Fort Battle Class Adjustment

My dueler will miss his dominance, but I love it. It will undoubtedly make damage more balanced for all classes and will help counter the increasing hp among fort fighters. I personally lean towards 10%, because non-premium duelers' average damage per hit generally isn't much higher than a non-dueler with the same gun, but I guess when you have 140 people with a 10% chance in a large attack it might be a bit much.

I like the new dueler bonus as well. The only problem is that it could take people out of the battle when their hp gets too low, but it wouldn't exactly be unrealistic if losing 95% of your health reduced your fighting strength. I'm afraid it might encourage hiding a little bit more, but the relatively short range still makes you fairly safe on the back of a tower.

It would also still be an extra crit bonus for duelers. My dueler would love to be able to focus on bringing down the mammoths instead of shooting at the gazelle that's closer. It could also be used strategically to weaken the high-hp adventurers hiding in back in anticipation of a flag rush.

I love it

Right now there is no downside for pure fort fighters to go almost pure health once they reach level 120. Sure, it'll stop them doing quests, but anyone who knows about fort fighting will know that currently health is king.

All other fort fighting skill benefits drop dramatically as the skill gets higher, to the point that anything above 32-56 points is almost a waste. Health and hitpoints remain linear however.

This results in some worlds (w11 that I know, and w15 is heading that way, I don't play other worlds) from being a rush to get more health between alliances. It's an escalating cold-war type conflict. This may seem good (fort fighters sacrifice jobs/quests to be most effective), but it leaves the world in a very delicate balance. If either side gains a serious health advantage then they will dominate in battles.

It also raises the bar very high for new players who are interested in fort battles, they are told "health, health, health" which is probably not an area that they're interested in whilst they're still levelling.

Another side effect of the current system is that dueller class players dominate the top of the damage tables, and hence receive a disproportionate amount of the larger boxes from fort battles. Already w11 is seeing duellers dominate "damage done", even before they get to level 120 - purely due to the critical hits.

This proposed idea both addresses health (as being super-healthy just means taking bigger critical hits), and also provides a fairer playing field for all classes to be able to shine in the "damage done" stats (which give juicy box rewards). It also gives duellers a new and very useful bonus in compensation (able to pick off the weak and avoid annoying tanks).

The only issue is that crits for everyone will mean a definite shift in battle damage, with everyone taking more damage, and faster damage. There may need to be some game balance done in battles to compensate for this.

I love this idea, and I think it will be highly beneficial for the game and for fort fights.

-- Pete.

NB: And yes, I see how this can hurt advents trying to lurk for a rush - or even shooting them once they're on the flag, getting over potential blockers - and I'm an advent with a TON of health. If this changes in this way then it will seriously affect my personal gameplay for the worse in fort battles, but it's a huge benefit for the game as a whole.

This doesn't really stop health from being the dominant factor in battles and basically just adds the current advantage of the the dueler to the other classes. There are some more duelers that fort fight, but the majority of fighters are still soldiers. The selective targeting is an interesting idea, but it would be better if fort fights were overhauled than patched. I am firmly on the fence on this one, mainly because it's a big unknown how this will affect fort fighting.....I do hope it will be positive, though.....

I believe this helps put a stop to health as being dominant for the fact that this won't allow a player to take 30-40 hits in a single battle. There is a reasonably high percent that a player with 10,000 HP will be hit by a critical at least 2-3 times, which can take as much as 4,000 health points away in one round.

At the same time, this also allows lower level players to be effective in a battle. After-all the great part about battles is it allows ALL players to participate, regardless of level, class, and/or skills.

I am not being bull headed on the subject though, as I do agree maybe there is a better route to take. If I can spark an idea from anyone that is better than this, then I have accomplished more than I could hope for.

An over-haul would require so much change to the game that could be very hurtful to all parties involved. I agree something major needs to change, but it needs to be done slowly. Too many players, too much money, and too much on the line for something major to be pushed through.

I feel as if this could be easily (in context to many other ideas suggested) that could prove to be very effective. I believe this is an idea that could be tested at a reasonable cost to inno games.

Firstly I should say that I like that someone's trying to think of a new idea to try and help balance out fort fights, and I'm all for that.

However I'm not sure this, at least in it's current form, is the solution.
I DO like the idea of the Duelers being able to have a 'player aim' type function, I've never played as a Dueler either so it's not just me being biased, it just sounds like a good idea for a Class that's supposed to have good 'aim' type characteristics.

I don't think giving some form of 'Critical Hit' bonus to all Classes will help reduce the rush to high HP though.
One big reason for this is that you'd then be giving Critical bonus to Soldiers, so they'd been an even more popular Class as you'd be able to have high HP as well as critical bonus, and more high hits from all players in a battle will translate into people's minds as "I'd better get more HP so I can survive all the critical hits from everybody".

FilthyPete has a point when he says Duelers often top the 'damage done' stats and thus get good rewards for it. However that in itself is a symptom of Soldiers rushing to high Health. The more every alliance rushes to get more health the higher the Criticals that the Duelers are getting, and the more targets they have that will actually provide a high-scoring Critical hit. So who's to blame for Duelers getting more boxes and XP and damage etc? Is it the game, or is it really the fault of all the Soldiers for having so much health that they actually enable the Duelers? It's like all Duelers are alcoholics, and all Soldiers come to the battle with a 6-pack and a case of vodka, you're enabling them!

So we need to find a way of making lower Health an 'advantage', as opposed to capping Health, or giving Soldiers even more battle bonus abilities. And as also pointed out here by FilthyPete the current situation also goes against newer and lower-level players getting into fort battles.
So why not just make a simple change whereby Small Forts and Medium Forts have a maximum Health allowable for people to be able to get into the battle. For example (and this is just a random example!) you could have Small Forts with a Max Allowable HP set at 2500HP and Medium Forts with a Max Allowable HP set at 5000HP. This would mean that it wouldn't be an advantage to simply follow the "head for the health" approach, it would also give lower level players a chance to get involved in more battles, and would probably help stop the mad rush towards everyone being a Soldier.
However: I know people will say "oh but that's unfair that I have more HP so I can't go to that battle" So to stop this from being a complete restriction on who can enter a battle you could also consider allowing anyone with any Health level to enter the battle, but then treat them as a 2500HP player in a Small etc. So they have 9K HP but they enter a Small so they play the battle with 2500HP, and whatever % of 2500 they lose they'll lose that % of their 9K once out of the battle. so dead in battle still means dead in the game afterwards. but 2000HP lost in battle would mean 7200HP lost in the game afterwards, i.e. 80% of HP. It would mean that all the extra AP/SP that had been put into Health would be a waste, and may encourage them to not bother with extra Health and use the AP/SP for proper Skills.

I do really like the Dueler 'player aim' idea though

You know what,i like the way the game is - You decide what to do,you decide what to skill,you decide who you are and so... except one thing - there is a restriction for deciding what you want to be in the game
Here is my idea:
Instead of brainstorming, what new bonus has to have any class and how to make the game more unbalanced,like in real wife you should be able to decide what to be, at any moment. You want to be A builder go ahead,build.When you finish with that, you change your mind to "Hey i want to be a Soldier i would love to fort fight" - go, be a soldier; "Hey you know what, i want to roam the land" - You got it,be an adventurer; "Wanna duel?" - Duel then!
Like the chance we have, to reorder our skills at any time in the game - why don`t have the same chance to decide what to be in the world whenever we want to?
If you want to balance that,good make able to decide every 20 levels or 10 levels (like when you get the achievements for reaching that level - those can give you a reward to chose another class if you want). This means that class quests will be able for everyone - So?Game will get a bit more interesting,if you ask me

This may cause fort`s disbalance - easy thing to clear,make No ADV`,Dueler`,Solder`,Worker`s towers and instead of that just normal towers with a bit higher than ATM bonus they have...

Good point.

See... I'll say no when it tranforms into poll.

This idea is basically saying - give crits to soldier class as they don't have enough bonuses.
Forgive me, but adding anything more to soldier class instead of nerfing it is not just rediculous, but also tragic.

1 star = terrible idea

I don't believe being capable of changing classes will help solve the issue. The problem right now is very simple, health is too important and duelers have an unfair advantage. I'm not complaining whatsoever, as I know we have the choice to pick a dueler.

Let me relate this issue to a real life example. We don't have a choice in real life to be the hard laborer on a factory line, the manager, the research team, or the CEO. If we were all given this chance with a simple click of a mouse, wouldn't we all certaintly pick the CEO as he/she gets paid millions compared to the rest? This is a very broad example, and I don't need a lecture about furthering education and such lol.

My point is this, we are playing a browser game that allows the makers to balance a game. We shouldn't have to pick a certain class in order to do the highest damage in order to get boxes and top the charts on westforts. If we all picked duelers, then what's the point of picking a class at all? That surely is not a solution.

Currently, this is how the typical fort battle goes between classes. Soldiers get the most dodges and most hits taken, advents get the most flag grabs and hold the longest blocks, workers get the highest ratio of landed to missed shots and the highest ratio of dodged to hits taken, while the duelers get the top damage and top average damage done (regardless of weapon).

I believe the above suggested idea will clear what the duelers current dominating class does in a battle. It then replaces the dueler with the most KO's in battles, which is a very powerful tool. But then this opens the window for ALL players to have a chance at the highest damage, highest average damage done, and a better split of boxes.

Fort battles are fun because they allow all kinds of players to come together to fight alongside each other regardless of level or class. We shouldn't be forced to pick one class if we want to have the highest damage.

At Joxer: This gives crits to all players.

I'm ok with this. Duelers with 400 shooting, which doesn't give any bonus in forts, make more damage than me, a soldier pure fort fighter with golden gun and 9000 hp. They get the steel lined box and 1500 exp every battle. Listening to Joxer you would think me, soldier with the most overpowered class in this game, would also get something, but i didnt get even a wooden box in 30 battles.
PS Joxer if all classes will have 5% or 10% crits there wont be nearly as many pure hp soldiers. There wont be any point to have more than 5000 hp probably.

It would certainly kill the pure hp build. As well as change the whole way fort battles are played.
I still think 10% is too much. 5% is more like it, even with prem.
Sniping with low hp would be pretty hard, since the dueler would always be picking of the low hp snipers in the back.

Im not sure about this. It would make the Soldier class what the Adventurer class is today, and the Dueler class the new O.P class.

Think ill follow the thread before a while longer before I make up my mind.

Another idea would be to change the way crits work. Duelers will deal double damage with crits instead of 10% of max hp. This way we wont have lvl 60 duelers that deal more dmg than a 120lvl worker/advent/soldier.
With the current system a lvl 10 dueler can deal 1000+ dmg with a single shot. Thats messed up you have to admit it.

Before everyone starts to blame the devs for this, maybe you should go back and think why crit hits where given to duellist class in the 1st place. If it wasn't for players creating 10k HP premium soldiers to dominate fort battles than crits weren't needed to balance this out.

I say NO to this idea, everyone has the chance to pick duellist as char class on a new world, and still most players on w15 picked soldiers class, so they shouldn't whine about getting crit.

And for old worlds I am just going to say what I saw many players write about this game: TOUGH LUCK.

-Night Rider- said:

Another idea would be to change the way crits work. Duelers will deal double damage with crits instead of 10% of max hp. This way we wont have lvl 60 duelers that deal more dmg than a 120lvl worker/advent/soldier.
With the current system a lvl 10 dueler can deal 1000+ dmg with a single shot. Thats messed up you have to admit it.

Click to expand...

Juh, ditto that.

If this passes through, any player can do 10% of a tanks hp. Wanna be critted 1k by a Greenhorn?
Worse, a lvl 10 prem dueler can therefor be sitting in the back, doing 1000 dmg on the lvl 120 tanks 2 sectors away.

Im more for what you said. Double damage. Thats still up to 800 dmg with a GG.

Kraky no one blamed anyone what are you dreaming. We are discussing about a balance.
Why should all steel boxes go to duelers?
Why should lvl 10 duelers deal 1200 dmg with a single shot?
Why should a lvl 60 dueler deal more total dmg than a 120lvl of another class?

People seem to be missing the point which myself and Kraaky have both made: Criticals are the only way currently to combat high/pure HP build Soldiers.
I can't see how 'more' Crits from all players will convince soldiers to have 'less' health since the current way to combat Duelers has been to stick the High HP guys in their LOS with the snipers etc protected behind - so you'd just get even higher tanks at the front wouldn't you?!

Also where people are talking about the "player aim" function and how it would ruin low-health-sniping I think you're also missing part of the point, which is: You'd still need to have LOS on whoever you aim at!! You couldn't just pick any person in the battle, you still have to have LOS on them, but instead of hitting a 'random' person in a sector you could specify a 'particular' person in that sector that you have LOS on - if someone is standing behind someone else in a direct line then you don't have LOS on the 2nd guy, no LOS means you can't "player aim" him - or at least that's how I'd have it working

Do people read at all before they post? First of all, the rule EXCLUDES greenhorns.

With a 5-10% chance of landing a critical I don't think there will be duelers landing 1k hits on tanks hiding in the back. Why would a tank be hiding in back in the first place?

Kraaky, there's noway you read anything but the first post. I said time and time again that nobody is complaining at all. Simply trying to make things more balanced.

Firefly, why would players focus less on health points is your question, correct?

If a player beefs up to 10k and then jumps in front of 50-100 players, there is a pretty good chance that tank will be KO'd that round under this new rule. If you beef up to 10k, you will only take larger critical shots. Therefore I believe players will be more focused on the other skills involved in fort battling. Such as leadership will become important again, as people will want to be bumped less. Also leadership helps aiming and dodging, therefore I believe we will see much higher leadership values, dodging values, and aiming values. Yes I know the skills mean very little right now, but I still don't see people beefing up with the new crits.

Firefly Assassin said:

People seem to be missing the point which myself and Kraaky have both made: Criticals are the only way currently to combat high/pure HP build Soldiers.

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The whole rule adjustment takes that very point, and makes it stronger. If more players land criticals, then why would players keep beefing up? Why should only one class be able to combat HP build soldiers? And why is this only about soldiers? Look at world 11, there are advents, duelers, soldiers, and workers alike that have 6-7k HP. There's 4-5 advents that have over 7k. What are the chances of a dueler landing a critical on that player before they go invis? Wouldn't the chances be much higher if everyone had the same ability? You don't think the advantages would be balanced among the classes? Duelers will have more KO's as they can pick players off, soldiers with more hits taken, advents with more blocks and flag grabs, workers with better ratio's.

JoxerTM said:

This idea is basically saying - give crits to soldier class as they don't have enough bonuses.
Forgive me, but adding anything more to soldier class instead of nerfing it is not just rediculous, but also tragic.

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You don't think that having every single hit to be a potential crit isn't a massive nerf to soldiers' health?

Any soldier tanking up will find that they survive MUCH less time than they currently do.

-- Pete.

-Night Rider- said:

Another idea would be to change the way crits work. Duelers will deal double damage with crits instead of 10% of max hp. This way we wont have lvl 60 duelers that deal more dmg than a 120lvl worker/advent/soldier.
With the current system a lvl 10 dueler can deal 1000+ dmg with a single shot. Thats messed up you have to admit it.

Click to expand...

This isn't about nerfing duellers (far from it, it's about giving them a new cool bonus), this is about nerfing health - at the moment health is overpowered in fort battles compared to all other fort skills.

"double damage" wouldn't do that.

This is a complicated suggestion, it's a great idea, but I'm just concerned that people will vote against it because they don't like some aspect of it - despite all the parts are needed for it to work as a whole.

The aims of this suggestion are to reduce the advantages of people going health in fort battles (which causes a number of issues raised in my first reply), and then mitigating that to ensure that duellers don't feel nerfed once everyone can deal crits.

-- Pete.