Glad to see new quests but..........

[balvix]

Glad to see new quests but what about updating melee? I recall Steelstar stating that he knows that melees are in a bad place currently.

Hey, SteelStar here.

We understand that Melees are not in the strongest place in the top-end meta right now; we aren't trying to kick Melee when it's down. Rather, we're trying to bring the Melee outliers in, so we can better balance Melee as a group. Consider this some first steps that will allow us to better make other ones down the road (such as improving Melee Defense).

Before all the outcry, yes I clipped a massive portion of that quote out, it was all about how monks were too powerful and needed nerfed.

So instead of a update for melees to put them back in the running with the current meta, we get treated to new quests. Great, but that doesn't fix the issue of melees. I enjoy running my fighter, and I enjoy running my warlock. However, if I want to do high end content on high lvl reaper I don't bother loading up my fighter at all since there is really no point. That leaves one type of toon to run in that content should I wish to do more than show off my soul stone. Casters will always and should always be powerful in endgame. I'm not advocating for a nerf on casters nor on warlocks. What I am asking for is an update to melee toons so that they can be useful in the higher end content without being uber triple everything completionist with every perfect piece of gear available. Yes I understand that you wont have a first life fighter be useful at all in the high end content usually, nor should they, but if you have a well built fighter with several tr's and pretty decent gear in a high lvl reaper quest, he should be able to hang in there without having to run away every other couple of seconds hoping that someone sees his fleeing form and takes enough pity on him to throw a heal on him. How about instead of sending out more buggy content you fix the issue that is plaguing everyone that loves to make melee toons. I know I'm probably going to get a lot of people here saying im just complaining once again and should just stick to elite difficulty or make a caster, and that there is nothing wrong with melee, just look at the monks, but It's truly not like that. For some of us, we just want to play a favored class and be relevant not relegated to the back row while the description of the class says front row. The changes that are needed are not just "lets add in a little more melee power to shut them up" it's going to have to be something more than that. I don't want to be able to self heal or anything like that since its not something that a fighter would be able to do, and more prr just wont cut it either, Im around 200 prr with 1.4k hp and I still get crushed so rapidly that I have to run in, cleave, cleave, cleave, then run for my life, leaving the warlock to tank. What im asking for here is a role for fighters, and other melees that doesn't make you stick to one design or die, like the uber shielded tank fighter that basically intims then stands there like a lump shield blocking. I'm also not asking to be the #1 guy on the kill count, I'm just tired of hanging in the back picking off the random almost dead bad guy or being the #1 guy on the death count.

For my end note here, I understand that there is some few guys that have done the triple everything that they can do, or are very close and have 30+ reaper points so that they are now relevant again in melee, I have met a few of them, and that's fantastic, but for the rest of us it would be nice to not be pushed to only make casters unless we are doing past lives.



TLDR; MMGA (Make Melees Great Again)

[Domince]

Glad to see new quests but what about updating melee? I recall Steelstar stating that he knows that melees are in a bad place currently.

Before all the outcry, yes I clipped a massive portion of that quote out, it was all about how monks were too powerful and needed nerfed.

So instead of a update for melees to put them back in the running with the current meta, we get treated to new quests. Great, but that doesn't fix the issue of melees. I enjoy running my fighter, and I enjoy running my warlock. However, if I want to do high end content on high lvl reaper I don't bother loading up my fighter at all since there is really no point. That leaves one type of toon to run in that content should I wish to do more than show off my soul stone. Casters will always and should always be powerful in endgame. I'm not advocating for a nerf on casters nor on warlocks. What I am asking for is an update to melee toons so that they can be useful in the higher end content without being uber triple everything completionist with every perfect piece of gear available. Yes I understand that you wont have a first life fighter be useful at all in the high end content usually, nor should they, but if you have a well built fighter with several tr's and pretty decent gear in a high lvl reaper quest, he should be able to hang in there without having to run away every other couple of seconds hoping that someone sees his fleeing form and takes enough pity on him to throw a heal on him. How about instead of sending out more buggy content you fix the issue that is plaguing everyone that loves to make melee toons. I know I'm probably going to get a lot of people here saying im just complaining once again and should just stick to elite difficulty or make a caster, and that there is nothing wrong with melee, just look at the monks, but It's truly not like that. For some of us, we just want to play a favored class and be relevant not relegated to the back row while the description of the class says front row. The changes that are needed are not just "lets add in a little more melee power to shut them up" it's going to have to be something more than that. I don't want to be able to self heal or anything like that since its not something that a fighter would be able to do, and more prr just wont cut it either, Im around 200 prr with 1.4k hp and I still get crushed so rapidly that I have to run in, cleave, cleave, cleave, then run for my life, leaving the warlock to tank. What im asking for here is a role for fighters, and other melees that doesn't make you stick to one design or die, like the uber shielded tank fighter that basically intims then stands there like a lump shield blocking. I'm also not asking to be the #1 guy on the kill count, I'm just tired of hanging in the back picking off the random almost dead bad guy or being the #1 guy on the death count.

For my end note here, I understand that there is some few guys that have done the triple everything that they can do, or are very close and have 30+ reaper points so that they are now relevant again in melee, I have met a few of them, and that's fantastic, but for the rest of us it would be nice to not be pushed to only make casters unless we are doing past lives.



TLDR; MMGA (Make Melees Great Again)

No, melees are in a perfect place

[FlavoredSoul]

I mean (a) melee did get a massive buff this patch, Barbarian DR rework alone makes them a ton more tanky in Epic/legendary content, and that's before you consider the serious buffs FB and OS got.

Are all melees overall in the best place? no, there is still a lot of work to do but at least a little bit of progress was made this update.


I'd like to see some updates to Paladins (can be insanely tanky or can have decent damage but not both.), (Pure) Melee bards (Fighter Swashbucklers are still pretty decent, maybe boost their cores a bit, and boost warchanter dps), and stick Monks (unnerf the melee power in their later cores or unnerf all their cores and make the MP require a Qstaff).

[Qhualor]

I'm sure more is coming. Usually there is a game plan set out for the year and they try to stick to it. Sometimes they push stuff off for later for various reasons. Steelstar coming out publicly about making things better balanced generally was a bit of a surprise for many of us, so I don't doubt there is still some internal testing and fine tuning going on. Probably the PC is currently discussing it too. This update targeted barbarians more and next update probably will have even more targeting other melee classes. My guess anyways.

[Shadow_Jumper]

This sadly ignores the fact that melee dps are literally the STRONGEST builds that a player can run right now.

However, I can see this point of view. Player who don’t invest in PRR, who don’t invest in some form of melee CC, and who don’t invest in understanding how DPS works, then of course melee are terrible. Just the same as an ubdergeared, unskilled caster will be.

With the most recent barbarian update, their are very few classes that a skilled player could not translate to difficult content.

Lack of skill, poor gear planning, and bad tactics are hardly a reason for a buff.

[Morroiel]

Staff builds and pure pallys need a lot of work. All other melees (not including hybrid melees like cleric/fvs melee) are perfectly fine. All DPS tests on optimized toons are so close to each other in terms of dps and suriveability, as well as, cc abilities that its a miracle.

Rogues, Fighters, Barbarians (with the full patch work), Rangers, and Monks are all viable in the meta.

While dc casters are needed so too are dps toons, and I'll add that the number of dps toons needed is higher than the number of dc toons needed.

[LT218]

Glad to see new quests but what about updating melee? I recall Steelstar stating that he knows that melees are in a bad place currently.

Before all the outcry, yes I clipped a massive portion of that quote out, it was all about how monks were too powerful and needed nerfed.

So instead of a update for melees to put them back in the running with the current meta, we get treated to new quests. Great, but that doesn't fix the issue of melees. I enjoy running my fighter, and I enjoy running my warlock. However, if I want to do high end content on high lvl reaper I don't bother loading up my fighter at all since there is really no point. That leaves one type of toon to run in that content should I wish to do more than show off my soul stone. Casters will always and should always be powerful in endgame. I'm not advocating for a nerf on casters nor on warlocks. What I am asking for is an update to melee toons so that they can be useful in the higher end content without being uber triple everything completionist with every perfect piece of gear available. Yes I understand that you wont have a first life fighter be useful at all in the high end content usually, nor should they, but if you have a well built fighter with several tr's and pretty decent gear in a high lvl reaper quest, he should be able to hang in there without having to run away every other couple of seconds hoping that someone sees his fleeing form and takes enough pity on him to throw a heal on him. How about instead of sending out more buggy content you fix the issue that is plaguing everyone that loves to make melee toons. I know I'm probably going to get a lot of people here saying im just complaining once again and should just stick to elite difficulty or make a caster, and that there is nothing wrong with melee, just look at the monks, but It's truly not like that. For some of us, we just want to play a favored class and be relevant not relegated to the back row while the description of the class says front row. The changes that are needed are not just "lets add in a little more melee power to shut them up" it's going to have to be something more than that. I don't want to be able to self heal or anything like that since its not something that a fighter would be able to do, and more prr just wont cut it either, Im around 200 prr with 1.4k hp and I still get crushed so rapidly that I have to run in, cleave, cleave, cleave, then run for my life, leaving the warlock to tank. What im asking for here is a role for fighters, and other melees that doesn't make you stick to one design or die, like the uber shielded tank fighter that basically intims then stands there like a lump shield blocking. I'm also not asking to be the #1 guy on the kill count, I'm just tired of hanging in the back picking off the random almost dead bad guy or being the #1 guy on the death count.

For my end note here, I understand that there is some few guys that have done the triple everything that they can do, or are very close and have 30+ reaper points so that they are now relevant again in melee, I have met a few of them, and that's fantastic, but for the rest of us it would be nice to not be pushed to only make casters unless we are doing past lives.

TLDR; MMGA (Make Melees Great Again)

https://www.ddo.com/forums/showthrea...Helter-Skelter
https://www.ddo.com/forums/showthrea...Helter-Skelter

Hmm... someone apparently forgot to tell those guys that melee are in a bad place.

So they completed the first R8 and R10 Strahd raids serverwide with 6 melee DPS and 1 ranged DPS and people still think melee are in hurting? Heck, only 2 of the 6 melee were even monk icons. Their melee DPS had rogue, ranger, fighter, bard and monk icons. I highly doubt that all 6 of those DPS melee were quadruple/everything completionists.

Melee are actually in a really good spot right now, especially in reaper where multiple nerfs and stacking penalties to ranged have swung the pendulum fairly far to the melee side. There are fairly common problems with bad builds and player skill though.

An additional problem is that the devs don't know how to play their own game at a high level and instead rely on some mysterious internal testing methods which apparently don't provide results even remotely close to the in-game reality. Their testing indicated that Henshin quarterstaff builds were overpowered to the point of needing to be substantially nerfed. The reality is that Henshin quarterstaff builds weren't even the best possible quarterstaff option. Additionally, the top-tier tempest, assassin, wraps monk, and 2HF builds are orders of magnitude better than even the best quarterstaff builds.

[balvix]

https://www.ddo.com/forums/showthrea...Helter-Skelter
https://www.ddo.com/forums/showthrea...Helter-Skelter

Hmm... someone apparently forgot to tell those guys that melee are in a bad place.

So they completed the first R8 and R10 Strahd raids serverwide with 6 melee DPS and 1 ranged DPS and people still think melee are in hurting? Heck, only 2 of the 6 melee were even monk icons. Their melee DPS had rogue, ranger, fighter, bard and monk icons. I highly doubt that all 6 of those DPS melee were quadruple/everything completionists.

Melee are actually in a really good spot right now, especially in reaper where multiple nerfs and stacking penalties to ranged have swung the pendulum fairly far to the melee side. There are fairly common problems with bad builds and player skill though.

An additional problem is that the devs don't know how to play their own game at a high level and instead rely on some mysterious internal testing methods which apparently don't provide results even remotely close to the in-game reality. Their testing indicated that Henshin quarterstaff builds were overpowered to the point of needing to be substantially nerfed. The reality is that Henshin quarterstaff builds weren't even the best possible quarterstaff option. Additionally, the top-tier tempest, assassin, wraps monk, and 2HF builds are orders of magnitude better than even the best quarterstaff builds.

Might want to go reread my post bro. Those guys are multiple tr, most likely with plenty of reaper points, backed up by a total of 3 healbot clerics, and cc casters. So tell me more about how melees that aren't in the same situation are perfectly fine. I was in a group with 5 melee toons, a couple that I know are really good usually, and 1 warlock recently in a r10 quest. The melees had to go hide and the warlock soloed the quest. So knowing what we all know do you think it would have been possible for that raid to have been completed with all melee and no healbots and cc? or perhaps all warlocks? So basically unless you find yourself in perfect conditions such as in that raid, then my original point stands. Again, im not saying nerf warlocks since that one had done multiple tr's and had tricked out his gear to the max but on the same hand, the melees just couldn't hang, on my toon, I could kill a few things but then had to run for my life. If perhaps I had some cc and some healbot then sure I could have done something different. But lets be real here, how often do you find a healbot cleric nowadays?

[Domince]

Might want to go reread my post bro. Those guys are multiple tr, most likely with plenty of reaper points, backed up by a total of 3 healbot clerics, and cc casters. So tell me more about how melees that aren't in the same situation are perfectly fine. I was in a group with 5 melee toons, a couple that I know are really good usually, and 1 warlock recently in a r10 quest. The melees had to go hide and the warlock soloed the quest. So knowing what we all know do you think it would have been possible for that raid to have been completed with all melee and no healbots and cc? or perhaps all warlocks? So basically unless you find yourself in perfect conditions such as in that raid, then my original point stands. Again, im not saying nerf warlocks since that one had done multiple tr's and had tricked out his gear to the max but on the same hand, the melees just couldn't hang, on my toon, I could kill a few things but then had to run for my life. If perhaps I had some cc and some healbot then sure I could have done something different. But lets be real here, how often do you find a healbot cleric nowadays?

If you are playing with melees that are like that, they are bad, if my little druid wolf build THF horc at cap can do high reaper with 23 Reaper points and less then 11 total PLs, i think they can do well.

[Morroiel]

Might want to go reread my post bro. Those guys are multiple tr, most likely with plenty of reaper points, backed up by a total of 3 healbot clerics, and cc casters. So tell me more about how melees that aren't in the same situation are perfectly fine. I was in a group with 5 melee toons, a couple that I know are really good usually, and 1 warlock recently in a r10 quest. The melees had to go hide and the warlock soloed the quest. So knowing what we all know do you think it would have been possible for that raid to have been completed with all melee and no healbots and cc? or perhaps all warlocks? So basically unless you find yourself in perfect conditions such as in that raid, then my original point stands. Again, im not saying nerf warlocks since that one had done multiple tr's and had tricked out his gear to the max but on the same hand, the melees just couldn't hang, on my toon, I could kill a few things but then had to run for my life. If perhaps I had some cc and some healbot then sure I could have done something different. But lets be real here, how often do you find a healbot cleric nowadays?

This notion that players (especially those without all the bells and whistles) should be able to solo OR solo-archetype the hardest content in the game NEEDS TO STOP. This is what caused elite to be a fluffy, zero challenge difficulty.

A non-dps only group could not have completed that raid on that difficulty. A dps only group could not have completed that raid on that difficulty. Parity is there.

What good players see time and time again, is that in the hardest difficulty there are FAR more spots available for hard hitting melee dps than any other character archetype.

If you want to see something that isn't in a good place right now, I'd refer you to pure paladin and caster dps builds.

[balvix]

This notion that players (especially those without all the bells and whistles) should be able to solo OR solo-archetype the hardest content in the game NEEDS TO STOP. This is what caused elite to be a fluffy, zero challenge difficulty.

A non-dps only group could not have completed that raid on that difficulty. A dps only group could not have completed that raid on that difficulty. Parity is there.

What good players see time and time again, is that in the hardest difficulty there are FAR more spots available for hard hitting melee dps than any other character archetype.

If you want to see something that isn't in a good place right now, I'd refer you to pure paladin and caster dps builds.

Again, someone who might want to reread my post, or possibly read it for a first time. Exactly where in either post did I say that I wanted to "solo" anything? The only thing I asked for was for melee to become relevant again in groups, and sure there are spots available in groups but they aren't held for melees only, they are set for anyone so im gonna call bull on your suggestion that high lvl groups are holding spots only for melees.

[balvix]

If you are playing with melees that are like that, they are bad, if my little druid wolf build THF horc at cap can do high reaper with 23 Reaper points and less then 11 total PLs, i think they can do well.

Currently my fighter is doing a wolf build so I understand why you think that its so simple, I have plenty of self healing, and do really good dps. But try doing the same on a fighter with no self healing. Im not saying it cant be done, with a good group and everyone sharing the healing (except you of course since you wont be able to whip a wand mid fight) Most groups aren't willing to wait on the perfect composition to accommodate everyone's survival needs.

[Shadow_Jumper]

Currently my fighter is doing a wolf build so I understand why you think that its so simple, I have plenty of self healing, and do really good dps. But try doing the same on a fighter with no self healing. Im not saying it cant be done, with a good group and everyone sharing the healing (except you of course since you wont be able to whip a wand mid fight) Most groups aren't willing to wait on the perfect composition to accommodate everyone's survival needs.

So basically you’re complaining that reaper 10 is hard? This basically reads as “But I want to do the hardest difficulty in the game with a sub-par group and I can’t understand the reasons why a difficulty meant to be tackled by a balanced team is rough for melee.”

Bad group building is not a reason for a call to nerf. Look at your group composition next time, I’m sure the actual problem resides there.

[Morroiel]

Again, someone who might want to reread my post, or possibly read it for a first time. Exactly where in either post did I say that I wanted to "solo" anything? The only thing I asked for was for melee to become relevant again in groups, and sure there are spots available in groups but they aren't held for melees only, they are set for anyone so im gonna call bull on your suggestion that high lvl groups are holding spots only for melees.

Apparently you need to read my post again. The "or" was even emphasized.

Melees are relevant in r10. Your idea of relevant seems to be self-sufficient irregardless of group composition, which reaper specifically was built to combat. I'll add that no build is truly, relevant under your ad hoc definition.

[Kza]

Staff builds and pure pallys need a lot of work. All other melees (not including hybrid melees like cleric/fvs melee) are perfectly fine. All DPS tests on optimized toons are so close to each other in terms of dps and suriveability, as well as, cc abilities that its a miracle.

Rogues, Fighters, Barbarians (with the full patch work), Rangers, and Monks are all viable in the meta.

While dc casters are needed so too are dps toons, and I'll add that the number of dps toons needed is higher than the number of dc toons needed.

Agree 100%

[HungarianRhapsody]

No, melees are in a perfect place

Tahiti?

[Odysseus2011]

So basically unless you find yourself in perfect conditions such as in that raid, then my original point stands. Again, im not saying nerf warlocks since that one had done multiple tr's and had tricked out his gear to the max but on the same hand, the melees just couldn't hang, on my toon, I could kill a few things but then had to run for my life. If perhaps I had some cc and some healbot then sure I could have done something different. But lets be real here, how often do you find a healbot cleric nowadays?

What you’re asking for is basically melee to be god toons that can basically solo everything on r10.

[Fallout47]

Might want to go reread my post bro. Those guys are multiple tr, most likely with plenty of reaper points, backed up by a total of 3 healbot clerics, and cc casters. So tell me more about how melees that aren't in the same situation are perfectly fine. I was in a group with 5 melee toons, a couple that I know are really good usually, and 1 warlock recently in a r10 quest. The melees had to go hide and the warlock soloed the quest. So knowing what we all know do you think it would have been possible for that raid to have been completed with all melee and no healbots and cc? or perhaps all warlocks? So basically unless you find yourself in perfect conditions such as in that raid, then my original point stands. Again, im not saying nerf warlocks since that one had done multiple tr's and had tricked out his gear to the max but on the same hand, the melees just couldn't hang, on my toon, I could kill a few things but then had to run for my life. If perhaps I had some cc and some healbot then sure I could have done something different. But lets be real here, how often do you find a healbot cleric nowadays?

Being on the inside of the guild that ran that R10, I will let you in on a secret, we would never attempt an R10 quest with the group make up you just cited. At best, the warlock could adequately fulfill 1 of the 3 support roles required for an enjoyable R10 for the entire group. We can run R10 with 2 of the trinity but it is less enjoyable.

Melee is at the top of DPS and, correctly built, is quite survivable. Our best player in guild history was a pali/ranger non-completionist who was soloing R7 2 weeks after reaper went live.

I am actually most shocked that they pulled back from the rumored plan to 'buff melee' into orbit. It would have destroyed what's left of challenge in the game.

[Xanthrawl]

Being on the inside of the guild that ran that R10, I will let you in on a secret, we would never attempt an R10 quest with the group make up you just cited. At best, the warlock could adequately fulfill 1 of the 3 support roles required for an enjoyable R10 for the entire group. We can run R10 with 2 of the trinity but it is less enjoyable.

Melee is at the top of DPS and, correctly built, is quite survivable. Our best player in guild history was a pali/ranger non-completionist who was soloing R7 2 weeks after reaper went live.

I am actually most shocked that they pulled back from the rumored plan to 'buff melee' into orbit. It would have destroyed what's left of challenge in the game.

I was about to post something similar. Melee are GREAT in R10s if they have support. If you do NOT have that support, try a lower difficulty setting or wait until you DO. High skull reapers are not the "Old Elite" where you simply take the first 5 to hit the LFM and roll, expecting BYOH runs. You need to be much more coordinated and work as a team. DPS (read melee) is one ROLE of that team, but healing and CCing are vital as well.

That said, Melee DO have a bit of a survivability issue. Even on lower skulls, if you do not have the past lives, it can be challenging to run in a group without a healer and/or CCer. And since low Reaper is now the new norm, I believe this needs a minor, light touch, tweek. But I, too, caution against swinging the pendulum too far.

[Shadow_Jumper]

Might want to go reread my post bro. Those guys are multiple tr, most likely with plenty of reaper points, backed up by a total of 3 healbot clerics, and cc casters. So tell me more about how melees that aren't in the same situation are perfectly fine. I was in a group with 5 melee toons, a couple that I know are really good usually, and 1 warlock recently in a r10 quest. The melees had to go hide and the warlock soloed the quest.

And isn’t that what r10 is meant for? Skilled/geared players?

Also, your details to back up your claims are breathtakingly specific. “Some melee builds” “a warlock”. People totally understand that these were top of the line fantastic players who had ran r10 before.

Also-also. As feelgood said. If I was running a group of 5 melee dps and one caster, missing obviously the tank and heals, then we wouldn’t even bother going into r10. We’d be doing r7.