How to deal with the Soul Arrow controversy and other suggestions from a BM main

As discussed in earlier Archer-focused feedback some Archers were happy with the update while some not, I'll suggest something that could make both happy so I'll go directly to the point and try to be as clearer as possible:
Also, let's put the lore thing out of the way as Staff didn't consider this to make this particular change therefore it has no relevance in this discussion.

Let's focus on what really matters.

Pros of new Soul Arrow:
1. More "useful" function aka Retaining attack bonus from arrows
2. Uses less arrows (at least this is specially true with Bowmaster's Hurricane)
3. Lets you carry less arrow stacks in your use inventory, freeing up some space that can be used to hold pots, other stuff, etc...
4. People who accepted the change are happy with this new update. Particularly those who are on the top ranks and want to maximize every single digit in their range.

Cons of new Soul Arrow:
1. Archers are no longer able to attack without arrows, as the new function requires 200 arrows in order to be casted. If you happen to run out of arrows during a boss run, you are reduced to nothing but a literal SE mule, if you run out of arrows while grinding outside, you are forced to stop just for the sake of restocking them.
2. Previous non-arrow users who where used to the previous function now are forced to carry arrows at all times due to #1
3. People who where used to the old function of the skill are now unhappy because of #1 and #2, particularly those who play the class in a more relaxed manner and don't care much about maximizing DPS, they could apple or whatever if they wanted to maximize DPS. If they are in less numbers than the "true BM mains who happily accepted the change", it doesn't matter as they are still a part of the playerbase. Don't know if this is true, but it' also possible some BM's have quitted because of this.
4. Marksmen don't really benefit from this change, as some have Marksmen users stated that they would simply waste the same amount of arrows on non-bossing scenarios such as standard mob-grinding if they didn't simply cast the skill at all, this makes sense because: 1) crossbows have slower attack speed than bows, 2) Marksmen rely on Strafe+Snipe, those skills consume 4 arrows and 1 arrow, respectively, which at all times will never consume more arrows than Bowmasters Hurricane in the same timeframe.
5. If mass dispelling where to happen in a extremely short timeframe, Archer would have wasted more arrows casting the skill than if they simply didn't use it at all, this can happen in Horntail and with CWKPQ boss "Captain Gallywacks", though rarely it's still a possibility.
6. Archers now have one more buff to cast which means losing precious DPS uptime when they need to rebuff, with mass dispelling it becomes even worse.

How to remove cons #1, #2 #3:
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Instead of copy-pasting one skill into another, make a new skill exclusively for the new function of "Soul Arrow", as you may have guessed, you may change the skill name to properly fit it (suggestions I have in mind for this new skill name are: "Dark Arrow", "Shadow Arrow", "Anti-Soul Arrow" "Void Arrow", etc...) and place 20SP into it if it were to be placed in the 2nd Job skill tree, wait a second
Why 2nd Job?
Following the standard non-Final Attack build, you have 121 2nd Job SP to distribute as follows:
20SP Bow Mastery
20SP Bow Mooster
20SP Power Knock-Back
30SP Arrow Bomb
That leaves us with 31 SP to fill 20SP into good old Soul Arrow (1), there's now 11SP left
If Soul Arrow (1) isn't maxed or not even used at all, you can dump those 31SP into whatever skill you want, putting Shadows Stars err I mean Soul Arrow (2), that way even you can fill a 31SP skill if there was any...
Therefore with 31SP leftover and having pretty much the opposite effect of good old Soul Arrow, players can decide on investing SP on whatever skill they want, deciding if you want to optimize your arrow usage while retaining attack bonus or forfeit arrow usage and never use them again at the expense of losing the attack bonus they offer, you can still decide if you want to use one or the other, if not then place it on 4th Job skill tree which makes sense at least for the Bowmaster as your arrow consumption will abruptly increase once you learn Hurricane, if placed into 4th Job tree make it 30SP, I'm pretty sure BM has spare points to waste after maxing SE, Hurricane, BE and MW, after that you can max out the new Soul Arrow (2) while other less-relevant bossing skills can be delayed 10 levels later, such as Dragon's Breath (doesn't work on bosses) Phoenix (doesn't do much damage when bossing) and Concentrate (the att bonus of +26 for 240 seconds +5min cd is worse than those of Red Cider +35att/5min, Heartstopper +60att/1min, Apple +100att/10min, Gelt +120att/10min and Narc +140att/8min, respectively Hint: buff Concentrate please). If any Archer players quitted because of this, they can be welcomed back if this were to be implemented.

How to remove con #4:
Decrease arrow usage for Marksmen in order to cast the skill. They use less arrows than BM's so it would be only fair to decrease arrow requirement for them.

How to remove con #5:
Should make the skill resistant to dispel? If yes, make sure to also immunize NL's Shadow Stars to dispel as it's pretty much the same problem for them.

Con #6 can't be removed, but it would help increasing duration of the skill for both classes in general. Anywhere from 300 to 600 secs would be ideal.

Let me know what you think about this. Any feedback will be appreciated.
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And last but not least...

I don't why but something tells me that Staff will keep pulling off their "consensus that x change it doesn't fit with the identity of y class", however they want, and whenever they want, they don't see any problem with scraping a very unique class skill with a very specific niche purpose which is part of their "class identity", in favour of making a literal copy-paste of another character's skillset which is "more meta", and also losing it's identity. Why one was deemed "unfitting" for the identity of the class and the other was straightforward implemented without even asking if the current BM population wanted it is pretty much controversial, if you ask me. ANYWAYS, that was just some unconstructive ranting but more of a critic to their methods of implementing the stuff they propose.

 

I have a few questions that I hope you can put into consideration.
1. How long does it take to reload on arrows if we reload at normal potion shops?
2. How many slots of arrows do we need to put in our inventory because of this change?
3. How much time will our arrows last because of 2)?
4. How much DPS uptime do we lose by needing to cast ~two additional soul arrows in a span of 10minutes?

 

I'm ok with dispel, you're suposse to watch your screen while playing and be attentive, the risk of losing your arrows/stars is your own fault and literally one of the few risk besides dying when running any boss as a ranged also, if bowmasters doesn't want a +6 att buff I'm pretty sure any other would take it without doubts under the same conditions (buying 4-5 stacks of arrows at showa every 2 hours or so) i would even mule all my dummy scrolls just to get more slots to carry arrows. Anyways, if you don't want it you can just buy 2k regular arrows at any potion shop.

You're a 2D character who literally shoot arrows, you are suppose to carry arrows with you, it is like a gunslinger asking to shoot their guns without bullets or assassins throwing stars out of nowhere.

 

I wasn't a heavy arrow user, I used to buy like 20k worth of arrows before the update? Before entering any boss runs I would either go Showa or Shrine. The thing is that sometimes I didn't carry any arrows at all, now I am only forced to buy arrows at all times, even If they grant me attack, I no longer have the commodity of not having to deal with arrows in my inventory.
Also, since Marksmen uses less arrows, they take less time recharging.

You can carry as many arrows as you want, as long as you have enough space for them, but me being a compulsive storekeeper who loots every single thing on the ground, storing arrows is sort of difficult for me as I don't have an easy time optimizing my use inventory space. Again, now I no longer have the commodity of not having to deal with carrying arrows at all, despite I used the attack bonus from red/diamond arrows before the update, I would like to have this feature back. Also again, Marksmen would need about half the arrows a BM would carry. I don't play MM so I can't exactly guarantee this is the case.

Hard to determine, depends on your level, range, which boss you're going how many attackers go there and the quality of those attackers themselves, so thought it seems like a straightforward question, it has so many variables on it. Maybe 10k stacks should be enough for Duo Shao with a well-funded Lv180NL but I'm no longer actively playing so I'm not sure if I'm being accurate at all. Again again, marksmen arrows will last longer assuming they recharge the same numbers of arrows as BM

By sheer counting each frame, Soul Arrow has a duration of 37 frames before you can do anything else, that's slightly more than half a second. Two additional Soul Arrows would be 74 frames, as a matter of fact Hurricane fire rate is of 8.33 arrows per second, on the other hand, it takes roughly 19 startup frames on Hurricane before the 1st arrow is visible, so you would lose more than a second er even one and a half second if we consider the instances where we stop hurricaning to specifically recast Soul Arrow, which with the current 120 second duration, it only gets worse as the boss run extends longer.

All in all, I think you are entirely missing the point here.

 

For your information:

Inventory prepared before Horntail Run:




Inventory after Horntail run (70 minutes, lesser dispel than usual):

 

Can we please lay to rest the notion of whatever this "casual player" is? I don't understand why players assume that they're a "casual player" just because they're not in Fryslan or Oblivion or whatever the top guild nowadays is. As someone who actually casually played a BM until 150, I just find this whole notion to be ridiculous. I probably would have just continued to use regular arrows because I'm that much of a "casual player" (i.e. lazy bum). If you run out of arrows while bossing, don't forget to buy arrows before your run next time. If you run out of arrows while grinding, you now have to *gasp* return to town and restock? The absolute horror of it all! Because the same concept didn't apply for potions, right? I don't know about you, but I never went even close to using up all of the potions and elixirs in my use slots during a single grind session. And having to carry arrows around now would not change this fact. If you manage to use up your entire inventory of arrows, potions, and elixirs in a single grind session then I genuinely congratulate you. But I also sincerely ask that you follow the system warnings that suggest you take a break after a couple of hours.

The whole basis of this argument is that the new Soul Arrow mechanic has certain drawbacks to a BM's DPS caused by its new inconveniences. That by definition makes you a min maxer just like all these other "top players" that you scorn. If you don't like the new Soul Arrow mechanic, sure. There are good arguments that players have made on behalf of reverting certain aspects of this new mechanic. But creating this false dichotomy between "casual players" and "top players" is just not it. If the data reveals that the new Soul Arrow mechanic does indeed cut down a BM's DPS despite the buffs, then sure it's something significant to consider. But otherwise just say that you're lazy and you don't like the changes and move on. That's honestly fine. There's no need for all this show.

 

Soul arrow lasts 200 seconds though. When you get dispelled you have to recast SE again (and booster if you're MM) and maybe MW so the hurricane start up time is still going to be the same. I wasn't on the camp of using arrows before the change, but I did bring 1-2 sets for the times dispel timers would be too close to bother spending time rebuffing soul arrow again so I think the principle is the same again. Don't rebuff soul arrow if you expect two dispels within a very short period of time, just SE and continue going until the last dispel hits.

 

Actually yes, before the update, you could just have many arrows on your inventory without needing to recast a buff every 120 seconds. FYI, Hurricane fire rate is 8.33 arrows per second, every Soul Arrow cast takes near 37 frames before you can input anything else, so 2 Soul Arrows waste like 74 frames approximately, so indeed every 2 SA you lose more than 1 second worth of Hurricane, now let's suppose I go on a HT run which should take between 30 minutes or can last up to 1 hour.
If I take 30 minutes to complete the run and optimally recast SA every 120 seconds, I should lose on the least:
37*15=555 frames which is exactly 9 minutes and 15 seconds, before the SA-revamp, you didn't need to waste 9 minutes and 15 seconds recasting a 2min buff.
If it takes one hour, it takes exactly 1110 frames, thats 18 minutes and 30 seconds if my math doesn't fail, 18 minutes and 30 damn seconds you lose where you could instead keep holding the trigger on hurricane.
This is still accurate for a 2min SA but not for 200sec, can just recalc very quickly

Actually yes, before the update, you could just have many arrows on your inventory without needing to recast a buff every 200* seconds. FYI, Hurricane fire rate is 8.33 arrows per second, every Soul Arrow cast takes near 37 frames before you can input anything else, so 2 Soul Arrows waste like 74 frames approximately, so indeed every 2 SA you lose more than 1 second worth of Hurricane, now let's suppose I go on a HT run which should take between 30 minutes or can last up to 1 hour.

If I take 30 minutes to complete the run and optimally recast SA every 200 seconds, I should lose on the least:

37*9=259 frames which is exactly 4 minutes and 19 seconds, before the SA-revamp, you didn't need to waste 4 minutes and 15 seconds recasting a 200sec buff.

If it takes one hour, it takes exactly 518 frames, thats 8 minutes and 18 seconds if my math doesn't fail, its 8 minutes and 18 damn seconds you lose where you could instead keep holding the trigger on hurricane.

OH AND THE BEST PART, I'm not even counting mass dispels and each time the Hurricane startup animation (thats 19 frames FYI) needs to be resetted because of having to stop to recast SA. So in the practice, in reality you're gonna lose more than 5 minutes worth of Hurricane DPS on your average 30-min HT run and more than 10 minutes on your screwed HT 1hr run. Is this enough data for you or do I have to record myself playing the game and showing you frame by frame just to prove this point to you?

FIXED***

 

Sorry for not playing the game, I just the read the info for the patch notes, I'll fix my numbers accordingly brb

 

Yes, absolutely. How can I trust your calculations when you don't even realize Soul Arrow lasts 200 seconds?

 

frames is not the best thing to use when thinking of timing, better to use milliseconds since there are different frames of reference for...frames since some old games run on 24 frames / second, 30 / second, 60 frames / second, etc.

I am assuming you mean 60 frames a second since thats more standard now when it comes to timing so with your 120s soul arrow you are losing 555 frames per HT run which is actually just a bit under 10 seconds lost not 10 minutes lost.

 

I very much agree with @Sen . I was reading the feedback and I was trying to understand what exact inconveniences a 'casual player' face.

10k arrows (JUST 5 SLOTS) can last you a maximum of 2hrs 45mins. If we run out of arrows, return to town and buy some regular arrows. What's so difficult about that? I would rather think that non-casual players would find returning to town and reloading to be a pain (more so if they wanted red/blue/diamond arrows)

If you are casual, 5 slots don't mean a thing. Just hold 5 sets of pot less or stash 5 scrolls somewhere else.

Let's just round up the Soul arrow cast time to 1s from 0.62s. In that time, you can use 8.33 arrows. Assume that in a boss fight, you shoot arrows 50s out of 60s (the remaining 10s for movements and knockbacks or whatever). So in 10minutes or 600s, you would have been shooting arrows for 500s. That is 4165 arrows before the soul arrow change. With the soul arrow change, you now have to waste 2 additional seconds rebuffing soul arrow, and that is 17 arrows lost. To put into perspective, you lose 17/4165 of your damage or 0.4% of your damage. Assuming you are doing 180k dps, that's 734 dps lost. That 1 wa from regular arrows easily covers that deficit. Even more so if you choose to use better arrows.

Sigh. Just my opinion, but I think the only people who have accepted the updates are the ones who aren't too emotional about the whole matter. I personally think that this soul arrow change is hardly a pain, but as a person who multi clients a lot and hates moving all my characters, I would love there to be the option of choosing not to reload the arrows.

Support mule meta and change it back to how it was originally while increasing the capacity of arrows if the game client allows for it.

 

Yes I know this, this is hard to explain but the frames you see in-game or the frames the game was coded to run doesn't affect this general rule: All games have 60FPS-based animations for the sake of simplicity and compatibility, since all those numbers are multiples of 60, in the case of 24fps I'm not sure but 12 is also a multiple of 60. For example, Mario Kart 64 despite being a game to run at 30FPS and lower on the original hardware,it doesn't prevent you from applying the proper gameshark codes to make it run at 60FPS, despite the fact original game was never meant to run at 60FPS on the original hardware. Therefore if an render/animation is coded to run at a framerate that is not 60fps but instead a multiple like 15, 20 or 30 , I can pretty much guarantee that game will be able to render the same textures and animations if it were to run at 60FPS.

Frames is that thing I know best when recording game data, I don't know if there is such thing as a v62-based Maplestory frame data library so all I can give you are roughly estimates by manually counting each recording's frame by frame. I'm pretty sure Maplestory runs at 60FPS because 2d-games tend to consume less gpu and it's practical for the engine to render them in 60FPS. If someone has more info about at what FPS run Maplestory, I also would like to know it but I'm pretty sure it's either 59.94 or 60FPS by just watching with my sheer eye

 

What we're counting frames in a casual mushroom game now? last I checked this wasn't smash

 

Hikari replied to this for you, but I don't think you understood based on your latest post. You're saying one frame == one second... If you assume 60 fps 518 frames == 8.63 seconds over the 60 minutes as Hikari noted, not 8 minutes as you were saying. I think recording yourself playing the game may be very informational for you.

 

the only person that say "mm dont need but" is nasist..

 

it takes 4 minutes and 19 seconds to cast soul arrow 9 times? man imagine how long dragon roar gonna take, prob 30 minutes for 9 roar

 

It's quite sad you would quit just because of this feedback thread. But seeing at how rude you are, it probably is for the greater good.

 

I mean delethe the WHOLE thread not that specific post lmao but if you for whatever reason find this thread useful you may not delete it it's just that I messed up many times and I'd rather delete it at this point

 

FYI I already stopped actively playing Royals like 1 month ago, it's not the post in itself it's just the several flaws I didn't notice while thinking of it. Anyways, I would like need a HUGE reason to get motivated to play back again and this update is not one of them.