Welcome to Cove

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This isn't a flame, or a rant, or a reason to have a flame or a rant on this thread but, after two weeks of fighting Vesper, I have logged early in the battle - why?

It's not because I had prior engagements or because the phone rang, but because it quickly becomes boring and anti-fun to get mana dumped straight away by a flotilla of mages.

I don't mind loosing battles, I'm not a sore loser,  but there is a difference, and it has nothing to do with how 'well they train' or anything like that, but if you have a large amount of pvp hungry mages, you can only expect the same result.

When a game, which is meant to be fun doesn't - my policy is to turn it off.

What happened to the maximum mage count in a battle? I remember that rule having a purpose.


Raven

I stand with ya, back in CoY mages were banned.. totally!

No they weren't Kado.  Grd have mages, the church.  KTD had mages, the monks, three of which completely desecrated Grd one time.  UD and Orc both had mages. The numbers were just kept in tact.

Please use correct facts when trying to make a point.

Calm down, they were kept in moderation, and very much in moderation. I dont want this thread locked, i just wanted to hear peoples opinions

Mages were very restricted in CoY, which was why i loved it. A bit hypocritical, seen as Khae's a mage, but he was my first mage. Low numbers of mages really helped with the low fantasy setting which CoY was great for. Only Grd still has the same sort of low fantasy setting, with the rest of the guilds mainly being high fantasy.

Would i mind Khae permadeathed for being a mage? Not really.

Numbers kept in tact, so much in tact.. it was as if no mages were around.

Well Cove also gots pretty decent number of mages atm, would it be fair to them to have to kill off those chars?
I can understand your frustration, and I think it wouldnt be so bad to maybe restrict it a bit....dunno really...but what usually kills off peoples desire to do rp (and the pvp within it) is too many rules. Its what happened back in the days of ERPA. I enjoy the rp and the rppvp to an equal degree, I dont mind being ganked be it by mages or warriors, its bound to happen sometimes (not everytime tho)

Well hope that came out correct..

:)

Actually, there is a way to somewhat counter the mage's para explo flamestrike combo. Pots. Lots of them. And exploding boxes, if they still work

Yeah I get you.

Ganking is never fun for me, on either side.


Pots? So you have to lower y'self to pots? and if you hold a bow?! bah. what about two or mages bombarding you?

Well its never really fun being on the reciever end of a gank, be it by mages or archer etc, but it is part of what happens. I just have to deal with it, sure it has gotten a bit out of hand with the mage ganks last weeks. But im sure the tables will turn. I love a fair fight in any case, but I dont expect to end up in one in a full on battle:)

Yea you can easily counter the para,explo,fs gank by mages. Trapped wooden box and apples. Anyone interrested in knowing more im there.
Now dont go assuming im a pvp whore, I love it yea but its not like that... ::) ;D

Apples have been recently changed to not remove paralyze.

"You can not use that potion while paralyzed" -is the msg you get when you try to. Sry I had forgotten about it:)

Oh, i've gotten away from three before. Kas, Esca and some other -V-. What you need to do is disarm, or switch to a one handed weapon. in case of para, you just use a trapped box and make a run before they can start to smash you. Chug a greater heal, time your heal, and there's no way they can get you. As Keres experienced, archers with quiver of blight are rather dangerous (50% cold, 50% poison) too. But i've rarely seen a mêléer win against an archer or a mage, due to their ability to run about. That magery and archery is vastly overpowered compared to everything else is fairly obvious, much like chivalry once that was implemented.

And you don't lower yourself to pots;p

It is understandable, especially straight after a battle to feel a little miffed at the result and indeed the manner in which it was reached.

Unfortunately our forces were a little imbalanced tonight, just having 1 mage and a few archers but plenty of melee fighters. If we'd have had the 5 or 6 mages we have active and a couple more archers we would probably have had a more evenly contested outcome.

It's just the way it goes some times, yeah we dont have to like it. I'm as bad a loser as anyone, but we have to learn from it IC and OOC and be better the next time. Torrak and I will both be holding regular trainings covering tactics and combat skills. You too are more than welcome to hold trainings sessions and pass on your knowledge and expertise. Just because we are officers doesn't mean we know -everything-.

If we work hard as a team in training it will pay off in battles. You get out what you put in. We can't expect to just stroll along and win, it takes time and practice like anything else,  so we must try and learn from battles whether won, lost or drawn and try to attend as many trainings as we can and schedule your own if you feel you have something to offer.

Skirmishes like these are where we cut our teeth for the conflicts to come. ;)

~ Raiden.

Yeah, training can help to a degree, but Sparrow and Raven died in <1 second from first strike. I dont like dedicating my time to something like that.

What we need is for our mages to actually come to the battles, and to come to the trainings. I'll start bringing Abigail to trainings instead of Torrak if I have to to even things out. This goes for everyone;

It doesnt help us One Bit if we get 20 people at a battle, if only 10 of those come to trainings. I'd take 5 people who work well together over 20 people who've never fought as a group.

Another thing that doesnt help is complaining or losing your temper when we hit a setback. Next time we lose, chill out and think about what adjustments to your strategy you can make for the next round, and pay attention for further orders.

Therefore;
- Work with us, we arent the greatest tacticians on the planet (but we try).
- Keep your temper in check, we cant expect to win every battle, nor can we expect every fight to be a fair one. S'the world.
- If you dont have anything constructive to say after a defeat, dont say anything.
- Come to trainings, please. They really do help.

Just sayin'.

~ Keres

Yes! I Concur.

If anyone needs a trapped box I've got a tinker in the low 30's and I use a box myself all the time, averages 8-12 points of damage or around there.

Do the Vespians use similar formations for every fight? Could we send our stealthers in ahead to find the one or two main targets ahead of time, maybe jab 'em with a poisoned blade when we come running in?....just tossing out ideas here.

I am not entirely clued up - what's this trapped box malarky?

A mage casts paralyze on you, you open a trapped (dart)  box that you carry in your pack (damage depends on the tinker's skill who makes the trapped box), and you take a, hopefully, small amount of damage which frees you from the spell.

Just let me know if you want one to try out.

I was pissed off because frankly, it just was not fun. If games stop being fun they stop getting played. I have better things to do than stand around for 20 minutes, go into battle for 1 minute and then repeat all night.

It can be frustrating to die to overwhelming odds but s'not the end of the world. I know that sounds like a cop out but sometimes these things happen, s'better if you can just grin and bear it. At the moment I think a couple of things are working against us, perhaps not Cove specifically, but the roleplaying circle in general.

S'my theory.....

• Cove's numbers are swelling.
• Vesper's numbers are swelling.
• Yew have always had a large number of players.
• As player numbers grow various strategies are becoming possible, winning battles and then being countered.
• During the Vesper campaign we achieved a lot of victories through use of Arcanists.
• Vesper made a lot of good moves with their Arcanists but to a larger extent.
• The lessons learned there (and the tactics) have now been perfected and put to good use.

The mass of mages is a damn fine weapon, but it's undefeated run can't last forever. I can easily see Yew demolishing it with a mass of Beseigers or Cove if we had all of our familiar faces present (and our new faces :-*). I mean obviously it can be viewed as unfair when someone arrives on your doorstep and you can pick the winner of the fight before you've even begun, s'a bummer. However it's not Magery or the ruleset that's at fault, it's simple numbers. If we got trounced by 25 swordsmen would people feel as hard done by? If we were on patrol and 25 stealth archers popped out and capped us would it be as annoying?

Naturally Magery has a few things to be said about it in terms of having 100% hit chance, ranged paralyse, high damage spells taking advantage of low resists and so on. But they're by no means invincible, nor are they the only class with frustrating abilities (sharpshooter 'Keres, I'm looking at you :D). The way I see it the problem is simply down to the growing population of the current roleplay circle, s'a good thing not a bad thing !

In other words.....

You win some !
You lose some !
At least we're still handsome right....? (http://smilies.vidahost.com/ups/dvx_rune/witch.gif)

Kas speaks the truth!

At least with regards to Raiden's handsomeness in particular and Covian handsomeness in general and... Avatar willing, through toil and tears, pulling hair and gouging we shall defeat the red menace of Vesper!

Harrrr!

Archer/Parry/Macer...powerfull..!? Nonsense.

...

*Slashes you with a bleed attack and shoots you in the back as you flee.*
 ;D

But yeah, amen to your whole statement.

Hear Hear. I've fought in few campaigns for cove, and just as few battles. I know what it feels like to get trounced by your enemy though. Especially when you were out numbered, and especially when "We are going to charge again" comes up and you simply want to ask why bother? Personally I have no love for PvP. Its why you wont find me developing a new tactic or seeking a fight. Wars on your doorstep none the less. If you don't like loosing, don't attend the fights, or quite. But don't join a diffrent side just because you want to win. That was a problem that lost us the border wars! I won't name their names but I know of numerous persons who would switch to their Yewish alts just before the battle. Needless to say I do NOT speak to these people any longer. But my point is, if its not fun then don't do it, but don't get so caught up on winning that it becomes the only thing that matters to you.

Cheers,

MK.

Concering mages, if you have fire/energy resist at aprox 60, and you have dex at say 100/120, the mage cant kill you unless he manages to stop your bandage with a poison or something. Orange petals and cure pots will save your life.

And concerning last nights battle, there was aprox 19-20 vesperians. How many was cove? I know it was less that that...so no biggie loosing a battle with such uneven numbers.

I think the worst bit is when you get frozen, they sit back, have a sip of coke and then 5 mages flamestrike you. There is no comeback from that.

Mages are very difficult to deal with, from any point of view, be it Grd, BoC, DOT whatever.
Being in Grd command, I know just what a Vesper mage gank squad feels like, however I also know that there are methods to counter these ganks.
I'll talk through them briefly.


Spell resist - Simple, effective. Maybe you can't fit it into your template as you favour parry, if you're only fighting mages, ask yourself, do you really need parry?

Stealth - If a mage can't see you, he can't gank you. Now - I'm aware that not everyone has stealth, but everyone with abit of a try can hide. Try hiding and getting the jump before they can pre-cast, because I can promise you now, a mage won't stand still if 5 warriors charge it.

Conflags - A group of mages can easily be disrupted initially by a well placed conflag/explo pot or 20. I know from reading your forums regularly that you've got the chance to attend an explosives lesson, I suggest you go.

Finally, the biggest bane and rival to the mages, something which we (Grd) have had to rely on to beat Vesper time after time. Archers. Without a good set of 4/5 archers you're going to really struggle against mages.


To finish, I'll simply say you need to listen to what targets are called, and thrive to be the first to react, too many times in any guild I will see a target called and everyone waits until someone else makes the first move. Getting the first kill in can sometimes be key, and you can get into a pattern of calling targets and having the target dead before your text has faded off the screen.

Listen to your commanding officer, and remember never be afraid to 'flee' for a few seconds just to avoid a potential ganking. ;)

Theres 2 ways to use the trapped dart box against mages spell combos.

1. A mage paralyzes you. You use the trapped box to break paralysation and you can run off to avoid being blown up.

2. A mage(or two++) starts to cast for example Explotion, you see the Vas Ort Flam. Then you use the dart box even if you aint paralyzed, you'll take 8-12 damage and you Immediately starts to apply the bandage. When the Explotion and the Flamestrike/Energy Bolt hits you for damage your bandage is already 2-3 seconds into applying. You'll be healed up again before he can even start his next spell.

Pots is a great thing, you raise yourself to using them. RP-PvP have evolved in UO...its your responsibility to follow the stream :)

Our mages should make a habit of eating grapes of wrath just before they cast their heavy damage spells. They give a slighty damage increase and lasts for 20 seconds.

Ive tested this and they give roughly +5 damage each spell you hit for 20 seconds. Basicly its like have GM Inscription for 20 second (if you already have gm inscription your spells will hit hard!)

:D

Stealth/Fisher/Mage ftw. Flamestriking from hiding rocks.

And tbh, fighting a mage (or three) shouldn't kill you if you're prepared. Pots, bandies and your best running shoes at the ready and off you go! Just distract the mages for long enough for them to split up as your mates carve their initials into them.

I actually like where they post has ended up, from something so negative to people showing really useful suggestions. I really enjoyed Raidens training last night too (first example I saw of the trapped box). Can we get some boxes on the vendors in the market?

Trapped Boxes has a durability.....like forever, you basicly only need one. Ive used the same box for months. If anyone would like one I'd hook you up np.

How do you click it in battle, without losing bandages as your last object macro? :  (

Use Bandage self and bandage target macros instead

They dont work?

They dont work for me, but I use uoassist for it. But for those that dont have uoassist theres only one "solution" I guess. Doubleclick bandages right after you've used it.

For those macros to work, you need to have the new targeting system enabled.

OMG HOAGIE THANK YOU YOU ARE MY HERO DIOS MIO!

*Fixes his bandage self macro and stops dieing*

New targeting system sucks for screenshots :(

((Everything is misspelled with bekause my si - I kant use that key, sorry - key isnt funktioning on this laptop.))

To quote Shadwell, who was in turn speaking to Markus Kobra...;

"Are you seriously playing UO without a mouse and assist?"

I <3 my assist, tbh. Its a great program, and pretty mutsh (mu_h) everyone uses it. Its like...as essential for PvP as a weapon or regs.

I only really use UOAssist for the bandage timer.

And pots if I'm in a long drawn out fight.

UOAssist - quick weapon changes, pots, heals, everything.

I am so used to assist that I would find playing without it anoying. I am using the old targeting system and bandageself works just fine.

I think we've got all we can out of this thread. We all now know the best ways of beating Vesper's Mage Gank Squads. I'm putting this on lock.

Love you all ;D