[Autumn]

Well, after some extensive testing, between myself and quite a few others, the fix for basic attacks that removed their power from the actual basic attack formula really brutalized a lot of builds, most people ended up losing anywhere from 20-60 damage, depending on if that attack was a critical hit or not, which is pretty significant in the end of things.

But more importantly, multi-hit guns lost pretty much all of their damage, a quickdraw with 10 power lost just about 70 damage before critical damage multiplied it, this fix heavily impacted guns the most here.

Right now there's not much reason to run basic attacks, autohits will do more than a non-crit and not have to make a hit check, granted they cost FP but so do some basic attack procs, and a lot of hit/crit builds are suffering to people who build full tank and autohit, when they had a fair chance before.

I fully believe before the fix to basic attacks, that tank vs dodge was more or less fairly balanced, you could get away with either or, even if being tanky meant you served a bit more purpose in a team fight.


So, I've come up to the following conclusion, I think implementing the basic attack formula from before as a proper feature would be very ideal to basic attack vs autohit balance balance.

[Fern]

Many people in the OOC have commented on how they would stop playing their gunner, and have actually followed their word after checking the numbers.

But gunners aren't the main concern here, it's the basic attack formula. I agree with Spoops' post entirely. Basic attacks aren't as attractive anymore because they lack the same impact autohits do.

The most simple fix for now is possibly reverting the formula, as it was mentioned just now. Despite how unintentional it was at first, it actually made things better in general. Many people (even the autohit players) thought it was better off that way, and some even believed it was intentional with how well it worked.

There might or might not be a better solution out there, but for now this seems like the fastest and easiest one.

[GSM]

I personally think that basic attacks before worked wonderfully even with the risk of being evaded. Autohits could do less damage and couldn't crit, but they were certain. Basic attacks, in my eyes, were risk vs reward, dodge vs critting.

Now, the waters are muddied for me, since anyone can slap on autohits and outperform anyone using basic attacks with just one less attack, and slap on defense or crit evade or dodge as an added middle finger to all of the basic attackers, in place of Luck and Skill. Not to mention my 9 shot dual Quickdraw Magic Gunner/Evoker lost a total of 120 or so damage against someone with 9 defense pre- and post-fix.

I believe that the solution, like Spo and Fern mentioned, is to revert back to how it worked before. It's more fair to the basic attackers, in my opinion.

[Neus]

I'm pretty sure the bug in the damage calc also applied to autohits. I also strongly disagree that getting a free 2x on your weapon's power is a good thing in any sense.

[Snake]

They're right. The bug fix did an insane damage to the game balance, the basic hit damage formula dropped significantly. In a rough comparison, It's doing like 100% SWA before being reduced by enemy DEF, making it range from 100% to 50%, while autohits do over 120%-140% nowadays for a minimal FP cost and ability to be spammed endlessly.

Basic hits require a lot of investment to work (you need STR/SKI/LUC/GUI to hit and damage people) and sometimes your SWA ends around 80-90 due to how you need to spread your stats, while auto-hits just require you to build your SWA beyond 150 and the rest of your free stats going to DEF/RES/VIT, and then with this you can out-damage anything while still being tanky as fuck.

Void Assassins, with those changes, lost around 70-90 damage on critical hits, they're no longer 'Assassins', just a bunch of, I don't even know... Maybe 'Back Massage Fanatics'? It was a grand downfall to whichever respect they had for investing all of their status in pure damage. Why build CEL to dodge if you can just be a tank and shrug off anything thrown at you? You don't even need CEL, or even DEF anymore, when fighting people that use basic hits.

It will be less work to just revert the changes to basic attacks, yeah. Much better than re-balancing all autohits in existence to do less than 100% damage.

That bug? That was really a feature.

[Snake]

Actually no, it didn't affect auto-hits as far as I know. I remember using Player Debug and it showing my weapon power as it was supposed to be, a lot of times.

Are you 'sure' what you did also influenced auto-hits? Then why only basic hits are doing LESS damage, and auto-hits are still strong and mighty? I can't explain this, but it's not okay at all.

[Neus]

Autohits also require skill point investment and cost FP, and I've said before that I would like to add an accuracy check to some of them, and/or some kind of weapon durability cost.

Readding something that ranged from minimally impactful for some weapons to insanely busted for others is not the way to go.

[Snake]

Then by all means, something needs to be done to auto-hits so they don't become the easy go-to for everyone, and other classes that fully bet on basic hits end up super obsolete. Just remember that guns, bows and daggers are the ones which suffered the most.

[Grandpa]

I think durability would be an awful idea, personally. Because then you just put the (very easy to get now) divine enchant on all of your things and you're done.

Autohits need taken down a peg, for sure. Why don't we just try lowering their damage to below basic attack damage? Yes, you have to invest FP, yes you have to invest a skill slot. But it's an autohit. It hits automatically. It makes over-investing into a stat completely pointless, and while you can argue it makes investing into defense a complete win, I think it balances out. There's stuff like hanging, or the obvious magic counter, or arbalest and everything else to deal with it.

My thoughts are: Autohits should either do less damage than a basic attack (excluding the ones that have hit chances) or they all need some kind of hit chance or a permanent type of evasion placed globally on all characters to punish people that don't invest into hit chance. (And makes cel not pointless to invest into.)

[Ryuzaki]

Both of my characters have suffered greatly for this and one of them for all intents and purposes can run autos without any problem.

I lost a good 60-80 damage on a 110 SWA weapon for basics, but can still churn out almost 200 dam on an Autohit, this is clearly the furthest thing from balance I can possibly imagine. My Basics are lucky to do 60-70 dam on a level 60 player, and I have seen them go as low as 30 on a Geldoren that literally shreds defense on a hit. That's on a character who has 64 STR and can raise it higher.

As for my Basic hit reliant Kensei/DH, who was specifically designed for PvE. I can't even play him right now because of the shit-sorry state of basic hits. Their damage is so god damn low that even against NPCs, with a 115 SWA Raijin and its potential unlocked, he gets laughed at by mobs. And I mean you might as well literally have the NPCs inside BDPs physically laugh at him for his scaled damage. Yet, when I use an AH on him (Swift Crystal Rose for instance) I can stack up to 200 dam against most mobs if I lightning crit.

How is this fair or remotely balanced when something that is nigh guaranteed to hit (Save for the likes of BoI and Cobra stopping it) doing vastly more damage than something that comes with the risk of missing and wasting MP, or being countered by the likes of Sheathe Sword/Quickdraw. I've seen a Gunner who's QD/MLM build actively countered mine become so laughable in damage that I can literally outheal the damage they do as an Onigan Destined MA.

AH/s don't need a fix/nerf, they're meant to be automatic. But Basics need their hit back or at least significantly boosted. Losing more than half your damage on an all basic hit character makes them unplayable.