Feedback to multiplayer balance - EoC IV Thread - Evolution of Combat IV mod for Star Wars: Jedi Academy

Hey guys,

here are 3 things i noticed that - right now- seem to be over the top and break multiplayer balance:

- knockdown (laying on the ground) time is too high! especially annoying if you are in a saber-duel and can´t use force push to get you our of trouble... right now this is a ~80% guaranteed loss for the one laying on the ground and he can´t even fight back, i think the knockback time should be lowered by at least 1 second. this really steals the fun out of saber-duels.

- Juyo-style (purple) is too strong overall and very hard to block, easiest style to win with, even if you have no experience with it

- the "crouch-foreward-attack" deals way too much damage and should be easier to block

The rest seems fine as i can say till now.

Greetings, Danny

Juyo is not that difficult to counter. The purple style has a problem. Although highly unpredictable (that's what juyo is about, in fact), it lefts the user completely open to an attack, specially during the spinwheels. So with timing you can take a purple user in a single stroke. Obviusly, if well used, it can give you pretty too much problems BUT it can be beaten. Besides this, I don't know why all the forms must have balance. Star Wars world is not about that. Some Forms lean towards defense, another ones lean to a more offensive approach, as it's the case of Form VII, and is supposed to be an op state, in fact.

For those who are bored and want to read about the Form VII philosophical point of view and why Vaapad shouldn't be nerfed... here it goes. If you don't want, skip it right till the second horizontal line.

This Form, in Star Wars world, is known to be very difficult to master without going into the dark side, and appart from that, is known to be shapeless, unpredictable in it's attacks, very agressive, and put's a lot of stress into the enemy, as it's attacks are fast and deadly. Talking about shapeless, this reminds me of the teachings of Bruce Lee and Jet Kune Doo, where he said that martial artist where too much binded to the traditions, when he though those traditions should be some kind of advice that could be followed or not, not act as unbreakable rules and retrains to obtain your full martial artist potential.

You must understand something. Form VI, Niman, is supposed to be the Form that reunites all the teachings of the other Forms and put it in one Form all along. It is a kind of "Jack of all trades" Form. However, it is a flat form. It lacks a spirit. It is a completely nihilist Form. It's kind of contemplative summary of all the teachings of the all Forms. It's a passive form, too, it aims at not having weak points, it aims to be technically precise to remove all the weakness of the previous forms, but when doing so, it negates the inner force of the martial artist, his Will Power, his inner decision. As I said, it's a Form that encourages the passive and meditative way of the Jedi, but also loses grips on his emotions, that is where the Will Power lays, in the struggle for the subsitence of the individual. Because all of this, the Form lacks of strength points aswell, as it's phylosophy is "don't get involved" and individuals only get better when involving with other individuals. It's the interaction with anything else but ourselves, in any form, what makes us improve, and Form VI comes to say just to not interact. Stay inside your inner limits, interact with the world the less possible. That's the Form VI path, and that's why this Form lacks strengths.

However, Juyo/Vaapad goes beyond all that. It tries to look at the other forms and minimize his weakness, as Form VI does, but, aswell, tries to grip to the individual motivations, pasions, feelings, and tries to get power out of them. While Form VI is too abstract, too far away from the practical world, Vaapad returns to it. Vaapad returns to the physical world after going in trial with your own fears, feelings, motivations, and after fighting against the nihilism that builds the philosophical core of Form VI.

Vaapad is supposed to be the state of mind of Nirvana, of complete awareness, calmed but at alert to act without mercy in order to save your life or the one's you love. The Will Power coming from the pasions is the fuel of this Form, and giving shape to this pasions is what leads to this upper state of being. This is the reason of Juyo/Vaapad being so powerfull, specially the last one.

The difference between Juyo and Vaapad is simple. In Juyo your feelings control you, and when loosing control of yourself, you stop walking towards the direction you want, you walk to the directions that your pasions want. And since reason is more evolved than pasions, it's quite stupid to let them take control of yourself. For sure, you will be more powerfull, but it will be a meaningless power. Vaapad users understands that pasions devouring your reason and your gist, leads towards disaster and the eventual lose of the fight of the individual for it's subistence. And Vaapad wants to win. Is that simply. Vaapad is wining the fight against yourself, your doubts and motivations, and so become an individual capable of dealing with the outer world with a much better and faster responsiveness. The Vaapad, in last term, tries to be a tool for the individual for it's subsistence, or the subsitence of the things the individual wants to subsist.

So, I repeat, don't cry if Juyo is overpowered, because it's completely normal some things are better than others, that is how the world works. And since the purple style is pretty strong but not as much as to be unbeatable, and that is the way it is supposed to be... well, I think it is not a problem. Let it be as it is now. In other case, I would buff some other styles, to be more precise, red and cyan, that are currently the most underpowered styles.

But there's really no point in take out juyo, when it's a style that can be fairly beaten with the yellow style, only with timing and cool head.

Edited by: Hels

Sorry but your argument is invalid.

This is a game, not a movie. And a game needs balance. The goal of a game that focuses on dueling is to achieve that the player with the best skill has the upper hand - not the player with the best style/gear etc.!

And to answer your last sentence: why should anyone bother with timing, cool head and all that stuff if he can just go easy mode with Juyo and have a pretty good rate of succeed without any need of skill? Just sayin´.

Edited by: Danny777

Danny, Evolution of Combat has defined itself as a movie accurate mod. Not by me. By the admins. That means that if they want to do so, some styles should be little bit superior than others.

You say that why should anyone bother with timing, cool head if he can go with Juyo and have a pretty good rate of succeed without any need of skill. Well this is a false argumentation. If you played a little bit the game, Juyo NEEDS SKILL. Is a different thing that most of the players in this mod have probably tried moviebattles or other mods like those before, and so, you think the purple style is op because you see a lot of slaughter. If it is so op, go on and do slaughters yourself.

This argumenation you gave pretty demonstrates how much have you played to the game. Purple is not what you say an easy style. It has a lot of strange moves that open your defence, and YOU MUST KNOW when to use it, since they can mean your inmediate death.

Once thing is to be a little bit overpowered (as it might be now purple style), and another thing, far from that, is a style being far superior to others. While maybe purple needs a couple of nerfs to some attacks with speed a little bit over average, in general is pretty a fair style. What makes purple style so good is the fact of being pretty UNPREDICTABLE as it is in the movies. At least to the new players. However, as the players start to know the moves and the killing potential of each style, is where the trully overpowered styles arise. For example, I consider blue style to be far more powerfull than purple one.

So before speaking about shit, take two times to think what are you going to say, cause purple is not THAT overpowered. No style is completely op, in fact, but if I had to say one, because of its motion, it would be blue. Why? Because is the easiest style to attack in the front, and the easiest style to take advantage over an enemy's timing fail. The second one, far more op than juyo, would be duals (more attack speed and blur than juyo). Even staff is more op than juyo, I would say. In order to have Juyo being efective you DO need timing and control, as with any other style, and that is what makes this mod SOOOOOO good. The fact that saberstyle has been polished and balanced before going out. The only thing I could complain about is that is very difficult to deplect the Force Points pool of an enemy, meaning that he will have posibilities to defend, and you won't be able to break his defense by simply puttin presure on him. That's the one and only real problem with saberfighting here, which leads to red style being pretty underpowered. But for the rest, the gameplay is almost perfect.

But keep complaining, bro, keep complaining.

Edited by: Hels

Hels, you judge about my experience to the game, although you do know nothing about my background?

So, just for you: I support this mod from the very beginnings and i was Serenity´s Beta-Tester in EoC III. So don´t try to tell me something about "how much i played the game" and about game-mechanics, ok?

And yeah, if you don´t believe me, go ahead and ask Serenity. He will confirm it to you

I´ll stop this discussion here and let the dev´s decide about it. I´m not the only one who noticed this Problem. We´ll see how they decide.

Btw.: my old ingame nick was Vinrock, my new one is Count Danny (or Master Danny). Maybe we´ll see us online some day?!

Maybe, and you might be beta tester, but I insist to you, juyo is not THAT overpowered. Damn, yes, is in a good spot, but not op. In fact blue gives you the posibility to have your blade always pointing against the enemy. If you open yourself for a bit, blue punish with a kill almost for sure.

Your experiencie as beta tester in EoC III do not have many to do here. In fact, maybe because you are used up to the EoC III multiplayer style, where juyo was kinda incomplete, this new purple style seems pretty powerful to you. I admit that juyo has the power of giving unexpected blows, but with a fast style, you can beat it. I have beaten myself many juyo users, and have been beaten by them.

The key here is that against juyo users is not very smart to have the initiative, since they will probably end up landing a hit into you. But if you are smart, you wait them, parry, kick into the ground and get the kill. Or else land a hit in a middle of one of his attacks. Juyo is pretty simple. It creates a barrier of flurry attacks that creat a "safety zone" in front of them. That's how it works, and that is how IT MUST WORK. I mean, is what purple style is about, creating a zone in front of you where the enemy does not feel comfortable. As blue style does aswell by pointing the blade against you and having fast short attacks that hit in front of the character, with not many more spinwheels. Maybe lowering the attack speed of Juyo just a little bit, or making the wind up animations (animations before attack) endure a little bit longer, would make it so that is easier to play against a purple user, and yes, is a little bit abusive currently. But, by far, nothing imposible to beat. However, I wouldn't nerf the purple, or not too much, maybe a little bit attack speed. What I'd do if possible is to add new abilities to other syles, that make you defend better, or make disarm easier, etc. If you remember EoC III, there was some traits related to each of the Forms. If the mechanics of the previous title where in some way endorsed to the new one, then the game would be balanced. The previous game was all about depleting your enemies block points, and this is all about timing and hitting when the enemies opens it's defense. But you can't break through enemy defense by hitting till he gets tired. If a medium point is achieved, juyo and makashi won't be so op, and red style won't be so underpowered.

I think that before nerfing styles and so on, new strategies and mechanichs must be added to the game, and once the core is completed, then we talk about nerfing things.