Experiences of a Fighter in 2.0

This leads to its own set of problems though, like Ability Bloat and Defense Bloat (our out-right immunity) to compensate on the NPC side of things, especially in chapters with lower numbers of NPCs per game.
Completely unlike 90-117 spell casters with 100+ 10's a day, right? ;)

Fighters can soak damage.
Perhaps in a system that wasn't takeout-reliant. Which 2.0 is decidedly not, as currently written.
 
Fighters can soak damage.

The thing that prevents them from being tanks (which is really the scout/rogue role) is that they have no easy/affordable way to mitigate disabling carrier attacks once their armor is breached.

So, they're great for that first 40-60 points, but after that, whether they are at 1 body or 200, it doesn't matter because they are eating that drain (or whatever) carrier.

Which is what casters are for: either earth to remove debuffs or celestial (or just a guy with scrolls) casting mend armor to keep the fighter up.

But solo, no, not tanky.

They're not even great for that 40-60 points, because in order to put up those higher numbers of armor, they're going to need a lot more physical armor, and that makes them sitting ducks for the plethora of packet-based CC that they have absolutely no way to mitigate.
 
I keep getting stuck on the following example.

Swings-5's the fighter, all build spent in-class, vs a couple 20 body spiders with a couple shots each of packet-delivered binding. What are the options to successfully resolve this combat in the favor of the fighter?

So far as I can tell, the only real answer is 'charge in as fast as you can, blow PTD skills and hope you can land both before one of the NPCs throws a packet'.

That answer doesn't change with any arbitrary amount of in-class spent build you care to add.
 
Perhaps in a system that wasn't takeout-reliant. Which 2.0 is decidedly not, as currently written.

Like I said, they can take damage. The prevalence of takeouts doesn't change the fact they can take damage, it just means they are doing while under an effect that makes them useless.

But it's not the ability to take damage that makes a tank, a tank. It's the ability to mitigate damage and debilitating effects and the ability to maintain an enemies focus on you.
 
They're not even great for that 40-60 points, because in order to put up those higher numbers of armor, they're going to need a lot more physical armor, and that makes them sitting ducks for the plethora of packet-based CC that they have absolutely no way to mitigate.

The prevalence of takeouts making the fighter useless, was more or less my point. Being a tank is less about taking damage and more about mitigating the side-effects of it. The issue is that we have no way to build in most of the "stuff" that gets used in other realms to assist in the prevention of damage or the maintenance of threat (I'll assume everyone knows what that means).

We don't have taunts, we don't have Dex or Agility scores, we don't have an armor rating that makes you harder to hit or makes your armor, point for point, better than anyone else's.

I don't nessesarily think any of the above things not being present is bad (except maybe the last), but these things, combined with the drop in damage are pushing fighters out of the limelight.
 
I keep getting stuck on the following example.

Swings-5's the fighter, all build spent in-class, vs a couple 20 body spiders with a couple shots each of packet-delivered binding. What are the options to successfully resolve this combat in the favor of the fighter?

So far as I can tell, the only real answer is 'charge in as fast as you can, blow PTD skills and hope you can land both before one of the NPCs throws a packet'.

That answer doesn't change with any arbitrary amount of in-class spent build you care to add.

The answer is get friends. Magic Items are a substitute for friends. If u have 1,000 friends you don't need magic items. If u don't have friends u need those magic items to keep u up.
In your example I would pair off my teammates so that there was some one to cut some one else out. After the packets are used up, u can then advance as a fighter.
Packet attacks are the best attack in this game, no matter what the version. If I can hit u with range before u hit me I win. Range trumps melee every day. Even if u swing for 100.
Back to your example. If u went on a mod with all fighters (assuming magic items are gone) it is a very poor choice if your up against any mob with packet attacks.
I have always pictured Nero/Alliance as a dnd campaign. When u start with your friends u should build a well rounded team so they u can adapt.
 
Like I said, they can take damage. The prevalence of takeouts doesn't change the fact they can take damage, it just means they are doing while under an effect that makes them useless.

But it's not the ability to take damage that makes a tank, a tank. It's the ability to mitigate damage and debilitating effects and the ability to maintain an enemies focus on you.
I think that the point, with the damage nerf, is that there's going to be literally no reason for Fighters to be tanks or damage. Consistent damage is the only thing that can effectively take the place of a "taunt" like effect -- ignore the fighter pummeling you at your own peril, you can block at the expense of not fighting the Scholar chucking spells at you. When damage goes down, you're looking at a fighter with single-chance PTD skills (that can be off-hand blocked, magic-armored, or other defense-avoidance called), or a scholar with who knows how much burst and utility. I can tell you who I'd pay most attention to, regardless of class or monster type played (Barring "really freaking dumb" intelligence level creature intelligence).
 
If the point of the Fighter is to swing 5, then you are FAR better off playing a Templar and swinging 4 (or even a Scholar swinging 2) with spells for defense and take-outs.
 
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The person in that quote says teams - presumably on the EC - are very class-heavy in one direction, or have very few healers, likely because of the plethora of magic items so widely available (especially LCO items).

Excuse me, sir, but you are badly misrepresenting what I said. What I said was that I had seen a wide range of teams in my time playing the game and that I have rarely seen a team that neatly fits the [paraphrasing what you said earlier in that thread] 1/3 fighter / 1/3 healer / 1/3 caster dynamic. The teams I described were examples of some of the teams I have seen, not an exclusive list.

I don't know whether you simply didn't read the post within the context of the discussion or whether you were intentionally misrepresenting (I am assuming the former), but I ask that you edit your previous post or otherwise acknowledge that you are misrepresenting what I said.

(Also, you should probably edit that last sentence. It looks like you accidentally hit the caps lock key before writing it.)

-MS
 
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I don't think this is a particularly good answer, mostly because not everyone has the "friends" experience.

Speaking from my personal experience, Fighters (who play like me, anyway) and Rogues are going to have to drastically play differently, and the Skirmish Game that Rogues are build around is going to be determined by how many take-out effects they have (Waylay), not by how much constant damage they can do. Literally any class can get 30+ armor which leaves at least 1 Flurry Rule attack sequence of attack damage that a skirmish target can ignore if it's just damage.

Now to deal with the meat of your argument. I will assume you are a highly experienced player who has played various rogue and fighter roles over the year. I also fit into that category (my current PC is a scout for reference) and the person you quoted above has been playing a fighter in Alliance for the better part of two decades. In short, there is a lot experience to go around. I'll respect yours. I request that you respect ours.

To start off, I want to examine your claim about how any class can get 30+ armor. This claim while true (always has been true, technically), isn't very meaningful. PvP is not and has never been the primary form of conflict in Alliance. I challenge you to show any evidence to the contrary in any chapter of the game ever. I can think of some specific weekends where it has been the primary form of conflict, but certainly not by the intention of plot, and never as an overall theme for the chapter.

Thus, determining the value of a class based on a PvP concept (armor value of a PC class) means you are using a poor metric to determine value. Even in a theoretical game where the primary combat antagonists were humanoids with class levels, monster camps rarely have the resources to provide armor phys reps for even half the NPCs, let alone all present in a conflict. This applies basically any time all or most NPCs are in-game, whether all participating in the same battle, running multiple scenes / modules at the same time, or some other combination.

Though, to an extent, that doesn't really matter, since armor and body are pretty much interchangeable as far as most NPCs are concerned. And that is the key point. The total "health" of NPCs will drop when the new rules are implemented, because damage numbers are lower. If it doesn't drop, then that is a problem with scaling and whoever in monster camp is in charge of scaling. Those numbers should have already dropped during playtests. Again, if they didn't, that is a problem with scaling. Those numbers went up originally because damage numbers rocketed so high. If the reverse isn't true, then some portion of the game staff isn't doing their job.

Next, I want to look at your claim about rogues. Honestly, it doesn't make much sense. As the game is now, rogues who don't have backup alchemy or spells have only only one real option when in a constrained space: ranged weapons (I personally prefer thrown weapons for rogues). When they are in a non-constrained space, they use positioning to produce damage output.

Nothing about the new rules changes that. In a constrained space, they still are limited. In a non-constrained space, they can deal a big burst of damage when they pull off a flank (yeah, I know the attack is from behind, but a good flank usually forces the issue). They don't need to waylay or incapacitate for that to be true. And if they don't kill the target in three swings, that doesn't mean the target just turns around and pulverizes the rogue. In any sort of team-up / flanking / etc., that means the NPC has just turned their back to the other PC (who will happily "explain" why that was dumb). If it was some sort of "drive-by" attack in an open field (or similar setting), the rogue has plenty of room to back off until another opportunity arises.

The only meaningful situation where a take-out effect was necessary is a solo sneak assault. And in this case, in the current rules, rogues basically always use take-out effects already. Since you never know for sure how quickly your target will respond, or what defenses they might have, relying on pure backstabs when you absolutely need to take someone out alone is foolish. It is foolish in the current rules and foolish in 2.0. That isn't a change.


TLDR: Using metrics that are appropriate for the standard experiences of PCs (no matter what coast they are on), the rules you are objecting to don't meaningfully change play style. And if you honestly think they do, please provide solid examples that are representative of a whole (the spider example above doesn't really work, for example, because, as many have point out, there is no difference between how current fighters and 2.0 fighters interact with web-throwing spiders).

-MS
 
TLDR: Using metrics that are appropriate for the standard experiences of PCs (no matter what coast they are on), the rules you are objecting to don't meaningfully change play style. And if you honestly think they do, please provide solid examples that are representative of a whole (the spider example above doesn't really work, for example, because, as many have point out, there is no difference between how current fighters and 2.0 fighters interact with web-throwing spiders).

Not necessarily true. Current world, fighters/scouts/rogues have a shot at cloak/bane-ing binding effects from said web-slinging spider(men), should you be fortunate to have said effect(s). 2.0-world, you stand there and get whittled away while said web-slinging (menace) slowly chews through your armor and body, while you helplessly watch as they low-damage flurry-3, wait, reset, flurry-3, wait, reset, you down to zero, then negative body. Quite possibly as agonizing an experience as you can get. Especially for new players. Whom Alliance wants to attract, in general.
 
Not necessarily true. Current world, fighters/scouts/rogues have a shot at cloak/bane-ing binding effects from said web-slinging spider(men), should you be fortunate to have said effect(s). 2.0-world, you stand there and get whittled away while said web-slinging (menace) slowly chews through your armor and body, while you helplessly watch as they low-damage flurry-3, wait, reset, flurry-3, wait, reset, you down to zero, then negative body. Quite possibly as agonizing an experience as you can get. Especially for new players. Whom Alliance wants to attract, in general.

Sure, but the only way you can do that is with a magic item. And it isn't like magic items have gone away completely in 2.0. I will admit to not fully grokking the new ritual list, but are you telling me that there is no magic item a fighter can have that will stop a web effect (the original spider example doesn't specify how the effect is delivered, so it could be arcane, magic, or poison conceivably)? I find that improbable, especially since I saw a reference to spell parry somewhere in the rules.

Again glancing at cases, high level characters will have some magic and I expect will carry more production than they currently do (it will be nice to see more money leaving the game). Unless they are badly outnumbered or really suck at dodging, this should mean they can handle the few packets that fly in their direction (and honestly, if a character is badly outnumbered, the character is probably toast in any version of the rules).

At low level, I will acknowledge a likelihood of getting webbed. However, that is also true in the current system. Adding an extra second every three swings doesn't sound meaningfully more agonizing to me than getting tooled down at a constant pace under the current system (when unable to fight back). It sucks and there is a reason that monster camp usually advises NPCs not to do this unless there is no other legal target on the field.

And all of that analysis doesn't take into account racial abilities (dryads and some wylderkin will laugh at the spiders, regardless of class) or the fact that rogues may have dodges (less important due to generally low numbers even among high level rogues and a tendency to horde them... My Precious).

Again, I don't quite see how this represents a meaningful change how a group of fighters / rogues deals with a group of spiders (beyond the economic difference due to the higher likelihood of this interaction costing the players production items).

-MS
 
Please read the new ritual effect list before continuing to comment on the state of 2.0's magic item effect-list impact on Fighters, I feel that trying to detail them to you will not be productive.
 
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I don't think this is a particularly good answer, mostly because not everyone has the "friends" experience.

https://alliancelarp.com/forum/threads/earth-casters-in-2-0.35643/page-2#post-285518

The person in that quote says teams - presumably on the EC - are very class-heavy in one direction, or have very few healers, likely because of the plethora of magic items so widely available (especially LCO items).

Speaking from my personal experience, Fighters (who play like me, anyway) and Rogues are going to have to drastically play differently, and the Skirmish Game that Rogues are build around is going to be determined by how many take-out effects they have (Waylay), not by how much constant damage they can do. Literally any class can get 30+ armor which leaves at least 1 Flurry Rule attack sequence of attack damage that a skirmish target can ignore if it's just damage.

And finally:

nOT EVERYONE WANTS TO PLAY LIKE THE EAST COAST AND JOIN A TEAM AND FIGHT IN A LINE AND JUST HAVE WAVE BATTLES TO MUCK AROUND WITH.

Check the rulebook. I believe the word "Friend" (friends and friendship) is mentioned around 50 or so times. The game was created with playing with your friends in mind. Heck, its even a great selling point; bring your friends and come have an adventure (bring your dnd campaign).

Your saying this is a problem and I'm saying this is the solution and your response is something in the line of, we don't play that way.
*Shrugs* Oh well. I don't know what else to tell you. I still feel that if MI were removed it would solve a LOT of problems. "Oh no a fighter is a two spell kill!". Yeah, so what. Again the game was made so that you need to work as a team. You need to rely on others, same reason we don't have cast on the fly.
 
Frankly, that is bad game design, especially given that it is inconsistently applied in the extreme. Every other class save the explicity not scaled for combat Artisans has avaliable takeout defenses that do not require anything but build spent in class to obtain.

Given that Fighter is losing its primary ability to deal repeatable high damage numbers along with the ability to shore up the defensive gap via MI, I see no argument that they are not strictly and obviously inferior to playing scout or templar, who get everything a fighter does at a slight premium and access to defensives a 2.0 fighter as written can never have.

The more I look at it, the more boring 2.0 Fighter strikes me to be. They really do have nothing but swinging damage to do with themselves, and top out as far as effectiveness with that a lot faster than the casting classes. Rogues at least get access to the actual meat of the game, effects, via in-class alchemy.
 
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I agree with you. The flurry rule totally screws the already screwed fighters.
 
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