melee vs range pure duelist

[DeletedUser]

Somewhat of a newb question for the veterans regarding melee vs range.

At a glance they seem equal, weapon damage that is, until you take into account skills and attributes they are anything but equal: melee means more strength which means more hitpoints in addition to vigor and toughness, whereas range means more aim and shooting, but less hitpoints. This leads me to believe that melee would do better than range in fort battles whereas range would outperform melee in duels, but there's really only 1 way to find out which is to try both, which takes a lot of time, hence of the purpose this post.

Melee and range are both equal in damage modifier (vigor vs shooting), and equal in that dodge is a non attribute for both, but unequal in that rangers have a higher aim whereas melee has better toughness and hitpoints.

My philosophy has always been however, in war as in love, ‘tis better to give than receive.

My question then is, I read on the forums that a duelist can do 5000 damage easily in fort battles if he is specced right, but they did not specify if this was for a melee duelist or range duelist, so to my simple lizard brain it all boils down to 1 question: WHO IS THE BETTER KILLER, that means who deals out more damage, range, or melee?

I am lead to believe that because melee can TAKE more punishment with toughness which should be more appropriately referred to as melee-resistance as the term toughness is inappropriately indicative of all around toughness which is not the case, and most importantly a melee specialist has higher hitpoints, therefore game balance would dictate that the hitpoint inferior range duelist would have to be able to DISH OUT more punishment to compensate.

In other words, a melee specialist is the better SURVIVOR whereas the range specialist is the better PUNISHER.

Is this correct? If not please clarify.


Further, it is my inexperienced observation that appearance and tactics are more relevant for fort fighting but not quite a decisive factor for duelling. Correct?

As a side note, it seems that at the elite levels of game play, those who do not spend gold nuggets would not be able to compete with those who do. True?

Thanks

 

[DeletedUser]

I won't go answering things that will probably change in the next update. But this one I will:

As a side note, it seems that at the elite levels of game play, those who do not spend gold nuggets would not be able to compete with those who do. True?

Generally, that is not true. It is true only on two worlds (w13 and w14) but new players will hardly choose to play on those two worlds since the latest world is w15 (where skillbuying premium is disabled).
More on the matter, the game is not really about nuggets. Even without nuggets you may still be one of the best in your role. Without nuggets the only thing you'll desperately lack of is versatility, so you won't be able to respec on every update just to solve a new quest and then respec back to duelist, fortfighter, builder or whatever your prime role is. But then again, who says you should play only one world and switch roles on only one character?

 

[DeletedUser]

One questions: what are hitpoints? The only thing I can think of is health points and I am not sure that is what you mean.
You are a bit confused there between duels and battles. Duels use the following skills: aim, dodge, vigor/shooting, reflex, toughness, appearance and tactics. Reflex and toughness are your resistance. Resistance minimizes the damage taken (with high resistance you lose a lot less health points per shot taken). Vigor/shooting increase the damage you make (vigor for melee and shooting for firearms). Appearance is only used in duel attacks and tactics is only used in duel defenses. My advice is to either go for a resistance build, or a high aim/dodge appearance/tactics build. I also believe it is a lot easier to build a melee resistance dueler, than a ranged resistance dueler. So in my book the choice is between melee resistance and ranged dodger. Both builds are pretty tough and both can be pretty effective in battles.
In battles, the following skills are used: leadership, stamina/hiding, aim and dodging (stamina in battle attacks and hiding in battle defenses). A melee resistance dueler could be really effective in battle attacks (high health, high stamina). A ranged dodger dueler is decent in battles as well, specially if 1/4 of the attribute points are assigned to charisma (the rest to dexterity), giving the dueler the needed leadership for a decent chance to dodge and chance to hit.
The dueler class does nice damage in battles due to a certain bonus the class has. The dueler is able to make a critical shot, which is: basic gun damage + 10% of the total health points of the player shot. The critical does not depend on duel build or battle skills. Is all about luck in the battle. So both builds have equal chances to do high damage in battles. The fact that melee has the health to survive longer, thus to make more shots, might give melee the edge. I have a ranged dodger and I am very proud of it, both in duels and battles.

 

[DeletedUser]

Premium vs. non-premium also has a bigger effect on battles than dueling. You can still do well in battles without premium, and some do very well, but the effect on character fort bonuses is huge. With dueling, I think premium only really affects performance with soldiers (esp. melee soldiers) being able to duel more before having to sleep, before level 70 when everyone can use golden weapons anyway, and defensive dueling for soldiers (esp. high charisma soldiers).