LS rogues are excellent due to practices. Learn to leverage that via projectiles, pick, search,track. Meren is effectively an LS rogue and I do these things.
Suggestion I have is improving the effectiveness of the projectile crits (palm and backstab required iirc). Anything move related buffs a clan with as others have said, excellent bonuses.
What even are the perceived weaknesses of LS rogues? I'd rather play one than my trolloc rogue.
LS Rogues
Re: LS Rogues
The reason moves keep getting brought up is because imms specifically asked about the difference between LS and DS rogues, sure LS moves are still absolutely playable, but we were specifically looking at the disparity between LS and DS rogues and thats the biggest difference.Aureus wrote: ↑Fri Jul 14, 2023 3:33 am
One of the consistent pieces of feedback we have received is that LS (and SS) rogues are much harder to play than their DS counterparts
How do you feel about LS rogues in particular? What might we do to make them easier to play when compared to their DS counterparts, but not OP relative to hunters and warriors?
Most everyone has agreed that rogues in general are plenty strong as it is. Very few people will say that LS rogues are more powerful than DS ones though (apart from the OP clans). Seems like the best solution would be to nerf DS rogues in some way rather than boosting LS rogues to bring things into balance. Could be something like a longer stab timer, which affects stab in general (under 8 seconds to not affect smobbing too much) but to make it harder to land a stab in the middle of pk and make it to where its more of something that is used only when they are entirely unaware of the stabber. A 32 pulse stab would mean that you couldnt land a stab in the middle of a weave or from a failed bash but could still pick off someone who was careless, which would encourage rogues to melee/projectile in actual combat rather than just sit there running stabs like everyone seems to hate, it would also shift the balance towards LS stronger than DS since LS has high OB mounted with melee/projectiling, and a better source of projectiles. If people dont have to worry about dying to a stab from a failed bash, they may be more likely to stick around and actually fight a rogue. Many dont like fighting them now because rogues can just wait around for a lucky shot, and just leave before they ever get in danger of dying if a lucky shot doesnt happen.
Re: LS Rogues
Stab has always been a crutch for bads and the go to style for when you lose gear on your main alt, go play your stabber for a week or 2 and you will probably get some luck kills to gear up. Easiest way to fade on DS was through a rogue, how many fades were previously rogues and terrible fades - all of them 
I mastered a rogue but I never stabbed a single PC. Melee/attack/sblades was quite powerful on its own back then, with projectiles currently and still decent sblade damage I think they are still good in melee in todays game.
Blicks should be incredibly rare but unfortunately they are quite common. I am also in the hyperparanoid generation where I very rarely died to stab unless it was a missed bash bullshit or uncontrolled timing. Healthy to dead, scratched to dead, hurt and even high wounded to dead should never happen or at the very least should be incredibly rare. I always thought damage should be downed and Offset this with higher landing %.
I haven't played much so I am not sure about how practicing survival adjusts trolloc moves/regeneration, however, one idea could be to more closely tie in practices to landing % or perhaps damage. Thus, trolloc rogues would naturally land less and do less damage but would have an easier time roaming around. Human rogues with their superior practices would land more and do more damage but have the limitations of moves. Probably the easiest. A trolloc rogue could sacrifice survival for higher practices in the stab essential skills but then get slightly less regeneration - if that is how it actually works.
But in general, less rogues is better for PK.
There are actually some fun rogues as mentioned above, Fermin comes to mind, Rig was a slightly less shitty trolloc rogue and thus became a slightly less shitty fade.
I mastered a rogue but I never stabbed a single PC. Melee/attack/sblades was quite powerful on its own back then, with projectiles currently and still decent sblade damage I think they are still good in melee in todays game.Blicks should be incredibly rare but unfortunately they are quite common. I am also in the hyperparanoid generation where I very rarely died to stab unless it was a missed bash bullshit or uncontrolled timing. Healthy to dead, scratched to dead, hurt and even high wounded to dead should never happen or at the very least should be incredibly rare. I always thought damage should be downed and Offset this with higher landing %.
I haven't played much so I am not sure about how practicing survival adjusts trolloc moves/regeneration, however, one idea could be to more closely tie in practices to landing % or perhaps damage. Thus, trolloc rogues would naturally land less and do less damage but would have an easier time roaming around. Human rogues with their superior practices would land more and do more damage but have the limitations of moves. Probably the easiest. A trolloc rogue could sacrifice survival for higher practices in the stab essential skills but then get slightly less regeneration - if that is how it actually works.
But in general, less rogues is better for PK.
There are actually some fun rogues as mentioned above, Fermin comes to mind, Rig was a slightly less shitty trolloc rogue and thus became a slightly less shitty fade.
Re: LS Rogues
I feel the problem is less "LS Rogues" and more "Rogues across the board"
Most of the problem comes to the one trick pony playstyle of stab, and outside of 4-5 v 4-5 with lots of fleeing and a small number of rogues, you generally don't get two chances to finish a stab timer in pk against a competent opponent in a 1v1, once they know you are there and turn on notice, and the scummy flee-stab stuff should also go away.
Projectiles help a lot with that, but then you need LS pracs to make things work out. The "critical hit" interactions between certain pracs could really use a rework -- rather than reinforcing the 1-trick pony-ness (backstab), it should have other interactions to point toward a different prac set up.
fencing blade set ups where you need a tulwar to bash and a piercer to deal damage should have some fun/interesting combination/options, as bash/weapon/attack is quite prac intensive and generally not quite worth the sacrifice needed to make it work (at least, from the DS hunter view with the already restricted pracs) as well as the barbed throwing javelins for larger varieties of viable eq/prac combinations and get some extra utility out of sheath-swapping weapon set ups.
A timer run skill to punish rogues that spam timers would be another option. LS has the option for charge -- and it is a wonderful feeling to land a charge on h.rogue. a DS-only skill that has the same function, but only works with polearms, would be a very welcome addition. Perhaps make it a rogue prac so that they can go gimp combo/bashy and punish LS rogues that tend to spam stab, or FCs that routinely spam long weaves unengaged.
In any case, my experience is rogues are about as fun to play as they are to play against. the one trick pony aspect with very little utility in the traditional group-faceoff-fight...shouldn't be the main/only option for playing a rogue. There's a place for it, sure, but it should be one of several options.
Most of the problem comes to the one trick pony playstyle of stab, and outside of 4-5 v 4-5 with lots of fleeing and a small number of rogues, you generally don't get two chances to finish a stab timer in pk against a competent opponent in a 1v1, once they know you are there and turn on notice, and the scummy flee-stab stuff should also go away.
Projectiles help a lot with that, but then you need LS pracs to make things work out. The "critical hit" interactions between certain pracs could really use a rework -- rather than reinforcing the 1-trick pony-ness (backstab), it should have other interactions to point toward a different prac set up.
fencing blade set ups where you need a tulwar to bash and a piercer to deal damage should have some fun/interesting combination/options, as bash/weapon/attack is quite prac intensive and generally not quite worth the sacrifice needed to make it work (at least, from the DS hunter view with the already restricted pracs) as well as the barbed throwing javelins for larger varieties of viable eq/prac combinations and get some extra utility out of sheath-swapping weapon set ups.
A timer run skill to punish rogues that spam timers would be another option. LS has the option for charge -- and it is a wonderful feeling to land a charge on h.rogue. a DS-only skill that has the same function, but only works with polearms, would be a very welcome addition. Perhaps make it a rogue prac so that they can go gimp combo/bashy and punish LS rogues that tend to spam stab, or FCs that routinely spam long weaves unengaged.
In any case, my experience is rogues are about as fun to play as they are to play against. the one trick pony aspect with very little utility in the traditional group-faceoff-fight...shouldn't be the main/only option for playing a rogue. There's a place for it, sure, but it should be one of several options.
Re: LS Rogues
I don’t think LS rogues need to be upped in any way.
The last time they were upped, by tinkering with the backstab formula to give additional landing chance up to 99% s blades, was a good upping IMO.
They are powerful melee characters, particularly since the infinite projectile loads were added to certain shops.
It is true that DS rogues are inherently better suited for stabbing than LS rogues for the simple reason that they are always dismounted.
If you are wanting to mitigate that advantage you could do something like make sneak cost +5 mvs per room for a troll rogue. Voila! Now they have to “dismount” too
The last time they were upped, by tinkering with the backstab formula to give additional landing chance up to 99% s blades, was a good upping IMO.
They are powerful melee characters, particularly since the infinite projectile loads were added to certain shops.
It is true that DS rogues are inherently better suited for stabbing than LS rogues for the simple reason that they are always dismounted.
If you are wanting to mitigate that advantage you could do something like make sneak cost +5 mvs per room for a troll rogue. Voila! Now they have to “dismount” too
Re: LS Rogues
As a non-Fermin quality level historic player, I do find movement management more challenging on human rogues than trolls. That said, I also feel like the history of the game has been to not focus enough on what top quality players can do. ie. channelers claiming broken, unbalanced skills were fine because the overall player average skill level was low but Jestin was running around annihilating people.
I think the quality of the discussion in this thread so far has been very good, but I also wonder if some of the decision points are based on things that are flexible or temporary. Like everyone, but particularly human rogue mobility, is going to be based on availability of vials. If vial rarity were to continue to advance things could be problematic.
Similarly, for all the talk of projectiles - a large part of the discussion has focused on FD selling projectiles and I can't help but think this won't go on forever. At some point someone upstairs is going to see this as broken cause outsider looking in it looks pretty silly. A substantial portion of the balancing of projectiles has to be their availability.
I think the quality of the discussion in this thread so far has been very good, but I also wonder if some of the decision points are based on things that are flexible or temporary. Like everyone, but particularly human rogue mobility, is going to be based on availability of vials. If vial rarity were to continue to advance things could be problematic.
Similarly, for all the talk of projectiles - a large part of the discussion has focused on FD selling projectiles and I can't help but think this won't go on forever. At some point someone upstairs is going to see this as broken cause outsider looking in it looks pretty silly. A substantial portion of the balancing of projectiles has to be their availability.
Re: LS Rogues
Great posts as usual, really appreciate your POV Eol. I can't respond to everyone here but will respond to two points:Eol wrote: ↑Sun Jul 16, 2023 11:12 pmAs a non-Fermin quality level historic player, I do find movement management more challenging on human rogues than trolls. That said, I also feel like the history of the game has been to not focus enough on what top quality players can do. ie. channelers claiming broken, unbalanced skills were fine because the overall player average skill level was low but Jestin was running around annihilating people.
I think the quality of the discussion in this thread so far has been very good, but I also wonder if some of the decision points are based on things that are flexible or temporary. Like everyone, but particularly human rogue mobility, is going to be based on availability of vials. If vial rarity were to continue to advance things could be problematic.
Similarly, for all the talk of projectiles - a large part of the discussion has focused on FD selling projectiles and I can't help but think this won't go on forever. At some point someone upstairs is going to see this as broken cause outsider looking in it looks pretty silly. A substantial portion of the balancing of projectiles has to be their availability.
1. Vial availability: this was reduced intentionally (along with human blood). It is one of those things that people who can play 8 hours+ a day can grind out, and people that play more casually can't. So ultimately leads to massive disparities in movement beyond what seems healthy for our playerbase (few of us can play that much these days, and one of WoTMUD's strengths has always been it is pretty accessible for more casual players [no scripting/systems required, etc.]). We tied that reduction to things like trolloc survival, etc. to even it out a bit more. I do not see us going back to massive numbers of vials being available, though they are definitely more available on LS than DS and that seems reasonable.
2. We added "infinite" projectiles in FD b/c they were easily farmable in the Black Hills and Altaran Kingpin for those who knew how (again, a time commitment thing), so it seemed fair to add them to FD for a pretty high gold cost as a gold sink. But not the best ones, and I'd be open to feedback there too (maybe the sellable ones should have higher weight?). At any rate, it is not an oversight. I've played a lot of rogues in my time and I tend to find lurking-and-stabbing pretty boring, so I do like seeing other options that are more melee focused and less antisocial. I think we'd be more likely to tweak projectile (and rogue melee) mechanics themselves than reduce projectile availability as the limiting factor.
Re: LS Rogues
As it is now, a non-bonused clan human rogue is still, in my opinion, leagues better than a trolloc rogue in terms of mobility. This is solely due to the fact that outside of northern zones, the difference in range between a LS rogue and a DS rogue is huge. If you want to go from Bandar Eban to Caemlyn, the LS rogue is going to get there first just off of horses alone within 3 tics and without using a vial. It’s going to take that DS rogue at least twice as long, if not longer depending on their practices.
There’s this weird ideology that rogues HAVE to use stab. As it’s been said in here by others, especially Kryyg, rogue melee is still the strongest melee source in this game, outside of fade/warder berserk attack. Especially now that rank damage is a thing. Stab is great as an open/ending/surprise and that’s it. Nobody is ever thinking to themselves “wow, if I land this stab I hope it doesn’t kill them!” It’s there to appease our brain rot of wizkilling someone and that’s it.
LS rogues have an advantage to damage and land %, have a movement advantage in 95% of the mud, have a practice advantage, and an ob advantage. They don’t have to make a decision between getting 6 survival or maxing their land % and damage.
Vial availability is still insane. Hit troopers Seandar, stab herbalist seandar, take ways to EF and kill hobrion/rogues, run down to Falme and murder herbalist/4x lithe, Chico seanchan herbalist, go back up EF and buy herbs off of Surelle(sp?) in Watch Hill, hit herbalist in Baerlon, hit troopers in se WB, hit herbalist in Caemlyn/Tar Valon, go FD and hit herbalist/troopers and you have enough herbs/vials to last a while in the span of an hour. Doable on both DS and LS. Not including picking up herbs along the way.
Infinite projectiles aren’t “great” but it isn’t bad either I guess. I’m not a huge fan of everyone being able to just buy a dung ton of them at a whim instead of farming them like everyone else used to, but it’s whatever.
There’s this weird ideology that rogues HAVE to use stab. As it’s been said in here by others, especially Kryyg, rogue melee is still the strongest melee source in this game, outside of fade/warder berserk attack. Especially now that rank damage is a thing. Stab is great as an open/ending/surprise and that’s it. Nobody is ever thinking to themselves “wow, if I land this stab I hope it doesn’t kill them!” It’s there to appease our brain rot of wizkilling someone and that’s it.
LS rogues have an advantage to damage and land %, have a movement advantage in 95% of the mud, have a practice advantage, and an ob advantage. They don’t have to make a decision between getting 6 survival or maxing their land % and damage.
Vial availability is still insane. Hit troopers Seandar, stab herbalist seandar, take ways to EF and kill hobrion/rogues, run down to Falme and murder herbalist/4x lithe, Chico seanchan herbalist, go back up EF and buy herbs off of Surelle(sp?) in Watch Hill, hit herbalist in Baerlon, hit troopers in se WB, hit herbalist in Caemlyn/Tar Valon, go FD and hit herbalist/troopers and you have enough herbs/vials to last a while in the span of an hour. Doable on both DS and LS. Not including picking up herbs along the way.
Infinite projectiles aren’t “great” but it isn’t bad either I guess. I’m not a huge fan of everyone being able to just buy a dung ton of them at a whim instead of farming them like everyone else used to, but it’s whatever.
Re: LS Rogues
I think rogues over the years have been downed significantly in general. Where they sit right now in 2023 is appropriate. I always thought there were lots of people playing the class but, to play it well you have to adjust your playstyle a lot.
some characteristics I can think of that makes for a good rogue:
1. they buff and stick around more than a few rounds instead of fleeing instantly.
2. they are the assigned blockers when their group wins
3. they can be designated as chasers in some circumstances
4. knowing when to show up unannounced, and knowing when to leave (Raolin told me that a long time ago and it always served me well)
what usually happens in 2023:
1. insta flee
2. block sometimes, usually they elect to chase.
3. run solo vs operate as a force multiplier in a group
4. do a bad job at showing up unannounced, and do a great job leaving the moment they fear for their lives.
I think the class is fine the way it is, it's the playstyles that are problematic. I think that instantly fleeing is bad for the game, I also think hanging around and rolling stabs the entire time instead of meleeing can be an issue. Always has been. I think what you meant to say is "how do we balance LS rogues up north" because that's where 99% of your rogue pk is occurring these days. Maybe make south of blight more move friendly but, honestly I just thought that was the cost of doing business. Bring vials. If you're serious about not dying, bring vials. If you're a newer player, and you're playing a rogue, that's a learning moment that that new player will arrive at on their own due time. Once you realize you need vials more or less up there, that's just the way it is so you bring them or you run the risk of getting caught out. I can think of a lot of more pressing issues than what we should do about LS rogues, for what it's worth. I'd say leave them be. If I could change anything I'd make it so they can't throw projectiles the way they can right now unless it cost them a LOT more pracs, because I think it's a weird game mechanic. Either you throw projectiles and stab very poorly, or you don't throw projectiles and you stab well when you land. That's about all I got.
some characteristics I can think of that makes for a good rogue:
1. they buff and stick around more than a few rounds instead of fleeing instantly.
2. they are the assigned blockers when their group wins
3. they can be designated as chasers in some circumstances
4. knowing when to show up unannounced, and knowing when to leave (Raolin told me that a long time ago and it always served me well)
what usually happens in 2023:
1. insta flee
2. block sometimes, usually they elect to chase.
3. run solo vs operate as a force multiplier in a group
4. do a bad job at showing up unannounced, and do a great job leaving the moment they fear for their lives.
I think the class is fine the way it is, it's the playstyles that are problematic. I think that instantly fleeing is bad for the game, I also think hanging around and rolling stabs the entire time instead of meleeing can be an issue. Always has been. I think what you meant to say is "how do we balance LS rogues up north" because that's where 99% of your rogue pk is occurring these days. Maybe make south of blight more move friendly but, honestly I just thought that was the cost of doing business. Bring vials. If you're serious about not dying, bring vials. If you're a newer player, and you're playing a rogue, that's a learning moment that that new player will arrive at on their own due time. Once you realize you need vials more or less up there, that's just the way it is so you bring them or you run the risk of getting caught out. I can think of a lot of more pressing issues than what we should do about LS rogues, for what it's worth. I'd say leave them be. If I could change anything I'd make it so they can't throw projectiles the way they can right now unless it cost them a LOT more pracs, because I think it's a weird game mechanic. Either you throw projectiles and stab very poorly, or you don't throw projectiles and you stab well when you land. That's about all I got.
Re: LS Rogues
Vials aren't really that hard on any side right now, but they're still arguably easier on DS. Rares or TPs for tokens for 1-2 vials and a strength tea per token really adds up. More expensive, but also do not need to rely on clans to fill up broker.