do anything. If the Sampire has Parry for Evasion to work, then odds are he doesn't have Resist.

Seth · January 2019

PlayerSkillFTW said:

Paithan said:
Evasion is overpowered. That is why literally everyone uses it when group fighting. The 12 second cool down on 8 seconds of evading 60% of spells? That is a joke.

You only get 8 seconds of 60% Evasion if you have 120 Bushido AND 120 Parry AND GM+ Tact AND GM+ Anat. No Parry Mage has that. Not to mention, Parry Mages that use Evasion, are wielding a Wep , therefore being vulnerable to Disarms.
Evasion used to be overpowered, back when it had no CD, had no skill requirements other than Bush+Parry, and only Mages had the MR to keep it up 24/7. Hence why they added the 20 sec cooldown to it, and made it require Warrior skills for the max duration.

Cookie said:

Resist Spells = not required due to orange petals, trapped boxes, and cleanse.

Learn to Mana Vamp. Watch people without Resist crap their pants and run. 1 Mana Vamp basically neuters them.

Cookie said:

Dismount is the most unfun part of pvp, it just kills the vibe. It is certainly overpowered. Running is just an essential part of current pvp, used by all classes. Dismount prevents running. Of course, I personally would prefer everyone was on foot chained to the same area. But nah, I also like using different terrains.

Dismount actually puts a Dexxer at a bigger disadvantage than it does a Mage in a 1v1. If a Dexxer gets on foot and Dismounts you, just Teleport away from him, and proceed to nuke his ass. Him taking longer to get to you, or to run from you, buys you more time to unload on him with spells. Just keep interrupting any Ethy attempt, and you have him. Teleport is a third level spell that can be quickly cast to create an up to 10 tile gap between you and the dexxer, where you can hit him with spells, and he's gotta try to slog his way to you. The only time this doesn't work, is if you're Yew Gate fighting near a crapload of houses that block Teleport. Mages can dismount others as well, from range, with a Bola.

It seriously sounds like you need to take a look through your spellbook, and realize just all the tools that Mages have at their disposal. This combination of utility tools (Bless, Teleport for gap open/close, Wall of Stone for LoS, E-Field to block passage, Dispel Field to bring down Wall of Stone/E-Field/Gates, Invis to break targeting, Greater Heal for 10 tile cross heals, Arch Cure for ranged/AoE cures, Reveal, Gates) is something that no other base skillset has. Mages also have a good amount of burst and healing capability. If you combine that with Parry, you get not only even more defense on the template, but by extension, you also get more offense out of it due to more uninterrupted casts, not to mention the burst of mixing in a Shield Bash with a Exp+FS. No other template has that degree of versatility.

Seth said:

By the way, when I just started out with the basic Parry Mage, my friend can kill it with his sampire because of evasion and bokuto nerve strike.

Mana Vamp his Sampire, and watch him be unable to do anything. If the Sampire has Parry for Evasion to work, then odds are he doesn't have Resist.

Yes mages have 64 spells.

Yes mages with parry can help to defend against dexxer.

My concern was previously with mage warrior or dexxer pvper.

After removing the parry from the mage, you just made every pvm dexxer template more effective against any mage in pvp? They probably need to bokuto nerve me to death, no chance to even cast a spell unless I have protection and FC fr = 0.

Cookie · January 2019

PlayerSkillFTW - You can always tell the players who don't play a mage, they give it all the theory craft, and talk a good game. Go and play a pure mage on Atlantic in 10v10 battles, and tell me how it goes for you.

Then tell me how easy that mana vamp was (circle 7 spell, anything above circle 4 is pretty hard to cast in pvp with dexxers all over you), and how feared you were due to you using it. I can tell you from real ingame experience, it does very little.

Go and hit your little teleport key when you are splintered, bleeding, stunned, dismounted with 10 players dumping on you and you're stuck on foot again because your the mage without parry.

Current mounted dismount puts the dexxer at no disadvantage at all, they have macros that work the speed of light, off and on in the blink of an eye, meaning they were never at a disadvantage.

The_Higgs_1 - You have just not seen the entire issue I'm afraid. "All these players have parry, parry must be the problem..." Is just a gross oversimplication, to the point of not even seeing the real issue.

Thing is, I don't even use parry. Nerfing parry will have zero effect on me. But I do know what it will do. It will convert the last few parry users in the game to weapon users/dexxers. Or the ones like me who have so far refused to use parry, will have to quit, we already cannot compete, and facing even more dexxers/weapon users than the current avalanche will be an impossibility.

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Parry Balance Discussion

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