Tree of Savior Forum

Higher monster damage per party member to buff support classes

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#1

At least during the early 60-70 levels full support classes are often more a convenience rather than a necessity, even during boss fights. That becomes particularly evident when grinding for a long time on the same map before proceeding to the next monster level range, even worse if the spot is overcrowded and everyone gets just one mob anyway.

So I think higher damage per party member would improve the need for such builds. If that mechanic is already in place you should scale it up.
Optionally, instead of plain damage, you could try to increase one of the other offensive monster attributes, e.g. the critical chance. I would avoid the defensive ones though, like higher monster evasion, as that would decrease the leveling speed of parties.
Bosses should scale separately but you may not need to at all if you improve their behavior.

#2

Honestly I think this is the wrong way to go about this. You bring up a real issue, but I find your solution to be rather bizarre.

A party supported by a cleric or priest should really open new doors. The party should move forward (backhanded comment about the linear game architecture) to a higher level area, or to a more hostile area, or something that allows them to be more effective in a way greater than they not having to sit and rest between excursions.

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#3

Maybe unoriginal because dozens of other RPGs do that but bizarre?!

That isn’t how this game works, however. At some point you’re forced to start grinding for several levels and due to the experience rates, map design, monster spawn rates, monster distribution, player traffic, crafting, etc. staying on a lower level map may be much more effective.

#4

Could you name at least a dozen? I’m also going to give you the benefit of doubt and believe you meant MMORPGs right? Because comparing MMORPGs to just RPGs hmm…

I kind of understand what you’re implying here but I feel because of some of the reasons you mentioned above, wouldn’t it be better to level at a higher area, killing less mobs but be rewarded with more experience and not have with the problems that come with overcrowding? (as what @PsychoRomeo already said).

Let’s assume that this idea actually gets implemented and you increase the mob’s hp the more people in a party you have. Wouldn’t this discourage people from trying to form larger parties? Logically, if I’m someone who could dish out enough dps to kill mobs effectively in the grind area, why would I want to penalize myself by making the mobs harder to kill and sharing the exp for that extra effort? Why would I want to pick up someone who will do much less dps (aka the support class) if it’s going to hinder my progression of exp?

Let’s try the alternative suggestion you gave, we increase the damage the mobs do. Would hinder the lower levels in an area quite a bit since they will take some damage before killing said mobs, but how does this affect people who 1 shot the mobs anyways or play classes who have enough range to kill the mob before it touches them, aren’t the support classes the ones still being hindered in this case?

If support classes are simply mere conveniences then focus on improving support classes alone to make them less of an inconvenience. Suggesting something like this is going to open doors to a multitude of issue without actually fixing the problem intended to be fixed. It’s like China’s Four Pests Campaign where you kill the sparrows to save the crops, funny how that turn out didn’t it?

#5

You’re right. It’s not how it works. It’s how it should work though.

Yes, bizarre. “Hey archer buddy, we’re around the same level so let’s party - ow the icebolts one shot me now let’s unparty.”

This kind of thing makes sense in an ARPG like Diablo or something (and frankly this game has very similar architecture), but an MMO? It’s bizarre.

#6

No, actually, I was wrong on that part, Apparently I started to believe the games I had in mind not only scaled the exp or hit points but also the damage from enemies.

This doesn’t negate my point, however. It only hints this method is difficult to effectively implement . Nonetheless, in my opinion, due to the way ToS works it is worth to consider.

That is complete nonsense, not to mention you’re just attacking my choice of words. Parties are as important in many other kinds of RPGs and you can compare almost any game to each other as long you can make a fair point.

When did I talk about HP? I explicitly excluded defensive attributes. Besides, see the patch notes from 09.2014:

  • Changes to increase health of monster depending on party members (more members = more HP monsters)
  • HP increased from 50% to 100% depending on amount of party members (maybe during quests)

ToS encourages players to spread on about three consecutive maps by distributing a similar amount of exp for many monster levels. The resulting mix of player levels, types of monster defenses and elements as well as the better exp rates forces players to party up. Without all of this I wouldn’t have suggested a method which obstructs parties as its side effect.
My suggestion isn’t concerned with the issues op players cause in a zone, like being able to oneshot mobs with their basic attacks, that’s for other mechanics to inhibit. That said, such players still might feel the increased damage from melee/ranged mobs and choose to invite a supporter instead of the fifth dmg dealer.
Lower leveled char aren’t any more or less affected than others. The calculation should be player based as if one lower one’s physical or magical defense.

To reward bigger parties, whether or not HP scaling for non-instanced mobs has been implemented, one could slightly increase the HP of all mobs by default and reduce it again for every additional group member in exchange for mob damage. Alternatively, you could raise the damage less with every new player.

Lastly, so that parties won’t avoid higher level maps based on the level difference we can reduce the damage again.

The same can be said about any other bit of the balance system so to imply it were simpler to improve the supporting builds is naive. Besides, the main point is not to increase a supporter’s usefulness but to improve their demand in a party setup, especially during plain grinding. After all, the more dominate the roles of utility and support based builds get the more interesting the game becomes.

@PsychoRomeo, you did’t introduce any sensible argument so there isn’t much to answer. Just that, this isn’t Diablo or one of its clones where even a 10% dmg increase could lead to you getting constantly one shot.