Upcoming Publish and changes to PVP = PLS lets discuss before they go live

We’ll be adding a debuff icon for nerve strike.  No other changes are planned at this time. 

Kyronix, how do you justify that? No change at all despite it literally being pvp breaking mechanic of 50hp stuns when including hit spell? The characters are completely overtuned with far too much offensive for the amount of parry/evasion defense they have.

They 100% require either a nerf to nerve strike damage/CC or a nerf to to evasion chance when magery is above 30 skill points. 

At this stage it feels like you're purposely leaving it in a poor state and its been this way for nearly a decade!!! Just made all the easier by the sheer amount of properties available to players now to build overtuned templates, but this one just takes the absolute cake.

"We listened to your concerns about the damage and CC of Nerve Strike, so now just in case you are not sure what is happening when you're stuck still taking extreme damage, you can now look to your buff bar before you die and see the reason for the grey screen you are about to experience"

Merely that we have no plans to make any major changes to PvP in the current development cycle - that's not to say we are against the idea of updates, just they aren't planned for right now.  As we mentioned at the M&G - we encourage continued discussion by the community about what potential changes to PvP we can make.  Feel free to comment on the thread here.

Well there is a few things you're leaving out when it comes to landing a 50 damage nerve. First off you need to have a 100% elemental bokuto you need to have 100 di you need to have 100 tactics and you also need to have real 120 bush no skill inc. Nerve strike damage is a range of 15-25 damage. Specifically when your nerve paras someone it will hit for 25. There is a cooldown on the para and the nerve will do less damage during that time frame. You get 3 damages on a nerve strike . 1 being the base hit ranging from 10-15 depending on skill di tact ect. The next is the nerve damage ranging from 15-25 depending on real bushido. And last the hit spell ranging from 9-13 depending on the type of hit spell you have and SDI. The para is able to be broken from any type of damage so most people use a trap box to get out of it then you're on cooldown to not be nerve stuned again or slept  or para blowed . Theres alot of stuff you need to invest in to hit a 50 damage nerve on top of it being melee. Theres already a very small amount of good weapons to use in the game and nerfing nerve would just make there far less viable templates to play. I've been actively playing uo for 20+ years and ive done nothing but pvp nerve has been the same since it came out with 1 adjusted they made way way back. There is plenty of other bigger issues than nerve strike in pvp. IE we have people who can chain spam dp darts and shriukens for FREE no mana cost the Cooldown is so low it can be chained back and forth on top of the poison being sticky taking 10 pots to cure. We have sleep requiring only 85 skill in mystic to force walk someone with 120 resist on top of dropping their DCI to 0. 85 magery wouldnt allow you to para or use any CC spell without eval vs someone with 120 resist. There are far bigger issues than nerve. I can keep the list going also and these are issues that have been around for some time and that have never been addressed. 

Kyronix said:

Merely that we have no plans to make any major changes to PvP in the current development cycle - that's not to say we are against the idea of updates, just they aren't planned for right now.  As we mentioned at the M&G - we encourage continued discussion by the community about what potential changes to PvP we can make.  Feel free to comment on the thread here.

What is the current pvp development cycle though? I can't remember the last proper PvP balance changes bar the nerf to pure parry mages. Devs were also quick to nerf supernovas by adding a delay to the trigger or changes the conflags so we couldn't double cast them, quick to change Glenda. Why is this any different?

Do we just talk amongst ourselves for another 5 years hoping some balance / meta forcing changes can happen or you could literally right now, commit to a date to change some of the clear fundamental problems with template choice and that unless you have Parry or Bushido/Parry/Wepskill your character is so poorly catered to from a balance viewpoint its almost impossible to enjoy the gameplay.

Development teams prior went through the effort of implementing spellweaving, necromancy, mysticism and ninjitsu, to allow variety and personalisation and its quite clear that when ONE template or style of play literally dominates the scene that it requires a hot fix. 

Why is it so difficult to commit to some time for a QOL change for everyone, Bushido Parry mages are NOT healthy. My argument of overtuned offensiveness and defensiveness is plenty of rationale for an immediate change and anyone who shrugs it off either doesn't play the game, plays a bok mage and can't learn any other template or simply can't be bothered to deal with a problem.

When we get a better sense of the scope of the changes based on community feedback we would be better positioned to give a timeline as to when those changes may be implemented. 

PwnySlaystation said:

Kyronix said:

Merely that we have no plans to make any major changes to PvP in the current development cycle - that's not to say we are against the idea of updates, just they aren't planned for right now.  As we mentioned at the M&G - we encourage continued discussion by the community about what potential changes to PvP we can make.  Feel free to comment on the thread here.

What is the current pvp development cycle though? I can't remember the last proper PvP balance changes bar the nerf to pure parry mages. Devs were also quick to nerf supernovas by adding a delay to the trigger or changes the conflags so we couldn't double cast them, quick to change Glenda. Why is this any different?

Do we just talk amongst ourselves for another 5 years hoping some balance / meta forcing changes can happen or you could literally right now, commit to a date to change some of the clear fundamental problems with template choice and that unless you have Parry or Bushido/Parry/Wepskill your character is so poorly catered to from a balance viewpoint its almost impossible to enjoy the gameplay.

Development teams prior went through the effort of implementing spellweaving, necromancy, mysticism and ninjitsu, to allow variety and personalisation and its quite clear that when ONE template or style of play literally dominates the scene that it requires a hot fix. 

Why is it so difficult to commit to some time for a QOL change for everyone, Bushido Parry mages are NOT healthy. My argument of overtuned offensiveness and defensiveness is plenty of rationale for an immediate change and anyone who shrugs it off either doesn't play the game, plays a bok mage and can't learn any other template or simply can't be bothered to deal with a problem.

Bok mages are the most balanced template in reference to having it all. Good offense and good defense. I dont think anyone can argue that. I play a dexxer as a main but I can play anything at a top level and id be willing to show you that if you think otherwise anytime you want. If were really going to look at the issue with bok mages its going to be the capability of survival. Their defense is too good. You have bushido unbreakable confidence parry warcry mini heal pots seeds ect. You have about 7-8 defenses/abilities to heal and sustain during a fight. Their offense is very lackluster you have nerve and spells to do damage maybe a hatchet to ai also. If were looking to debuff a bok mage it needs to be on their defensive side not the offensive side.

PapaCrunch said:

Bok mages are the most balanced template in reference to having it all. Good offense and good defense. I dont think anyone can argue that. I play a dexxer as a main but I can play anything at a top level and id be willing to show you that if you think otherwise anytime you want. If were really going to look at the issue with bok mages its going to be the capability of survival. Their defense is too good. You have bushido unbreakable confidence parry warcry mini heal pots seeds ect. You have about 7-8 defenses/abilities to heal and sustain during a fight. Their offense is very lackluster you have nerve and spells to do damage maybe a hatchet to ai also. If were looking to debuff a bok mage it needs to be on their defensive side not the offensive side.

I definitely did not mention nerfing both the offensive AND defensive, but templates should be balanced. 

They added parry to the non focused mage list because it was too much damage back then + too much defence, this is still now the case with bok mages.

I would say i'd be happier with removing their defence than offense, at least it opens the possiblity that they can be taken down earlier than being able to dish out the damage in quick succession that they can. Removing evasion chance if Magery is over XX makes the most sense, that way they keep their vs warrior parry chance(hence parry skill) but brings a better argument for mages to be viable.

Or the cooldown from the additional bok damage needs to be longer, ie not just the stun that is cooldown'd so the damage isn't spammable. Its far too easy to dish out massive damage at 1.25 swing with little cost involved in your character/suit.

I also have played just about every pvp template there is at high level on Europa and Atl, I completely understand that people will have their opinions on what is over-powered and what isn't, there is a handful of very small problems that require some changes and they're not exactly back-breaking coding issues. It would just be nice to see that some other templates are viable when ultimately right now in team fights, its either have some form of parry character or you lose. Hybrids have always existed, but they had a trade off, bok mage doesn't.

Your other points are valid re: shuriken and Magery/mystic vs Resist issues.

PwnySlaystation said:

Kyronix, how do you justify that? No change at all despite it literally being pvp breaking mechanic of 50hp stuns when including hit spell? The characters are completely overtuned with far too much offensive for the amount of parry/evasion defense they have.

They 100% require either a nerf to nerve strike damage/CC or a nerf to to evasion chance when magery is above 30 skill points. 

At this stage it feels like you're purposely leaving it in a poor state and its been this way for nearly a decade!!! Just made all the easier by the sheer amount of properties available to players now to build overtuned templates, but this one just takes the absolute cake.

"We listened to your concerns about the damage and CC of Nerve Strike, so now just in case you are not sure what is happening when you're stuck still taking extreme damage, you can now look to your buff bar before you die and see the reason for the grey screen you are about to experience"

 Do you even play UO anymore? This sounds like a disgruntled ex-wife argument that has little basis in fact and more in spite.

@PapaCrunch makes excellent points based in fact about the secondary weapon special, nerve strike, for the bokuto. 

PapaCrunch said:

 IE we have people who can chain spam dp darts and shriukens for FREE no mana cost the Cooldown is so low it can be chained back and forth on top of the poison being sticky taking 10 pots to cure. 

From what I understand, the current chaining of DP darts/shurikens is due to a certain client exploiting a server side issue that allows the "chaining" of darts and stars. The server issue allows this specific client to ignore the typical "use item" cool down of 1 second therefore allowing the dart/shuriken spam. 

I get what youre saying about "no mana cost" but its hard to justify applying a use mana cost to a "use item" command. If you apply a mana cost to one skilled based use item, why not apply it to all use items that require a skill to perform?