I’ve wanted to start a discussion on this matter for a long time now, but time restraints have always stood in my path and they still do. But now more than ever, it is obvious to me that this is not something that can be put off any longer.

As the title of the thread proclaims, the central topic of this discussion is of course the scope and effect that group attacks have had on the well-being of the game. Now, some may doubt the importance of this issue, but it is my belief that it ties into so many facets of the game that it needs to be addressed as a whole, rather than piecemeal. As has been the case, in the numerous discussions that have preceded this thread, targeted towards specific skills that affect groups, such as choke, thunderclap, boulderblast.

The goal here is instead to focus on what defines balance at the group level, because these skills are specifically made for use against groups. So conventional “wisdom” such as combat is not meant to be balanced in groups, bears no significance.

As earlier stated though, I do not have the time to give this topic the attention it wholeheartedly deserves. So I’m going to outline a few group attacks and hope that I have inspired some of you to give this some thought.

Everyone Attacks

Choke

Group Attacks

Hailstorm
Boulderblast
Poison Breath
Demesne Effects

Limited Group Attacks

Contagion
Darkmoon
Ancestral Curse

Smudges, barghest howl, bellow, bardic songs, blankchord, and reality would also fall under "group attacks".

EDIT: Also squall, and scissorkick. Illusions would arguably be an "everyone" attack though not really. I'm probably forgetting some things too.

Ectoplasm.

What does "limited" mean? Powercost? If so, Choke should be a "limited Everyone attack".

Think he that they hit less the more people are in the room.
Oh, and transfix gem too.

The three under that category don't always hit everyone.

He means it hits less the more people are in the room.

That would be wrong, since some of the non-limited things (like demesnes) don't work on somebody who isn't enemied. But yeah, hitting less due to number of people would make sense in the "limited" context.

Curse you.

From the replies, it seems that most have misunderstood the reason for this thread. It was not meant to define what is or is not a group attack. But instead to discuss the balance of those kinds of attacks as a whole. What standard should group attacks be judged by? What makes such skills balanced? What effect have they had on the game so far? These and other questions like them are what I wanted to be at the center of this discussion and it is my fault for not making that clear beforehand.

Power costs are a factor, if something costs 8p (darkmoon) it's entirely different then something that costs 3p (choke), or 0p (hailstorm), just because the 8p skill prevents offensive combo's for being used at the same time (double whammy x5) for instance.

On the other hand, the maintenance or set-up time for a skill is another factor, not only can they not be spammed indiscriminately, like the high-power skills, but there is another way to remove them, or a way to avoid them. My example for this would be demense effects Vs. Blouderblast/hailstorm.

I guess that leads up to defenses, if there is a skill to easily prevent the group attack affecting you it lowers its impact. choke Vs. hailstorm as my example. There is no way to prevent one; there is a universal inept skill to prevent the other.

Now, none of these are absolute, and that's not my point anyway. It is that combinations of them make for a powerful group attack, a low maintenance, no set-up, incurable/no defense for it, no/low power attack is something I'd be much more concerned about then if the group attack had those restraints.

I was actually thinking about proposing a damage group attack to my envoy, using all of them, set-up, defense, maintenance, and power has ways to balance it out, and prevent it from being the "iwin" button that other group attacks become when overused.

P.S. Actually you guys have already brought up another point, which I failed to address. Multiplication of effect. Vs. Lessening of effect. This is a huge factor and I can’t believe I missed it, but perhaps I did because it’s such a basic part of group attacks. Example: (I could have used darkmoon, as it's a good example, and at twelve people it's significantly lessened, but I'll keep it damage vs damage for a good comparison. Even though I don't know the math for suerpnals and do know the math for darkmoon)

Supernals/Avatars/Demonlords
Verses one person, we'll say they do 30,000 damage each. (yes I know these six are wrong, but they're close enough, don't go nit-picking me about incorrect numbers when the theory behind them is sound)
Verses six people, we'll say they do 5,000 damage each.
Verses twelve people, we'll say they do 2,500 damage each.
Hailstorm, on the other hand:
With one person, we’ll say it does 1200 damage. (yes I’m ignoring individual characters difference of resistance, but that’s minor anyway)
With six people, 7,200 damage.
With twelve people, 14,400 damage.

Edit:I guess my post was on topic then?

Edit:Edit:I missed another one, ability to function with or without the person present. This is what makes demense effects have power, and is the countering balance to skills that take up your eq everytime they are used, like hailstorm/boulderblast. This one isn't as major and is hardly limited to group attacks, hexes, infused runes, heck guards to a lesser extent, traps… Hrm, I'm not sure now, if it's a pit everyone falls in right, so maybe pits ARE group attacks, just with high maintenance and even higher set-up, oh and no mobility.

Mobility is another one, though I sort of included that in with maintenance/set-up it's really separate, anyway, I think I've babbled enough, obviously all group attacks have some of these elements in them, and are lacking in others, and their strength is based on the elements, well and WHAT they do, which technically might be even another element, but I've already exhausted my ability to talk anymore on this topic.

I would consider Hailstorm and Boulderblast the worst of this list. Bardic Songs can be just as bad though, but when you have a group of 3+ people one room away using a ranged attack that hits as hard as these two skills do, it makes the ones who use it or who have more mages the victors. Honestly I think that mage ranged attacks, are a little too much.

I am not sure how to balance it out, but all one side needs to win a battle is 5+ geos or aquas one room from the main battle blasting or storming and the fight will be over before it began.

Yes I know you can shield from it, but lets say you don't have your shield up and 5 boulderblasts hit you. Well goodnight Irene. And it is very easy to get people to drop a shield so mages can blast/storm.

One way to balance it, but not sure if it could be coded is to make it more of a limited group attack, or make the damage much less since it is a ranged attack.

Bamn you've been worlded. No more shield.

Personally think that skills such as Boulderblast and Hailstorm have no place in Lusternia. While I think group afflicting is an entirely different thing (demenses, dark/contagion/curse) Damage is entirely another. Active group damagers shouldn't be here, or if so, should be weighted in that less damage is done per the number of people in the room being targetted. If your hitting five people with it, it should take 4-5 mages to do the same damage that one mage currently does.

Nah a pit only hits one person, dart traps can hit up to 25 people 1 time or 1 person 25 times. So on group attacks with an average of 10 people in the group, if they walk into a brand new completely venomed dart traps it will hit everyone 2 times and then half 3 times. But dart traps are not a super damage increaser, unlike bblast or hailstorm. They don't cause damage, only afflictions, and can be cured quite simply.

I think Zenji and Dia have the right idea here. Balance is about how effectively equal sized groups can fight each other.

Boulderblast and hailstorm are scary because, unlike demesnes, they can be stacked. Because of this, six or seven mages can kill twenty in one round of balance.

Demesnes are an interesting concept. They give a home field advantage to one side, but, barring little people or gross incompetence, they don't kill without active interaction. A mage's or druid's active skills are a little toned down to account for this in one-on-one combat, but in the presence of a group, it makes a big difference. Since it's equally available and easily recognized by all sides, I think balancing demesnes against each other and mages/druids with fully active and timed demesnes against other archetypes in one-on-one combat is sufficient for balance.

Choke is one of my favorite skills in the whole game. Everyone is affected. Period. It changes the whole dynamic of a fight in that room. Personally, I think there should be more skills like it, some with positive effects, some with negative.

One-off active skills against enemies should either be absolutely trivial (fear) or have a power cost.

Would it be possible to have an attack that affects some people more than others...say somebody gets the full force of the blast while others around him get less, sort of like explosive damage.

Hailstorm/bblast are one of the bigger issues. They're definately too strong. What Kharvik and I did a while back shouldn't be possible (2 vs ~10, he just bblasted from outside while I tanked all of them). Those fights lasted like 10 seconds and was simply a demolishing. I don't really see that as an asset to Lusternia. To further my point, I believe Kharvik was without any decent curing/reflexes at the time.

I guess the time has come for me to clearly state my own opinion on this topic. Similar to some of the statements in this thread so far, I also find the primary issue to center around Hailstorm and Boulderblast, but I do not want to look at them in isolation, but rather a part of an overall evaluation on all group attacks.

I’ll begin with just those two skills though. For a long time now I have felt that these skills should have stayed as they were at the game inception. They were once attacks similar to choke in that they affected everyone in the room, rather than just enemies. It added a liability to the skill that prevented it from being used indiscriminately, which is solely lacking now. The change to the skills also did not come about as a result of an evaluation of them, but rather because of issues with declare after its inclusion in the game.

Now the power of these skills can not be debated even when you do consider the variance in damage based on the health and defense of the intended target. Because even if the damage was as low as 700, that would equal 21000 damage that can be dealt to one group of thirty with one attack by one mage. It should be obvious how this can multiply when multiple mages are firing, and no other archetype can come anywhere close to that kind of damage output. Thus unless the damage was drastically lowered the best course of action would be change the area of effect, either by increasing it to include everyone or lessening it to hit with less force dependent on the number of people hit.

Wesmin actually mentioned a similar evaluation of the damage output against groups, but I felt it needed to be reiterated.

Choke is being discussed ad nauseum, and I’m not that particularly interested in the debate nor have I read it, but I will say that I think the skill is fine for the most part. The only thing I think should be evaluated about it is the time of activation. So perhaps there is some specific warning before it is placed in your room.

A question has plagued me for a long time though, regarding group attacks as a whole. Why are they predominately the domain of mages?

I remember shortly after this game begun, one of my skills was drastically changed with the stated reason being that only mages should be able to effect groups in such a way. I speak of contagion which used to hit everyone, including allies (non-liches), which was changed to be the first limited group attack. I look also at skills like dark moon and ancestral curse which actually have a higher power cost than reality, and yet are limited in ways that reality obviously isn’t.

Why is this so?

There is; we have to cauldron release before we can cast choke.