Class/Skill Improved MM Feedback Thread!

You can boost their crit chance by 15% up to 70% with se so they will become true snipers, since right now NL's have higher crit lol.
This boost will put mm with si above BM but it will still be weaker without si

 

Thanks for the interesting read. However, as someone who has extensive experience with both archer classes, it feels like this thread is just dancing around the core issue without addressing it properly. Sub-classes arent supposed to be in direct competition with each other in the exact same niche, as BM and MM currently are, that niche being ranged single target attacker (and support, obviously). For instance the warrior classes work so well because they do their own niches. Paladin is strictly single target, while hero and drk are variations on the multi target attacker. This should ideally be the case with the archers too.

I would argue that the original intent for the marksman class is to fulfill the ranged multi-target need as the intended main attack, piercing arrow, shows. There is no other class competing in this niche currently and it would create very interesting new party gameplay possibilities if implemented well. Just imagine having a MM using pierce to hit all 3 HT heads at once, no other class can effectively do that (while also being supportive ofc). There is a clear hole in the design space and massive potential if the issues with piercing arrow are just, finally, addressed. Again, I dont think MM should even try to compete in single target damage with BMs, that is supposed to be BM's niche where they shine. This way choosing between BM and MM is not a damage issue, it's a gameplay issue, as it should always be.

As some posters have already outlined here, the main issue with piercing is the skill cancelling when hit. This is mainly due to (as I understand it), being hit throwing you into the air and as you cant release piercing in air, it just cancels out and nothing happens. This is extremely frustrating when trying to use the skill effectively. The other glaring issue is not being able to shoot close to enemies, as for instance corsair's torpedo can. Having a window to actually utilize piercing is never certain since the charge up time takes so long that you cannot predict whether or not you can release it when you're done charging.

No class compared to another should be strictly worse in every possible situation. There should always be a scenario where MM is preferred over a BM, and vice versa. If the classes are in the exact same niche, this will always be a problem. No amount of snipe and MMB tweaking will change that.

 

I agree with @Nivi that MM should excel in multi-target. Charge time should be reduced to half of the current but should require SI. Currently I think Piercing Arrow's damage calculation is only additive with sharp eyes with the amount of pierced targets and I think that formula should be changed to multiplicative as MM get less out of criting in comparsion to BM's with hurricane (Need confirmation on formula). This will allow us to hit above cap more often in multi target cases.

Also blind should get fully reworked. Have it have a long CD (5 min or more) with a strong blind debuff (70% or more) with a moderate duration (30 seconds or more). Great supportive skill for the party that increases survivability. Similar to shadowers smokescreen imo but not as strong.

 

I really like this line of thinking, and I've suggested the same thing before. Being a mega old timer MM, it always felt like I should be a multitarget class with my clearly superior 3rd job mobbing and getting a brand new mobbing attack for 4th job.

As you've said, there is currently no ranged multitarget focused attacker in the game. Instead of making MM and BM slightly different variations on each other, that being single target focused attackers, we could leave MM single target alone and instead buff Piercing Arrow to put them in line with other multitarget classes and open up a whole new meta for MM and bossing in general and better distinguish MM from BM while still retaining core class identity.

Pros

- Gives MM a niche no other class can fill, ranged multitarget support.

- Distinguishes MM from BM, making it a gameplay choice instead of just a flavor choice.

- Helps MM scale into endgame, as Piercing Arrow is the only skill that can actually break damage cap (unless thats been "hotfixed" too).

- Retains class identity, as MM will still be a "slow attack, big damage" class.

- Opens new meta possibilities for bossing MM. MM being able to hit 4 Zak arms or 3 HT heads at once is huge. Washed MM can go CWK bottom, have an easier time with Shao clones, and better attack any boss that spawns mobs while helping to efficiently clear them as well.

- (Probably?) Easier to implement than a lot of these sort of roundabout suggestions to buff the class.

Cons

- Complete overhaul of the playstyle may turn off some who are accustomed to the current gameplay.

- Not nostalgic

I'd like to hear from more current MM mains, whichever ones are still left, about how you would feel about a significant buff to Piercing Arrow and a shift to multitarget focused gameplay.

 

I saw your MM feedback thread answer on similar lines last summer that gained some traction. I remember there was a Staff response there (I dont remember who it was exactly) saying they'd be open to allowing piercing to be fired in air and close to enemies, which would make a world of difference in making the skill boss-viable. Recently when having a discussion about this with Chee in game, I promised to link her the Staff response, but I was unable to find your old feedback answer from last summer (did it get deleted?). I dont know what happened to it, but I would've wanted to link it for reference. As it stands now, the discussion is just stuck on buffing snipe and MMB even further, which didnt solve the issue of giving MM class identity previous times either.

EDIT: Anyway nice breakdown on the Pros and Cons, I very much agree.

 

Pierce needing better user execution is a must, (no cancelling for sure. in air would be extreme qol, and lowered no min distance as well.)

However I really think the charge time should stay if this is the case, and I would really rather another skill NOT lean on buccs SI to be it's highest potential. I've said it before but just the slightest hair shorter charge time would make it viable

I really don't want to outcast myself further since I have little to no support in most of my mm feedback obviously, but pierce, unless totally overhauled and ruined, simply can't be mm main bossing feature just because it can multi-hit.

I like how strong it is now. If it stayed the same rates with the few changes I just posted were made, it would be excellent, but it would still not do the work people think it would in bosses, @UrbanJuggernaut and I had this convo before.

The skill would need to be very different for it to suddenly be MM main bossing skill and signature style. I agree pierce rules and is very distinct but I always thought of MM as the more tactical archer, not simply the multi target archer. Mm have snipe and pierce, single and multi target skills, and can spam strafe, a third job skill. I don't think the existence of pierce makes the mutually exclusive argument that MM are therefore the multitarget opposite to BMs single target, because BM can dot burn, stun with arrow bomb, which is the exact same status as freezing, and dragons breath mobs all the same. Hurricane attacking so quickly, combined with hamstring, does a great job of being pierce in its own way and if both skills were compared, they'd probably be about the same, the only problem is that pierce is much slower and wonky and the mm would need to freeze or dragons breath more to only wipe mobs with pierce.

So it comes back to pierces mechanics that hold it back from being a viable to use skill, which obviously was the point of it's charging, and it is very strong mobber and worth the time if you can time it IF it wouldn't totally cancel when struck (which is unlike any other skill, the time lost charging is doubled down because of this mechanic)

There's just so few places that pierce would actually shine in bossing compared to doing strafe snipe, that the % @and function of the skill would need to be totally changed, as well as the cancelling qol, and that's threading a lot of needles just to justify the existence of one skill and to justify a conceived identity of the class

@Ayane I'm not against a small increase in crit we are snipers and MM, it makes sense, but you know what I'll say, it should be a result of a boss being in blind, a boss being low on health, or a conditional effect, because that kind of buff could set them over the the top with SE

and @DeCero , I've considered that, but that will only encourage blind mules. as I said early on, it being active makes it more fun to use and what keeps it from being abused by mules. and if the whole party got the lowered accuracy effect all se mules would be mm, and even if it worked as I said in my op, but the party got the benefit, people would attempt to mule it, which would be lame. it's why I specifically said 1v1

 

Replying to your pro and con list:

-Shads would still be top tier multitarget and support in ht, and drks would still support with hb and wreck arms better in zak, with heros mowing down any boss single or multitarget.

-mm is currently a substantive gameplay choice, not style

-this would not help mm in late game. there is no way pierce would get all these changes you expect, and somehow still break cap. no way staff will change pierce to a stronger torpedo and you can spam and still break cap. if any improvements come to pierce were suggesting, the damage will def go down and it will likely never break cap again

-will do very little to the bossing meta and mm role if you actually think about it, and only if the only warrior in cwk is a paladin would a mm go attack bottom with the pierce in your mind.
most spawned boss mobs are immediately killed off by everyone unless they totally fly away, pierce wouldn't dispatch them any differently or effectively, especially with pierces narrow straight line hitbox

-easier isn't necessarily better

-and no I'm against a total overhaul of mm as a class and play. all my suggestions come from looking at what mm already do, and making that more dynamic and synergize with itself

 

@Nivi
I believe this is the thread you're looking for https://royals.ms/forum/threads/marksman-snipe-buff-suggestion.159167/page-3#post-968675

 

@whitemagejames I just want to be clear when I say autotarget "bullseye like" I do not at all mean give mm bullseye, which is not the same. I'm not equivocating the two words, I literally mean a 6 second auto target where attacks are focused and that's it. Bullseye lasts forever and increases all damage +30%, not what I'm suggesting.

All classes already have autotarget in some ways, such as melee classes all get autotarget on the first mob they hit, without any skills

 

I checked the post but couldn't find a staff response either. Perhaps deleted, who knows.

I think removing the charge function altogether while leaving the minimum distance requirement and inability to fire in the air would be fine so it still requires positioning and awareness to fire off successfully. I originally tried thinking of ways to make it work with charging but at the end of the day, thats really what holds the skill back more than anything and would require a lot of extraneous work to make it happen. A slight lowering of damage may be necessary without a charge function. I think removing the charge would make it absolutely viable.

It also makes sense for MM to require SI to max attack speed as they are the slow attackers and SI is already somewhat of a niche buff with both Thief jobs and BM not even needing it and other classes that would traditionally need it being able to bypass that need with Fast (4) weapons like Flame Sword Pally/Hero.

I agree there could be more multitarget focused bossing content for Pierce to do work, and hopefully in future updates we get more content like that. At the moment though, a slightly changed Piercing Arrow MM would excel anywhere a Hero/DK does. It wouldn't require much changing at all. Obviously in single target scenarios you would still Strafe/Snipe but giving MM a role outside their literally worst in the game single target DPS would really fix a lot of issues most have with the class.

 

Mms would be able to control mobs much better at bosses if it didn't need to be charged. Snipe acts as the burst option for single target and pierce should do the same for multi.

 

- Why not both? Shadowers existing as a good multitarget option does not invalidate bringing a MM. Shadowers attack the arm/wing/head spot typically, while a MM could stay up top and hit 3 heads while providing SE and not triggering arm seduce. I also don't see how DK/Hero would "just be better" assuming they balance Piercing Arrow to be in line with other multitarget classes mobbing, and Heroes do not shred single target by any stretch lol, they are quite literally the worst right above MM and don't even provide a party buff.

- I would heavily disagree, you trade Hurricane for Strafe/Snipe and your birb is blue instead of red. You get some freezing utility but other than that, name one relevant area where MM isn't strictly a worse BM.

- I think a single change is pretty reasonable. As I said, a slight reduction in damage may be in order, I'm sure it would be tested before implementation. Piercing Arrow also scales better than Strafe/Snipe which would be better for endgame MM.

- I'd say giving MM something to excel at that is different than what they do now would def shake up the meta a bit, especially for MM themselves. They would be filling a role that literally didn't previously exist, thats definitely going to change things. The mob clearing aspect is niche and not super relevant, just an added bonus.

- Easier is absolutely better when you have a single developer for the server who is also wrapped up in autoban development while still pushing updates regularly. @Karven is a human being, not a machine, and presenting convoluted, and dare I say gimmicky, suggestions that take much longer to code is just increasing his workload.

- Thats totally fine, and I can see where you're coming from on the playstyle shift, it would certainly be different. I'm also taking things that MM already have (better mobbing over BM) and trying to make it a focal point that gives MM a niche.

 

Thanks! This is what I was looking for:

While somewhat different than I remembered it to be, it seems Shane still had the intention to stop piercing being cancelled when hit. The current problem isnt the charge ending when hit, but instead being knocked in the air when hit, cancelling the skill if released at the same time. Same effect, but requires the ability to be fired in air to be fixed. And yes, this happens frequently. (As a sidenote, buffing dragon's breath does nothing to BM as pushing mobs is a waste of time for this class, besides separating shao clones and imperial guards.)

It's not that I dont like your ideas, in fact I'd very much like to see blind (and hamstring) having reduced effect on bossmobs, but having MM's intended primary 4th job attack being broken to the point of being literally useless in bosses, is definedly a priority in being addressed. And even when mobbing piercing is not that efficient due to half the damage going to overkill (paradoxically hurricane reigns supreme in mobbing as well as it deals its damage efficiently without overkill).

As for the counter argument that piercing would be overpowered if these QoL restrictions (shooting in air, shooting close) were removed, what is the harm of being able to test the skill in bosses as currently it cannot be? We could argue over the numbers after gaining data on its effectiveness. I do not know whether it would be overpowered or not without trying it out 1st.

 

I'm not against slightly less time, shooting in air, shooting prone, or closer/no min, I've been suggesting these for a long time, probably the first to even. I'm saying with those changes and pierce still being as slow as it is, it still wouldn't break through the meta. Pierce would have to be a significantly shorter charged skill/no chargeto be useable and in that case it would have to be powered down a lot,and then probably wouldn't be worth the changes and loss, but yeah, what changes would be possible or considered would need to be known and tested first, I'm just getting ahead of the discussion because it will either be no cancel, or shorter and weaker, but we'll have to see

 

I don't think pierce without interruptions will change much in bossing, it still got the charge so the DPS is still a bit low (and also it's only good against many targets while bosses only have like 2-3 at best usually)
In HT it will be able to hit 4 targets but since MMs got trash avoid and no stance you'd fall like half of the time and you won't be able to utilize it that well.

It could work in CWK I guess but it's still a lot weaker than Hero/Drk so people will just tell you to hit the top bosses while the warriors hit bot.
In zak I think it will hit like 3 arms or so but again it's a lot weaker than hero/drk and it will be kinda awkward to position yourself.

It could be decent in shao but it's better to just push the clones and use strafe, while the rest of the bosses are 1vs1
So basically it will only be some quality of life improvement but nothing major and BM will still be better

 

I think we're accidentally disagreeing so much on pierce because we are envisioning lots of different possibilities for what pierce could do

as for the arbitrary single developer's work load, I would rather wait for quality improvements instead of just increased attack hotfixes. We are probably wasting our time even talking about pierce because of spaghetti coding, it's probably impossible to change without scrapping it entirely, but until someone can confirm, I agree pierce is just not worth using in bosses.

When I was a young mm, I tried to use it in pap and pianus to practice using it, thinking I could make it work later in zak etc, because bombs can line up in pap/pianus and you can solo both. Pierce is hard enough to use in normal training, pierce as it is in bosses is a joke, especially real ones like zak. Until we can decide what is best for pierce and know what is possible, we are going to be replying in bad communication about where it would take itself from there and how it would actually help mm

If it simply had no charge, it would be OP torpedo and would have to be nerfed

If it had no cancel/no min distance, it would still be too slow to realistically boss

Also, still really disagree to lean even more onto buccs just to make pierce charge faster with si, this would only help mm in bosses with si, and nowhere else

I also wanna say again I absolutely love pierce, it's rad, it's beautiful, it's strong as hell, but it's a pain to use when you can just passively freeze mobs with FP, blow mobs back with DB, and rip through them with snipe/strafe

If pierce had a 4 sec cd and could be used like snipe, it might be a lot better, or if it could be charged and held to release later, and if you could use other attacks during charge, then that would be great

Firing from ropes would be great too.

But yeah one key to charge, then same key a 2nd time to release, while being free to move and attack or heal, anything in-between would be great. Would be similar to ship management, mm who would want to use it would need to juggle three skills, would be pretty fun imo

Passive charging could drain mp until released, as well as slow your char down?

 

^this. I'm not gonna try to position myself awkwardly on a mm to try to hit multiple targets while risking falling off (which will probably happen within 1-2 hits at right side. Climbing back up if I accidentally fall is such a pain in ht already, I can't imagine doing it 10x a minute. On my 14.9k hp mm I already freak out when HT casts weakened at a weird timing and I walk off my platform instead of jumping, almost touching a head or wing. I'd much rather stay safe and comfortable up there with my mediocre single target dps where I don't feel like I'm falling too much to hit or likely to die if I misposition just a little with low hp. And then there're the seals/darkness, which are pretty awkward when you have a charge skill, since it just nopes your charge into nothingness. Also, I can see why nls would prefer bms in a all nl, no si pt, but I can't specifically think of why anyone would want a mm even if they can hit more parts(?), since with other aoe attackers (i.e. you already have 1-2 dk/hero/shads) you don't actually want to down wing/hit arm warning too fast either, you want the single target people to be doing heads in a timely manner.

And cwk?? I've seen archers die just trying to walk to the melee bunch to buff SE. You'll have to be quite washed to comfortably tank melee bosses to avoid stuns/knockbacks/seals while shooting at point blank range, not to mention the pot usage and the possibly dying in 2 hits if your pot happens to fail once (if you're charging, I don't think you can pot while charging either?). Melee cwk bosses without stance is also a huge pain (ask stanceless low level warriors), and even on my shadower, if I don't keep holding << which luckily allows me to move a tiny step in between hits without dps loss, Ii'll definitely get pushed away and stunned into oblivion (even more so for mms without a thief's avoid). With no stance doing melee bosses at >> side would be easier, but as a "support" class, everyone expects your priority to be buffing SE, so you can expect yourself to be walking back to the middle every 5 mins or less, and the right side is much further than the left. You'll probably get stunned a million times on your way back and forth too. The NL will probably also prefer you stay up so they can get a SE rebuff whenever they get dispelled by the pirate boss. Given a choice between mediocre single target and mediocre multi target, I think many will still prefer the former since it's likely to be way less annoying. (what I mean is that even with the changes you're probably still gonna be up there hitting mage boss a lot of the time) A lot of people don't even want to take low/mid-level shadowers on cwk for melee since warriors outclass us easily in the same level range, so given the choice between a higher single target dmg bm or a possibly multitarget but annoying to deal with mm, I think the choice is pretty simple. Not to mention we need SI as well which can be annoying.

It's a nice idea to have better aoe for mm, and I do think piercing arrow definitely needs to be made more usable, but trying to buff a single skill and thinking that can smoothly help the transition into mms being a respectable multi target dps class without considering that they are not made for it (in various ways) is hopeful at best.

I would enjoy using an improved mm aoe skill for better dps if it is comfortable, safe and worth it to do so. But it doesn't seem to be very applicable in many situations so far. I'm looking forward to if someone can convince me that it's better, and in what situations.

Trying to give mms a new niche is great only if the niche isn't really useless in a lot of situations. Going "hey, mages are great dps when it's wep cancel!" is silly because crash exists, and no one wants to bring more crashes so mages don't get affected by magic cancel, and even without any crash it's hard to argue for using them over other classes. I'm not trying to compare mm to mages or anything (it's a totally different thing), but in the same way IN MOST BOSSING SITUATIONS, attacker mages aren't better than other jobs, IN MOST BOSSING SITUATIONS, i can't see mms being better than bms with the piercing arrow changes (unless it gets buffed to ridiculous levels)

(most situations:
1. zak? yeah that sounds plausible, except that my high level friends and i don't even zak anymore, or they do trio zaks or so and probably just bring a better attacker and a se mule if needed cos "se damage sucks"
2. scar/targa? maybe if you stack them. but with only two targets idk if the difference will be significant. i rarely do this boss so i can't comment on it much. it isn't uncommon for someone to just bring a better attacker with a se mule instead though
3. krex/auf/etc. single target enough said
4. ht/cwk? i've already said above what i think
5. idk, i don't do much else)

 

Slightly off topic but I would advocate for a buff to archers in general rather than MMs alone.

Bowmasters are now outclassed by every DPS class in the game except heroes and marksmen under optimal endgame conditions without concerns related to knockback, and when knockback is considered they would almost invariably be inferior to heroes who have the advantage of stance.

Spoiler

https://royals.ms/forum/threads/drk-joins-the-battle-again-post-patch-drk-buff.176195/#post-1028846

A buff to marksmen to bring them on par with BMs could mean more players are willing to play MMs compared to BMs, but the actual number of people willing to main archers particularly to level 180+ is dwindling to begin with because the balance changes over the years have meant that
- archer DPS/DPM have become steadily inferior in comparison
- parties are less dependent on SE given nightlords are relatively "less mainstream"
- the availability of SE mules are significantly more prevalent as the server ages

Just some food for thought. I would maintain that MMs primarily need a buff to their main damage output skills to fit in with the current heavy bossing meta, and unfortunately the design of Piercing Arrow doesn't really fit that in any regard like ZJ has outlined.

 

Ty ZJ, this exactly the painstaking reply I wanted to give about mm/pierce bossing reality but just had no desire to even try

 

Ok, to summarize the long post, there are many situations in which piercing would not be effective and you would still resort to single target damage (strafe+snipe). I do not contest this at all, but the point is not to replace strafe and snipe, but to give situations where piercing actually does give an advantage. You gave examples of MM trying to use the multi target warrior meta positions, which obviously wouldnt be universally used as the class works differently. It is always possible to cherrypick situations where something does not work. But having situations for both strafe+snipe and piercing is exactly what we need to give options for varied and interesting gameplay (obviously strafe and snipe would still be preferred in many cases). To give a couple options for piercing advantage for MM just off the top of my head:

1: Zakum arms, middle left side. This is where DrKs currently reside, but only hitting the left side arms. If the QoL restrictions were lifted, a MM could stand in the current DrK spot and pierce 4 zakum arms at once, two on the left side and two on the right. Currently this is not possible since to reach the right side you'd need to stand so close to the arms that being too close triggers and piercing will not fire. Since knockback here is always to the left, you'd only need to walk back right and never actually fall. It's even possible to utilize the charge timer for walking against knockback hence not losing any dps to it.

2: HT heads, ABC or ACB head orders. Again, standing on the left side since all knockback here is to the left hence no falling. Here we have the exact same situation as in zakum arms, for being able to reach the right side head C, you'd need to stand so close to A that the too close cancellation triggers. If the QoL restrictions were lifted, you could simply walk against the knockback while charging and consistently hit the 3 heads. To reach C, you would probably need to stand on the 1st platform above A.

3: Shaolin while killing the clones for extra exp. This is arguably the best case for bossing piercing currently has and something I've heavily tried out. The current problem is the way the boss attack works by extending the boss hitbox on you, triggering the too close cancellation (same thing happens in Nibergen, notably). If there was no cancellation, you could reliably hit 4 targets over and over with piercing, switching to strafe+snipe after the clones fall.

4: Core Blaze summons. Again, assuming the summon cancellation meta of using summoning sacks is not used (I've understood this is discouraged by Staff responses as it makes the whole encounter trivial), piercing would be an efficient means of dispatching the high hp imperial guards and other NT mobs. It could even splash into the boss itself on the last hits giving reasonable boss damage while clearing mobs.

These examples are from mainstream boss encounters, where piercing (without QoL restrictions) would be more efficient than strafe+snipe. This is to give MM a partial power spike during some phases of the bosses to balance out the shortcomings of strafe+snipe compared to hurricane over the 1 target phases. And if piercing damage still isnt enough to spike MM dps in 3-6 target situations, it certainly could use a buff. I honestly cannot predict a meta I have yet to witness and I find it dubious many posters claim they can. Again, we are comparing mainly to BMs as the support role overlaps, comparing to anything else without SE is much harder to judge (comparing apples to oranges).