Just a note.....

To let you guys know that I have extended some open guild invitations to a few people. They are/were Golden Horde members who have decided to part with that particular guild. I wasn't fishing in other guild ponds I promise. The few people that I did invite are all active players, easy to get along with and I've played with them for years. I opted not to send guild invites thru the mail because I didn't want them to feel that I was trying to pressure their choice on leaving the Golden Horde. With that being said, I told them that if they did decide they wanted to come to Storm Shadow and I wasn't on they could talk to just about anyone in the guild.

My understanding was that they are having a vote on asking their guild leader to step down and all would depend on the out come of that.

Indel wrote:To let you guys know that I have extended some open guild invitations to a few people. They are/were Golden Horde members who have decided to part with that particular guild. I wasn't fishing in other guild ponds I promise. The few people that I did invite are all active players, easy to get along with and I've played with them for years. I opted not to send guild invites thru the mail because I didn't want them to feel that I was trying to pressure their choice on leaving the Golden Horde. With that being said, I told them that if they did decide they wanted to come to Storm Shadow and I wasn't on they could talk to just about anyone in the guild.

My understanding was that they are having a vote on asking their guild leader to step down and all would depend on the out come of that.

Related. I have alot of friends that want to try and joining me in the game, so I'm extending warm guild like welcome to a lot of them, so you may see some others that will say (oh, i'm strype or gunnner's freind)

Good people are always welcome. I've run with the Golden Horde and found them to be good folks.

Don't worry Strype we won't hold it against your friends that they know you

Seriously though it's good to extend the invites. If it isn't a good fit it it will resolve itself. In the last month or so we've added several people and lost one. This type of attrition will occur no matter how careful you are about selections.

Keep up the good work and make sure to change the MOTD if we get new members

Strype I have to ask... what do you think of artificer so far? I started a runic champion type build and am enjoying it. I will probably do the archer next.

Morrek wrote:Good people are always welcome. I've run with the Golden Horde and found them to be good folks.

Don't worry Strype we won't hold it against your friends that they know you

Seriously though it's good to extend the invites. If it isn't a good fit it it will resolve itself. In the last month or so we've added several people and lost one. This type of attrition will occur no matter how careful you are about selections.

Keep up the good work and make sure to change the MOTD if we get new members

Strype I have to ask... what do you think of artificer so far? I started a runic champion type build and am enjoying it. I will probably do the archer next.

Well, as my first impressions of the class and the turbine 'archetypes' presented.
I want to go ahead and get it off my chest, thus far the class really does live up to my hopes in being a fun different approach to the game. They have a decent lot of spells, and some that are incredibly powerful that will be a boon to groups. The roll is that of a bard with a slightly selfish dps focus ( bonuses to self, not others), but party beneficial buffs. Traps are taken care of (yep.) . So, I do love it. Its true.

Now that fanboy moment is past, lets hit on a few mechanic issues (I'll be alot more through in a TL:DR post later)

1) with the increased fortifications across the board AND artificers filling the rogue slot better (much more defined roll than some rouges) rogues/sneak attack is taking a hit, and rogues are going to be even-more-red headed step children. Yea, This bothers me.

2) Ranged combat pushed. I'll be honest here. I don't like the ranged combat push with artificers. The melee approach is not as nicely rounded out here. And wow what a feeling it is to say that for once in this game. I think that when we see some more of the melle -ficer toys in the future, I'll be alot happier with the runic champion approach. And the runic champion, is the most 'normal' in therms of ddo style play. I like it, it needs the bit of polish that repeaters got with a prestige enhancement that works with it.

3) To akin this more to bard. Virtuoso - Combat Engie, Spellsinger - Mastermaker, Runic Champion - Warchanter. As of yet, there is only one clear path, and Combat Engie is the forgone conclusion of that path. In that since. EH. I really cant say much in terms of flexablity. Mastermaker needs the most love to be really intresting. Combat engie is the duh/obvious choice path, runic champion needs to get you a reason to choose that style.

4) does glanceing blows/bastard sword work with rune arms? It looks like that is more or less the style with runic champion in the get go...and that looks damn cool if it works like that.

MORE LATER!

Ok so it's no secret that I'm too cheap to buy the new class (for heavens sake I haven't even bought favored soul yet). I really don't want to spend money on a class that I'm not sure I'll enjoy playing for one and for two I'd really rather wait and see how you guys feel about them since (again no secret) I often have to turn to you guys for build help.

With that being said I LOVE MY ROGUE so the fact that the new class may make her obsolete is some what disheartening. It's always hard enough getting a pure rogue into pugs with the fact that you have people that multi class them with rangers and even wizards. Great builds with multipurpose functions like this often over shadow us.

So it looks like what I'll end up doing is getting her to level 20 and sticking her on the shelf until I decide to TR her with the ranger build that Strype helped break down for me or until you guys work out the kinks on the new classes and start posting your own builds.

Well Indel, as you know my main is a Rogue and the whole Artys make rogues inferior is a bunch of crap. First off Artys don't get sneak attack damage, except by items. Second is Arty's don't get evasion. So all those traps you actually have to run through to disarm them? Artys will die on hard/elite/epic. And on top of that I don't see how an Arty can ever do more damage than a Rogue Acro build can. On my build I can hit for 150-200 a hit doing Sneak dmg and 70-100 with no sneak damage if I got aggro. Plus with the semi-perma haste wielding Staffs and the haste boost. and..... People will soon realize that Artys are nothing more than another type of Bard. Good at doing all sorts of stuff but master of none.

The primary function is gonig to be Weapon and armor/party buffing, repairing of Warforged, and Ranged combat. Worth buying the Arty if you like the idea of a slightly gimpy rogue with good party buffing capabilities.

Hope this helps Indel. (And besides FvS is unlockable with favor and so will the ARty come next update. They have said as much. ;o)

Wingtail wrote:Well Indel, as you know my main is a Rogue and the whole Artys make rogues inferior is a bunch of crap. First off Artys don't get sneak attack damage, except by items. Second is Arty's don't get evasion. So all those traps you actually have to run through to disarm them? Artys will die on hard/elite/epic. And on top of that I don't see how an Arty can ever do more damage than a Rogue Acro build can. On my build I can hit for 150-200 a hit doing Sneak dmg and 70-100 with no sneak damage if I got aggro. Plus with the semi-perma haste wielding Staffs and the haste boost. and..... People will soon realize that Artys are nothing more than another type of Bard. Good at doing all sorts of stuff but master of none.

The primary function is gonig to be Weapon and armor/party buffing, repairing of Warforged, and Ranged combat. Worth buying the Arty if you like the idea of a slightly gimpy rogue with good party buffing capabilities.

Hope this helps Indel. (And besides FvS is unlockable with favor and so will the ARty come next update. They have said as much. ;o)

I like my bard for the support class and let's be honest that really is all she's good for. My kill count with her is often the lowest in the party and she isn't going to win any VIP awards for best tank anytime soon. I love my rogue for her sneak attacks although I'm sure that it really ticks the tanks off when I creep up behind them and steal their kills. My understanding at first was that arties were going to be a support class but if I know Storm Shadow like I'm pretty sure I do then I know that someone is going to make an uber build that can solo just about anything.

As far as favor goes I kinda of missed the nail on the head with that one because the one toon I had the most favor on was deleted (I didn't like her build) at lvl 16 before I knew the TR's were coming out. So now I'm back at the grind. The closest favor I have is with my lvl 20 cleric which is the only reason I haven't TR'd her yet.

In all honestly I probably will end up making one just for the fact that all my toons in one way or another are support. I really doesn't bother me to know I'm not the most uber in the group (people start to expect things from you if you are) and I take great comfort knowing that I can always be in a guild group and the job gets done one way or the other.

Well the one thing about Arty's is that they are SUpport in a different way than a bard. Their support comes in the way of enchanting Armour and weapons of fellow party members. Giving a weapon Flaming or Acid, or even making them adamantine. Plus enchanting to give extra Hit points and such. SO similar to a Bard but in a different way. ;o)

It might be worth it to spend the extra money for class....I dunno I gotta talk myself into it. Gimme a week.

Well, on the issue of rogue v. Artificer.

I am a rogue player. I love my rogues.
However there are people out there that say '' I'm focused on traps, everything else is secondary'' and these changes really exasperate the major issues there. In that, rogues will now be a lot more damage focused and damage centric.

-this is good.

The roll many rogues find themselves in, especially when leveling (or tr-ing for that matter) is when someone wants to only look for a trap-smith, will they consider a rogue. In this case, rogue/rogue splashes were the only game in town when it came to trap duties, so the precived need for rogues has decreased.

-This is the bad.

Rogues as a whole, have a bad reputation for being squishy to the point of dead-man-walking. FAR too many times have I had to send people the old rogue thread classics (Ramses' Penitent rogue // Brenna's notes of a dancing rouge) because they just were doing it wrong.
We have a bit of a running joke about -that one time in monetary of the scorpion- where we had a rouge, in party, at 18, with less than 150 hp. Dead man walking. And he did die. Alot.

Artificers have less of that stigma built up from years of rogue play. They have some really great aggro management tools (dogs). They make the barbarian -seem- better, when they are honestly adding the same real damage as a rogue, but differently.

Lastly, there is the issue of fortification changes. No, they didn't give every monster heavy fort in the game. Or even every boss monster heavy fortification (even on elite/epic). However, fortification effects rogues the MOST out of any of the classes, just out of the habit of using the highest crit range weaponry as its norm, and half if not more of its damage coming from sneak attack.

With all that what do we have.
1) Rogue skills are now more wide spread, ergo competition in skills.
2) The main source of its competition in skills does not have the same social stigma as rogues.
3) Fortification changes hurt the rogue most in its damage.

Rogues are not quite inferior. They do things that no one else can do. However, they now are in extreme competition. Some of the best reasons to play them are now being questioned and some of them, slightly nerfed.

Perdictions: Rogues will get the rest of their prestige classes SOON. (why should I be a mechanic instead of a artificer? Ditto with Acrobat...because we are here too). There will be alterations in the nature of sneak attack.

Truth: Artificers are bard/Rogues. Plain and simple there in terms of party/roll. Its like being a party of one.
Bard like (buff) spell casting (no CC here). Rouge Like skills. Using your pet to tank with micromanagement, cleric-ing for your pet, Arcane Archer like cb damage. Twitching to use your rune cannon.
Artificers really have a little bit of each skill you learn from each class built into them, at the same time, all at once.

Strype McClaine wrote:Well, on the issue of rogue v. Artificer.

Truth: Artificers are bard/Rogues. Plain and simple there in terms of party/roll. Its like being a party of one.
Bard like (buff) spell casting (no CC here). Rouge Like skills. Using your pet to tank with micromanagement, cleric-ing for your pet, Arcane Archer like cb damage. Twitching to use your rune cannon.
Artificers really have a little bit of each skill you learn from each class built into them, at the same time, all at once.

Exactly. Couldn't say it better even if I tried. I said on the Horde forum that the Arty is going to be a really tough class to play properly, just like the rogue. If you don't like Multi-tasking you won't like an Arty. The constant buffing and changing to suit your enemies will keep you almost as busy as a Cleric healing a harder quest.