E-Mail from an employee of RavenSoft (unofficial patch information)

Sir Losealot · April 12, 2002

The danger of removing the blue glow from "absorb" is that it may completely cancel any need for using dark powers. Invisible "absorb" and "heal" will become a most powerful combo and most people will be using only this. Is this what we want?

Just a thought.

Ascari · April 12, 2002

Judging from the e-mail Mike wants to nerv Heal and Drain.

I'm sure they will come up with a good solution

I just hope my faith in them will be justified when the next patch comes out

Creston · April 12, 2002

Originally posted by Sir Losealot
The danger of removing the blue glow from "absorb" is that it may completely cancel any need for using dark powers. Invisible "absorb" and "heal" will become a most powerful combo and most people will be using only this. Is this what we want?

Just a thought.

Everyone, including Kurgan, seems to believe that if we change the situation where one combo is now overpowered, this AUTOMATICALLY leads to a situation where another thing is overpowered? The word BALANCING should mean something here, right? Isn't that what most everybody is asking for? BALANCING of the force powers? Is the meaning of the word BALANCING that hard to understand?

Absorb and heal combo? Absorb isn't something you can just turn on and leave on for the rest of the game, eh? Also, this is a defensive combo. Personally, I don't really have a problem with someone having the opportunity to heal himself. Either he heals, or he respawns, or he walks over the large shield booster, what's the difference?

The thing about this passive combo is that you still have to do something ELSE to make kills. Going up to a crowd and hitting your force lightning 3 quick key, now THAT'S a very hard way to kill some people. By all means, let's leave that in here..

On another topic, I wouldn't have any problem with the saber being the most powerful weapon. Quite frankly, I think it's meant to be that way in the SW universe, but even disregarding that, it does actually take at least SOME modicum of skill to kill someone with the saber, especially if they have a saber too.

What kind of skill does it take to alt fire with the repeater rifle? You don't even have to AIM to get a kill!

And before some of you go and shout "People just bash buttons and get a kill!"

I heartily believe that this is an exception and it only works against new players. If someone with strong stance who just swings around like an idiot kills you, you are doing something wrong.

If they (Raven) set up a modification where you are either a saberer with force, or a gunner with powerups, they don't have to change a thing to weapons or anything. The force will balance the alt repeater rifle, ESPECIALLY since alt repeater n00bs won't be able to just continuously force jump while dumping their blue balls of death all over the level. In fact, LEAVE them the way they are. I also agree that when we are BALANCING, we shouldn't totally nerf the guns.

In fact, if they have the time and dedication for it, we could have some minor balances to the guns (the alt repeater does realistically need to fire slower, and it WOULD be more logical in every game option that backpedalling makes you move slower than forward running does) for straight pure FFA, and then have an option to play as Jedi vs Gunners or something. (a la Saber Only, No Force etc). Where things could be as they were for all I care.

Guns are in JO, so they are meant to be used? No argument there. The LIGHTSABER is in JO as well. Can it at least have a modicum of a chance to stand up against gunners? Thank you.

Creston

DannyDiplo · April 12, 2002

Originally posted by Kurgan
JK2 is NOT that kind of game. The fact that it features all those other weapons, and the saber does NOT dominate, is proof that the developers never intended to create such a light-saber only game.

Whilst what you say is true, how many people once they got the light saber used virtually nothing else? Start a poll and I'll bet you find that 90% or more used the saber almost exclusively, apart from in a few situations that demanded guns. I know I certainly did, and I'm not even a big fan of Star Wars (I just liked using such a cool melee weapon in an FPS game for a change).

Maybe the developers never intended it, but that seems to be what a lot of people want, and a few minor tweaks to multiplayer gameplay could give them that. If the fans are happy then the developers make more dosh, and I'm sure Raven wouldn't object to that

DannyDiplo · April 12, 2002

Originally posted by Sir Losealot
The danger of removing the blue glow from "absorb" is that it may completely cancel any need for using dark powers.

My solution to this is to make absorb only glow blue when someone attacks you with a force power, but not before. The problem with the way absorb acts now is that if you have it on you are blatantly telegraphing to someone not to bother using drain etc. on you. Drainers already have one of the most powerful forces, why should they get even more advantage by knowing when you are using it? This wouldn't give absorbers a huge advantage because it drains your mana so fast that you can't keep it on for long anyway.

Sartis · April 12, 2002

I highly doubt they will enhance Absorb after looking at nerfing Drain

Sir Losealot · April 12, 2002

Originally posted by Creston

The word BALANCING should mean something here, right? Isn't that what most everybody is asking for? BALANCING of the force powers? Is the meaning of the word BALANCING that hard to understand?

Creston

Yes, balancing should not mean to kill variety in a game. Guns and force powers should be there. But to balance them, especially guns against saber, will require a lot of thought and testing.

I've been playing JO for the last 2 weeks like a madman and I am definitely not a Star Wars fan.

The only part which totally captivated me was saber fight. This is the only fps game on the market with lightsaber fight.

Guns are in every fps game. I've played most of them (my cusin works in computer store) and I NEVER EVER was as excited about any of theirs weapons as of lightsaber.

So, I don't agree with those who says that "lightsaber is just another weapon and developers never intended to give it a special place". This game IS about developing saber and forcepowers skills.

I wouldn't have even touched this game with a stick if it was not for lightsaber and forcepowers. I never even touch the guns. I remeber them only vaquely from single player game and when I get a rocket in the head in multiplayer.

After 2 weeks of playing I noticed my increased frustration with unfairness regarding weapons vs saber balance. I already know that if the patch will not correct these issues in a satisfactory manner, I will stop playing this game.

What's a point of playing game where bunny hopping gun*****, running backwards shoots blindly and kills you anyway.

And please don't tell me about pulling his weapon out of his hand or pushing the missile back. In the heat of battle you can't be precise enough all the time in order to even the odds.

Even when you push a couple of missiles back, next one will kill you because you run out of force. His own missiles won't kill him because he happily maxed out his forcejump and speed ( the points which I used for saber attack and defence) and is flying all over me spraying the goods without even aiming.

What to speak about those "BEST" players on the scoreboard who stay aside and watch 5 saber players fighting and throwing C4 or whatever it's called in JO, and killing 5 people at once. No fun at all.

And no, I don't want to play only duel games.

The patch must correct these issues soon or JO will become just another fps amongs many.

Sir Losealot · April 12, 2002