saying that having to spam 2 buttons b/c the other 5 had 45 cool-downs is not a rationale for claiming that combat design is poor. a PvP skill set in this game is vastly different than one you would use in the PvE environment. more than half the players you killed in your visual proof were already engaged with another opponent, and none had the common sense to even throw an 8 second hinder on you, or impair you and kite you from range. WAIT! maybe we didn't get to see that aspect of combat since you are obviously as skilled with editing as you are with chaos/fist against PvP beta testers.
claiming that you can faceroll your way through 99% of the content in the game by smashing 2-3 buttons is simply irresponsible on your part. not to mention the developers WILL take action and balance as the game comes along, just as any game continues to balance years after release (and this one hasn't yet).
i won't deny that i would love to have more than 500 skills so different that i could spend the rest of my life experimenting with over 6 million effective and worthwhile combinations. some are seemingly fluff or not essential. but from a practical standpoint, i'll take 20% of that and have a blast adopting one (and many others) to my personal play style. i use all seven buttons on my bar, and almost never an identical rotation more than twice in a row, depending on all kinds of factors.
if you don't like the game, just say so. but stop making false claims and presenting incomplete evidence that not only is taken out of it's complete context but also fails to substantiate such claims in the part of gameplay (PvE) in which 90% of the players will spend 90% of their time.
Most of the opponents I’m fighting are CB testers with QL10 FATE gear (4k+ HP). I’m wearing QL10 greens as well.
This argument revelase one important thing. You assume that HP is the indication of QL gear. I guess you have never entered a pvp game without a boosted character. I have over 5K hp when you approach me in that video, and you completely destroy me because I have QL3 gear and only some basic abilities. Many of the dragon players you approached are new CB players who worked hard to get QL3 as quick as possible before the pvp test. We did not know about the FATE boost.
I have seen you around in Fusang Projects several times, so yes.. you've had time to experiment with your boosted character. You killed me equally fast with your pistol spec earler in the weekend. Most people don't get their character boosted and are complete noobs with low QL talismans and basic abilities. I mean.. a few QL3 players can dominate a QL10 player easily if they knew what they were doing. Did anyone use purges on you? Wouldn't other consumer and aoe spammers (hello blade users) also destroy you?
Yes, more work needs to be done when it comes to balancing, but the video you are posting here highly exaggerates the problem. There is no good way to tell what QL gear the player has. Again, with the def suit I have 5K+ HP on my QL3 character that you decimated in seconds.
Basically as it stands, playing TSW feels like playing a clunky, F2P version of a WoW rogue made for newbs who can't hotkey more than 7 abilities.
It's simplistic, dull and requires no skill, and there really is no variety at all once you realise that all weapons are just builder->finisher and they all play the same outside merely cosmetic differences.
What and using 3rd party hotkey programs is skillfull... i think your wrong.. and any game that requires you to use hotkey software to be competitive has a flawed combat system..
What? Who was talking about 3rd party hotkey programs? Are you trying so hard to defend TSW's poor combat that you'll just invent things?
To establish a relevant combat comparison, you have to compare TSW with another game that has a 5 combo point --> finisher system. So a WoW rogue.
A WoW rogue cannot be "macro'ed" - let's say they only have 1 damage builder and 1 damage finisher (they have more), outside of that they have over a dozen other abilities, all of which do different things, defensive cooldowns, mobility tools, CC tools, things that work out of combat but not in combat, etc
All of which is minimum 20 hotkeys, which I think is about right, maybe 12-15 is a perfect number.
Anything less than 10 abilities for a 100%-hotbar-combat-driven game (which TSW is) is just bad. It's great for newbs who want to spam 1-2 all day, but it doesn't allow for much more. This is a hotbar MMO, not a MOBA, they work differently.
Originally posted by heartlessI think that one of the biggest issues the combat has in this game is the lack of impact. There is no feel of hitting the opponent in melee. It's like your character is just flailing his arms/weapon around. That's why I prefer AR/pistols and shotgun. It just looks and feels better.As far as the skills go, a lot of skills are very similar and combined with every weapon using the same builder/finisher system it feels too samey.I actually agree with the lack of impact, but that's not really the aim of the thread. It's also an issue that has been highlighted a few times on the official forums.Regarding the homogenization of builders/finishers.. Well.. I'm eager to see what the masses think of it and how the devs react. If they react.Originally posted by VutarI could give it time if this game were still in beta to fix the things wrong with it. However, it releases in less than a week with a sub/cash shop as if nothing is wrong with it. If this were a F2P game I'd buy it and think nothing of it. However, they are treating this as if it is a AAA mmo and is simply isn't as it currently stands. If GW2 released later this week i'd say the same thing about it. That game is not ready for release either.
Did you even read my post?The issues highlighted in the OP aren't in public light.Why?The game isn't released yet, so the masses have done little more than dip their toes into it.The devs can't react to an outcry that isn't there. Yet. If the OP is correct, it will be.My solution to you, sir, is to not buy it, which you weren't going to anyways, and move on. It's voting with your wallet. It's very effective.
Sure, I read you making a plea to give TSW time yet I didn't read a reason why we should be willing to do that. Why should we trust a developer that has ignored the issues with combat all through beta even though it has been pointed out to them by numerous people? Yet somehow these same devs are going to magically fix it after release if we just "give it time." My solution to you, sire, is to stop drinking the koolaid.
i hear that any day now they will fix all the broken raids in aoc .. any day now. /srsnod
LFD tools are great for cramming people into content, but quality > quantity. I am, usually on the sandbox .. more "hardcore" side of things, but I also do just want to have fun. So lighten up already
Sure, I read you making a plea to give TSW time yet I didn't read a reason why we should be willing to do that. Why should we trust a developer that has ignored the issues with combat all through beta even though it has been pointed out to them by numerous people? Yet somehow these same devs are going to magically fix it after release if we just "give it time." My solution to you, sire, is to stop drinking the koolaid.
Not to beat a dead horse, but 'giving them time' is a pretty piss poor excuse imho. This game is launching in 2 days, with the most expensive business model a game can have. They haven't earned that amount of patience yet. It's basically the same thing as saying 'just throw money at them. They've fix it! right?'.
- to Blackbrd: Sadly, 'voting with your wallet' just doesn't cut it unless you get enough people to do it with you. There's a reason why gaming companies keep pulling stuff like this on gamers. It's because gamers are perpetual suckers. We're the easiest demographic of people to sell to, and have proven over & over that we are more than willing to pay top dollar for utter crap. The Kinect is a great example of this. Hell, it's the same reason why D3 and ME3 pushed DRM / RMAH / on release DLC on gamers. They know we will buy shit, even if we don't approve. What it really comes down to is how smart their marketting team is. There's an entire science around getting people to buy crap they don't want. You can't make waves with a pebble.
Yeap, the OP is right about skill and combat boredom in TSW. Exactly my reasons why I doubt I'll buy it. The skills and combat are definitetly the most underwhelming part of this game. I hope that someone will prove us wrong by producing interesting, fun to use and powerful in the same time builds. Right now all I see is builders and finishers with good passive combo and maybe few mobility skills in between. I suppose the general boredom of MMORPG skills is more visible in TSW, thanks to freedom of choice.
Originally posted by Dominionlord great combat =great game? TERA?
speaking personally the last thing I would say about tera's combat is great.
Definitely tons more fun in compatlrisoj to GW2 combat.. just sayin..
Wait, you think GW2 combat is bad but that TSW combat is good? Wow...
ok not taking sides here but, TSW at least you have to hit your abilities your builders ect to keep on top of a fight, GW2 just hit 1 then 2-4 repeat, do I find that borring? No but alot of others will
i would like to see you on sPvP on GW2. will be so easy to kill, players that only spam skills are very easy to spot and are always the first we aim to kill since they will die in 10s or less.
TSW have lot of great things combat/animation obvious isnt strong of game. create personal builds is great but combat itself is just "mehh" IMO. still i prefer it than any WoW clone combat system, just tired of them
OMG this proves nothing. First you edited out points where you basically smashed faces.
second and this is most important.
You used F.A.T.E. to automatically level yourself to QL10 max abilities. Those people you go up against aren't.
/end thread.
That was CB, I guarantee you nearly every 4K HP+ player I went up against was using QL10 DPS greens from FATE. A lot of those players were also regulars in Fusang which I've been PvPing with for weeks. Things will be even more whack when you start having people with purple QL10 gear.
I'm sorry, but there's no way you can guarantee this. You can only speculate. Again : A QL3 player can easily enter Fusang with 5-6K HP. Many of us actually level our characters the manual way and like to try out pvp even if we are highly undergeared. Fusan Projects is the game mode were lowbies can actually get something done as well.
Tell me this : How do you separate a QL3-5 player from a QL10 player without inspecting the characer?
Again : Yes, I agree that the game is far from perfect, but you are presenting "evidence" that you don't understand to an audience that probably knows far less about the game than you.
I had 6.7K hps in pvp with the tank gear set. That was with a mix of QL4-6, roughly half greens and half blues from pvp and dungeons. The weapons were blue QL5 vendor items from Savage Coast.
I was using a blade/chaos build and pretty much dominated 1v1 and I used all 7 buttons in pvp. 1-3 were builder + 2 damage like the OP, but I then had a CC (domino effect I think it was) in the 4 slot, a gap closer in the 5 slot and 2 defensive cooldowns in 6-7. I used all of them constantly. Yes they do have cooldowns but I was still using them when I could to survive combat.
My passives were focused a lot of surivability and synergy with my active abilities. I believe I had 3 healing passives (lick your wounds from fists, the one that gives a hot when you penetrate and the one linked to one of my defesive cooldowns).
The combat certainly isn't a complex as some other games, personally that's good for me and I enjoyed the combat without finding it boring.
Originally posted by Dominionlord great combat =great game? TERA?
speaking personally the last thing I would say about tera's combat is great.
Definitely tons more fun in compatlrisoj to GW2 combat.. just sayin..
Wait, you think GW2 combat is bad but that TSW combat is good? Wow...
ok not taking sides here but, TSW at least you have to hit your abilities your builders ect to keep on top of a fight, GW2 just hit 1 then 2-4 repeat, do I find that borring? No but alot of others will
i would like to see you on sPvP on GW2. will be so easy to kill, players that only spam skills are very easy to spot and are always the first we aim to kill since they will die in 10s or less.
TSW have lot of great things combat/animation obvious isnt strong of game. create personal builds is great but combat itself is just "mehh" IMO. still i prefer it than any WoW clone combat system, just tired of them
Considering that GW2 combat is FAR from perfect FAR! , ya you can hit those buttons , switch weapon sets and move left to right, dodge here and there, but honestly the combat is the same old boring garbage that almost every mmo has, so yes I am saying it, GW2 combat with animations is sub par at best and needs ALOT of work including the pathing on some of the abilities, If I want a true PvP game I'll wait for PS2 where that is real skill. People talk so highly of GW2 and badly of TSW mostly on tab targetting bad animations, yet they need to look in the mirror, because the very things that they complain about in TSW is the same thing in GW2.
i hear that any day now they will fix all the broken raids in aoc .. any day now. /srsnod
My old AoC guild have pretty much figured out and cleared all the bosses http://taintedsouls.eu/ the last new boss takedown on June 17th. The Raids are hard for sure.
This is basically the reason why I don't plan on purchasing the game. I literally just spammed 2 buttons almost the entire time. No CD's on stuff, you just spam. I definitely like the feeling of using your CD's wisely like in GW2 over the combat in TSW so far.
If the combat was more interesting, it would be a must buy for me. Unfortunately, the gameplay >> all else, and I don't feel it is all that great. The fact that I only played the CB for a few days and have no desire to login anymore isn't good.
Also, a lot of the people you were fighting in that video seemed like keyboard turning retards. No offense to anyone he smoked
I am glad some people enjoy it though, to each their own. I hope you continue to play and enjoy the game. I may take another look at it on down the road if some combat changes come.
only the builder abilities have no CD.. its same as pretty much every other MMO. Most other MMOs play out the same even if they have no builder finisher system for every class you basically have a couple no CD abilities that you use till the longer CD abilities come up.. works the exact same here..
I realize that. But many of the "finishers" have no bearing on how many "builder points" you have built up. So I found myself literally just spamming 1-2-1-2-1-2-1-2. Also, it is the exact same mechanic on every class in the game. And you can only have 8 skills on your bar.
Don't get me wrong, I like the less skills that make a bigger difference (I hate games where you have 8 hot bars on screen), but the pistol class and choas class felt pretty similar. Played both of these through the first zone. I might need to give it more of a chance to warm up to it?
Maybe it is more dynamic later with "finishers" that need 3 or more built up points, or something, I don't know. But I played through the entire first zone, and was in the second, and it didn't seem to get much deeper than literally just spamming 1-2, while popping a couple other abilities here and there. For 95% of the PvE, I literally just spammed AoE's while popping defensive CD's before engaging. Even the first dungeon seemed pretty mindless for the most part, I didn't even die
I like to get my ass kicked and be challenged. Pulling 5 groups of mobs at once and AoE'ing them down with ease seems a little too easy to me :P
later on you get a wider variety of not only finishers but abilities that do more damage depending on how many resources you have built up..so basically you can have finishers for each weapon on top of skills that hit harder with more resources but these skills are generally on a CD.. Can't argue it's pretty basic at the start but really can't think of any themepark MMO that isn't right off the bat
Not to mention that you will have finishers that work on States your target is in which will hav ea cooldown so instead of doing 1,2,1,2 it would behoove you to do build up to 5 combo points and do a normal finisher followed by one of these "state" finishers.
The complex system of the deck building system in TSW is a Min/Max'ers wet dream and for the simple minded I can see it not being all that good but for those who want a system as complex and intimate as one can get then TSW is a freaking beast.
The OP can go ahead and keep his narrow minded viewpoint of the combat system and contine to be underwhlemed but for the people like me who see the beauty of the system I w'll be developing decks to kick the pants off anyone who bothers.
Playing: GW2 Waiting on: TESO Next Flop: Planetside 2 Best MMO of all time: Asheron's Call - The first company to recreate AC will be the next greatest MMO.
Considering that GW2 combat is FAR from perfect FAR! , ya you can hit those buttons , switch weapon sets and move left to right, dodge here and there, but honestly the combat is the same old boring garbage that almost every mmo has, so yes I am saying it, GW2 combat with animations is sub par at best and needs ALOT of work including the pathing on some of the abilities, If I want a true PvP game I'll wait for PS2 where that is real skill. People talk so highly of GW2 and badly of TSW mostly on tab targetting bad animations, yet they need to look in the mirror, because the very things that they complain about in TSW is the same thing in GW2.
This sounds familiar. You aren't the same guy that was complaining about the greatsword's lack of mobility, are you?
You are right about GW2's combat not being perfect, but are wrong as to the why. There are some wierd pathing issues, but they are fairly limited (and mostly to the pet / clone AI). This is also a problem with both these games I might add. I'd also point out that neither of these 2 games have perfect PvP, but they have VERY different issues when it comes to improving them. That you apparently don't seem to realize this makes your judgement highly questionable.
Some abilities "build resources" and are called builders. Others "consume resources" and are called consumers. Depending on your weapon type, some resources are built on yourself (visible just above your health bar), or they're built on each target you're attacking (floats above their head). Melee weapons like hammer start out fully built with 5 resources ready to pop with a consumer as your opening attack in each new fight. (This helps tanks do some front-loaded damage to build hate faster than teammates, or can simply be used to apply more overall DPS.)
Most builders do so for both weapons at the same time, but some (usually the healing builders) will build only for one weapon. Pay attention to this when choosing your builders, because it's always more efficient to use builders that build for BOTH weapons at the same time.
It's also most efficient to have one good consumer for EACH weapon in your deck, and to pop them back-to-back once you've built up 5 resources for each. Only after blowing both of your consumers should you go back to building.
Many abilities are written in a manner that does not suggest that more resources = more damage for the consumer. IMO this is a quality issue with the tech writing for the ability descriptions. In my testing, I've found many such consumers where clearly 5 resources made them do more damage than with only 1 resource, so assume this pattern as a general rule of thumb even if the ability description doesn't explicitly say something like "does X damage for each resource".
Finally, a nuance of timing your builders and consumers is that you don't always need to build to 5 resources before popping a consumer. For example, two of the elemental consumers require only 2 resources and 3 resources, respectively. (of course, with 5 resources on the target, you could pop them back to back). Another example is that the *difference* between X damage for 1 resource and Y damage for 5 resources isn't large enough, such that it's actually higher DPS (damage per *second*) to spam builder > consumer > builder > consumer with only one resource each time. And yet another example is that sometimes a target is near dead and you're confident that two resources will finish him off.
Understanding "state" abilities
In TSW, "states" are temporary flags put on either your offensive target or yourself (or any of your teammates). The states are reflected in the UI with those four small bars immediately beneath the HP bar for yourself, teammates, and your currently selected target. When a state is toggled on for anyone, many abilities will REACT to that specific state by doing something interesting. Broadly speaking: Afflicted states are applied along with a DoT, Weakened states are applied along with a damage-reducing or hit-reducing debuff of some sort, Hindered states are applied along with a snare or root, and Impaired states are applied along with a stun, knockdown/knockback, or silence.
It is very important to understand that many of these typical MMO effects (roots, stuns, debuffs, DoTs, etc.) can also be applied by various weapon abilities WITHOUT ALSO APPLYING A STATE. Generally speaking, when an ability can apply a state, the state name is clearly listed in the description of the ability.
Understanding "SubType" abilities
In TSW, "subtypes" are specifically the shape of a weapon attack:
Strike is a single-target attack (but not every single target attack is a "strike"). Burst is a single-target attack that comprises multiple small hits, each with their own independent hit/reaction roll. Focus is a channelled attack over time, that ticks more damage the longer you sustain it. Frenzy is typically a circular AOE of some sort. Blast is usually a cone-shaped multi-target spread in an arc in front of you. And Chain is a single target attack that subsequently spreads to other nearby targets.
As with states, it is very important to understand that not all attack shapes are also subtypes. For example, not every single-target attack is also a "Strike", not every AOE is also a "Frenzy", and not every cone is also a "Blast".
Finally, you will hear the term "multi-hit" a lot. This refers to three specific subtypes that each generate multiple smaller hits per target over a short span of time, rather than one single instant hit per target:
Multi-hit: Focus, Frenzy, and Burst.
Single-hit: Strike, Blast, and Chain.
Understanding Triggers
Note that I didn't use "trigger ability" in the title of this section. That's because there are no abilities that cause a trigger. (But there are abilities that cause states and subtypes to be applied.) Triggers are instead any general condition that some abilities (especially many passives) can react to.
Synergy combos
The concept of a "synergy combo"
Just like in trading card games (TCGs), the core theme of most strong decks (builds) center around one or more ability combos that the deck is built to set up and execute as often as possible during a fight. For example, there are ways to guarantee application of an Afflicted state on your target, and there are other passives that will do useful things when you subsequently hit that now-afflicted target. Such abilities, when used together to achieve one or more synergistic effects, are collectively known as a combo.
This section lists only the guaranteed combos that can work with any equipped weapon types. There are many other ways to create the trigger conditions than the ones I list below, but they are not as reliable or consistent. There are also many other possible (and interesting) combos, but since they cannot be produced with 100% reliable consistency, I don't include them in my list. For example, there are many nice combos that can be triggered off of a penetrating hit or off of a critical hit, but since you cannot control/predict pens and crits with 100% consistency, I don't include such combos. However, it's certainly worth looking for and exploiting such combos if you are using a crit-heavy or pen-heavy build.
Notes:
There are no guaranteed, reliable ways to trigger the Impaired state with any weapon, so there are no "Impair combos" listed here.
Since hit types like crits and pens are not 100% predictable, I don't list any combos based on hit type here.
I don't list any attack subtype-specific combos here (such as combos that can be triggered with any Burst attack or with any Focus attack, etc.), because all of these will limit your weapon choice in some way. However, there are many good subtype combos to be found and employed, so I encourage you to use the Search blade of the in-game Ability Wheel to browse through all passives that can be triggered from each subtype.
Affliction combos
Affliction is one of the easiest states to inflict on your target due to one simple 16 AP passive from the Fist tree: Bloodsport. With Bloodsport in your deck, every single successful hit (re)applies Affliction plus a stacking DOT that does a medium amount of DOT damage every second. If you glance, one stack is removed, so this key passive isn't as useful if you're fighting red or orange targets, but certainly against yellows and easier, you can keep Affliction applied most of the time. There are other passives that can also trigger Affliction (primarily from the Blades, Blood, Elemental, and Rifle trees) that might be easier to unlock at first, but Bloodsport should be one of your high-priority unlocks just because it's so useful to making any two weapons able to trigger Affliction and therefore use any of the following Affliction combos:
Affliction > Penetration Booster
Trigger: Any non-glancing hit from any weapon type Passives: Bloodsport (Fist 16 AP), Dark Potency (Blood 2 AP), Iron Maiden (Blood 12 AP)
Synergy flow:
Your first hit triggers Bloodsport to apply Affliction and start stacking DOTs
Your subsequent hits on the now-Afflicted target each trigger:
A 1x stack of the Penetration Rating buff (from Dark Potency), granting you +150 Penetration Rating at 5x stacks.
The Minor Penetration Chance buff (from Iron Maiden), granting you +10% Penetration Chance.
Affliction > Weaken Stacker
Trigger: Any non-glancing attack from any weapon type Passives: Bloodsport (Fist 16 AP), 12 Gouge (Shotgun 12 AP)
Synergy flow:
Your first attack triggers Bloodsport to apply Affliction and start stacking DOTs
Your subsequent hits on the now-Afflicted target triggers a 1x stack of the Debilitated debuff (from 12 Gouge) plus the Weakened state on your current target, reducing their damage output by 30% at 10x stacks.
Note: The other two Weaken debuff types (Corrupted and Exposed) cannot be applied as easily, because they require either specific attack abilities or harder-to achieve conditions such as evading attacks, making crit hits, or hitting impaired/hindered targets.
Weaken combos
Weaken is also an easy state to apply to your target regardless of your weapon types, thanks to your old pal Bloodsport and the Affliction > Weaken Stacker combo described above. (Bloodsport + 12 Gouge). There are other ways to apply Weaken too, but the only guaranteed way regardless of weapon choice is with the Affliction > Weaken Stacker combo.
Since all of the following combos rely on Bloodsport, which causes Affliction, you can easily combine any of these with the preceding list of Affliction combos, provided you have enough free slots in your Passives bar.
coming soon
Hinder combos
Hinder > Crit Chance Booster
Trigger: Any non-glancing hit from any weapon type made in melee distance to target (within 3 meters) Passives: Close Quarters (Shotgun 50 AP), Hothead (Pistol 1 AP)
Synergy flow:
Every hit made within 3 meters of the target triggers Close Quarters to apply the Hindered state. (The fact that the snare itself is subject to diminishing returns is of no consequence. You're not using this for the snare.)
Hothead reacts to the application of Hinder by itself applying the Minor Critical Chance buff to yourself, for a +10% Critical Chance. Basically, you can keep this buff up permanently as long as you keep making melee-distance hits at least every 8 seconds.
Hinder > Weaken Stacker
Trigger: Any non-glancing hit from any weapon type made in melee distance to target (within 3 meters) Passives: Close Quarters (Shotgun 50 AP), Bad Break (Pistol 9 AP)
Synergy flow:
Every hit made within 3 meters of the target triggers Close Quarters to apply the Hindered state. (The fact that the snare itself is subject to diminishing returns is of no consequence. You're not using this for the snare.)
Bad Break reacts to the application of Hinder by itself applying 2x stacks of the Corrupted debuff plus the Weakened state on your current target, reducing their self-healing output by 50% at 10x stacks.
Hinder > Debuff Cleanser and Buff Purger
Trigger: Any non-glancing hit from any weapon type made in melee distance to target (within 3 meters) Passives: Close Quarters (Shotgun 50 AP), Exploitation (Pistol 9 AP), Perjury (Shotgun 34 AP)
Synergy flow:
Every hit made within 3 meters of the target triggers Close Quarters to apply the Hindered state. (The fact that the snare itself is subject to diminishing returns is of no consequence. You're not using this for the snare.)
Exploitation reacts to the application of Hinder by itself cleansing you of one (randomly chosen) debuff.
Perjury reacts to the application of Hinder by itself purging the target of one (randomly chosen) buff.
Hinder > Penetration Booster
Trigger: Any non-glancing hit from any weapon type Passives: Close Quarters (Shotgun 50 AP), Beanbag Rounds (Shotgun 9 AP)
Synergy flow:
Every hit made within 3 meters of the target triggers Close Quarters to apply the Hindered state. (The fact that the snare itself is subject to diminishing returns is of no consequence. You're not using this for the snare.)
Beanbag Rounds reacts to the application of Hinder by itself applying the Minor Penetration Chance buff to yourself, for a +10% Penetration Chance. Basically, you can keep this buff up permanently as long as you keep making melee-distance hits at least every 8 seconds.
Leech combos
Leech > Heal Multiplier
Trigger: Any leech active, but Anima Shot (Rifle 1 AP) is typically the best fit for this combo trigger Passives: Anticoagulant (Rifle 16 AP), Leech Therapy (Rifle 9 AP), Post-Op (Rifle 27 AP)
Synergy Flow:
Your first Anima Shot triggers Anticoagulant to apply Affliction and a medium DOT to your current offensive target.
Your subsequent Anima Shots against the now-Afflicted target each do this:
They each trigger Leech Therapy, which applies a PBAOE heal to yourself and each of your nearby teammates. The heal is roughly the same size as the heal from your Anima Shot. This effectively doubles the healing output of Anima Shot for your current defensive target (two stacked heals per shot).
They each trigger Post-Op, which stacks a third heal on your current defensive target.
Playing: GW2 Waiting on: TESO Next Flop: Planetside 2 Best MMO of all time: Asheron's Call - The first company to recreate AC will be the next greatest MMO.
Zylaxx, you already posted the link. You don't need to copy & paste the entire website. Maybe put it in it's own thread if you really feel like noone will look at the link?
Some ab [...] hich stacks a third heal on your current defensive target.
All of this is basic MMO synergy and theorycraft.
Within a week after release, we will know optimal DPS builds, the best tanking and healing builds, the best CC build etc.
The Secret World's ability wheel is no different from trees, it's just presented differently.
Once you strip out the layout and look at abilities and how they interact in the buff/debuff/CC system, it's actually very simplistic. There are basic synergies everywhere, and most of them are qualitatively the same and have repetitive patterns.
The metagame is very basic and will lead to a few optimal builds for everyone shortly after release. Unlike GW2, the builds are not group-synergistic due to the way buffs/debuffs are applied in the 4 categories, so really it's very very simple.
The only people who won't be using the handful of best builds will be the usual newbie "flavour" crowd who just want to do things differently for the sake of feeling special.
What? Who was talking about 3rd party hotkey programs? Are you trying so hard to defend TSW's poor combat that you'll just invent things?
To establish a relevant combat comparison, you have to compare TSW with another game that has a 5 combo point --> finisher system. So a WoW rogue.
A WoW rogue cannot be "macro'ed" - let's say they only have 1 damage builder and 1 damage finisher (they have more), outside of that they have over a dozen other abilities, all of which do different things, defensive cooldowns, mobility tools, CC tools, things that work out of combat but not in combat, etc
All of which is minimum 20 hotkeys, which I think is about right, maybe 12-15 is a perfect number.
Anything less than 10 abilities for a 100%-hotbar-combat-driven game (which TSW is) is just bad. It's great for newbs who want to spam 1-2 all day, but it doesn't allow for much more. This is a hotbar MMO, not a MOBA, they work differently.
I dont get it why is it bad? Why do you need 12-15 skills to be on your hotbar?
TSW is not a poor combat system, it works and flows well I dont see any major draw backs with it. ITs also not just spammnig 1 and 2 all the time you do have other skills that all do different things as well, yes you have to build them up with normal attacks of defense skills adn then choose one of the other skills to use that suits the situation..
I dont play wow myself but from what i get told there are certain skill roations that you need to stick to so you can do the best dps for your class if you dont do this correctly then you can mess up raids and so on.. to me that sounds like your basically stuck pressing 1234567890-= in whatever order is needed for the best roation.. So what makes that any better than needing to press a few less buttons ??? at the end of the dat the tab target system is very limited and pretty boring no matter how you work it.. liek i said in an earlier most i think the combat systems in Darkfall and Mortal Online are a lot better..
But we can all like different things in this world thats what makes it so good...
Me I enjoy the TSW combat system so Im happy to play the game.. you dont like it and thats fine..
Considering that GW2 combat is FAR from perfect FAR! , ya you can hit those buttons , switch weapon sets and move left to right, dodge here and there, but honestly the combat is the same old boring garbage that almost every mmo has, so yes I am saying it, GW2 combat with animations is sub par at best and needs ALOT of work including the pathing on some of the abilities, If I want a true PvP game I'll wait for PS2 where that is real skill. People talk so highly of GW2 and badly of TSW mostly on tab targetting bad animations, yet they need to look in the mirror, because the very things that they complain about in TSW is the same thing in GW2.
This sounds familiar. You aren't the same guy that was complaining about the greatsword's lack of mobility, are you?
You are right about GW2's combat not being perfect, but are wrong as to the why. There are some wierd pathing issues, but they are fairly limited (and mostly to the pet / clone AI). This is also a problem with both these games I might add. I'd also point out that neither of these 2 games have perfect PvP, but they have VERY different issues when it comes to improving them. That you apparently don't seem to realize this makes your judgement highly questionable.
No I'm not the guy who mentioned lack of movement greatsword??
Anyways, enlighten me about my judgement being highly questionable? I actualy find that funny considering you are going to judge someones judgement is like saying someone with a opinion has no right to say that in the first place, or to " Question" His opinion LOL god.
Considering that I had a ranger in GW2 and everytime I switched to my sword and did a charge I almost always missed my target flying right past the mob or sometimes not even reaching my mob, and I was in range, or passing through a mountain , falling through the world and getting stuck, basicly having to logout and relog in to find I am still stuck LOL But even after these little issues I stil enjoy the game, but for future referance you might want to stay away from the above highlighted sentence, because that is highly questionable.
Well i actually like it to be that way. About 4 buttons mashed during fight (1 builder, 2 ST spenders, 1 AoE spender), 3 more buff/cc/heal/etc buttons and of course passives. For me it's fine like this, really. I don't want a bar with 15 attacks.
I agree. In pretty much every MMO I have played. (including LOTRO, EQ2, WoW, etc) you end up mashing the same few abilities over and over.
In EverQuest 2, I had 4 bars full of abilities. At least 12 are active buffs (press and forget), then you got a handful of temporary buffs you don't use all that much (as the effect is neglible, unless you hardcore raid) and then you got like 10-12 attacks, from which only 2-3 have a short cooldown, while all the rest have looong ones. So you basically end up mashing 2-3 attacks 90% of the time as well.
Then I got some hate generating abilities and heals. (As Paladin).
In TSW, you got 7 passives (see them as active buffs like above) and 7 actives for attacks, AoE, CC and/or heals.
So for example if you like to solo a lot (both PVE and PVP) you end up loading 2-3 good attacks, 1-2 CC's and 1-2 heals.
And then you'll end up using all 7 actives all the time. No different than any other MMO. But at least in TSW you can rotate and try out different builds on the fly! Making it more fun and diverse.
So the OP is really overdramatising.
Sure if you want to play like that... go ahead, but you can play like that in every MMO.
What? Who was talking about 3rd party hotkey programs? Are you trying so hard to defend TSW's poor combat that you'll just invent things?
To establish a relevant combat comparison, you have to compare TSW with another game that has a 5 combo point --> finisher system. So a WoW rogue.
A WoW rogue cannot be "macro'ed" - let's say they only have 1 damage builder and 1 damage finisher (they have more), outside of that they have over a dozen other abilities, all of which do different things, defensive cooldowns, mobility tools, CC tools, things that work out of combat but not in combat, etc
All of which is minimum 20 hotkeys, which I think is about right, maybe 12-15 is a perfect number.
Anything less than 10 abilities for a 100%-hotbar-combat-driven game (which TSW is) is just bad. It's great for newbs who want to spam 1-2 all day, but it doesn't allow for much more. This is a hotbar MMO, not a MOBA, they work differently.
I dont get it why is it bad? Why do you need 12-15 skills to be on your hotbar?
TSW is not a poor combat system, it works and flows well I dont see any major draw backs with it. ITs also not just spammnig 1 and 2 all the time you do have other skills that all do different things as well, yes you have to build them up with normal attacks of defense skills adn then choose one of the other skills to use that suits the situation..
I dont play wow myself but from what i get told there are certain skill roations that you need to stick to so you can do the best dps for your class if you dont do this correctly then you can mess up raids and so on.. to me that sounds like your basically stuck pressing 1234567890-= in whatever order is needed for the best roation.. So what makes that any better than needing to press a few less buttons ??? at the end of the dat the tab target system is very limited and pretty boring no matter how you work it.. liek i said in an earlier most i think the combat systems in Darkfall and Mortal Online are a lot better..
But we can all like different things in this world thats what makes it so good...
Me I enjoy the TSW combat system so Im happy to play the game.. you dont like it and thats fine..
Of all comparable games with hotbar-combat, Secret World is the worst, most limited and most clunky one I have seen so far.
It has the mechanics from just 1 class out of the 12 in WoW: the rogue.
Rift had multiple classes following combo point based mechanics, but they had more variety than TSW's system which is very samey across all weapons.
No you did not spam just 4 abilities in WoW, or any other hotbar MMO. If you did, you were horrible at the game and simply clueless. A "rotation" is not just a predefined order, it also involved priority choices and reactives depending on what was going on either with you, or the thing you were attacking, or the environment.
I have played most of the major hotbar MMOs from the last 6 years from WoW to SWTOR through RIft, War, AOC, Tera, etc - and if you think TSW combat system is as good as any of those, then it means you haven't played any of the others to any level of competence to make a proper judgement on the matter.
Well i actually like it to be that way. About 4 buttons mashed during fight (1 builder, 2 ST spenders, 1 AoE spender), 3 more buff/cc/heal/etc buttons and of course passives. For me it's fine like this, really. I don't want a bar with 15 attacks.
I agree. In pretty much every MMO I have played. (including LOTRO, EQ2, WoW, etc) you end up mashing the same few abilities over and over.
In EverQuest 2, I had 4 bars full of abilities. At least 12 are active buffs (press and forget), then you got a handful of temporary buffs you don't use all that much (as the effect is neglible, unless you hardcore raid) and then you got like 10-12 attacks, from which only 2-3 have a short cooldown, while all the rest have looong ones. So you basically end up mashing 2-3 attacks 90% of the time as well.
Then I got some hate generating abilities and heals. (As Paladin).
In TSW, you got 7 passives (see them as active buffs like above) and 7 actives for attacks, AoE, CC and/or heals.
So for example if you like to solo a lot (both PVE and PVP) you end up loading 2-3 good attacks, 1-2 CC's and 1-2 heals.
And then you'll end up using all 7 actives all the time.
So the OP is really overdramatising.
Sure if you want to play like that... go ahead, but you can play like that in every MMO.
Thank you for hitting the nail on the head, thats what I was trying to say but some people just like to see things " Flashy "
I seriously can't believe people are going to play this game.... I think it is a joke. I have this thing called "standards" and this game falls short on all of them...
"The King and the Pawn return to the same box at the end of the game"
What? Who was talking about 3rd party hotkey programs? Are you trying so hard to defend TSW's poor combat that you'll just invent things?
To establish a relevant combat comparison, you have to compare TSW with another game that has a 5 combo point --> finisher system. So a WoW rogue.
A WoW rogue cannot be "macro'ed" - let's say they only have 1 damage builder and 1 damage finisher (they have more), outside of that they have over a dozen other abilities, all of which do different things, defensive cooldowns, mobility tools, CC tools, things that work out of combat but not in combat, etc
All of which is minimum 20 hotkeys, which I think is about right, maybe 12-15 is a perfect number.
Anything less than 10 abilities for a 100%-hotbar-combat-driven game (which TSW is) is just bad. It's great for newbs who want to spam 1-2 all day, but it doesn't allow for much more. This is a hotbar MMO, not a MOBA, they work differently.
I dont get it why is it bad? Why do you need 12-15 skills to be on your hotbar?
TSW is not a poor combat system, it works and flows well I dont see any major draw backs with it. ITs also not just spammnig 1 and 2 all the time you do have other skills that all do different things as well, yes you have to build them up with normal attacks of defense skills adn then choose one of the other skills to use that suits the situation..
I dont play wow myself but from what i get told there are certain skill roations that you need to stick to so you can do the best dps for your class if you dont do this correctly then you can mess up raids and so on.. to me that sounds like your basically stuck pressing 1234567890-= in whatever order is needed for the best roation.. So what makes that any better than needing to press a few less buttons ??? at the end of the dat the tab target system is very limited and pretty boring no matter how you work it.. liek i said in an earlier most i think the combat systems in Darkfall and Mortal Online are a lot better..
But we can all like different things in this world thats what makes it so good...
Me I enjoy the TSW combat system so Im happy to play the game.. you dont like it and thats fine..
Of all comparable games with hotbar-combat, Secret World is the worst, most limited and most clunky one I have seen so far.
I have played most of the major hotbar MMOs from the last 6 years from WoW to SWTOR through RIft, War, AOC, Tera, etc - and if you think TSW combat system is as good as any of those, then it means you haven't played any of the others to any level of competence to make a proper judgement on the matter.
Seriously, both Rift and especially TERA are far worse than TSW.
What? Who was talking about 3rd party hotkey programs? Are you trying so hard to defend TSW's poor combat that you'll just invent things?
To establish a relevant combat comparison, you have to compare TSW with another game that has a 5 combo point --> finisher system. So a WoW rogue.
A WoW rogue cannot be "macro'ed" - let's say they only have 1 damage builder and 1 damage finisher (they have more), outside of that they have over a dozen other abilities, all of which do different things, defensive cooldowns, mobility tools, CC tools, things that work out of combat but not in combat, etc
All of which is minimum 20 hotkeys, which I think is about right, maybe 12-15 is a perfect number.
Anything less than 10 abilities for a 100%-hotbar-combat-driven game (which TSW is) is just bad. It's great for newbs who want to spam 1-2 all day, but it doesn't allow for much more. This is a hotbar MMO, not a MOBA, they work differently.
I dont get it why is it bad? Why do you need 12-15 skills to be on your hotbar?
TSW is not a poor combat system, it works and flows well I dont see any major draw backs with it. ITs also not just spammnig 1 and 2 all the time you do have other skills that all do different things as well, yes you have to build them up with normal attacks of defense skills adn then choose one of the other skills to use that suits the situation..
I dont play wow myself but from what i get told there are certain skill roations that you need to stick to so you can do the best dps for your class if you dont do this correctly then you can mess up raids and so on.. to me that sounds like your basically stuck pressing 1234567890-= in whatever order is needed for the best roation.. So what makes that any better than needing to press a few less buttons ??? at the end of the dat the tab target system is very limited and pretty boring no matter how you work it.. liek i said in an earlier most i think the combat systems in Darkfall and Mortal Online are a lot better..
But we can all like different things in this world thats what makes it so good...
Me I enjoy the TSW combat system so Im happy to play the game.. you dont like it and thats fine..
Of all comparable games with hotbar-combat, Secret World is the worst, most limited and most clunky one I have seen so far.
I have played most of the major hotbar MMOs from the last 6 years from WoW to SWTOR through RIft, War, AOC, Tera, etc - and if you think TSW combat system is as good as any of those, then it means you haven't played any of the others to any level of competence to make a proper judgement on the matter.
LOL 6 years, that it?
I find TSW is by far the most customizationable ( Not sure if I spelled that right ) game in regards to character advancement, I've been playing MMORPGS since 1997 and then even before that MUDS and afew other games , so it does'nt matter if you have 6 years or 50 years of gaming everyone has their own likes/dislikes and me personaly, I found TSW to be extremely refreshing , much better combat that WoW and shall I say? GW2 THERE I SAID IT! LOL
So bottom line I agree with Caldrin and disagree with you.
Orighers to any level of competence to make a proper judgement on the matter.
Seriously, both Rift and especially TERA are far worse than TSW.
Personally I did not like Rift for its overall world and dullness of its lore - but the combat was deeper than TSW by far.
Tera combat is far, far better, and much more skill based than TSW - and despite being action based, still had more hotkeys/abilities, even as a Lancer despite the fact that you spent 80% of your time blocking.
Comments
saying that having to spam 2 buttons b/c the other 5 had 45 cool-downs is not a rationale for claiming that combat design is poor. a PvP skill set in this game is vastly different than one you would use in the PvE environment. more than half the players you killed in your visual proof were already engaged with another opponent, and none had the common sense to even throw an 8 second hinder on you, or impair you and kite you from range. WAIT! maybe we didn't get to see that aspect of combat since you are obviously as skilled with editing as you are with chaos/fist against PvP beta testers.
claiming that you can faceroll your way through 99% of the content in the game by smashing 2-3 buttons is simply irresponsible on your part. not to mention the developers WILL take action and balance as the game comes along, just as any game continues to balance years after release (and this one hasn't yet).
i won't deny that i would love to have more than 500 skills so different that i could spend the rest of my life experimenting with over 6 million effective and worthwhile combinations. some are seemingly fluff or not essential. but from a practical standpoint, i'll take 20% of that and have a blast adopting one (and many others) to my personal play style. i use all seven buttons on my bar, and almost never an identical rotation more than twice in a row, depending on all kinds of factors.
if you don't like the game, just say so. but stop making false claims and presenting incomplete evidence that not only is taken out of it's complete context but also fails to substantiate such claims in the part of gameplay (PvE) in which 90% of the players will spend 90% of their time.
btw, i like GW2 and intend to play it as well
This argument revelase one important thing. You assume that HP is the indication of QL gear. I guess you have never entered a pvp game without a boosted character. I have over 5K hp when you approach me in that video, and you completely destroy me because I have QL3 gear and only some basic abilities. Many of the dragon players you approached are new CB players who worked hard to get QL3 as quick as possible before the pvp test. We did not know about the FATE boost.
I have seen you around in Fusang Projects several times, so yes.. you've had time to experiment with your boosted character. You killed me equally fast with your pistol spec earler in the weekend. Most people don't get their character boosted and are complete noobs with low QL talismans and basic abilities. I mean.. a few QL3 players can dominate a QL10 player easily if they knew what they were doing. Did anyone use purges on you? Wouldn't other consumer and aoe spammers (hello blade users) also destroy you?
Yes, more work needs to be done when it comes to balancing, but the video you are posting here highly exaggerates the problem. There is no good way to tell what QL gear the player has. Again, with the def suit I have 5K+ HP on my QL3 character that you decimated in seconds.
What? Who was talking about 3rd party hotkey programs? Are you trying so hard to defend TSW's poor combat that you'll just invent things?
To establish a relevant combat comparison, you have to compare TSW with another game that has a 5 combo point --> finisher system. So a WoW rogue.
A WoW rogue cannot be "macro'ed" - let's say they only have 1 damage builder and 1 damage finisher (they have more), outside of that they have over a dozen other abilities, all of which do different things, defensive cooldowns, mobility tools, CC tools, things that work out of combat but not in combat, etc
All of which is minimum 20 hotkeys, which I think is about right, maybe 12-15 is a perfect number.
Anything less than 10 abilities for a 100%-hotbar-combat-driven game (which TSW is) is just bad. It's great for newbs who want to spam 1-2 all day, but it doesn't allow for much more. This is a hotbar MMO, not a MOBA, they work differently.
i hear that any day now they will fix all the broken raids in aoc .. any day now. /srsnod
LFD tools are great for cramming people into content, but quality > quantity.
I am, usually on the sandbox .. more "hardcore" side of things, but I also do just want to have fun. So lighten up already
Not to beat a dead horse, but 'giving them time' is a pretty piss poor excuse imho. This game is launching in 2 days, with the most expensive business model a game can have. They haven't earned that amount of patience yet. It's basically the same thing as saying 'just throw money at them. They've fix it! right?'.
- to Blackbrd: Sadly, 'voting with your wallet' just doesn't cut it unless you get enough people to do it with you. There's a reason why gaming companies keep pulling stuff like this on gamers. It's because gamers are perpetual suckers. We're the easiest demographic of people to sell to, and have proven over & over that we are more than willing to pay top dollar for utter crap. The Kinect is a great example of this. Hell, it's the same reason why D3 and ME3 pushed DRM / RMAH / on release DLC on gamers. They know we will buy shit, even if we don't approve. What it really comes down to is how smart their marketting team is. There's an entire science around getting people to buy crap they don't want. You can't make waves with a pebble.
Yeap, the OP is right about skill and combat boredom in TSW. Exactly my reasons why I doubt I'll buy it. The skills and combat are definitetly the most underwhelming part of this game. I hope that someone will prove us wrong by producing interesting, fun to use and powerful in the same time builds. Right now all I see is builders and finishers with good passive combo and maybe few mobility skills in between. I suppose the general boredom of MMORPG skills is more visible in TSW, thanks to freedom of choice.
i would like to see you on sPvP on GW2. will be so easy to kill, players that only spam skills are very easy to spot and are always the first we aim to kill since they will die in 10s or less.
TSW have lot of great things combat/animation obvious isnt strong of game. create personal builds is great but combat itself is just "mehh" IMO. still i prefer it than any WoW clone combat system, just tired of them
I'm sorry, but there's no way you can guarantee this. You can only speculate. Again : A QL3 player can easily enter Fusang with 5-6K HP. Many of us actually level our characters the manual way and like to try out pvp even if we are highly undergeared. Fusan Projects is the game mode were lowbies can actually get something done as well.
Tell me this : How do you separate a QL3-5 player from a QL10 player without inspecting the characer?
Again : Yes, I agree that the game is far from perfect, but you are presenting "evidence" that you don't understand to an audience that probably knows far less about the game than you.
I had 6.7K hps in pvp with the tank gear set. That was with a mix of QL4-6, roughly half greens and half blues from pvp and dungeons. The weapons were blue QL5 vendor items from Savage Coast.
I was using a blade/chaos build and pretty much dominated 1v1 and I used all 7 buttons in pvp. 1-3 were builder + 2 damage like the OP, but I then had a CC (domino effect I think it was) in the 4 slot, a gap closer in the 5 slot and 2 defensive cooldowns in 6-7. I used all of them constantly. Yes they do have cooldowns but I was still using them when I could to survive combat.
My passives were focused a lot of surivability and synergy with my active abilities. I believe I had 3 healing passives (lick your wounds from fists, the one that gives a hot when you penetrate and the one linked to one of my defesive cooldowns).
The combat certainly isn't a complex as some other games, personally that's good for me and I enjoyed the combat without finding it boring.
The Enlightened take things Lightly
Considering that GW2 combat is FAR from perfect FAR! , ya you can hit those buttons , switch weapon sets and move left to right, dodge here and there, but honestly the combat is the same old boring garbage that almost every mmo has, so yes I am saying it, GW2 combat with animations is sub par at best and needs ALOT of work including the pathing on some of the abilities, If I want a true PvP game I'll wait for PS2 where that is real skill. People talk so highly of GW2 and badly of TSW mostly on tab targetting bad animations, yet they need to look in the mirror, because the very things that they complain about in TSW is the same thing in GW2.
My old AoC guild have pretty much figured out and cleared all the bosses http://taintedsouls.eu/ the last new boss takedown on June 17th. The Raids are hard for sure.
Not to mention that you will have finishers that work on States your target is in which will hav ea cooldown so instead of doing 1,2,1,2 it would behoove you to do build up to 5 combo points and do a normal finisher followed by one of these "state" finishers.
The complex system of the deck building system in TSW is a Min/Max'ers wet dream and for the simple minded I can see it not being all that good but for those who want a system as complex and intimate as one can get then TSW is a freaking beast.
The OP can go ahead and keep his narrow minded viewpoint of the combat system and contine to be underwhlemed but for the people like me who see the beauty of the system I w'll be developing decks to kick the pants off anyone who bothers.
http://yokaiblog.wikidot.com/guides:build-mechanics
Everything you need to know about Elder Scrolls Online
Playing: GW2
Waiting on: TESO
Next Flop: Planetside 2
Best MMO of all time: Asheron's Call - The first company to recreate AC will be the next greatest MMO.
This sounds familiar. You aren't the same guy that was complaining about the greatsword's lack of mobility, are you?
You are right about GW2's combat not being perfect, but are wrong as to the why. There are some wierd pathing issues, but they are fairly limited (and mostly to the pet / clone AI). This is also a problem with both these games I might add. I'd also point out that neither of these 2 games have perfect PvP, but they have VERY different issues when it comes to improving them. That you apparently don't seem to realize this makes your judgement highly questionable.
Understanding builders and consumers
Some abilities "build resources" and are called builders. Others "consume resources" and are called consumers. Depending on your weapon type, some resources are built on yourself (visible just above your health bar), or they're built on each target you're attacking (floats above their head). Melee weapons like hammer start out fully built with 5 resources ready to pop with a consumer as your opening attack in each new fight. (This helps tanks do some front-loaded damage to build hate faster than teammates, or can simply be used to apply more overall DPS.)
Most builders do so for both weapons at the same time, but some (usually the healing builders) will build only for one weapon. Pay attention to this when choosing your builders, because it's always more efficient to use builders that build for BOTH weapons at the same time.
It's also most efficient to have one good consumer for EACH weapon in your deck, and to pop them back-to-back once you've built up 5 resources for each. Only after blowing both of your consumers should you go back to building.
Many abilities are written in a manner that does not suggest that more resources = more damage for the consumer. IMO this is a quality issue with the tech writing for the ability descriptions. In my testing, I've found many such consumers where clearly 5 resources made them do more damage than with only 1 resource, so assume this pattern as a general rule of thumb even if the ability description doesn't explicitly say something like "does X damage for each resource".
Finally, a nuance of timing your builders and consumers is that you don't always need to build to 5 resources before popping a consumer. For example, two of the elemental consumers require only 2 resources and 3 resources, respectively. (of course, with 5 resources on the target, you could pop them back to back). Another example is that the *difference* between X damage for 1 resource and Y damage for 5 resources isn't large enough, such that it's actually higher DPS (damage per *second*) to spam builder > consumer > builder > consumer with only one resource each time. And yet another example is that sometimes a target is near dead and you're confident that two resources will finish him off.
Understanding "state" abilities
In TSW, "states" are temporary flags put on either your offensive target or yourself (or any of your teammates). The states are reflected in the UI with those four small bars immediately beneath the HP bar for yourself, teammates, and your currently selected target. When a state is toggled on for anyone, many abilities will REACT to that specific state by doing something interesting. Broadly speaking: Afflicted states are applied along with a DoT, Weakened states are applied along with a damage-reducing or hit-reducing debuff of some sort, Hindered states are applied along with a snare or root, and Impaired states are applied along with a stun, knockdown/knockback, or silence.
It is very important to understand that many of these typical MMO effects (roots, stuns, debuffs, DoTs, etc.) can also be applied by various weapon abilities WITHOUT ALSO APPLYING A STATE. Generally speaking, when an ability can apply a state, the state name is clearly listed in the description of the ability.
Understanding "SubType" abilities
In TSW, "subtypes" are specifically the shape of a weapon attack:
Strike is a single-target attack (but not every single target attack is a "strike"). Burst is a single-target attack that comprises multiple small hits, each with their own independent hit/reaction roll. Focus is a channelled attack over time, that ticks more damage the longer you sustain it. Frenzy is typically a circular AOE of some sort. Blast is usually a cone-shaped multi-target spread in an arc in front of you. And Chain is a single target attack that subsequently spreads to other nearby targets.
As with states, it is very important to understand that not all attack shapes are also subtypes. For example, not every single-target attack is also a "Strike", not every AOE is also a "Frenzy", and not every cone is also a "Blast".
Finally, you will hear the term "multi-hit" a lot. This refers to three specific subtypes that each generate multiple smaller hits per target over a short span of time, rather than one single instant hit per target:
Understanding Triggers
Note that I didn't use "trigger ability" in the title of this section. That's because there are no abilities that cause a trigger. (But there are abilities that cause states and subtypes to be applied.) Triggers are instead any general condition that some abilities (especially many passives) can react to.
Synergy combos
The concept of a "synergy combo"
Just like in trading card games (TCGs), the core theme of most strong decks (builds) center around one or more ability combos that the deck is built to set up and execute as often as possible during a fight. For example, there are ways to guarantee application of an Afflicted state on your target, and there are other passives that will do useful things when you subsequently hit that now-afflicted target. Such abilities, when used together to achieve one or more synergistic effects, are collectively known as a combo.
This section lists only the guaranteed combos that can work with any equipped weapon types. There are many other ways to create the trigger conditions than the ones I list below, but they are not as reliable or consistent. There are also many other possible (and interesting) combos, but since they cannot be produced with 100% reliable consistency, I don't include them in my list. For example, there are many nice combos that can be triggered off of a penetrating hit or off of a critical hit, but since you cannot control/predict pens and crits with 100% consistency, I don't include such combos. However, it's certainly worth looking for and exploiting such combos if you are using a crit-heavy or pen-heavy build.
Notes:
Affliction combos
Affliction is one of the easiest states to inflict on your target due to one simple 16 AP passive from the Fist tree: Bloodsport. With Bloodsport in your deck, every single successful hit (re)applies Affliction plus a stacking DOT that does a medium amount of DOT damage every second. If you glance, one stack is removed, so this key passive isn't as useful if you're fighting red or orange targets, but certainly against yellows and easier, you can keep Affliction applied most of the time. There are other passives that can also trigger Affliction (primarily from the Blades, Blood, Elemental, and Rifle trees) that might be easier to unlock at first, but Bloodsport should be one of your high-priority unlocks just because it's so useful to making any two weapons able to trigger Affliction and therefore use any of the following Affliction combos:
Affliction > Penetration Booster
Trigger: Any non-glancing hit from any weapon type
Passives: Bloodsport (Fist 16 AP), Dark Potency (Blood 2 AP), Iron Maiden (Blood 12 AP)
Synergy flow:
Affliction > Weaken Stacker
Trigger: Any non-glancing attack from any weapon type
Passives: Bloodsport (Fist 16 AP), 12 Gouge (Shotgun 12 AP)
Synergy flow:
Note: The other two Weaken debuff types (Corrupted and Exposed) cannot be applied as easily, because they require either specific attack abilities or harder-to achieve conditions such as evading attacks, making crit hits, or hitting impaired/hindered targets.
Weaken combos
Weaken is also an easy state to apply to your target regardless of your weapon types, thanks to your old pal Bloodsport and the Affliction > Weaken Stacker combo described above. (Bloodsport + 12 Gouge). There are other ways to apply Weaken too, but the only guaranteed way regardless of weapon choice is with the Affliction > Weaken Stacker combo.
Since all of the following combos rely on Bloodsport, which causes Affliction, you can easily combine any of these with the preceding list of Affliction combos, provided you have enough free slots in your Passives bar.
coming soon
Hinder combos
Hinder > Crit Chance Booster
Trigger: Any non-glancing hit from any weapon type made in melee distance to target (within 3 meters)
Passives: Close Quarters (Shotgun 50 AP), Hothead (Pistol 1 AP)
Synergy flow:
Hinder > Weaken Stacker
Trigger: Any non-glancing hit from any weapon type made in melee distance to target (within 3 meters)
Passives: Close Quarters (Shotgun 50 AP), Bad Break (Pistol 9 AP)
Synergy flow:
Hinder > Debuff Cleanser and Buff Purger
Trigger: Any non-glancing hit from any weapon type made in melee distance to target (within 3 meters)
Passives: Close Quarters (Shotgun 50 AP), Exploitation (Pistol 9 AP), Perjury (Shotgun 34 AP)
Synergy flow:
Hinder > Penetration Booster
Trigger: Any non-glancing hit from any weapon type
Passives: Close Quarters (Shotgun 50 AP), Beanbag Rounds (Shotgun 9 AP)
Synergy flow:
Leech combos
Leech > Heal Multiplier
Trigger: Any leech active, but Anima Shot (Rifle 1 AP) is typically the best fit for this combo trigger
Passives: Anticoagulant (Rifle 16 AP), Leech Therapy (Rifle 9 AP), Post-Op (Rifle 27 AP)
Synergy Flow:
Everything you need to know about Elder Scrolls Online
Playing: GW2
Waiting on: TESO
Next Flop: Planetside 2
Best MMO of all time: Asheron's Call - The first company to recreate AC will be the next greatest MMO.
Zylaxx, you already posted the link. You don't need to copy & paste the entire website. Maybe put it in it's own thread if you really feel like noone will look at the link?
All of this is basic MMO synergy and theorycraft.
Within a week after release, we will know optimal DPS builds, the best tanking and healing builds, the best CC build etc.
The Secret World's ability wheel is no different from trees, it's just presented differently.
Once you strip out the layout and look at abilities and how they interact in the buff/debuff/CC system, it's actually very simplistic. There are basic synergies everywhere, and most of them are qualitatively the same and have repetitive patterns.
The metagame is very basic and will lead to a few optimal builds for everyone shortly after release. Unlike GW2, the builds are not group-synergistic due to the way buffs/debuffs are applied in the 4 categories, so really it's very very simple.
The only people who won't be using the handful of best builds will be the usual newbie "flavour" crowd who just want to do things differently for the sake of feeling special.
I dont get it why is it bad? Why do you need 12-15 skills to be on your hotbar?
TSW is not a poor combat system, it works and flows well I dont see any major draw backs with it. ITs also not just spammnig 1 and 2 all the time you do have other skills that all do different things as well, yes you have to build them up with normal attacks of defense skills adn then choose one of the other skills to use that suits the situation..
I dont play wow myself but from what i get told there are certain skill roations that you need to stick to so you can do the best dps for your class if you dont do this correctly then you can mess up raids and so on.. to me that sounds like your basically stuck pressing 1234567890-= in whatever order is needed for the best roation.. So what makes that any better than needing to press a few less buttons ??? at the end of the dat the tab target system is very limited and pretty boring no matter how you work it.. liek i said in an earlier most i think the combat systems in Darkfall and Mortal Online are a lot better..
But we can all like different things in this world thats what makes it so good...
Me I enjoy the TSW combat system so Im happy to play the game.. you dont like it and thats fine..
No I'm not the guy who mentioned lack of movement greatsword??
Anyways, enlighten me about my judgement being highly questionable? I actualy find that funny considering you are going to judge someones judgement is like saying someone with a opinion has no right to say that in the first place, or to " Question" His opinion LOL god.
Considering that I had a ranger in GW2 and everytime I switched to my sword and did a charge I almost always missed my target flying right past the mob or sometimes not even reaching my mob, and I was in range, or passing through a mountain , falling through the world and getting stuck, basicly having to logout and relog in to find I am still stuck LOL But even after these little issues I stil enjoy the game, but for future referance you might want to stay away from the above highlighted sentence, because that is highly questionable.
LOL
I agree. In pretty much every MMO I have played. (including LOTRO, EQ2, WoW, etc) you end up mashing the same few abilities over and over.
In EverQuest 2, I had 4 bars full of abilities. At least 12 are active buffs (press and forget), then you got a handful of temporary buffs you don't use all that much (as the effect is neglible, unless you hardcore raid) and then you got like 10-12 attacks, from which only 2-3 have a short cooldown, while all the rest have looong ones. So you basically end up mashing 2-3 attacks 90% of the time as well.
Then I got some hate generating abilities and heals. (As Paladin).
In TSW, you got 7 passives (see them as active buffs like above) and 7 actives for attacks, AoE, CC and/or heals.
So for example if you like to solo a lot (both PVE and PVP) you end up loading 2-3 good attacks, 1-2 CC's and 1-2 heals.
And then you'll end up using all 7 actives all the time. No different than any other MMO. But at least in TSW you can rotate and try out different builds on the fly! Making it more fun and diverse.
So the OP is really overdramatising.
Sure if you want to play like that... go ahead, but you can play like that in every MMO.
Of all comparable games with hotbar-combat, Secret World is the worst, most limited and most clunky one I have seen so far.
It has the mechanics from just 1 class out of the 12 in WoW: the rogue.
Rift had multiple classes following combo point based mechanics, but they had more variety than TSW's system which is very samey across all weapons.
No you did not spam just 4 abilities in WoW, or any other hotbar MMO. If you did, you were horrible at the game and simply clueless. A "rotation" is not just a predefined order, it also involved priority choices and reactives depending on what was going on either with you, or the thing you were attacking, or the environment.
I have played most of the major hotbar MMOs from the last 6 years from WoW to SWTOR through RIft, War, AOC, Tera, etc - and if you think TSW combat system is as good as any of those, then it means you haven't played any of the others to any level of competence to make a proper judgement on the matter.
Thank you for hitting the nail on the head, thats what I was trying to say but some people just like to see things " Flashy "
I seriously can't believe people are going to play this game.... I think it is a joke. I have this thing called "standards" and this game falls short on all of them...
Seriously, both Rift and especially TERA are far worse than TSW.
LOL 6 years, that it?
I find TSW is by far the most customizationable ( Not sure if I spelled that right ) game in regards to character advancement, I've been playing MMORPGS since 1997 and then even before that MUDS and afew other games , so it does'nt matter if you have 6 years or 50 years of gaming everyone has their own likes/dislikes and me personaly, I found TSW to be extremely refreshing , much better combat that WoW and shall I say? GW2 THERE I SAID IT! LOL
So bottom line I agree with Caldrin and disagree with you.
Personally I did not like Rift for its overall world and dullness of its lore - but the combat was deeper than TSW by far.
Tera combat is far, far better, and much more skill based than TSW - and despite being action based, still had more hotkeys/abilities, even as a Lancer despite the fact that you spent 80% of your time blocking.