PvP compared to MO1

[Skkyner]

What are the most major differences in PvP compared to MO1? I've played the stress test for a few hours and so far I noticed the following:

Combat seems to be slower all around. All weapons seem to have slower swings, or is it just me?

Counter attacks are much slower, this kind of ties in with the previous point. In MO1 it was almost impossible to block counters, at best you'd have to guess by the direction your opponent would go just before swinging. I seem to be able to block much more counters in this game than I did in MO1 and so do my enemies, but we have overhead strikes now so maybe it could work?

Do weapons hit harder? I can't tell which material is which but I'm pretty sure I hit some dude in full tindremic plate (can't tell the material but I assume decent) for 40 with a cuprum 2H sword and my character is far from maxxed out. Attacks being more punishing is an interesting addition tbh.

 

[Aesorn]

It's 100% slower, this is well known between the veteran players though it's actually intentional for better or worse.

There's of course pros and cons to everything, and in MO1 the combat was substantially faster which was great but ping disparity would cause things like a EU player swing hitting a US player before his swing animation even finished on your screen sometimes. SV has mentioned multiple times there is basically some kind of ping normalization system in MO2 which is very noticeable especially the exact moment you unclick your mouse to swing a weapon, you will notice a slight delay.... and this is basically the game / server updating this to the other player before the swing actually happens or something along those lines. In MO1 we had a guildie from EU who would reckt everyone in a 1v1, he's still great in MO2 but actually is beatable and seems mortal now.

So as much as I do miss the faster combat, and even me as a US player would rather get dumpstered sometimes in exchange for this, for one global server like MO has it's probably best overall we have a more fair system that doesn't give as big of a advantage to people closer to the server. Im sure they can make some aspects faster though and not ruin this ping normalization system they have, cause honestly I can actually parry people from EU now consistently but for sure could use improvements if possible in terms of speed in at least some aspects.

 

[Jackdstripper]

With how slowed down melee combat is and the wider blocking cone you’ll see A LOT more parry whores. It’s gonna be much harder to kill people especially in small groups, and fights will last a long time. This will probably push people to very light weapons, and perhaps mages will play a bigger role in finishing.

hybrids will be more common now because healing with a weapon equipped is now super easy. More hybrids will not be a fun time for mages.

If the new system does indeed help with prediction and ping issues I’m ok with the slower combat. However I still don’t think it will fix everything. Only time will tell.

 

[alfie]

Do weapons hit harder? I can't tell which material is which but I'm pretty sure I hit some dude in full tindremic plate (can't tell the material but I assume decent) for 40 with a cuprum 2H sword and my character is far from maxxed out. Attacks being more punishing is an interesting addition tbh.

I would of always said Cuprum 2h's did okay damage even in MO1, but the swing speed is so atrocious as of the weight (which is why they're fairly useless, esp now with the slower swing speed, but better then nothing).

I've felt the opposite to your point though (least for melee), unless you're an absolute giant potato character with big damage bonus (and that's the trade off for speed I guess - good luck getting away if you're isolated, best thing you can do is block). The problem is it's difficult to say at times as a lot of people are using low end gear.

It feels to me if you've got a good set of armour, you really don't take much damage at all from melee and combining this with the current parry system you can mitigate so much melee damage. If you're in trouble, turn and parry & call for a heal, don't run you'll 100% die - coming out of combat mode with anyone near you feels like a guaranteed death sentence due to the speed diff (combat speed movement vs out is way more then MO1).

As of this when outnumbered, it's a lot harder to reset the fight and recover stam, plus at the same time, blocking takes stam (I have no issue with that, not really sure how to balance it).

This makes it a lot more difficult to commit into a fight and focus someone down, and then disengage.

You can literally just walk backwards and parry several people as the moves are very telegraphed and the blocking arc covers your entire body. Though I mean for obvious reasons, it's hard for three people to gangbang you with swords without tripping over each other which is fine.

I think this favours defensive play from larger groups, as you can't really burst/focus people without magic.
Take that with a pinch of salt as still new to it and I'm forever a baddie bad bad.

Plus it also seems really easy to get handle hits with a sword (and similar weapons) compared to anything else.
This makes Spears/Daggers really strong (daggers hurt a lot) - sure they're easy to parry head on, but they don't seem to handle hit at all and when it's a cluster fuck you can get run over as they're spammable & do decent damage.

I don't dislike the new melee system (think it's an improvement overall), but I think it needs a lot more tuning (would like to be able to cancel my attack mid anim, M&B style but doubt we'll get that).


Mages are in a bit of a weird area now.
On one hand the damage feels more potent - getting hit for 70/80's with fulmination doesn't seem right but I suppose that's fat mage life (though imagine if 3 people timing that together, or mages on mounts - super RIP). It's really nice that purify can be used to remove fulmination though and you can cast mage reflect on other people.

Corrupt is still very strong - messes with mages as it did in MO 1 and also good for messing with Archer's aim.

The pure "classic" group mage seems gimped though, but haven't played it enough myself (going off feel of the group) - if someone semi competent gets on top of you (and melees will just sprint at a mage), then you're just food unless you pull out a weapon to parry with (parrying really is a must for everyone).

You just can't run/kite in the old way anymore, unless the person chasing has gimped themselves with their dex.
The counter argument is to use terrain/objects I suppose, but doesn't really play out like that - you quite literally just need to turn and run ahead of time, so seems pointless to roll pure mage over hybrid.

I think a lot of that really comes down to the removal of the double tap jump, as although it was a bit silly (more so as of the desync/rubber banding), it allowed you to get moving again quick without the slow acceleration (I still think being able to do this on a short CD with it consuming a chunk of stam would be okay). This mechanic was pretty critical for general kiting of mages - without it you have no real counter play.

Perhaps they'll bring in utility spells for pushback or similar - who knows. It needs something.
It's really nice now though that you can hit mounts with magic and the extra damage magic does to mobs also applies.


Archery right now feels pretty broken and it's so much easier to aim (imo).

You can make high strength bows that have little to no stam drain (can sprint with them pulled) but do 40's+ consistently against decent armour (talking 80+ odd on nakeds - quite obnoxious really). These kind of bows are stupidly easy/cheap to make compared to the equiv melee weapon. I can't imagine this is working as intended.

And best of all, if you aim for the legs, most people in good gear seem to adopt the tradition of skimping as of weight, on the basis you don't get hit in the legs as much. You can almost stand still and trade hits with melee using a bow (keeping in mind, a melee has to close the gap - that's at least a hit or so before they're in your face). Taking damage should really cancel pulling a bow back.

To be fair, SV have said bows aren't working as intended right now, as you're apparently not supposed to be able to use Longbows on mounts etc so again, will see what happens. Still early days.


I feel the meta is going to turn into group veela veela bow spam with a mix of hybrids.

The Veela clade gifts are really strong for PvP (keeping in mind, it's the race with the highest dex & speed) - jumping same height while in combat mode, capped fall damage (I mean you can jump into the jungle and take 60hp; I'm sure that's going to be nerfed), group speed boost (although CD is 15 mins, but if you've got a group with it, you can manage the CD's) and able to get extra points for bow stuff etc.

Sure you don't hit quite as hard with a bow as veelas don't have as much strength, but it's certainly still enough. Small characters are also slippery oiled little pigs.

Though again, it's early days and game is suffering from half implemented systems.
They need to build the game mechanics out and then balance it once it's all working as intended. Still having a lot of fun with it atm.