Near plans on New server. Balance updates.

[Kazama]

Last days there was a lot of discussions about balance on a new server.

Below we have some information from developers:

Greetings! I will try to summarize the main points compared to the previous server and describe the current server situation. We didn't change anything with archers, duellists, dreadnoughts, adventurers etc. As for mages in comparison with previous server was made following changes:

• Aura flash cooldown was slightly increased, so you cannot spam it without delay (like it was on l2off c6). You can always use Frost Wall/Blazing Circle/Tempest for AOE when your aura flash is in cooldown.
• Fixed bug with resistance to cancel. Right now when you have 100% resistance - you are immune to cancel. This is significant nerf against some classes, I agree.
• Fixed elemental resistances. And this is the main difference between our servers. Before the OBT started we, setup resistances exact like it should work on interlude, but they were too OP. So we decided to decrease cap to 60% (after latest patch it is 50%). In other words it means that you will deal at least half (-50%) of your base damage against target which have +50% or more resistance difference against your element. On the other hand, you can break through enemy resistance with help of Surrender and Vortex. Also Seed of Water/Wind/Fire can improve attack of your element. So as example enemy have all 3 resistance buffs which gives 90% resistance to some element (don't forget cap is 50%). If you will use surrender to water and vortex enemy will have only 10% resistance against you! So you will lose only 10% from base damage. If you add buff Seed of Water, you will get +10% (or more if enchanted) attack of your element. So Seed + Surrender + Vortex completely neutralize x3 resistance buffs.
• Magic critical cap was increased from 20% to 50%. Detailed info about how it works you can find in Alt + B. And you can reach cap even without Valakas (if you play MM and have x2 WM and masterwork weapon - Nature).
• Rollback lvl80 skills (from books) to the Interlude rules (need force charges).

Future plans:

• We do not plan to rollback resistances to High-Five mechanic (like it was on previous server)
• We plan to make magic critical cap easier to reach.
• We plan to increase magic critical power from x3 to x4 like it should be on interlude.
• We do not like bug with macro which allows to ignore floating part of the cooldown (if it is 0.99s macros rounded it to 0). Because of this Duellists and Warlords are a little bit stronger than planned. We'll make vote poll soon about implementation fix for macros bug. This fix should not critically affect main skills of other classes. If so - we'll fix.
• We are not planning to decrease delay of Aura Flash like it was on High-Five. We are not against the magic AOE skills, but aura flash, among other things, is a very strong control due to the target cancel effect. Anyway we plan to remove de-buff for pvp damage which appears after using it. And btw this is non-elemental skill, so resists are not working on it and damage is exactly the same like on previous server.
• We plan to change enchant tree for Robe Mastery. Right now it gives insane bonus for M. Def when enchanted and almost useless bonus to P. Def. We'll make some balance between this option. So you can choose what is more important for you - P. Def or M. Def. This change will help you to counter damage from physical classes.
• We plan to decrease power of residence and clan resistance skills. Due to this, the damage from elemental skills in mass fights should increase a little.
• Magic classes needs enchanted skills more than others and right now there is a shortage of Giant's Codex on the server. We plan to improve ways to obtain it.
• We do not plan to change lvl80 skills (from books), because we had a lot of bad experience in the past (box bd for noise etc).

Here you can see some tests of current balance (same as on live server) with +/- equal gear :

And finally keep in mind that mages become much stronger on late game with proper boost. We made game balance not for the 1st week, our servers live long life and balance can't be perfect on each stage. We keep our eyes open and promptly fix critical issues, if any. Our goal is the best balance and class diversity for our project. Let’s make Dex better together!