Backstab Overpowered?!

[Jurdex]

A battle scarred mercenary rises to his feet.

< 146h/146H 139p/139P 106v/115V >
< E: mercenary EC: few wounds> gsa stand jas
Out of nowhere, a battle scarred mercenary stabs you in the back, RIP...
With a final blow, you feel yourself falling to the ground.
Your soul leaves your body in the cold sleep of death...
You feel less wooden.
Your magic armor fades away.

*** Welcome to Sojourn ***

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1) Enter the realms of Sojourn.
2) See who is currently playing.
3) Read the background story.
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Make your choice: Wrong option.


146 hps to death?

Hit rathipon from full health (91) to 0 a couple times on normal hits..

Isn't this quite a bit?

Jurdex

[Valeos/Dorac]

heh i was kileld twice today by circles from battle mercs 112 hps to dead instantly...the second time pissed me off more cuz i was invis at the time hehe.

[Corth]

this makes a great case in point as to how much more difficult the mud is for newbies than on soj 2.

I only played the first two weeks of soj 2. My group of 7-8 friends were killing these same battle mercs after 2 nights. On soj 3, after a week, they can only be killed with great difficulty.

Corth

[izarek]

Er, I think you'd find that most ppl wouldn't get back up from an unseen dagger attack to the back. No sympathy there. I will however, have to agree with valeos on the invis one. Even if a mob can d.i., i'd say the invis would interfere enough to prevent an uber easy attack (i.e. backstab). Just my 2 cents, tho.

Izzy

[Sarvis]

<BLOCKQUOTE><font size="1" face="Verdana, Arial">quote:</font><HR><font face="Verdana, Arial" size="2">Originally posted by izarek:
<B>Er, I think you'd find that most ppl wouldn't get back up from an unseen dagger attack to the back. No sympathy there. I will however, have to agree with valeos on the invis one. Even if a mob can d.i., i'd say the invis would interfere enough to prevent an uber easy attack (i.e. backstab). Just my 2 cents, tho.

Izzy</B></font><HR></BLOCKQUOTE>

Most people also can't stand back up after being enshrouded in blood from someone elses sword blow. But we just keep on fighting when after things like that on sojourn. Not to mention walking back to our own corpses... heh

Sarvis

[Elseenas]

From a rogues perspective: my experience with backstab so far has been that it is not overpowered.

I have also noticed that mobs tend to be much better at these things than I am at an equivilent level.

Keep in mind we do much more damage than we could ever take and mobs have many more hit points than we can generally conceive. Whats overpowered for a mob is not necessarily overpowered for a character.

------------------

Elseenas of No House Worth Mentioning

[This message has been edited by Elseenas (edited 04-06-2001).]

[Treladian]

Yeah, mob backstabs are nasty. I've learned a few tricks as a ranger to avoid them, but they still hurt bad when those tricks fail. Doing over 100 damage with a backstab does seem excessive for a mob in the 20s with a 1d4 weapon though. Then there's also that neat trick that the cat burglars have where they can circle and backstab you while tanking. Wish my elf thief could learn how to do that . . .

[moritheil]

1) mob backstabs have often owned players.
2) you don't have to exp on BS mobs.

As they say... enjoy.

[Sarvis]

Funny thing that. I've survived backstabs long ago. In fact things like cat burglars used to bs me regularly. Never for that much though. :shrug: And no... we don't need to exp on rogue mobs, or on fighter mobs for that matter... or on casters or clerical mobs... err... wait... what's left now? Well... I guess we can slay lots of those nasty, evil bastard merchants!

Sarvis

[Treladian]

Sarvis, backstab damage can vary a lot. I'm guessing that it's based on how backstab worked in 1st and 2nd edition AD&D where it the base damage was multiplied by some number, which on Sojourn would depend on your skill. So if a mob rolls really low or really high, you can take laughable or insane amounts of damage. Course, rangers have a few abilities to deal with pesky rogue mobs backstabbing us and I do wonder if awareness lowers backstab damage . . . .

[Tilandal]

As I remember the cat burglers in WD could BS for > 100 hp on a good shot. We used to not alow anyone with sub 150 hps in on a cat group cause they would get stabbed to death but cat burglers are what level 38 about? The mercs are only about 23 so maybe that is a little overpowered from a players view. Perhapse it should be looked at

[Corth]

Basically, what i think is happening is that AC isn't effective enough at low levels. Starting out as a newbie, getting to say 20 ac is difficult. Battle mercs shouldn't do that kind of damage to someone with 20 ac. Level 10's should be killing battle mercs with ease, but are getting owned.

What i think happened is that the new AC emphasis was tested with high level players in the original alpha, and now must be adjusted at lower levels.

Corth

[cherzra]

I have -27 ac and seem to tank no better than Blung, who has -I'm guessing- no lower than 40 ac. This is against level 20ish mobs, mind you, rather strange.

[Orvik]

<font face="Verdana, Arial" size="2">Basically, what i think is happening is that AC isn't effective enough at low levels. Starting out as a newbie, getting to say 20 ac is difficult. Battle mercs shouldn't do that kind of damage to someone with 20 ac. Level 10's should be killing battle mercs with ease, but are getting owned.</font>

Should they tho? while only being 13 lvls higher isn't that much, they are still over twice the lvl of the PCs fighting it.

How many lvl 10 mobs should it take to beat up on a lvl 23 PC, quite a few I'd imagine. Perhaps there is a problem with exp at low levels because low levels mobs were unbalanced before (too easy). And now that they are 'balanced' we have to kill smaller prey at low lvls which give less exp per kill.

just a thought, hard to compare since we can't play both soj2 and soj3 side by side.

[Tilandal]

Hmm I said 23 I may be mistaken. I think im 15 now and they con something like are you mad? I dont think level 10's should be trying it although it is possible if you have enough in the way of damage.

[Corth]

Tilandal

If level 10's should not be trying to kill level 15 mobs, then the way experience is distributed on this mud is screwed. Cause at level 10 you need to kill stuff at level 15+ or you will remain level 10 for many months.

Corth

[Nokie]

Incapacitated mobs have between -1 and -10 hps, right? Well about 25% of the time, when I land a backstab on an incapacitated mob, he still isn't killed. So this means that it's doing less than 9 points, no?

Something to think about!


< T: Nokie TC: excellent E: graverobber EC: nasty wounds>
A grave robber misses you with his hit.
You land a mighty pierce on a grave robber
A grave robber is nearly slain by the force of your pierce!
A grave robber is incapacitated and will slowly die, if not aided.
A grave robber slumps to the ground.
< 67h/67H 94v/95V >
<> be
A grave robber makes a strange sound, as you place a polished steel dagger in
his back.
A grave robber is mortally wounded, and will die soon, if not aided.

[Tilandal]

Um if im 15 and they con are you mad how does trhat make them 15? they are more like 20+. If you want to kill a 20+ mob at level 10 be my guest but your not going to live long.

[Jurdex]

A level 25 backstabber should be able to do 150+ point of damage insta-killing a level 12 player through a 20 ac?

heh.. sounds off to me, sorry..

Jurdex

[Tempus]

The reason Level 10's can't kill Battle Mercs (a level 24 mob) is because there is now a level differential built into the thac0 calculation. You receive a penalty for attacking mobs that are substantially higher than you. I believe there is no penalty for mobs that are either a few or several levels above you, but when you start talking 6 or 7 levels, the penalty will make it very hard for you to hit.

I believe, tho I am not sure, that there is a bonus in the other direction as well.

Why? Because we disagree that level 10 players should be killing mobs 14 levels above them "with ease." Moreover, this goes a LONG way towards reducing the ability to powerlevel newbies.

Some will respond to this by saying that experience tables should be redone to accomodate this change. In general, I think most of the gods are pleased with the rate of leveling during the alpha, especially given the fact that lots of zones have been removed, thereby lowering your xp opportunities. Leveling will be faster during beta because of the reintroduction of all zones, plus new ones.

Temp

[Jurdex]

Tempus,

I understand the reasoning you've given, and I don't disagree entirely.

We had enough damage to kill the battle mercs, we'd done like 2 before that.

The problem was not in killing it, the problem was it killed my level 13 cleric with 150 hps in one backstab, I don't see how if I am level 20 that is going to make _that_ much of a difference, I'll still be practically dead.

Are they supposed to be backstabbing on that ac and doing that much damage is my question.

thanks!

Jurdex/Dornax