Empath Lash

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General Maximus
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Empath Lash

Post by General Maximus »

I know I have brought this up, but here it is.

For next year, can it be alowed that an empath can spend as many life points they want at 1 time to do there lash attack? can not spen into negatives.

aka, I spend 5 life and do 10 lash.

I would like this becasue it is easier to deliever the damage, and it is easier for people to take the damage. It is simpler for a person to take 10 damage, than take 2,2,2,2,2. It gets hard to count the hits, especialy when there are others hitting the target. Much simpler just to say 10 lash.
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Post by General Maximus »

This effect can be play tested next event to see if would cause any problems.
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Post by dier_cire »

It's actually more beneficial for the empath to spread them out so I don't see anything wrong with this.
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Post by Zydana »

so if i'm going to hit you with my sword 5 times, I can just save time and call 5 once since calling 5 once would be much easier for you to understand than one, one, one, one one?

I would think no on this because it would prevent people from either getting away from you as you start calling lash and it would prevent people from attacking to make you stop.

It would definatly eliminate reaction time for your foe.
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Post by WayneO42 »

I agree, I dont think the damage should be combined
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Post by General Maximus »

Hitting an empath doing lash would do nothing. The lash skill is life point skill and cannot be distrubed if you are hit. Though you can just beat the empath down.

yes this would prevent people fom fleeing from the empath when they start their lash attack if you could do it at once. But an empath can only be wearing light armor when this skill is used and it is a 2nd teir skill. Right now the emapth lash skill has very little use in game. It is a fun roleplaying skill, but I think it was meant to be more of a combat skill

As an empath lashs, they losse hit points. So if an empath runs up to a group of people and does 10 lash, they will have little life and armor left to protect themselves. Any one still standing could just hit the emapth a few times, and they would die.

The worst case this would create is an empath running into combat, doing a large lash, and hopefuly they get out to be healed.


The max lash a 20th level empath could do and still run away is 18 magic lash. Yes that could knock out any non warrior, but would only leave the empath with 6 armor (4 from light armor, and 2 from combat reflexes), and 1 life to run away with. Hope they didn't piss off that warrior. This is worse case.

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Post by Amagus »

But the reaction time is vital. Say an Empath has 10 life. He thinks to himself ‘Gee, if I could run into the center of the enemy group and do 20 damage, I could down them all and just fall unconcious to be revived by my friends!’

He runs into the enemy, calls ‘2 Magic Lash! 2 Magic Lash, 2 Magic Lash’ before a hail of sword hits account for the rest of his Life. Enemy support characters have run out of the lash radius after taking just 4 damage, while the warriors have stopped the Empath from inflicting all 20 Damage.

If the Empath could use all his life at once, the enemy would stand no chance. Indeed battles would be very short, as their tactics fall to just running ‘mage bombs’ at the opposing force to blast them apart. Archers would be useful for cutting them down before they get too close. Melee warriors become obsolete.

Imagine - mages from both sides running passed each other, some detonating themselves to stop opposing mages from reaching their targets. The rest carry on toward each other’s lines, archers and defensive mages picking them off as they close. The surviving mages then detonate, forming huge rents in their opposition’s lines. Then and only then, should the battle not have been instantly decided there, can the melee fighters charge forth to do battle.
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Post by General Maximus »

There always people who have resist magic who could just stomp the empaths into the ground. But, yes I can see your point Doug. It would change the combat stragetis some what, but it would not make the warrior obsolete. Yes bombers would be a problem, but it is easly taken care of.

Empath booms stop them dead in there tracks, resist magic stops them, any ranged attack, and it would take 2 bombers to take out a full warrior. And a person has to build there character to be a bomber. And don't forget that emapth has to make it back to their friends.

But, if people don't think it is a good idea, than no problem. It would be a scary empath ability, but it has a major cost that could easly get the empath killed. If the large damages is a concern, put a cap on the spenditure, Say an empath can spend no more than 5 life at a time. That is 10 lash max from an empath. Of make 3 or 4 life max to spend.

2 lash is cool, but no very useful. Being able to do 6-10 lash makes it very useful.
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Post by dier_cire »

Shifting tactical favor is a moot issue. Both sides are affected therefore the net result is zero. In a single person combat, the 18 lash is far less effective than the 2 lash 10 times. In mass combat, the 18 lash can be more vastly more effective (as it can blow up shields). Giving it a limit of like 5 life (10 lash) would make it more reasonable. There's already semi precedence for this via archer and his charge ups.

The biggest issue is the complaint that damages are too high for most non warrior types, and this would just aid that complaint.
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Post by Tullus »

I can somewhat see the reason behind wanting to attach these bits of damage to each other. The two lash itself is impressive in theory, yet in practice it becomes a death sentence for the empath using it. I can see it being used as a last ditch effort, to finish off a group of low life point foes, or a scare tactic.

I have played a warrior. I feel combining damage from the lash call isn't equal to combining normal melee swings. The cost of the swing is just the movement of the weapon, while the cost of the lash is the empaths life points itself. In essence, killing themself to do small bursts of damage. Then the contest becomes how fast can you say, "two magic lash", before they take you down. At max, most empaths will be able to acomplish ten to twelve magic lash in total. A normal defensive warrior will have over twenty soak. When I played as Ravinal, I had twenty-seven soak. With this, an empath giving there life to kill one warrior becomes meaningless. Not even a contest. One or two "two magic lash" being met with two or three "Two" swings and the empath is downed. This is why I don't forsee using this ability as Tullus.

Yet, as has been said. If it were to be allowed, this lash damage combining, then it could become exploited to a large degree. I will continue to brainstorm a different possible solution to this idea, to make it more appealing to use.
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Post by Todd »

*sigh* I hesitate to add my .02 but here goes,

Filters on....

Apples to apples. With a weapon you can only swing as fast as you can call. Generally speaking max damage is 2 to 3 and only effects one target. Lash effects everyone. Booms do more damage, generally 5 to 15, but are ranged and again only effect one target.

You are asking for a skill that would be faster then swinging a sword, do as much or more damage as a boom, and effect ALL nearby targets.

Yes I know you do this at a temporary loss of LP, but not nearly enough to offset the benifit.

In addition, you also need to take into account total effect. Example; There are 5 Paths, if played evenly each allows for 20% of the players in game. Of the 20% that are Warriors possibly 75% wear there armor etc. all the time. That 75% are the ones who can take the Boom/BigLash effect. By the miricles of math that means that a BigLash attack would Drop, or Kill, 85% of the player base instantly.

Does this still seemed balanced? No. Cool? Yes. Balanced. No.
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Post by dier_cire »

Since the amount of damage each can do was brought up...

Let's say we give the empath max life, and it hits the most amount it can, say around 8, that's 8 x 18 = 144 total damage per 4 minutes or 0.6 damage per second. (Note: this also takes a healer out of combat)

Biggest Boom damage = 8 for 10 seconds of charge or 0.8 damage per second.

Swinging a weapon = 2 damage per hit and staying somewhat defensive you can easily achieve one hit every other second or 1 damage per second. This is keeping a warrior very defensive. If we used an all out offensive combat like Vince and I had in the cave it'd be over 6 damage per second.

Now if you limit the lash skill to 5 lilfe, it can't blow shields and is very in line with the rest of the damage dealers. And the chances of hitting more than 2 or 3 people is very unlikely.
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Post by Peace420 »

LOL Not every character type needs to be a badass in combat, wanna be a combat badass be a fighter. 2 Lash is plenty, the empath can do quite abit of damage already and is not meant to be a combat bomb.
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Post by dier_cire »

Peace420 wrote:LOL Not every character type needs to be a badass in combat, wanna be a combat badass be a fighter. 2 Lash is plenty, the empath can do quite abit of damage already and is not meant to be a combat bomb.
Lash and booms are in the same path... And It wouldn't make empaths more effective in combat. It would give them another viable option other than throwing booms and fear.
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Post by Amagus »

But than who would dare stand against a Empath? They’ll smash you at range. Attempt to charge them to take them out and they’ll smash you there, too. No one, save those who can resist magic, would dare to be the one who rushes in in an attempt to take out the enemy firepower, and you certainly can’t just sit back and take their booms.

Empaths are awesome at range, vulnerable up close – that’s balanced.
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