Enchanter is broken and overpowered on P99

[cd288]

“Hey so remember that other thread I posted complaining about classic things? Well nobody did anything when I cried and demanded it so I’m gonna try it again by making another thread”

[Castle2.0]

You think enchanters are OP levels 1-12?

I solo'd PoD on my 50 Enchanter. I agree, Enchanters are too OP levels 1-12.

*greedily rubs his hands together hoping levels 1-12 (when ENC is weakest) get harder and there is less competition at the top*

[Ivory]

You think their summoned pets is OP?.... oh boyy....just wait until you find out about their charm spells [You must be logged in to view images. Log in or Register.]

[cubiczar]

This is one of the most tired subjects on this forum. If you have classic evidence for how things were in 1999 then put them in the bugs forum. That includes things that are nerfs to other classes like the fs dagger issue, or nerfs to enchanters like Tash being resistable early on, or channeling being too good (which like someone else mentioned makes other classes better as well). But whatever it is bring your evidence (not your feels) and put them in the bug forums so maybe something will get changed rather than just starting yet another thread here.

None of the classes are balanced with each other, this isn't WoW so if you want class balance you are in the wrong place.

[azxten]

So I did some testing of my main hypothesis, that Enchanter is OP because channeling isn't working right.

On a level 1 Druid with 0 channeling skill I was interrupted every cast. No chance to channel. I then went and put 1 point into channeling.

Out of 30 channeling skill checks, 9 were interrupts, and 21 were successful.

Just some starting data and final channeling skill was 9. Level 1 channeling is ~70% successful? Seems a bit off, I'll do more testing.

Also something interesting I noticed which may just be random given the small data sample is that if I was fighting on a hill where pushback seemed to move me further as I slid down the hill my interrupt rate was higher than if I positioned myself to be pushed uphill. To avoid this I threw out a couple samples and only took data from flat terrain. Data gathered may need to be while positioned in a corner to minimize push interruption vs hit interrupt chance.

http://www.angelfire.com/nt/com1/playg.html

Lots of player comments that dexterity impacts chance to regain concentration. This link seems to support that as it was an official document.

"Dexterity:
This is your hand/eye coordination and is used in combat accuracy and spell casting capability. This is used in calculating your missile combat skills and aids in determining if you are interrupted when you are hit while casting a spell. "

[azxten]

Looking at EQEmu code at least dex is not part of the calculation at first glance, not sure on ChannelChanceSpells potentially having a stat component but doesn't seem like it.

https://github.com/EQEmu/Server/blob...one/spells.cpp

I find this interesting:

// modify the chance based on how many times they were hit
// but cap it so it's not that large a factor
if(attacked_count > 15) attacked_count = 15;

channelchance -= attacked_count * 2;

No hits past 15 during your spell cast will impact your interrupt chance.

// max 93% chance at 252 skill
channelchance = 30 + GetSkill(EQ::skills::SkillChanneling) / 400.0f * 100;

Magic numbers? This seems to suggest that you get 30% chance to channel at 1 skill which scales to 93% chance at 252 skill. If that is how P99 works I'm pretty sure there was no guaranteed 30% success rate simply for having the skill in live.

//avoid the square root...
distance_moved = d_x * d_x + d_y * d_y;
// if you moved 1 unit, that's 25% off your chance to regain.
// if you moved 2, you lose 100% off your chance
distancemod = distance_moved * 25;
channelchance -= distancemod;

I made a hotkey to get a loc before/after casting when taking a hit. Generally a hit seems to move your character about .01-.04 on the X/Y coordinate. If the distance calculation for interrupts is based on a full X/Y value movement I'm pretty sure this means it would be doing a calculation that has the least impact compared to skill level and number of times hit.

This means at 1 channeling skill you have a 30% chance to cast, if you're hit 1 time it removes 2% chance up to being hit 15 times which removes 30% chance. The distance moved calculation is mostly irrelevant for individual fights but can be significant if you're being hit 10+ times during your cast (10 hits *.06 aggregate movement per hit = .60*25 = 15% reduction).

EQEmu randoms a number up to 100 and if it's higher than your channel chance you fail to channel.

Biggest chance to channel is the built in 30%, then up to another 63% from skill. Biggest loss is being hit itself as each hit guarantees 2% loss to chance up to a max of 15 hits, and then movement which can be countered by walking into damage or using game geometry to minimize movement.

After looking at all of this I suspect that 30% built in bonus is what isn't classic and makes things too successful compared to classic at lower levels. You only get hit 1-2 times for a 2-4% chance reduction and very minimal push movement.

Why isn't dex accounted for?

Why did my testing on P99 show a ~70% success rate for channeling at level 1 when EQEmu code seems to support a 30% chance at such low skill?

[Tethler]

Just move the clarity spell line from enchanter to wizard. Things will work themselves out.

[azxten]

Additional testing of push modification of X/Y coord reveals some interesting things based on terrain geometry. It is possible to create optimal angles between yourself and the pushing mob in relation to the X/Y grid that can minimize the amount of push even eliminating it entirely in one of the two axes.

Who would have thought that your position in relation to the mob and the X/Y grid can add or remove multiple percentage points of channeling chance?

[cd288]

Did you really just do all this testing but offer zero evidence that’s things were different during classic? Lol

Like yeah, cool you gathered some data for yourself. But that data just proves that X is X currently...not that X was actually Y 20 years ago

[azxten]

Originally Posted by cd288 [You must be logged in to view images. Log in or Register.]

Did you really just do all this testing but offer zero evidence that’s things were different during classic? Lol

Like yeah, cool you gathered some data for yourself. But that data just proves that X is X currently...not that X was actually Y 20 years ago

Calm down buddy.

So with further testing I can say that video lag results in more player push. Given the code that EQEmu uses this would result in significantly higher interrupt chance.

Talking a change from 2% chance reduction if you get hit once to 200% chance reduction if you get hit once and a change in moving X/Y axis from .02 to .2.

My new theory is that in EQ live players experienced video lag and lower performance and the EQ client actually moves your player model more if it is lagging when you get hit.

You can test this by taking a /loc before and after being hit and then do the same when alt tabbed to induce some video processing delay (on most systems).

Thus the final conclusion is that similar to Bard AE kiting getting nerfed channeling chance should be about 10x less likely on P99 due to the types of computers people played on back in 1999.