So this is just a super hypothetical idea dump of things because my brain can't help it. Marksmen. Pretty overlooked class, probably just made to be mules, outshined and damaged by bowmasters, besides hurricane and a bird summon, they are basically the same exact class. This kinda bugs me, so heres an idea dump to give them more identity and utility 3rd job, sniper. Shave off 10 levels of eruption because thats basically only good in pirate pq and the damage scale all the way up to 30 is embarassing waste of sp, especially the last point. OR Shave off 10 levels of thrust but do not make the skill scale, its still +2 per level, 20 max speed, an advantage to rangers In place, a 10 point skill called prone shooting or something. Works like bullseye but with no auto target or casting. Holding down (keydown) your char goes prone and you can get up to an extra 15?/20?% damage increase, but also take 15?/20% more damage from all types of attacks, making bossing/tanking more risky. You also get up to 50 passive avoid points when prone. Mp cost on all skills while prone increases Mortal blow should be more lethal for snipers, just higher % and damage than the ranger skill with much higher MP cost, but doesnt get boosted til 4th job~ Have puppet look different just because (wooden training dummy?) Have golden hawk attack the farthest mob. Make dragons breath not proc mortal blow. Or of it must, change and improve the effects of mortal blow, making it a mob skill up to 3 in this scenario. Bowmasters as well Hextreme jungle training. Really difficult to unlock skill for 4th job passive buff skill. Increases attack distance of all skills (like blessing of amazon) except eruption, increases strafe damage by 10%?, increase w.def and m.def by 200, hp and mp by 200, extra avoid boost when prone. This is also when you get your motal blow boost (higher proc and really high single damage ((more than a strafe but high mp cost)) or decent damage buff but always crits) Maybe you also get a cool medal for completing the sb quest for this skill but its stats are whatever as usual 10 hands 10 avoid 1 dex 1 str 50 hp/mp (Class specific medals and quests should be a thing, just for fun and variety, not super op stats or rewards tho. Like wks protecting npcs from zombie attacks, bandits sneaking/stealing treasure) Blind works on bosses but only 5% at max and increases crit rate against enemies in darkness by 5% at max (party members can take advantage as well) can stack with sharp eyes *if* blind and se are maxed but crit damage doesnt stack and any crits in the 5% boost from blind will be basic critical damage, not se crit damage. This seems fair and helpful for high level bossing like ht runs, but not a massive advantage, just a slighly higher curve and dpm over a long time and possible miss/stance effect contributing for that, at the reward of maxing blind/se Call me a blasphemer but i think making frostprey just normalprey and not being ice element and not freezing mobs. blind (or stun, but pref blind) is cooler imo a passive addition to darkness resistance built into 4th job's marksmanship skill. reduced chance to be afflicted by darkness (or immunity) would just be great SNEAK/BLINK. This is going to sound insane but teleport for marksmen. High mp cost,delay between uses, passive 60 avoid boost, slightly less distance than mage tele So really not much at all increase in damage, but distinctive class improvements Ok thanks for reading this junk! As an aside I just really don't like any skill that's considered useless and all skills under these labels should be reconsidered and reworked to have value so they can revitalize a class or ideas about builds in general
To keep things even, here are some counterpart bowmaster changes At max level, hamstring can slow boss attack rate down by 5%, and movement speed by a small amt Hamstring can also completely stop a normal mob at low rate, like 10% at max Inferno/phoenix have dot on normal mobs (edit: hey! they made this a thing!) Concentrate adds more w.att Silver hawk/phoenix attack closest mobs Thrust also adds 10 jump and 20 avoid for rangers at max level Have arrow rain be stronger than eruption by like 15-20% Have bm dragon breath do more damage//OR hit more mobs than mm, and proc hamstring when active Concentrated fire damage on one mob if mb procs w/ inferno
So what do you guys think? The changes are very situational and small but add a lot of depth and character to the class, and a tiny potential for MM to compete with BMs for damage
I think marksman are completely fine with their own identity. I think every class would like % numbers buff, but identity isn’t the issue. Hurricane Vses snipe/strafe rotation are the core skills for their entire game play and are unique to each their own. Eruption is amazing cause its more reliable on flat surfaces. Arrow rain is amazing on flying targets Sniper are better at Himes as a result. Rangers are better at typhoons and WS. Golden hawk is a bad skill. Dirt Low damage and only stuns non bosses. Just use Frostpret, some people dont even max it hawk. Don’t buff mortal blow. Mortal blow is awful. It only procs if you’re too close. If anything remove it all together, but that ruins the original GMS. Hextreme: I’m not sure if this is a future skill but royals will never implement future or self thought of skills. Blind: I dont see a reason to change it. Its as used as NL venom star. If you want to edit all useless skills you’d have to change every class. Frosprey freezing is amazing. it freezes summoned mobs and makes them fall down and slows mobs down in ToT so you can kite better. Blink? I think we should just give MM a flash jump, but does a somersolt kick from pirates in mid air while doing it for style points. Thrust is amazing. i scrolled my pet for jump so i have base 140/120. Theres also literally nothing better to max. Dragons Breathe is useless though. A touch up would be nice. But PKB is pretty reliable Piercing arrow is the third best skill for crossbowmen. It clears mobs. It does not seem you know this class at all. They already have more utlity than BMs. BMs have more flat damage. MMs: Can clear mobs Can do dmg thru watt cancel strafe walk to avoid zak stuns BM: can deal more damage with one button I don’t mind the current state of MM gameplay. Maybe increase the numbers slightly. But identity is not the issue. And I suggest against any color changes. BM: Making bosses attack slower will do nothing to gameplay but make BMs use less pots. Concentrate: Meh. Its fine at it is, and I don’t want any skills to be stackable with attack pots. Theres no explanation or reason why arrow rain should do more than eruption. Same with dragons breathe hitting more mobs than MM. Birds already hit the closest target and hit multiple mobs. Situational tweaks should never be implemented because if its such a minor issue/tweak if there a reason to even change it. Your suggestions are not reasonable or minor. Adding damage/hp randomly, a teleport, color coded changes, more additional uses on sister skills on bowmaster; do not seem reasonable or minor.
MM were never meant to be equal to BM at all game stages in bosses. Snipe is what puts them ahead of BM by far during early to mid game, but of course falls off a bit in late game. But I am not really complaining. They arent actually as far behind in damage as some people think. The changes you give here (Prone shooting especially) would overwhelmingly give them power over BM’s at bosses which I dont think is really fair. I agree with basically everything @Cynn wrote.
Until 4th job and specifically snipe, pierce, and blue bird, they are basically mirror classes. I stay away from ideas that are just straight damage increases, that's a slippery slope. This was also a fun idea dump and not an actual suggestion thread, I dont expect anyone to take like that, the title alone says that much Don't disagree about hurricane vs strafe/snipe and that's why i didnt bring it up, not sure what you mean in the 2nd paragraph. Im not trying to change any core mechanics. I dont have any problems with eruption or rain. The damage increase by level is bad, so to mitigate that really lacking 30 point commitment to a 20 point, and thrust to 10 to make for a new skill was fair. Eruption has interesting range but probably best used at typhons for training after ppq. Yes golden hawk isnt great, i understand that lol... And frostprey completely destroys it... Yes. I understand all this, and didn't hint otherwise. Mortal blow: Why not improve something instead of remove it? Bigbang logic... It's a really unique idea and skill that helps the close range weakness archers have. Stylistically giving it a buff in 4th inside another skill is helpful, more true to t2ge class and not op... To me those core tenants go a long way in the overall love and appeal of a skill and class Extreme jungle training idea was a 4th job skill idea you can unlock like all classes have. Do a specialized quest, get a 4th job skill. Very modest and fitting buffs, not to be taken as somethingbthat would ever happen in royals, these were all just pet ideas to fill and round out the sniper vibe and small buffs to potentially contend with BMs Frostprey is great, I don't disagree. We also have blizzard though and the opposite bird idea is really meh to me. Having hawk/prey hitting farthestt instead of closest is just a small technical change to make a very minor but stylistic and functional mechanic to differ playstles between the classes Blink, its more like sneaking thru the environment/map than loudly flashjumping and somersault kicking everythinh, which is just what bigbang did as well and we all know how fun that is. It's a tactical/placement skill as well, and the high mp cost would make it less likely to be spammed for all movement, but it would be an option Thrust is great but i also wanted to debuff it for marksmen so the blink payoff would be worth it. You can always scroll or get speed equips but the concept being Bms are the quicker flashier legolas types and marksmen more deliberate Dragons breath is great in concept, and pkb is too. Db not proccing mb would be a huge and preferred improvement to my 2nd suggestion Piercing arrow is great and I have nothing against it and not sure what you mean, and I had a 4th job Mm in bera in gms, I do know the class What you said about the two classes in comparison are true, the only distinction i wanted to make between the two in my thread were basically: Mm: slightly more concentrated 1v1 damage, with rounded buffs in strange/weak areas of other skills Bm: mobbing buffs, dot buffs, and some flat attack buffs to be totally different than the situational attack buff and risk mm take with prone shooting. And I'd have to disagree, I think my ideas (not suggestions, although id be honored for them to be considered) are modest and both reasonable and minor, while making a big difference without any core value or skill changes to the class. I hope I made things seem more clear, and I appreciate the reply!
Well its really only a 10% buff to strafe, since snipe cant break cap, and prone shooting puts you at risk for higher damage and death to deal extra strafe damage, on paper it sounds vast but it would be very different to a normal unwashed, unfunded MM who is actually in a boss fight. So its a flat 10% to strafe with jungle training, which is on a 4 line attack, which makes damage output allover the place especially with crits As well as a possible extra 15/20% buff to strafe (this is basically the only skill you'll use to boss with prone except snipe which wont be affected) So a possible 25 to 30% buff just to strafe with dynamic skills and skill usage that cant always be used, like ship, and gives you some mobility and time trouble if you need to move a lot or get knocked around a lot or to go unprone to avoid extra damage I tried to make it near equal Bm damage output from just holding hurricane vs all the managing and rotating and a mm would need to do as well as paying closer attention to telegraphing attacks to avoid them to make it worth the effort to close the damage gap Which is also why I made bm qol counterbuffs to be squarer
As someone who was a Marksman main before the new source gave us any kind of buffs at all, I think what the team has done to even out the classes and buff the underused ones (MM, paladins, and buccs) has been pretty balanced in my view. Marksman are way more viable than they once were in the current meta. The DPS difference between MM/BM is now pretty balanced, while still giving BM's a slightly higher single target DPS during end game in line with the theme of the two classes.
I guess I should make it more clear, this is not a buff suggestion thread, and not a serious one at that. This is, as the title implies, a very dreamy idea dump for marksmen conceptually that doesn't alter core gameplay or make them op