haymaker

[Ali_gmud]

I've pinnacled 2 berserkers, one recently and I think they are fine, just one odd concern though..

I decked out of my tree, wielding to weapons which I had both mastered, dual wielding, wasn't blind, vs'ing a cleric, I raged, my hit and dam was max'ing 70 + and I was still seeing a lot of MISSES

maybe he was really lucky? only Mya knows... that little hottie.

[L-A]

Fire up Emp_newb, tell us what you really think!! :-P All jokes aside Emp has a a very LARGE point - there are many things on this thread from players who couldn't extract an ounce of PK prowess from a zerk if their lives depended on it. Sorry if that bruises some ego's here, but its just how it is. Zerks are not at all an intuitive class. Anyone who tells you they are is wrong or lying. They are a class that requires a solid plan before a battle, the right set of equipment before a battle, the discipline to stick to that plan AND the fortitude to see it out to the last hp when required. I don't necessarily LIKE the fact that zerks end up VERY close to death when fighting against many classes, but the fact remains that if you want to win with a zerk you have to be prepared to risk it. This means you die more often - but you're a melee so you have to expect that.

Here are three things you NEED to have correct if you're playing a zerk:

1) Eq. Quite simply, you need the right eq for each battle. That means hit/dam, saves and weapons. Ideally (I'm not saying you'll ever get this) you want -30 (-40 is better) total in all saves categories, 60/60 hit dam before rage and the right weapons to fight the class you're up againt. What are the right weapons - glad you asked :-)

If you've ever played a warrior you know that some weapons work better in some situations. Sometimes your opponent doesn't know the weapon, sometimes the weapon is selected because it does well vs your opponents defenses. You need to work out which weapons work best at what times - and the only way to know for sure is to test it. That means doing hack work - pay some schmuck to sit there with a shield, sword, staff, polearm, dagger etc etc etc and run through your weapons. See which hit the most, which get blocked, parried or dodged the most. 100 rounds on each combo then change. Go count it all up and put it in a spreadsheet so you can easily see the results. I've done this for a variety of weapons but not all. Hence there are a few things I'm missing in the overall strategy of melee.

Virigoth's warrior essay is also a must for general melee tactics. Crypt's is worth reading too - though zerks are vastly different now than when he had Smash.

2) Knowledge of your skills vs other classes. Unfortunately, this only comes from PK experience and log analysis. Log your fights, count weapon shots before and after you use your skills. Work out what you did wrong, go get your eq again, rinse, repeat. There is no substitute for experience - which is why the class is never going to be changed until you can put up a decent argument with some hard facts behind you.

3) A plan - there are not a lot of rounds in a fight (well, at least not when you're getting your @$$ kicked). You have a lot of skills (dirt, rage, roar, slam, trip, hay, head, weapon cleave, shield cleave,, path skills, cabal skills, race skills and the list goes on) and they mostly take two rounds of lag. With an opponent beating on you its imperative your getting the RIGHT skills in play instead of wasting your time. Using the right skills will win you a fight. Using the wrong skills will GET YOU KILLED.

Something else to consider - sometimes fights with zerks are just plain ugly. Take the crusader my last (evil ogre) zerk had to fight. He was clearly better than me in melee - he's just hitting me more. I do have a HP advantage on him though - not really sure its enough but its all I have over him. He's also getting sloppy with his sanc when I'm using haymaker. So what do I do? Rage and zerk up with as many hitpoints as I can, knock haymaker down and lag him praying he runs out of HP first. He did - and I won (I think I had 70hp left). Definately an ugly win, but he was dead and I wasn't. My point is some fights are going to be like this when you're a melee, but particulary when you're a berserker.

Cheers,

L-A

PS - I think zerks are probably slightly more underpowerd on the matchup scale than I'd like BUT they are not the stumbling retards of FL that many make them out to be. They do require a fairly hefty investment of effort to get the most out of them though.

[L-A]

I've pinnacled 2 berserkers, one recently and I think they are fine, just one odd concern though..

I decked out of my tree, wielding to weapons which I had both mastered, dual wielding, wasn't blind, vs'ing a cleric, I raged, my hit and dam was max'ing 70 + and I was still seeing a lot of MISSES

maybe he was really lucky? only Mya knows... that little hottie.

Wrong type of weapon - see 1) of my post. At least you probably know what not to use again).

L-A

PS - look at the log of my evil zerk vs cleric on the PK logs. I have the correct weapon types (both rare) on and the cleric still gets WAY too much defense IMHO. What I don't have is the right saves (read: none, and I'm an ogre to boot) which is the ONLY reason that battle is even close.

[-Totenkopf-]

Farkin hell Scott. Some people definitely invest too much effort into this if they wanna go testing different weapons against other weapons. Fark that. Infact, I don't think it even really matters. Different weapons have different attack/defense ratings, and I think thats the main thing taken into consideration (as well as victims proficiency in said weapon).

Meh, -40 saves and 60/60 hit/dam is a pipe dream. I'd love to see it.

Why don't you get out their and show em hows its done Scott?

[L-A]

Because with half the effort I can probably get as many kills on a cleric or dk? - yes I'm taking the p!$$ here. However, that's the REAL issue here for most people. Effort invested for possible payoff. Most melee's can rule the world - zerks still suffer from shocking matchups even when eq'd. Rangers, warriors and DKs still have a massive advantage.

A warrior vs a shaman, cleric, invoker or battlemage (essentially the weak matchups on a warrior) suffers far less in super eq than a zerk vs zerk foils.

Here's my 'hot tip' on how to balance zerks - remove the dimishing returns on hit/dam for the berzerker class ONLY.

L-A

[-Totenkopf-]

Yeah, I've found 40/40 hit dam is more then enough, seems to do very little over this.

I've found DK's INCREDIBLY buff since their changes. You'd be amazed how useful that spell casting when lagged skill is. Its screwed me over multiple times. I don't know much about the other one used for defense vs staffs though. I might have to make one and see how it all works.

[Grumpy]

Just an idea, we could give berserkers the old WM deathstrike. It seems to fit with their fighting style.

[Pali]

Meh' date=' -40 saves and 60/60 hit/dam is a pipe dream. I'd love to see it.[/quote']

Ilendriel, as a paladin, had -40 mal/mental (aff was around -20) and 40/35 without a single piece of eq from Gear or Discord/Desolation (and with certain bits of +spelllvl and +luck eq that could've been substituted for).

Granted, though there was still room for improvement, Ilendriel's suit was one of the best I've had (and the rounded nature of it fit a paladin far better than it would've a more melee-intensive char)... but those numbers are certainly feasible. Not easy to get... but doable.

EDIT: And sweet Jesus on a pogo stick, NO, do NOT give anyone 1.0 WM attacks. If you think that's a good idea you have no memory of how powerful that skill was.

[-Totenkopf-]

This was probably my most balanced score sheet.

/---------------\/----------------------------------------------\

| Sslandith || the Master of War |

\---------------/\----------------------------------------------/

| Str: 20(21)^3 || Level: 50 Sex: M Age : 25(186h) |

| Int: 15(15) || Class: warrior Ethos: chaotic |

| Wis: 15(15) || Race : slith Align: good |

| Dex: 22(24)^5 || Hp : 694/982 Exp : 57274/534726 |

| Con: 20(20) || Mana : 386/395 |

\ Lck: [|||---] \/ Move : 453/487 +Hit: 45 +Dam: 37 /

/---------------/\------------------/\--------------------------\

| ARMOR || SAVES || Deity : Sylvantis |

| Slash : -337 || Spell : -18 || Faith : Purity |

| Pierce: -315 || Afflictive : -10 || Weight: 418/425 |

| Blunt : -334 || Maledictive: -21 || Items : 39/40 |

| Magic : -248 || Mental : -19 || Prac : 72 Train: 2 |

| || || Gold : 373k |

\---------------\/------------------\/--------------------------/

/ Condition: You are in the prime of your health. \

| You are wanted for crimes. Use "crimes" for details |

\---------------------------------------------------------------/

And this was the EQ

Sslandith is using:

(Glowing) (Humming) the Ancient Banner of Illisidar

(Glowing) a Ring of Accuracy

(Glowing) a Ring of Accuracy

the Cloak of Moving Shadows

(Glowing) (Humming) the Amulet of Sanctity

(Glowing) (Humming) the Duke's golden crown

(Glowing) some golden hoops

(Humming) the Torso and Arms of Adeptus

(Humming) Adeptus's Upper Arms

(Glowing) (Humming) a pair of spiked light-steel gauntlets

(Humming) the Legs of Adeptus

pair of Slimy Boots

the cloak of Righteousness

(Glowing) (Humming) a Burning Sheath of Acid adorned with an emblem of Gear

(Glowing) (Humming) a blood encrusted spiked steel bracelet

(Humming) a broken terminator

(Humming) a staff named 'Retribution' adorned with a soul tear

(Humming) a glimmering white staff

(Humming) some Chieftain's Warpaint

(Glowing) the Powerspring

I guess its almost possible, especially with a giant race. There are a couple of improvements I could make there. As well as hit/dam from weapons (that weapon was sheathed). Could have had powerfists with an emblem, lol.

Anyway, I still dont think with everything considered, I'd have been pushing 60/60 hit/dam. Score sheet is with warcry up I am pretty sure.

That character did own though. Ended up loosing interest and got rare purged before I managed to get killed.

[Mudder]

Heh' date=' thanks for correcting him. Personally, I welcome the idea of clerics dying more. [/quote']I got your back.

I've killed MANY a decked warrior as my thieves. MANY.

It was just a random example, and I was really only referring to in combat. Meaning: Bash thief;bash thief;bash thief;get all corpse.

Blah blah.

There was not a single constructive point in your post. If you don't agree with something, state why. Don't state it is because we all suck. Because guess what? Your berserker wasn't good. So stop pretending he was. You may have considered him successful, but I know I did not. Nothing against you, but you "started" it.

I suck with Battlemages. Do I claim they have problems? No. Why? Because I know the difference between my inability to do well with a class and the classes inability to do well.

What I have said for awhile and my main issue with Zerks is this. They take way too much eq to be viable in PK. Their powerspike is lower than that of ANY other class when they are at their "Peak."

You can take a warrior with comparable eq, and skill, to the Zerk and the Warrior will always do better than the Zerk. Always. Not just warrior vs zerk, but vs any other class. Does that not sound like they have issues?

Also. The new roar was not for path of anger. Why not? It's just silly. Give them a buff in the most unreliable skill they have(and still make it unreliable) and give them no added bonuses that the class really needed/needs ?

[Pali]

Unfortunately I no longer have any logs from near the end of Ilendriel's life, when I had his full suit put together, to provide evidence for my claims. Got a new computer recently as my laptop was dying, and now is dead.

But yes, the lack of having your weapon drawn, as well as a second weapon dualed (common enough for a melee), factors a lot into hit/dam (especially after a few improvements that I got made - crusader/invoker/cleric friends are good things for your weapons). You probably did not have berserk up, which is another 3/6 which would bring you to 48/43, add another few points from weapons and you'd be in the 50s, a tiny bit more from certain eq shifts and you're at 60 (I leave out cabal skills as I was uncaballed - which makes my case even more that it is doable if you include them). EDIT 2: Hell, totally forgot giants having more strength makes it even more likely that they can do it.

EDIT: This being said, there are many situations where just increasing saves and hit/dam isn't necessarily what you need. In my case, the +spell level, +luck and +various skills eq that I had more than compensated for any less-than-superb stats in individual areas (my ac was abysmal, for instance, but as emp_newb alluded to I was still incredibly hard to laglock despite this). I don't know zerks well enough to say whether it'd pay off for them to go a more balanced route or not... but experimenting might bring surprising results.

[Nekky]

Haymaker lands for me all the damned time. I seriously had to double take this thread to make sure I was reading it right.

I don't know what kind of berzerker started this thread, but an 80% fail rate is either ridiculously unlucky, or a total over exaggeration.

And as for the 'lucky to get 2 hits per round', if you are not dual wielding, 2 hits per round is 66.6% of all the attacks you could have landed as a zerk. That's not so bad.

I do not believe, nor will I ever believe that a berzerker with even half decent hit/dam will "Never do more than 2 hits per round, even against a person with no weapon or shield, even when raged." as I've Killed For Less stated earlier. I expect that even zerk-haters will turn their nose up at that comment.

Finally, people, please stop starting posts with "I'm a great PKer, but...". Lame-o.

[I've Killed for Less]

I'm a great PK'er but, im not lying about the 2 hits a round thing. I have ppl who can attest.

[H&R]

Meh' date=' -40 saves and 60/60 hit/dam is a pipe dream. I'd love to see it.[/quote']

Make a DK. The best I've had so far is insane. -70 saves AND 80/70 hit/dam (that's with bless, frenzy, reaver skill and stuff to buff). And I know I can go even higher.

[f0xx]

DKs are a special case H&R

[Mudder]

Make a DK. The best I've had so far is insane. -70 saves AND 80/70 hit/dam (that's with bless' date=' frenzy, reaver skill and stuff to buff). And I know I can go even higher.[/quote']

You could definitely go higher. Drop some of those saves, who needs -70 across the board?

[H&R]

You could definitely go higher. Drop some of those saves' date=' who needs -70 across the board?[/quote']

That's with unholy str though, which I often don't bother using

[Mudder]

That's with unholy str though' date=' which I often don't bother using[/quote']

Even more reason to drop saves and + hit/dam.

[Guest emp_newb]

As far as my zerk not being successful. I never said I was a huge success. I did however hold my own at pinn, which is all you can expect anyone to do. I do have an extremely shoddy record, BUT I was also completely balls out as an inductee and member. There is also the issue of if I was close to the win, and deathmark wore off, I would NOT run to reset deathmark even if it meant the loss of something on my record. Strictly because to get the lock set up, or the opponent near death, takes effort, all that can EASILY be undone when I cannot attack for an hour +. Also the ONLY complaint I ever had about zerks was the panic/blindness bug. I would get blinded, then cure it, and still have apnic for 7+ hours. That was fixed. And Lmathr came within inches of knocking down quite a few very strong players, and knocked down several more strong players.

Also, when Lmathr was ended, I did not initiate a 2 month dig into how bad the skills of berserkers suck did i?

[Old_Bastard]

Heh?

Having the ability to get anything greater than 35/35 without abandoning saves is absolutely rediculous. I am not doubting anyone here that it can be done....I am only stating that having those stats throws off any sort of balance to this game.

So I assume this is why I have standard monk attacks doing some caps damage through sanc on my communer while I am still missing easily 85% of the spells I cast.

[Celerity]

Oh comeon, even when fighting against Maleki wayyy back in the day, Dedric had similar hit/dam/saves as being described now.

I distinctly remember doing dismembers and mangles through your protections on a non-vuln hit...too bad I was much too inexperienced to dual wield/charge back then!

[Old_Bastard]

Saves

And your saves were low enough that I had a 90% hit rate on my spells. Did you actually read my post?

D was such an awesome character. Kudos. Did you con death?

[Old_Bastard]

One more thing...

...additionally: Complaints are for idiots in a game where you can be anything new by simply rolling the new character. Unlike WOW where you have invested thousands of hours to get to pinnacle (of which I have a number of characters).

That being said, I have obviously shifted to melee characters. That doesn't remove the fact that suggestions about alterations in the game, and discussion therafter, help the overall balance.

[Guest emp_newb]

I agree. Suggesting ideas is a great way to help the game.

Whining that skills are broken is just bleh.

[Evangelion]

Emp_Newb is broken. Poor guy needs a tone-up so he can be viable in PK.