[Autumn]

I'm going to be addressing some issues with Boxer currently that could be improved upon hopefully, the class is super fun to play and has been the ire of balance over the last couple of years, given its more than balanced state I thought this would be a good time to finally propose some ideas to make it less clunky:

The issue with Diagonals:
Often enough you'll run into issues with trying to run a Boxer right now where you have a very apparent dead zone that people can abuse very well, given that a majority of your kit is melee range it majorly breaks your tempo to have your opponent caught in that dead zone, that dead zone being illustrated here:



A lot of people are in full knowledge of this dead zone and will zone the boxer by ironically standing as close as possible to them at the immediate diagonal, the areas marked in red are areas the boxer cannot actually attack you in, Korkenzier can reach the outer area of this dead zone but will not give you any advantage for doing so, but even with that Korkenzier cannot actually target the inner area of this dead zone, so smarter players will abuse that part anyways for assured safety.

With no low momentum skills to abuse by crane hop like Verglas can, and the drawback of breaking your momentum as a boxer to actually move without geist schritt. This can be exceedingly frustrating to face against for any boxer, making it so that Geist Schritt is only ever the most useful when used by anyone with ranged attacks like magic or guns.

I want to suggest that Geist Schritt be changed to a 1-6 Line instead of a 3-6 Line, a little while back Winged Serpent was changed from a 2-8 Line to a 1-6 Line which allowed it to get some new functionality when faced with people hugging its diagonal.

With the existence of skills like Falcon Strike and winged serpent, this seems only fair for Boxers to have now.

Skill Points and skill slots:

Boxer has a LOT of skills at its disposal, but each of them are very costly both FP and SP wise, not only this but all 5 of its passives which may or may not be useful to certain builds do not have an additional rank which makes them cost no skill slots, these skills are:

-Weir Kounen (Stand off is a mirror skill which has an additional rank)
-Kid Gloves (Niche skill, actually has a use outside of horsing around for one specific purpose, titan gale.)

Gotthand, Nachbeben and Muuden both have their own very useful properties so I won't include them.

There is also 79 total skill points to spend in Boxer, many of the skills that are either necessary or majorly beneficial to have seem a lot like SP dumps to a boxer build, basically making destiny boxer the only viable boxer if you're looking to use more than 2 of its offensive skills.

Skills that could probably do with needing only 1 or 3 ranks instead of 3/5:
-Schwarz Sturm, this passive is just not that good if its not maxed out, making it an SP dump as it is essentially a requirement for boxer
-all 3 Geist Schritts
-Nachbeben
-Fighting Pace

Everything else in Boxer probably wouldn't need to be touched if these skills were only 1 rank, given pretty much everything else has a larger benefit for actually ranking it.

I'm thankful for the previous QoL change for Sturm levels depleting when other actions are used, I just thought I might propose some issues myself and other people have with Boxer atm.

[Kyro]

Yes, yes, yes. All of my yes. The diagonals have always been a problem for boxers, forcing them to sacrifice their Schwarz Sturm in order to punch their opponent in the face, making the Geist Schritts able to be resized in a 1-6 line will really fix such problem, and it wouldn't really make sense for them to not have this change especially with winged serpent, falcon strike, flip shot in the game already.

Skill points, a problem which was always thing regarding Boxers. Like Demon Hunters, you will never be able to get all of the skills in the class and force to adjust to the build how you want it to be, making non destiny builds to only have 2-3 offensive skills if they really push it. Making Weir Kounen not cost a skill slot at the price of an additional SP makes sense, considering Stand Off is it's twin in the MG class.

Kid Gloves has never really seen any useful approach except the Titan Gale memes by the ascended players of SL2, so I don't see any problem for it to get the same change.

Now let's talk about the big 3.

The Geist Schritts: Mandatory skills in a boxer's arsenal no matter how you look at it ( except Eins, it's really depending if you're a dodge build or a tank build ), so making them cost 1 SP will really lighten the load on the selection of our skills for the Boxer, and I doubt anyone would even comment about this change.

Then there's Schwarz Sturm: it's pretty much useless unless you spend 5 SP into it, and it's a mandatory innate, I don't see the point in it costing so much so it'd be fair if it's cost would be lowered.

Nachbeben: a pretty good passive but SP heavy, personally I'd say for it to cost 3 SP max and making it to start from 3 and finish at 5 at max rank, I'd assume it'll be pretty fair.

And the last, but not the least, Fighting Pace. An innate which is not that important, but it'd matter for Boxers who want to manage their FP resources for a long fight, and wasting 5 SP to regen 10 FP by ending your turn prematurely instead of attacking is a really high cost. Kenseis have a regen innate which literally gives them 6 FP per turn just because for 3 SP, so I don't see why won't Fighting Pace cost 1 SP considering you need to end your turn with at least 3M to get the 10 FP.

Sorry for the a bit long post, but I'd be really glad if those obvious problems of Boxers would see the light.

[Mr.SmileGod]

There's so much about Boxer that I'd like to see touched up on, definitely. Though, I think two big ones are still the loss of Sturm on using anything other than Boxer skills, and the effectiveness of Geist. Or, rather, how ineffective it is against a lot of bypasses like most of Duelist and its promos.

Personally, I'd like to see either all of Martial Artist be viable to use for the Boxer without losing Sturm, seeing as it's a prerequisite, or anything costing 2M or less not taking your Sturm. Either way, it'd give Boxers a few more options for mobility. That or the original poster's idea for changes to Geist's range.

As for Geist Eins and Zwei, well. I feel like it should be changed somewhat drastically to make it a proper gamble, instead of wasting 3M to watch your enemy go 'haha let me just bypass this real quick'. My suggestion for that? Make using any Geist skill set your evasion to 0 (for reasons I'll explain in a minute), but any damage of that type (basic hit or auto hit) would be ignored and proc the dash. But in the cases of AoEs, it wouldn't actually consume the damage for all in the AoE and cancel the attack, but instead just not hit the Boxer using Geist, similar to how Body of Isesip functions.

The reason for the 0 evasion clause would be to prevent it from being abused by dodgy people, because that'd effectively make auto-hit builds worthless against dodgy boxers 100%. And at the same time, it doesn't completely screw over dodgy Boxers, because it's only while you have the Geist status. You're taking that gamble, that risk, then you're back to normal. Then, of course, things like Poison and Cinders wouldn't proc Geist's damage avoidance, nor remove the status.

Other than that, yeah. I'd definitely like to see some skills be reduced in SP cost. A lot of it just seems bloated.

[Lolzytripd]

I'd also like to see one of the gheists or an additional gheist proc for deployment/summons/runes

[Snake]

Stab me against a cross but I say I prefer boxer having these situational weaknesses. It's not like they can't deal with smart asses going on diagonals. They do have Orkam Drehen and Felsmanege, both that are quite the nice way to punish people who do that, despite the fact they completely break your buildup.

In fact, a good QoL solution for that would be making Felsmanege only consume half of how many stacks you currently have, instead of all. Grandupper is justified to consume everything given its swole effect. Fels? It's more an utility and big brain punishment.

That aside, I got no real beef with anything else. Everything spoken there is true. I don't really like the fact I need to be destiny to fully use a class. Not when we have Duelist ever having this kind of issue. Give ol' punchers a bit more love!

[Autumn]

Stab me against a cross but I say I prefer boxer having these situational weaknesses. It's not like they can't deal with smart asses going on diagonals.

They do have Orkam Drehen and Felsmanege, both that are quite the nice way to punish people who do that, despite the fact they completely break your buildup.

I'm just gonna single out this little paragraph here, everything else with the post is fine, but both of theses statements sort of contradict each other.

The boxer shouldn't have to be punished for someone's throw away movement like Winged Serpent, Falcon Strike, Agile Accel etc. and still have to deal with someone's defensive skills like Snake Dancer/Evasion/Wraithguard etc.

Being forced to spend your sturm to attack someone is punishing enough, if Orkam Drehen didn't cost sturm it might be a different story, but then that would simply add to the amount of required skills a boxer must have to spend on with skill points and skill pool.

[Senna]

OKAY! Senna here.

Some suggestions I saw were too whatthefuckandwhy. SO! I'll take the quotes from the suggestions I'd like to talk about since the others ain't it chief.

I want to suggest that Geist Schritt be changed to a 1-6 Line instead of a 3-6 Line, a little while back Winged Serpent was changed from a 2-8 Line to a 1-6 Line which allowed it to get some new functionality when faced with people hugging its diagonal.

This, I'm a little iffy with. Personally, I'd want this change for my destiny boxer and my Kensei/Boxer but from a balancing stand point, this is a little too strong. We can't really compare it to skills that are only just moving. Giving a dash, that can shut down one complete damage type that targets them, the ability to control where they really want to dash to doesn't seem bad on paper. If we're adding other classes to the mix then it's grossly good. I understand that the three dash space is for balancing so, if we were to go through with that, I'd rather the dashes needed 1 Sturm to use and rewards 2 if guessed right.

Or my personal suggestion: Allow people to use the basic movement command without losing Sturm. since moving shouldn't break form or steam.

NEXT!

Skill Points and skill slots:

Boxer has a LOT of skills at its disposal, but each of them are very costly both FP and SP wise, not only this but all 5 of its passives which may or may not be useful to certain builds do not have an additional rank which makes them cost no skill slots, these skills are:

-Weir Kounen (Stand off is a mirror skill which has an additional rank)
-Kid Gloves (Niche skill, actually has a use outside of horsing around for one specific purpose, titan gale.)

Gotthand, Nachbeben and Muuden both have their own very useful properties so I won't include them.

There is also 79 total skill points to spend in Boxer, many of the skills that are either necessary or majorly beneficial to have seem a lot like SP dumps to a boxer build, basically making destiny boxer the only viable boxer if you're looking to use more than 2 of its offensive skills.

Skills that could probably do with needing only 1 or 3 ranks instead of 3/5:
-Schwarz Sturm, this passive is just not that good if its not maxed out, making it an SP dump as it is essentially a requirement for boxer
-all 3 Geist Schritts
-Nachbeben
-Fighting Pace

This, I'm actually 100% behind. Even with destiny, it still feels like you don't have enough points for this class. This would help boxer in the term of both points and skill management for both destiny and undestiny. In a way, provide more options to use.

[Autumn]

Allowing basic movement without breaking sturm is probably fine as well, but making Geist Schritt cost sturm wouldn't be very wise either, you'll find even when using Geist Schritt most people aren't actually affected by it terribly much, as the way to win vs geist schritt 100% of the time is just to do as you always did, spam x variant of powerful tile based spell/skill like Blood Spike/Scarlet Twister/Explosion/Chaser etc.


Geist Schritt will likely need to be reworked in the future, I just don't want a melee class to have a dead zone that nearly everyone can abuse, it seriously cuts the flow of the class and makes it not very fun.

[Shujin]

I am also a bit iffy about the Dash being 1-6. I like this little weakness, alone for the fact that they can't just dash behind someone and then benefit from on the Ropes so easily while having a defensive layer. It gives Boxers a clear weakness, but I think thats for the better to have for them and make them adjust otherwise. Its not like they can't fight back in that range at all.

I do however think that normal Move should indeed not cost SS levels.

The rest of the topic I can get behind though. Boxer could need some tiny adjustments here and there, its not weak though.

[FatherCrixius]

Bit late to the topic :

I am also a bit iffy about the Dash being 1-6. I like this little weakness, alone for the fact that they can't just dash behind someone and then benefit from on the Ropes so easily while having a defensive layer. It gives Boxers a clear weakness, but I think thats for the better to have for them and make them adjust otherwise. Its not like they can't fight back in that range at all.

Ignoring the fact the geist system is widely ignored in some capacity by most classes, a boxer wouldn't be able to proc On The Ropes on you provided you are at least facing them during a one to two tile geist - Something you are likely to do if your managing to hit trade in that range. You absolutely can make a boxer obsolete with these playstyles, especially so if you are a class - such as firebird - with the ability to direct both your attacks and where you end your attack, giving you a significantly stronger action economy than the boxer, even ignoring schwarz lost.

This, I'm a little iffy with. Personally, I'd want this change for my destiny boxer and my Kensei/Boxer but from a balancing stand point, this is a little too strong. We can't really compare it to skills that are only just moving. Giving a dash, that can shut down one complete damage type that targets them, the ability to control where they really want to dash to doesn't seem bad on paper. If we're adding other classes to the mix then it's grossly good. I understand that the three dash space is for balancing so, if we were to go through with that, I'd rather the dashes needed 1 Sturm to use and rewards 2 if guessed right.

This I agree with. Annoying setups are more than likely to occur that would otherwise shit on even more gimmicky playstyles, Nothing new to boxer, granted, but important to note. First that came to mind would be some form of Boxer VA, Geist behind for that chance DR and on the ropes to proc a cut-throat KD.
That being said though, it doesn't feel justifiable to argue that annoying setups can be made with X is why Y can't have nice things, especially when the crutch of the setup is the infallibility of geists.

The boxer shouldn't have to be punished for someone's throw away movement like Winged Serpent, Falcon Strike, Agile Accel etc. and still have to deal with someone's defensive skills like Snake Dancer/Evasion/Wraithguard etc.

Being forced to spend your sturm to attack someone is punishing enough, if Orkam Drehen didn't cost sturm it might be a different story, but then that would simply add to the amount of required skills a boxer must have to spend on with skill points and skill pool.

This. Class is too easy to pressure, other classes are even able to do it passively, barely affecting their momentum. Making Geists 1-6 in range would alleviate this somewhat, but not to the significant extent people seem to be expecting. You're still forced to expend momentum, Pressure is still there, but you don't lose Schwarz for trying anymore.

Anyway, sorry to necro, And that I have no damn clue how to make the quote thing work, back to Lurk.