Hi guys, for those who do not know me, I've mained a marksman since 2015. I took a long break end 2015, came back occasionally, and then rejoined properly at the end of 2017. It's been a weird time for us marksmen. There was the hype build up, the release of new source, the experimentation of mm's and then... Nothing. Fast forward to 2018 and we've been labelled as a second rated BM or SE mule. what happened? However, Fast forward even more to Mid 2018, Marksmen will officially be buffed. Spoiler: Irrelevant math as of update 54 BOSSING GAMEPLAY: First off, I'd like to point off playing a marksman isn't easy. Granted it's not as hard as dismounting and mounting on a sair, but it certainly requires your attention, unlike our sister class which can simple go alt tab in krex. Why? Enter: Snipe Marksmen use strafe and snipe to deal damage when bossing. Snipe has a cooldown of 5 seconds. A general MM's attacking pattern would be to alternate between the skills. Now, time for some numbers. For all calculations, we're going to assuming strafe and snipe have a cast speed of 600ms. (achievable attack speed with SI, optimal scenario) Strafe: 4 arrows shot in 0.6s. 100% damage at max level per arrow. Snipe: I cannot find any reliable source showing it's cast timing, but for assumptions sake let's go with 0.6s too. So, a realistic attack cycle will look like this: In 5 seconds: snipe x1 > strafe x7 > buffer 0.2sec (lag, repositioning, etc.)> repeat. That gives us, 28 arrows and 1 snipe being shot. Performing 7 strafes and one snipe in succession also requires a certain amount of attention, unlike other classes which only require one key to attack. Pressing the wrong button off sequence or too early will result in a DPM drop. Per minute we have: 336 arrows fired from strafe, and 12 snipes. Let's make this comparision to a BM: Hurricane: 8.333 arrows/second, 500 arrows per minute. As we can see,12 snipes needs to outdamage the offset amount of arrows BM's can fire off, in this case is 164. so 1 snipe needs to do the same damage of an average of 13.666 arrow's from a BM. Now here's the kicker: snipe does not scale. So let's do the comparison with my range: I have a 8k - 6.5k range clean, with MW20. You can sub in any range with the formula below dont be a dingus and forget advanced crossbow mastery gives 10wa like me Damage calculator for crossbow: Max: [(DEX * 3.6 + STR) / 100] * Weapon Attack Min : Crossbow = (DEX * 0.9 * 3.6 * Skill Mastery + STR) / 100 * Weapon Attack I will make a comparison with another 8k clean BM. One arrow does 100%, with 55% chance to crit an additional 140%. On average one arrow (from strafe or hurricane) does 177%. Spoiler: MATH .55(140) + 100 = 177 13.666 arrows of 177% = 2417.82%. ≈ 2420% important equation >2420%*(Max range + Min range)/2 This will be used to calculate the damage done with a clean range: 2420%*(8k+6.5k)/2 ≈ 175.5k now what does this mean? the amount of damage snipe would do surprisingly, outweigh BM's hurricane damage! BUT WAIT, Now's where the problem comes in. Noone actually bosses without buffs. Let's factor in a stopper, my range becomes 10.6k - 8.6k. Let's use the equation again: 2420%*(10.6k+8.6k)/2 ≈ 232.3k No surprise, BM's arrows would do more damage than one snipe. And it gets worse with an apple.... My range becomes 12.3k - 10k. using the equation again: 2420%*(12.3k+10k)/2 ≈270.8k As we can clearly observe, the damage gap gets wider and wider. Also, I'd like to point out that weapon defense has been ignored in calculations for simplicity's sake. Let's work backwards shall we? We can calculate the range where snipe breaks even with BMs hurricane. 2420%*(x) = 200k x being your average range. And this magical number is 8.2k. 8.2k for a buffed average range to break even with a BM. That's.... pretty underwhelming. In summary: when I apple/stopper vs when a BM apples/stoppers: I lose out 70k/32k damage every 5 seconds. What I'm getting at is that snipe hampers MM's damage in terms of scaling. Out of the 8 attacks a MM can pull off every 5 seconds, 1 of them will be capped. Also, a quote I've seen: "NL's can do more damage in one TT than one snipe." That's extremely discouraging to hear. Granted maybe snipe was more relevant in GMS, because not everyone had access to Godly (or better) gear in general. But i digress. In light of update 54, let's have a quick analysis of how marksmen fair with the new changes: NEW Bossing gameplay: Snipe's cooldown has now been lowered to 4seconds! This means effectively one attack cycle will be [Snipe (x1) > Strafe (x6)];Which takes a total of 4.2 seconds. In approximately One minute: 60s/4.2s ≈14 cycles can be performed. But wait, there's more! It is what it is, Strafe has increased from 100% base damage, to 125% base damage! This is a static amount and the addition 25% does not count to crit damage, so effectively one line of strafe will do 232% (old average) + 25% = 257%. Effectively, Per minute we have: 6x4x14 = 336 arrows (UNCHANGED) and 14 snipes, which leads to 336*257% = 86.352k% damage + 14x199k in a minute. VS (7x4x12) = 336; 336*232% = 77.952k% damage + 12x199k in a min Going again with my current stopper range, the comparision would be: 86.352k%*9600+ 14*199k = 11090k dpm 77.952%*9600+ 12*199k = 9883.380k dpm Please take into consideration these values are considered with SI, minimal lag and perfect casting with no delays. AKA it is highly unlikely such numbers will be reached. TLDR; I get to deal approximately 12% more damage now. Not bad. For a BM with a similiar range, he'd do: 500*232%*9600 =11136k dpm. Spoiler: Minor issues which still remain GRINDING GAMEPLAY: Now there might be a second argument: MM's are much better mobbers than BM's and can grind. Now I have a few issues with this statement, and this is because: 1. Dragon's breath is gimped, it mechanically does not make sense, as it fails to do its job of pushing monsters away from the MM at close range. PKB arguable puts in more work. It would be nice if both BM and MM could use it at point blank range, making this skill a lot more viable. 2. Piercing arrow is clumsy to use. It has a charge time of 1 second, and if release it at the wrong timing, will not even go off at all. Now this is the real kicker. Our "mobbing skill" is STILL extremely clunky and inconsistent. It requires precise avoiding of frames to prevent the move from FAILING. Note that the skill will not fire off at point blank range either. I will say this though, PA doesn't really need a buff as long as dragons breath would be more usable,as they both go in tandem. I really wish the two skills had better synergy. And thats not even considering the fact it is really hard to acquire HS at the endgame grinding spot, Ob4. (Or find a duo partner who has one). Yes rip fm button too. Yes MM > BM in terms of grinding, but its not saying much especially with such clumsily designed skills. Moving on, here are some plausible solutions for MM that I have thought of. I understand that some would really go against the spirit of royals *ahem* nostalgia, thus more than one suggestion is given. Spoiler: Old irrelevant proposals PROPOSALS: 1. Give MM a scaling Snipe. Aka, have snipe do damage based off a % instead of a static flat 200k. Comments: This gets rid of scaling issues, but makes MM lose its signature max damage hit. Would be interesting to see however as this would be the most balanced change to allow MM to scale uniformly to their range. 2. Lower the snipe CD Comments: Still doesn't resolve scaling issues, but just gives MM a general damage boost. I don't like this solution but a boost in damage is a boost in damage. This change might have one repercussion, making early game MM significantly stronger. I see a 4sec cooldown being thrown around a fair bit for the change in cooldown too. 3. Make snipes cooldown scale according to the MM's level. Comments: This one would be an interesting one to see. Apart from suggestion 1, I find this change good too as it includes scaling in a MM over levels, without touching its signature max damage line. 4. Increase the amount of lines strafe does. Comments: A nice change, but again not very GMS prebigbang like. I'd carefully like to add this was implemented post bigbang too. Thread lightly with this one. 5. Keep snipe with the same cooldown, but allow it to bypass the damage cap and do more damage according to the attack potion consumed. For example: 225k with a heartstopper. 250k with an apple/gelt. Comments: A unique approach to the skill while keeping the theme of doing 'max damage'. 6. Increase strafe damage for Marksmen. Comments: How does one increase the damage for strafe for only MM? I can think of one suggestion: Code it together with marksman advanced mastery to increase the % of damage done with a single line of strafe. Closing words: And that's my take on marksmen. I feel that we're in a pretty bad spot now. Pally's got a damage boost and are more playable with team buffs. Sairs got a rapid fire damage increase although their damage output was already solid back then. It hurts me to say it, but MM is not an attractive class to play. It comes with a low reward for a relatively hard playstyle. If not for SE, the sheer clumsiness of the class would render it unfavourable. The long deserved MM buff (which I didn't see coming) has finally arrived. Does it make MM OP. Nope. Does it make them more viable. Yup. Also, it is Clear we're still not as strong as BM's, but I feel that with the buff, MM's damage output has become somewhat more respectable. Go wild my fellow marksmen, and carry your team to victory as you slug it out with that next Horntail/zakum/continue to be an FMhoe. Cheers! -Sena Spoiler: too much math/words, didn't read Marksmen scale poorly and have unrewarding gameplay mechanics, making them one of the worse classes to invest time and effort into. However, now that they're finally getting a buff, this thread is more of an analysis instead of a feedback one *EDIT*: formatting, and added a 6th suggestion *EDIT* 28/6/18: New numbers added for the calculation for Marksmen damage.
I was actually really suprised not to see changes to MM in the update. Considering mages actually got a 1v1 damage buff. Madness. Pally really needed the buff, badly, we'll see if it was enough. It seems like every other "bad" class got some sort of fix besides MM. Shads got their boom step working on edges. Buccs got a slight fix, etc. I don't think they could make changes to strafe without it effecting BM as well tho right? Not that a BM would use strafe after 3rd. Some don't even get it at all. Making snipe scale with range would be interesting
Damage numbers is not everything you have to take in count when calculating the total DPS or DPM, for example, MM gets affected way less than BM when they get knock back. Having to recast hurricane a lot with that slow animation is a pain at zakum, making BM less efective bossers when they get stunned /debuffed or attacked overall. the difference in DPS between both archers is not that big overall
@ManxDrk I guess you didn't play a MM at Krex (for ex.) When we get hit and knocked, we not only lose the action of 1-2 strafes (~200k less damage in general) but also sometimes we get thrown at a spot that our arrows doesn't get to hit it (fake walls). @OP I don't think Snipe is the big issue for us, 5 secs cooldown isn't that bad (I'd agree to a change into lower level ones tho) But Strafe, that has a HUGE range of damage. We have 90% Mastery, but our damage can be 500% different from one line to another in the same strafe. I believe a good bump into strafe would be the best solution for the MM DPM. Either increase the general damage to 130~150% or increase the critical rate from 40 to 50%. About mobbing, It's disgustin that you hold piercing for 1sec, and then the mob walks up to you and it fails. I'd love to see Piercing and Dragon Breath to avoid knocking mobs, that would make MMs great mobbers. As a fellow Marksman, just these two things being changed, I feel we'd be as good as any other class.
@Shnang I main a MM too. One thing many people forget to calculate in is that snipe hits through weapon cancel. This gives MM's a significant advantage over many other classes. I still agree with several of your points on buffing MM though. Part of why I play MM is because it's not just a hold this button down gameplay. Even though during bossing we only have 2 main attacks, it's still more enjoyable than hitting play and walking away while hurricane does it's thing. I think to balance out MM against BM though, either adding a 5th arrow to strafe or increasing the % damage it does is the best way of going about it. I also totally agree that Piercing Arrow and Dragon's Breath should be able to work at point blank range. Those are such clunky skills to use because of it's interactions with mobs :/
Your thread is wrong at some parts. First of all MM has a slightly higher range than BM (they use dexX3.6 and BM use dexX3.4 as a formula) Second of all this part is wrong too: One arrow does 100%, with 55% chance to crit an additional 140%. On average one arrow (from strafe or hurricane) does 177%. One arrow has a 55% chance to crit an additional 240% and not 140% (100% base crit+140 from SE) with 232% on average. That means that even with 25 atk pot hurricane would do more damage than snipe.
I think once you reach 30k+ dmg per crit line on strafe, using only strafe will outdamage 6~7 strafes + snipe due to the (imo significant) delay time between casting these 2 skills. But that will just make us a high level Hunter.
Snipe is still stronger, 30kX4=120k and snipe hits like 200k. Even if you could hit 50k per hit snipe would still be better cause it would do more damage on average due to the unstable damage of strafe (50k on crit and like 15k on non crit)
I don't feel any delay using snipe , so it might be good to hear some feedback from others about this . Also , for starfe to outdps snipe you will have to reach 20k + range which is impossible on our server .
I'd not say impossible, but unlikely to happen. And yeah, when you get used to it you make it to fit snipe between strafe with zero delay.
Im play main With Marksman too First, sorry for my bad english ... About all was said earlier: I have one suggestion - Removes snipe skill and add an skill like "Ultimate strafe - advanced strafe with 6 hits for 4 job Marksman" See this video like example: See only 3 job (normal strafe with 4 hits) and 4 job ( ultimate strafe) Put Ultimate strafe with 6 hits and remove snipe(change snipe for ultimate strafe), i think it will resolve the main problem of all MM from server and still this class a lot of better and balanced in all therms... Other important think: The freeze skills from marksman at this server (Forstpery and Frezze arrow (3 job skill) not work correctly...
Other suggestion is : - When attack with strafe, make snipe be together like final attack( automatic)
@Nessi I just did a quick test, by using only strafe and strafe + snipe for 1 minute with booster and no SI (so 6 strafes per snipe), and it was roughly 83 strafes/min for strafe only 71 strafes + 13 snipes/min These are rough estimation by mere counting, but it still shows that there is no delay between casting the skills. I was probably being delusional because of the slow animation, my apology.
Hey there, Yup I'm aware of this.. But frankly this doesn't make too much a difference and I wanted to simplify some things, ... Let's say I compare a BM with the same dex and same wa as me. (DEX * 3.6 + STR) / 100] * Weapon Attack vs (DEX * 3.4 + STR) / 100] * Weapon Attack: 8k - 6.5k = 7.25k average vs 7.6k - 6.2k = 6.9k average. At base glance there's a slight difference, but since you seem to enjoy more math... Calcs including stopper: 10.6k - 8.6k = 9.6k average vs 10k - 8.2k = 9.1k average Calcs including apple: 12.3k - 10.1k = 11.2k average vs 11.6k - 9.5k = 10.55k average Don't know how this slipped me tbh LOL. Fixed should be corrected to: 13.666 x 232% ≈ 3170% 3170%*9.1k ≈ 288k 3170%*10.55k ≈ 335k So hurricane would outdamage snipe even more by 88k and 135k every 5 seconds with a stopper and apple respectively. BUT WAIT. Now we need to factor in the fact the remaining arrows from strafe do more damage than hurricane with an approximate value of the hurricane arrow doing about 5% lesser than strafe arrow, which I do not wish to calculate . I don't think the point of the thread is to bombard people with numbers, noone wants to see numbers in a "realistic/optimal scenario" as it's simply not achievable, but to provide a rough idea of the power level of a MM AND actual feedback after playing the class.
Yeahhhh as much as I want this to happen, I don't know what the Mods would feel about this one but I think it's not going to be favorable
Keeping in mind how long it takes for changes to be implemented on this server, I think that we should push for one (simple) buff instead of multiple ones. Marksmen's skills are worse suited for bossing than bowmasters' are, but I personally am okay with that. The change I most want to see is Piercing Arrow having no minimum range. I think this would be comparatively easy to incorporate (and therefore might actually happen). Dragon's breath having no minimum range would be really nice too, but again, we have to keep in mind the time it takes for changes to be made here. Whether you guys agree with me or not about Piercing Arrow being the best candidate for a buff, I think if we really want to see a change in Marksmen's skills, we have to decide on ONE thing and push for it together.
