Fighters, how would you react if...

[Arksenth]

What if they gave Brave and Wise Stance the animation of Wand Lovers?

Discuss.

[DJcooltrainer]

Not a fighter, but I'd probably switch just to feel fabulous.

[milranduil]

Passive bonuses or gtfo.

[Z-0]

I would just play Force since it's better anyway.
Or Ranger.
Or Braver.

[gigawuts]

I would just play Force since it's better anyway.
Or Ranger.
Or Braver.

But you see like, Fighter is the most balanced class.

[Xaeris]

I love twin daggers and knuckles. I hate the Fighter tree that they're married to. Come my lovelies, run away with me and we can be together. I'll treat you right, not like him.

[UnLucky]

Still too slow, there shouldn't be an animation at all. Or a stance.

In fact I think this change would actually make me use Wise less because Brave wouldn't get interrupted when refreshing.

[RadiantLegend]

Passive bonuses or gtfo.

What he said.

[Vetur]

What is the animation like? Is there a video or animated GIF of some sort that shows it?

[Walkure]

But you see like, Fighter is the most balanced class.
It's the shittiest class that isn't Hunter main, ergo BALANCE.

[UnLucky]

Hey, at least it can actually use its own skills as a main class without relying completely on a sub class for viability.

Like imagine if Knuckle, Twin Dagger, and Double Saber Gears didn't fill up whatsoever unless you had a skill only Hunter could get.

[Walkure]

That'd change literally nothing about FI sub choices, but I get your point. I just assumed that TE main even as a pseudo-FO would be better with all the new fancy techs, but I could be wrong.

[angrysquid]

Animation like katana combat (+ a bit faster ) would be cool ._.

[BIG OLAF]

I didn't know it had a different animation, so I don't care either way.

[Gardios]

It's the same animation, but you can't make yourself a coffee, drink it and do the dishes while you wait for the animation to finish.

[Mysterious-G]

I can't fathom why stances taking about a second to activate is considered a big deal. I get it, it tends to get interupted by enemy attacks and then fuck you player, but these kind of stances last for several minutes, and usually should not have to be activated in mid-combat unless you have been careless and not watching your skill bar. Then we got short-lasting skills like Wand Lovers, which exaxctly due to their duration need to be activated in the heat of battle when the situation calls for it, which is why the animation change was so welcome for it. Fighters don't need that, and honestly the fewest active skills do.

[Macman]

Because resetting your stances keeps you still for about 10 seconds and that's all it takes to fall behind in the group and miss out on whatever they're getting into. Fury Stance's delay makes sense since it's basically push-button-get-double-damage that never needs to be manually turned off. Brave and Wise are supposed to be more dynamic since they're all about positioning.

In the heat of battle it's already a hassle to find a safe spot to do it, then there's the fact that it pretty much makes switching from brave to wise in appropriate situations completely impractical.
Hey that group of Wondas? You're better off keeping your brave stance on and hitting the ass instead of wasting the time swapping to wise stance, killing them, then swapping back to brave.

[gigawuts]

I can't fathom why stances taking about a second to activate is considered a big deal.

because

it tends to get interupted by enemy attacks and then fuck you player

these kind of stances last for several minutes

have to be activated in mid-combat

need to be activated in the heat of battle when the situation calls for it

[Mysterious-G]

Because resetting your stances keeps you still for about 10 seconds and that's all it takes to fall behind in the group and miss out on whatever they're getting into. Fury Stance's delay makes sense since it's basically push-button-get-double-damage that never needs to be manually turned off. Brave and Wise are supposed to be more dynamic since they're all about positioning.

In the heat of battle it's already a hassle to find a safe spot to do it, then there's the fact that it pretty much makes switching from brave to wise in appropriate situations completely impractical.
Hey that group of Wondas? You're better off keeping your brave stance on and hitting the ass instead of wasting the time swapping to wise stance, killing them, then swapping back to brave.

I agree with stance renewing causing you to fall behind your group at times. That definitely happens. But considering you only will need to renew Fury Stance once every 5 minutes, it's not much of a big deal in my opinion. And as for combat situations, I'd think changing back and forth between brave and wise stance isn't problematic because of the second-long animation, but their cooldown periods if anything.

[Macman]

I dunno, I find it dumb that I can sit back and chug a Dimate faster than it takes for me to use my class-defining combat abilities.

[Mysterious-G]

You'll press that Dimate button a lot compared to your stance buttons that will only see some love every five minutes or so usually. I don't think that is a fair comparison to make at all.

[gigawuts]

It's not about how often you press them when they're not vital to defeating enemies that need the same stance, but how often you have to press them when you have to press them to defeat enemies requiring different stances. That is to say - hooray, ragne! Turn on wise to break back legs, now turn on brave! Oh but a lightning spire appeared while you were fistpumping again and you died.

It's also a matter of good and consistent design. It's a tedious chore that people dislike. We're not talking "aim for heads" which is rewarding, we're talking "do laundry for a damage bonus!!!"

Aside from having to change on the fly mid-combat, fighter stances share everything else with bravers: 2 stances that turn themselves off every 10 minutes. So why, might I wonder, would bravers never have an issue with these things but fighters would? It must be the things bravers don't have to deal with about their stances.

[Lumpen Thingy]

as a good fighter you should be using brave stance almost all the time besides falz hands so why would making brave and wise stance change anything on fighter?

[Walkure]

You'll press that Dimate button a lot compared to your stance buttons that will only see some love every five minutes or so usually. I don't think that is a fair comparison to make at all.Hitting dimate "a lot" more than "every five minutes or so" is a lot of dimate usage.


It's not about how often you press them when they're not vital to defeating enemies that need the same stance, but how often you have to press them when you have to press them to defeat enemies requiring different stances. That is to say - hooray, ragne! Turn on wise to break back legs, now turn on brave! Oh but a lightning spire appeared while you were fistpumping again and you died.Or Chrome Dragon after eating darkers, where you have to practically spend his eating animation to switch to Wise Stance to break his stupid wings before he flies up and wastes everyone's time with that crystal attack. Or just eat the damage penalty and smack his wings more, which is still annoying.


Aside from having to change on the fly mid-combat, fighter stances share everything else with bravers: 2 stances that turn themselves off every 10 minutes. So why, might I wonder, would bravers never have an issue with these things but fighters would? It must be the things bravers don't have to deal with about their stances.They seem to be changing/removing/streamlining fistpump on things that they "expect" players to use in mid-combat. So maybe there'll be something coming up for fighters.


...Unless they don't actually intend on FI switching stance midcombat for some stupid reason.

[UnLucky]

usually should not have to be activated in mid-combat unless you have been careless and not watching your skill bar

need to be activated in the heat of battle when the situation calls for it

Fighters don't need that

We're talking about Brave and Wise Stance. You know, Fighter's active skills? Not Hunter and Fury Stance. Not Braver, either.

Fighter.

[Mysterious-G]

We're talking about Brave and Wise Stance. You know, Fighter's active skills? Not Hunter and Fury Stance. Not Braver, either.

Fighter.

No shit. Last time I checked Fi/Hus were a very real thing, and you'd usually renew both Fury and Brave/Wise at the same time since both last as long. So you tell me how Fury Stance isn't a part of Fighter's alleged problems? Changing between Brave and Wise is not done at all except for a few cases, like Ragne as Giga stated. I'd want cooldown reductions for those two much more than a reduction of the time their animations take, so we can make proper usage of having both of them at our avail. A faster fistpump really wouldn't do a whole damn lot about it.

[UnLucky]

A major reason nobody changes on the fly is because it takes too goddamn long that it's completely impractical to run up to an enemy, fist pump, and then attack.

It's like saying why bother buffing gunslash melee PAs? Nobody uses those!

[Walkure]

So the fistpump animation is okay, because you only switch stances every 5-10 minutes, but the real thing limiting stance switching is the 1m cooldown on activating a stance?

Am I getting this right? Because this makes no sense.

[gigawuts]

Changing between Brave and Wise is not done at all except for a few cases, like Ragne as Giga stated.

But...

...

those are the cases the entire problem exists in

...

so that's all we're even talking about

I mean, it's not like it's a game-breaking, ragequitting, uninstalling the JP IME levels of infuriating...but it's still pretty annoying having to change stance to wise to wail on bibbles's core, have him stand up and face you, and have him constantly turn around to face you every time you try to make use of wise stance to break his feet again - so you finally give in and turn on brave and oh he's down again!

Same problem with ragne. He goes down, time for brave! He stood back up. he's mutated and there's an hp boost this wave and nobody has weak bullet and it's just you with an ely/sazan force. The next most broken leg is in the back, so we get to wait for wise while the idiot pugs run around in circles ignoring everything on the tower. Wise is back on! Break the leg, switch to brave, get ready to grab the core, aaaaand Ragne is finally dead. And now you notice nobody has been defending your tower so you have to not only run to it, but run in front of enemies that are facing away from you (each with attacks that will hit you for like 600 damage because lol fu melee). Do you run around them? Or through them?

All of this, or fighter stances could just be made into passives.

I mean, I know the real reason they're active is they didn't want both bonuses active at once and the stances canceling eachother makes sure that isn't possible. And, at launch, that was a more understandable balancing point; but the game has changed. Average vs. weak makes sense in that regard in the current game (well, if weak was a bit better), but not brave vs. wise. Brave vs. wise is more akin to zero range advance vs. sharpshooter, which aren't stances and should never be stances.

edit: My point didn't really get through in all of that - I realize these scenarios don't happen often, but the reality is they shouldn't happen at all and it would be very easy to make sure they can't happen by making fighter stances passive. It's an avoidable nuisance that shows how out of touch Sega is with its own game.

[Sacrificial]

I'd probably pick up fighter again if that would be faster. And it would be really nice if the cooldown usage was shortened as well.

[Mysterious-G]

So the fistpump animation is okay, because you only switch stances every 5-10 minutes, but the real thing limiting stance switching is the 1m cooldown on activating a stance?

Am I getting this right? Because this makes no sense.

If you can't make any sense of why the long cooldown period prevents players from changing between Brave and Wise Stance more often and effectively and so make proper use of the abilities their class provides them with, then I suppose you are just not able to make any sense of it.


(Shortened cause long.)

Well, I simply don't think the fistpump limits me significantly. I can only vouch for myself here, but when I get behind Ragne, I make sure to stay out of the area its legs can reach, and then go for the fist pump. Even if it launches the rays now, the animation won't take longer than the attack to hit. There are times I get cocky and try to sneak one in after the rays pop up, and then I end up being stanceblocked. That's on me then, and I never thought of it as faulty gamedesign. Vibras can be a headache for stance switching, but with how fast the target points on that thing change, I beg the question how much easier it would really be to navigate stances just with a faster fistpump. That said, I am sure it would help, if just a little. And yet I think the problem is that because of the target points changing so often, that I can't even change from brave to wise stance and vice-versa often enough with the stupidly long cooldown periods.
If I see a Gu Wonda and decide not to use Wise Stance against it, then that's not because of the fistpump, but because I know Brave Stance will need 60 seconds to be useable again. It's stupid, imo, and the exact opposite of intuitive gameplay.

Out of interest and because I agree Brave and Wise Stance are fucked up the way they are, how would you go about making them passives? Them being of bipolar nature has me scratch my head as to how they could even pull that off, as nice as it would surely be.

Edit: I just thought that it would be nice if failing to change stances because you were interrupted would still leave you with the formerly active stance still being active. I think that would be a neat fix for some rage.

[GoldenFalcon]

Making the stances have a 1 second cooldown would be awesome

Switching back and forth

all day

[gigawuts]

If you can't make any sense of why the long cooldown period prevents players from changing between Brave and Wise Stance more often and effectively and so make proper use of the abilities their class provides them with, then I suppose you are just not able to make any sense of it.



Well, I simply don't think the fistpump limits me significantly. I can only vouch for myself here, but when I get behind Ragne, I make sure to stay out of the area its legs can reach, and then go for the fist pump. Even if it launches the rays now, the animation won't take longer than the attack to hit. There are times I get cocky and try to sneak one in after the rays pop up, and then I end up being stanceblocked. That's on me then, and I never thought of it as faulty gamedesign. Vibras can be a headache for stance switching, but with how fast the target points on that thing change, I beg the question how much easier it would really be to navigate stances just with a faster fistpump. That said, I am sure it would help, if just a little. And yet I think the problem is that because of the target points changing so often, that I can't even change from brave to wise stance and vice-versa often enough with the stupidly long cooldown periods.
If I see a Gu Wonda and decide not to use Wise Stance against it, then that's not because of the fistpump, but because I know Brave Stance will need 60 seconds to be useable again. It's stupid, imo, and the exact opposite of intuitive gameplay.

Out of interest and because I agree Brave and Wise Stance are fucked up the way they are, how would you go about making them passives? Them being of bipolar nature has me scratch my head as to how they could even pull that off, as nice as it would surely be.

Uh, Brave Stance and Brave Stance Up would become Brave Advance 1 & 2, for 20% from the front each.

Wise Stance and Wise Stance Up would become Wise Advance 1 & 2, for 30% from the back each.

Neither 44% nor 69% is OP on this class with these weapons, especially if hunter continues to be what it is.

edit: To expound on what this would do to classes...
Braver, Ranger, & Gunner: nothing
Hunter & Fighter: enable them to actually move around the target as needed
Force: Almost nothing. A good 99% of the time forces get aggro from enemies, and then those enemies approach the direction the forces are in until they die.
Techer: Actually, it would be pretty good for Techer if Hunter wasn't so ridiculous to sub.

[Mysterious-G]

Uh, Brave Stance and Brave Stance Up would become Brave Advance 1 & 2, for 20% from the front each.

Wise Stance and Wise Stance Up would become Wise Advance 1 & 2, for 30% from the back each.

Neither 44% nor 69% is OP on this class with these weapons, especially if hunter continues to be what it is.

Hmm. That actually sounds pretty great. I'd lower the dmg boosts since they are permanent this way, personally, but I know not many would agree with that. But generally, the set-up seems fair.

My only worry would be that being passive, and thus just too good to pass on, the skills would become 'mandatory' to get, and limit skill tree variety of players a lot. I know that's not something this skill system does well in the first place, but I always thought Fighter did it better than most with the many choices of all-around decent skills it provides.

[gigawuts]

I doubt builds would vary much from what they are right now. People max Brave and then go with what suits their playstyle after that - usually at minimum 5 & 5 sp in wise, worth 37.5% damage. Most still put the last 5 into Wise Stance Up, bringing it up to somewhere around 63% damage. That last 6% for Wise Stance itself isn't typically taken for 5 sp, but considering the alternative is Critical Strike some people do go for it even though they rarely use it.

edit: a percent

[UnLucky]

If you can't make any sense of why the long cooldown period prevents players from changing between Brave and Wise Stance more often and effectively and so make proper use of the abilities their class provides them with, then I suppose you are just not able to make any sense of it.
I can't fathom how a 1m cooldown could be of any problem seeing as how you only need to reactivate your stance every 5 minutes or so anyway.


Hmm. That actually sounds pretty great. I'd lower the dmg boosts since they are permanent this way, personally, but I know not many would agree with that. But generally, the set-up seems fair.

My only worry would be that being passive, and thus just too good to pass on, the skills would become 'mandatory' to get, and limit skill tree variety of players a lot. I know that's not something this skill system does well in the first place, but I always thought Fighter did it better than most with the many choices of all-around decent skills it provides.
Not really, since those 20SP you put into Brave take no effect when you're behind your target.

Fury Stance is always active all the time no matter what you're doing and provides a much higher bonus than even Wise Stance.

If you reduce Brave Advance's damage bonus, it would get beat out by Average Stance, which is always active all the time no matter what you're doing.

Brave/Wise are conditional. They deserve the higher damage, but not the additional drawback of being a stance. And even as a passive skill, Wise Advance wouldn't take effect as often as Brave, so you could still save 5 SP by shaving off 5% damage as many do now.

[KazukiQZ]

My idea would be adding a new skill that allows both damage bonus of Brave and Wise to be activated at the same time, and eliminating the damage reduction during the course of the skill.

30 seconds duration of this skill, with a 60 seconds cooldown. (Numbers can be tweaked for balancing)

Or something similar to this.

[Walkure]

If you can't make any sense of why the long cooldown period prevents players from changing between Brave and Wise Stance more often and effectively and so make proper use of the abilities their class provides them with, then I suppose you are just not able to make any sense of it.
Ah, but before, you stated this:

You'll press that Dimate button a lot compared to your stance buttons that will only see some love every five minutes or so usually. I don't think that is a fair comparison to make at all.
So, how is the 1M cooldown itself is the reason that you only switch once every five minutes "or so"? The one-minute cooldown for activating a stance meaning you'd have to need switching three times in around a minute to actually run into problems with the cooldown.

[Mysterious-G]

I can't fathom how a 1m cooldown could be of any problem seeing as how you only need to reactivate your stance every 5 minutes or so anyway.

It's okay for unconditional skills like Fury Stance, but a problem for those you should be able to change inbetween more often, like Brave and Wise Stance. That 1m cooldown really greatly hinders them.

Right now, people only get Wise Stance for the occasional Ragne or Falz Arms, and sure, a 1m cooldown isn't a problem for those. But that's not what Wise Stance should be about. It shouldn't be that stance usable on boss x and y, maybe z. You should be able to use it on your smallfry mobs as well, like a Gu Wonda, without feeling like an idiot for having Wise Stance active and Brave Stance still on cooldown, even though it's already long dead and gone.

[UnLucky]

Even with no cooldown at all, if you see a GWonda and reach for the skies Wise Stance button, he's getting juggled by Elder Rebellion with an Ilgrants bouncing off his shield and a spiky Shunka Shunran deathtrap waiting below

UGH just let me BACKHAND SMASH HIS ASS

Instead it's actually faster to Deadly Archer through it to attack the weak point while staying in Brave Stance the whole time. Unless, of course, you started off in Wise Stance from within the campship, which I've done for this exact scenario in an Amadouche TA.

Really, it's both things. Which is why Brave/Wise very much ought to be passive.

[Mysterious-G]

If they were passive, there'd be neither fistpump nor cooldown, so I think we both can agree on that being the best solution, if not on everything else.

[FireswordRus]

i hate switch stance, need remove animation

[Macman]

If they were passive, there'd be neither fistpump nor cooldown, so I think we both can agree on that being the best solution, if not on everything else.
If they were passive. They'd cancel each other out and you'd just end up with 10% more attack on the back and no bonus from the front. (not counting stance up skills)

[milranduil]

No... passive as in you get brave stance bonus damage from the front OR wise stance bonus damage from the back.

[Macman]

I almost wanted to say out of kneejerk that that's too simple and there's literally no drawback but then I remembered that Fury Stance exists.

[WildarmsRE5]

I'd like it if the animation was like Wand Lovers (seriously, it's way faster than drinking a Monomate)

then having 1 sec cooldown?

I'm fine, it's good enough.

[gigawuts]

I almost wanted to say out of kneejerk that that's too simple and there's literally no drawback but then I remembered that Fury Stance exists.

Even still, what you initially said isn't true either

The penalty for being on the wrong side of your stance is 75% with 5&10 SP investments, or 80% with 10&10 SP investments. That'd mean 15.2% from the front and 35.2% from the back. Just being thorough.

Now, even if we couldn't activate both stances at once, I've felt for a while that an alternative solution is this:

Remove the penalties from both stances. Change the Stance Ups to work in all directions. This makes Brave Stance 44% from the front & 20% from the back, and Wise Stance 30% from the front & 69% from the back.

In truth, that would still actually change very little, except you wouldn't be forced out of a stance to break 1-2 parts. That's...much better design.

edit: Also, add a couple perks to the stances. Bonus damage against breakable parts (20-25%, before AND after breaking them) for Brave and bonus damage against weak points (15-20%) for Wise sounds ideal IMO. This would provide a clearer role and reduce the need to switch stances to hit one hitbox one time.

[Walkure]

Or Stance Dance (and Stance Dance Advance) (http://www.pso-world.com/forums/showthread.php?p=3126312#post3126312) if you want to keep the idea of being locked to a stance at a time.

Maybe 15-20s would be better for a stance switch mechanic, but a lot of those changes are something every melee class needs and/or could use.

[gigawuts]

I liked my older idea of Stance Advance, which would replace both Stance Ups on Fighter. They would give a bonus for having a stance active at all.

They'd ideally be 15% each. Brave Stance and Wise Stance would be left alone at 20% penalty each and 20% bonus for Brave & 30% bonus for Wise. The Stance Advances would work with Fury Stance if you didn't want to turn on Brave or Wise because you'd be changing sides.

[UnLucky]

The penalty for being on the wrong side of your stance is 75% with 5&10 SP investments, or 80% with 10&10 SP investments. That'd mean 15.2% from the front and 35.2% from the back. Just being thorough.
Actually, the penalties increase as you level up the skill, the opposite of Fury Stance. Weak Stance's penalty also increases.

So it's 17.3% from the front and 38.1% from behind if you leave the stances themselves at lv5 for 85% penalty. Your numbers are correct for everything maxed, which means if Brave/Wise became passive with the penalties intact you would actually lose damage in every situation by spending 10 extra SP.

Though he did say "(without stance up skills)" but in that case you would deal 97.75-96% from the front or 106.25-104% from behind, for 5-10 SP in each stance. Even worse than canceling out.

Change the Stance Ups to work in all directions. This makes Brave Stance 44% from the front & 20% from the back, and Wise Stance 30% from the front & 69% from the back.
I used to think that's exactly how they worked. I was like "oh that's neat, it counteracts the penalty so there's no reason to be in no stance, though there's clearly still a benefit to being in the correct one"

But then I quickly figured out that your damage actually decreased lower than if you hadn't spent over 20 skill points just to get out DPS'd by a lv1 Fighter.

Ughh there's a difference between rewarding skilled gameplay and just nullifying your full investment and progression.

[Dnd]

It's the shittiest class that isn't Hunter main, ergo BALANCE.
Are you just trolling? I'm pretty sure you are.. right?

[UnLucky]

I liked my older idea of Stance Advance, which would replace both Stance Ups on Fighter. They would give a bonus for having a stance active at all.

They'd ideally be 15% each. Brave Stance and Wise Stance would be left alone at 20% penalty each and 20% bonus for Brave & 30% bonus for Wise. The Stance Advances would work with Fury Stance if you didn't want to turn on Brave or Wise because you'd be changing sides.
Fighter would be in a pretty good spot with just 10-15% general damage somewhere.

65.6% damage from the front, 94.4% from behind, going up to 3x damage with Chase (90% for Force, and I guess Ranged too)

[Walkure]

Are you just trolling? I'm pretty sure you are.. right?
Kinda, before all the buffs to RA and FO I'd have agreed. Now it's kinda obvious that they're not balancing around FI's level at all so it's hard to say it's balanced anymore.

[Sanguine2009]

its still pretty middle of the road tier wise though. it just requires effort to get the most out of, which is how every class should be hence it generally being considered the most well balanced class