What Changes Will Affect Bows in Albion Online
So the bows are some of the most interesting weapons in the game. The insane mobility and CC they can dish out makes it possible for a bow user to survive situations that no other class could survive. This is the reason why currently bows are overpowered. There is very few counters to them, and the few counters that exist are too specialized. So the game needs to have more counters to bows. But at the same time we don't want to ruin the uniqueness and very fun gameplay of the weapon. So the best way to accomplish this would be some rather indirect nerfs. These are the best suggestions and ideas that I found on the forum and came up with:
Make roots stronger by changing the way that displacement abilities work
Currently, if you have a displacement ability (Blink, Delayed Teleport, Dodge, Frost Arrow, others), you can still move despite having a root on you. The game simply ignores the root for purposes of all displacement abilities. This should not be the case.
In stead, make it a feature of certain displacement abilities that they can be used while rooted. This allows for more balance to the different displacement abilities: Displacement abilities with short range and high cooldown can be "used through roots" or even "will remove stuns or roots from the player". Displacement abilities with long range and low cooldown (Frost Shot) will be blocked by roots.
This will accomplish several things:
1) Roots will become a viable counter to bows
2) If a player wants to counter roots, he has to sacrifice something for it
Move the "CC duration vs. players" away from light armor and make it a heavy armor stat
Tanks should be the ones who have strong CC. Not damage dealers. How this stat ended up being a light armor stat is beyond me. Just throw it on heavy and balance the base duration of the CC abilities after this. This isn't so much a nerf to bows. Its more of a general change that the game should have had from the start.
Increase the energy cost of Frost Shot
We want to keep bows' uniqueness. Nerfing Frost Shot into oblivion would ruin one of the most fun and interesting weapons. By just increasing the energy cost of Frost Shot, we will allow for bow users to still do their crazy dives into bigger groups of enemies. They just won't be able to do it all day like we're seing right now.
Reduce the slow time on Frost Shot
Other slowing weapons are single target. Most of them are even melee. And they are even balanced so that long slows aren't so powerful. Having a 20 second 40% slow that is ranged and hits multiple targets is clearly not balanced.
Rain of Arrows needs some looking into
I'm not sure how to change it without nerfing it into oblivion. But giving a weapon, that has all the tools available that Longbow has, one of the hardest hitting AoE abilities in the game and putting a slow on top of it, doesn't make sense.
Compared to other DPS weapons, longbow ranks top in both mobility, CC and AoE. No other weapon ranks top in so many categories at the same time. Usually, weapons are balanced so they rank top in ONE category and are average in 1 or 2 others. Being top in all categories except single target damage is clearly not balanced. Bows will still be very strong, even if you make all of these changes.
Make roots stronger by changing the way that displacement abilities work
Currently, if you have a displacement ability (Blink, Delayed Teleport, Dodge, Frost Arrow, others), you can still move despite having a root on you. The game simply ignores the root for purposes of all displacement abilities. This should not be the case.
In stead, make it a feature of certain displacement abilities that they can be used while rooted. This allows for more balance to the different displacement abilities: Displacement abilities with short range and high cooldown can be "used through roots" or even "will remove stuns or roots from the player". Displacement abilities with long range and low cooldown (Frost Shot) will be blocked by roots.
This will accomplish several things:
1) Roots will become a viable counter to bows
2) If a player wants to counter roots, he has to sacrifice something for it
Move the "CC duration vs. players" away from light armor and make it a heavy armor stat
Tanks should be the ones who have strong CC. Not damage dealers. How this stat ended up being a light armor stat is beyond me. Just throw it on heavy and balance the base duration of the CC abilities after this. This isn't so much a nerf to bows. Its more of a general change that the game should have had from the start.
Increase the energy cost of Frost Shot
We want to keep bows' uniqueness. Nerfing Frost Shot into oblivion would ruin one of the most fun and interesting weapons. By just increasing the energy cost of Frost Shot, we will allow for bow users to still do their crazy dives into bigger groups of enemies. They just won't be able to do it all day like we're seing right now.
Reduce the slow time on Frost Shot
Other slowing weapons are single target. Most of them are even melee. And they are even balanced so that long slows aren't so powerful. Having a 20 second 40% slow that is ranged and hits multiple targets is clearly not balanced.
Rain of Arrows needs some looking into
I'm not sure how to change it without nerfing it into oblivion. But giving a weapon, that has all the tools available that Longbow has, one of the hardest hitting AoE abilities in the game and putting a slow on top of it, doesn't make sense.
Compared to other DPS weapons, longbow ranks top in both mobility, CC and AoE. No other weapon ranks top in so many categories at the same time. Usually, weapons are balanced so they rank top in ONE category and are average in 1 or 2 others. Being top in all categories except single target damage is clearly not balanced. Bows will still be very strong, even if you make all of these changes.
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