Idea NERF HEADSHOT

Yes because clearly my mind is closed when I said myself that archer is OP right on my post last time. My opinion is that archers instakill is OP just less OP than pyro and assassin, and I tried to explain that very carefully by going through your post and pointing out where it differs in my experience. After all, the best person to know the class inside out is one who plays the class (In my case for several thousand games)

same with me, I'm just saying the opposite, that they're less OP

Your stat refers to the fact that archers instakill is annoying and unfair, not that it's more OP than the other classes, which is what this discussion was about. As I already stated, I agree that archers instakill is OP, but less OP than pyro and assassin. If you prefer to disagree please continue to argue with me, that's absolutely fine. My mind however is not closed because I never disagreed that archer wasn't OP in the first place. I'm always open to new perspectives, and you can't prove otherwise with an irrelevant statistic

 

I have not seen one decent rework that would take away archer's instakill, yet still give it a purpose ingame without helplessly attatching bandaids to other "OP" aspects of the game. Without archer's instakill, why would you go archer? Ninja / Assassin / Other Soldiers have a much better chance of inflicting much more damage against an enemy soldier than an archer would, even if all their shots to 7+ hearts, they will most likely only hit the player 1-3 times, and rarely if the player knows how to juke. And honestly, it isn't that hard to avoid headshots, just learn and adapt.

 

I Have two ideas for archer both very different. 1 is why aren't headshots able to be blocked with a sword? You hardly see them coming but when you do they should be blockable... (Obviously its a game but im going to use real life as an example) Pyro is more or less made up so i wont use it. Assassin is closer to a real life warrior. It has little armor but good shoes (for running) and a extremely light but sharp weapon. if the soldier (represented by the class heavy) sees him coming he can use his shield (sword) to block it's attack then hit with his weapon thus killing (since low armor). Makes sense right? Ok so lets take the same soldier who skilled at war(pvp) just killed the assassin. He sees an arrow coming uses his shield to block it moves forward blocks moves forward ECT. But in CTF theres no way to block it and its just dumb. Elf and Dwarf can block headshots but there both donor classes. At the very least heavy should be able to block it since it has heavier armor and a heavier sword.

My suggestion 2.
Remove headshots (snipes) in general. just code it so archer at full draw does 4 hearts of damage no matter what so in 3 hearts the player is killed (not that hard to do ESPECIALLY because every archer says he/she has a ton of skill.) which i could see as fair. and add a cool down (like pyro) so they cant bow spam so much or lower the punch 2

 

So you didn't like Admiral_Munson's rework? .-.
(@graycows so you see this too)

It's a seemingly paradoxical situation, yet I seem to agree with both sides of the conflict. Firstly, archer's headshotting as it is, is overpowered and unfair to most people; the average player tends not to be a pro at dodging arrows, and there's no escaping a 1-shot from a skilled archer. However its instakill still has a use. As Kev said, of course it's the only reason one plays archer; it's the only way you get any kills with the class, which was built for pvp only when absolutely necessary for self-defense. And if your team is in need of a speedy flag recovery, if you can catch up to the carrier within shooting range with those archer feet of yours, you can headshot the carrier and save the day. If you take away archer's instakill, its effectiveness is chopped in half--worse than that, actually.

At the same time, ever since the birth of elf, archer can't be nerfed/reworked as easily as it could be before. Elf is very effective in non-instakill bow work. In fact, if it's played well (which is what I've been practicing lately), an above-1.0 KDR can actually be achieved. A rework like @Admiral_Munson 's (this'd be more relevant in your rework thread, but here it is anyway), for example, is great, but it seems to make archer inferior to elf, or at the very least put it on the same level.

Granted, archer can still remain to be a free ranged class for starters while you can pay for an upgrade to elf (which slightly encourages pay2win, although elf takes much more skill than current archer imo), the elf class will probably become much more popular and nearly replace archer. There will still be the crowd of people who can't or won't donate, as well as those who own elf but wish to challenge themselves with a weaker class, but I believe archer will become more degraded than most would think.

 

My thing with archer is I never really understood the point Yes some (and i mean a very select few) actually try and kill the flag carrier. and might capture if there is bad defense. But 9 time out of 10 an archer just finds a spot like under where a sponge drops the player and just shoots their and to be honest thats not helping the team at all... its just collecting kills. Imagine if every archer on your team was a heavy or medic on defense or a soldier on offence That team would be SO much stronger than just having archers doing nothing but collecting kills. A big example of this is on the map kingdom islands you see archer just shooting at the spawn exit not even aiming shooting in the same spot that is doing absolutely nothing to help just making it harder to get out and play. And my opinion is if archers insta kills arent blockable by a none donor class like classes that people paid money for all insta kill blocking should be removed. so it would be more fair to those who paid money to instakill but be blockable. Sorry of that sounds dumb but thats what i think. but that will never happened and archer will never get nerfed. Since i started ctf in 1.2.5 people have been complaining about archer but it has never been nerfed but the donor classes have. In no way am i saying every archer is like this there are some that do a great job recovering the flag.

 

First off to be fair 'my' Archer rework wasn't really mine, it was a collaboration between me and others (mainly @LordCh4os).

I agree, even the Archer rework me and chaos came up with does not address the fact that other classes in the game such as Soldier that were previously be more harshly countered by Archer, would have to be changed to not completely break the game.
@pookeythekid hit on this point already, that nerfing Archer in any way will make it inferior by comparison to other classes, or Elf, for example and would not make the class as useful as it currently is.

Agreed. But that is only the case because Archer's instant kill is what makes it relevant in a game that is literally designed around instant kills and taking the headshots away without changing other stuff wouldn't really work.

This statement is somewhat true. How easily you can avoid headshots depends largely on the map you are playing as well as the skill of the Archer. Way back when on Unholy Faith it was VERY hard to avoid Archer headshots even if you were strafing better than a professional ice skater. This was the case because the map was narrow and didn't have much cover so it was open season for any skilled Archer. I remember once I went Archer, sat in some corner and practically bow-spammed by way to a 15 kill streak with no aiming required.

Of course to avoid any chance of Archer headshot abuse all maps would have to be closed in and have plenty of cover, but this should not have to happen simply because one class has a broken and ridiculously unbalanced kill mechanic.

Personal Take Away:

I think a good place to start is to remove Archer's headshot but in order to have it work in the game the other classes have to be changed so that a nerfed version of Archer can interact with them effectively and fairly.
That was what I was trying to do with that Archer rework. I wasn't suggesting that it be implemented as a single glance but as one of many others because if you want to change something as fundamental to CTF as Archer's instant kill you've got to change some other stuff or it screws things up right?
In other words, nerfing headshot should be one of the first steps taken in order to effectively rework CTF to remove instant kills and replace them with more balanced mechanics that encourage teamwork and makes the game more balanced for everyone.

By the way, @BAWSS5 look - I did my bracket quoting correctly! Are you proud of me sensei?

 

nice triplepost

 

I've got a few reasons why blocking with a sword is gonna be not a good idea. The first is that that's going to come down to ping again, whether the arrow lands before you block or not if you see and attempt to block at the last second. A lot of people don't like the ping element of assassin so adding one to archer may not well be worth it. Secondly, blocking is being changed for 1.9 so there's going to be a whole change on that front too. Thirdly and probably most importantly it doesn't fix the other aspects of archer that people don't actually like. I considered this approach before and decided it wasn't a good idea to rework. As for the dwarf and elf blocks, yes I agree that we should probably have a free fix to it (though how that could be achieved I don't know as of yet) and those classes themselves do need a rework as well. It's probably worth reworking those classes as well as the other classes considered OP at the same time, but obviously on different threads.

First and foremostly, archer is meant to counter everyone long ranged and be countered short range (sorry to bring that up again, but it's important for my explanation). This would mean that the archer would obviously have to hit the player at least 3 times from full health to kill, with steaks and such added to that meaning they could take an additional for every steak. I'm afraid that this just doesn't do enough damage to make archer able to counter everything long ranged as it's supposed to. I usually attack people from a much fairer distance, maybe 60 blocks, and I think it could be quite a struggle for some players in that instance to hit one player quite a few times. At the same time, short range you're also messing it up because archer can now deal 4 hearts true damage short range, meaning that they're suddenly a fair bit harder to counter. This would mean archer would lose a lot of it's long range potency, and gain some short range potency. If I'm honest this doesn't seem like an archer anymore! I'm gonna focus on the part I've bolded just for a minute. What I think has happened here is you've made it less powerful than it should be because you've heard some archers say they have a ton of skill. Now whether or not these archers are skilled or not is irrelevant, as realistically the classes should be designed for players who are not experts at the class to be usable and fulfill. A good player can make any class OP after all. For new archers who aren't experienced in a bow, they're not likely to be able to hit a lot, and if you're asking them to hit another player at least 3 times from full health to kill them, I just don't see them being able to hit that much, which would make archers unlikely to be able to affect much long range as they were intended to, except for the very good archer who could hit a soldier 3 times over 60 blocks away whilst he's attempting to strafe. Removing the punch 2 or adding a cooldown, whilst solving some of the other problems archer has, actually makes it worse in the situation because it makes it harder for archer to counter short range, meaning that you undo the extra power you give to archer with the 4 true damage no matter the distance. Without the knockback, players get to archer faster and can kill the archer relatively quickly. The bowspam prevention would further mean that you've got less chance to knockback so again they'll get to you easier. Archer is countered short range (as it should be) and this would keep it that way. The end result is a class which has a very limited effect long range, and still easily countered in the short. In other words, I think it goes too far the other way and makes it so archers are actually not powerful enough. It does a better job of fixing some of the other archer problems, but not all of them. You're also going to make camping a bigger deal because for newer archers the only real way to be able to consistently hit at the 60 or 70 block ranges is to make use of choke points, and so they'll camp around them.

Both your ideas are good attempts, but I just don't think they're going to have the desired effect. The first gives archer a ping element and doesn't really fix any of the problems associated with archer other than the headshot mechanics overpowered nature, which is also debatable. For the second, it makes a much more radical change, taking it too far the other way

 

So your saying that archer should not be blockable at all just because they may be an issue with ping sometimes? Just thinking out loud here... but if thats the case shouldnt the ability to block assassin be removed since ping may affect it.

 

It's a working fix. It just isn't optimal.

 

I'm also just looking for something that can be added right away. I dont see why the ability to block (or use the shield in 1.9 should not be allowed) It would take good timeing/skill to use. And argue to your ping I can block headshots just fine with elf... and never have a ping issue.

 

Then you don't have bad ping. Out of interest, what do you get regularly?

 

48

 

That's godly. Blocking won't affect you

 

But people who have a good ping shouldnt be allowed to block since some dont...