Replies to my Stun article

Going to consolidate some thread links for you for replies to my Stun article.

VN Boards WoW General Board post
WoW.com Azgalor Realm Forum
WoW.com PvP Discussion Forum post

And here is by far the best reply out of all the boards... from VN WoW general board... owning up Rogue whiners.

"If I understand the argument correctly, a Rogue "needs" all those stuns in order to kill "some" classes. I hear a Warrior can "own" a Rogue with Overpower if a Rogue so much as THINKS about using his Evasion skill. I hear that, due to armor and hit points, a Warrior has to be stunned if a Rogue is to have a chance.

With Frost Nova, Blink, Polymorph and Mana Shield, a Rogue needs stuns to kill a Mage. Maybe I'm getting too simplistic here, but do Rogues want to be able to easily defeat every other class? Or do they want to be "balanced"?

There's a simple mathematical FACT that most PvP freaks seem to forget: for every VICTOR there must be a VANQUISHED. What's the matter? You don't want to take your turn as the vanquished? That's just stupid. You already have a way to pick and choose your battles. You already have a way to escape a bad situation. A Chance at escape is all anyone should ask for, and you have it.

If Blizzard decided to re-work the class to where you LOST much of your stun ability but GAINED in other areas to compensate, would you still play a Rogue? Or is it strictly the "gank factor" you crave? I just wish some developer would get past the "mezz-stun" combat model and make it so every class has a chance to win or escape a fight.

If the Rogue Class didn't exist, then WoW would be pretty close to that and we'd be griping about Polymorph. Unfortunately, I think we're seeing how different it is to balance PvE abilities with PvP abilities. I still don't like to be frozen and unable to respond when I'm playing a game. If that's anyone's idea of fun, then you are made of sturdier stuff than I am." - Rethyl

Giving credit where credit is due... great post. Wish I could claim credit for it!

And it happens... WoW honor data lost

The day after the 1.7 patch and Blizzard is sorry to inform everyone that all honor data for the last 24 hours has been lost.

"There was an issue during the Honor tally process which resulted in incorrect collection of Honor points. While we have addressed the issue so that Honor will properly calculate in the future, we regret to inform you that the PvP Honor data which did not calculate for the last 24 hours since the end of Tuesday’s maintenance cannot be recovered." - Blizzard

Good or bad? Well no one likes losing anything. It is good for me in the fact that a lot of people hit AB hard and heavy gaining A LOT of honor. So now I will not have to gain as much to hopefully compete this week. Unfortunately that 24 hour period is about the only time I will get to log in during prime time bonus experience this week.

We will have to wait and see what Blizzard does about this.

MO2 - Stun

stun (st n)
tr.v. stunned, stun•ning, stuns
1. To daze or render senseless, by or as if by a blow.
2. To overwhelm or daze with a loud noise.
3. To stupefy, as with the emotional impact of an experience; astound.
n.
A blow or shock that stupefies.

Now that is how it is defined in the dictionary. How is it defined by an MMO gamer such as myself? A few words come to mind… gay… lame… retarded… and I probably could think of a lot more.

The essence of stun in any form in any MMO makes me sick to my stomach, but when it is thrown into a MMO’s Player vs. Player (PvP) system it makes me downright mad. Any ability designed to completely prevent you from playing your character is just bullshit. Slow, root, and other movement afflicting skills are great because you still have the option to fight back in some form or another.

It boggles me how any MMO developers building a game that is meant to be FUN can add a game mechanic that allows one player to completely prevent their enemy from fighting back. Where is the skill? There isn’t. Simple fact… if your enemy can’t fight back because you pressed the STUN button and killed them… you DON’T have skill.

Stun has been around since the beginning. Ultima Online had it in the form of paralyze. Everquest had it. Countless MUDs before both of them had it. Dark Ages of Camelot was the first “second generation” MMO to abuse it and every MMO up until now seems to be using it. World of Warcraft is the new flavor that seems to rejoice in letting a select few classes have mind boggling amounts of stun.

WoW being my current game… stuns have become a daily annoyance. Rogues, paladins, warriors, hunters, mages, Tauren, and any engineer have a form of stun. There is diminishing returns built into the system, but a stun is still a stun. The initial stuns last plenty long for a rogue to kill you and a paladins stun lasts long enough for the paladin’s friends to trounce you. Mage, hunter, warrior, and engineer stuns are short and uneventful.

However, they INTERUPT your current action. I can understand this being part of a classes abilities, but giving it to engineers and Taurens as a racial ability? WTF. It’s bad enough the most overplayed classes in WoW, rogues and paladins, spam stuns everywhere on the battlefield, but having engineering slowly become the must have trade skill profession for PvP… blah.

Stun when it is used as an interrupting ability and not a game stopping ability can work. WoW warriors intercept stun is an agreeable use of stun. It lasts for merely a split second and is as described… an intercept. WoW rogue stuns are unbearable and have driven me to log out more than once. Classes get some items that break stuns, but the stuns can be reapplied so quickly that it is worthless. Blizzard needs to realize diminishing returns are not working properly for stuns and fix them the same way they fixed slow effects such as frost shock and frost nova. The fix… after three stuns you become immune to stuns for approximately five minutes.

Stuns plain suck. They were reason for outcry in Dark Ages of Camelot and are creeping into the bullshit category in WoW. Let's hope the next generation gets a clue.

Everquest 2... the SOE effect

What is this SOE effect you ask? Its the pattern that SOE has shown us for their two largest MMO's to date... Star Wars Galaxies (SWG) and Everquest II (EQ2). Basically... release the game and fix it later.

SWG recently underwent major changes to the combat system and Jedi system. These are two essential systems that any Star Wars MMO should have in a final working condition the day of launch. Combat should be something any MMO has figured out at launch.

I have combat system bolded for a reason. Everquest 2 is suffering a similiar fate... behold Everquest 2's Producer Letter. I quote the letter "Many people will be relearning parts of their characters, getting used to new spell lines and working with altered buffs. That's a lot for us to ask, and we realize that. " Essentially EQ2's combat is being overhauled similiar to what happened when SWG's combat system was overhauled. Also in the letter "We understand that changes of this magnitude, even when many of them are positive, can be disconcerting."

Not only does this show that EQ2 was not ready to come out of beta, but it leads to a disturbing trend amongst SOE MMO's. Complete reworking of CORE game systems is what BETA is for. SOE does not get this and have not gotten this. Both SWG and a very limited EQ2 beta were nothing more than PR events to get players excited about the game. A vocal majority from both games beta testers provided in length reasons why the repsective games were not ready for launch. To steal a quote from Tobolds MMORPG Blog "EQ2 has 400,000 paying beta testers, which were subjected to major "disconcerting" changes from day one" - Tobold.

So the SOE effect is in full force again. I wish people would stop giving SOE their money... send a message that SOEunderstands... $$$.

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send a message that SOE understands... $$$.

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I don't want to completely blow this letter aside... there was one good quote in it. "To sum up these changes: In any MMO, people come for the game, and they stay for their friends and the long-term challenges and rewards present in the world. We're not just in the business of providing an interesting, fun, and challenging world to adventure in. We're equally responsible to ensure that we provide a setting in which our game draws people together as best as it can." - Scott

Drawing people together... Massively Multiplayer... go figure.

World of Warcraft Patch 1.7

Update: 8 Jul, 2007 - Removed post. This will be kept as a placeholder for historical value.

Originally, this post contained links to various World of Warcraft patch download websites.