Someone who can, move all the stuff from the main Special Report topic that's only choke here?

Envoys did come up with the idea to change it back to room-wide. Geb agreed as well. I recall Nydekion telling me that it was likely to be changed back until something more ideal could be implemented. No word on that. Targeting single targets was not a good resolution. When it first went in, Narsrim howled about the fun he'd have with that and created his SD alt to partake of the glory.

It's fairly simple. In -groups- choke is overwhelming. In a game where group combat is rampant and even preferred by a majority of the players (seemingly), it needs to be addressed FOR groups. Room-wide is preferable because at least everyone is impacted and the tables are more easily turned in that situation. Until something like pacified ents and meld effects in choke is implemented.

We nerfed trample/sac. Nerf choke already, it's been 6 years now with no real fix in sight.

Just a note: if you agree on making Choke active aeon (like Wane), return us a passive manadrain attack (like Succumb). The whole point of the Succumb-Lash exchange was because the Moondancers had active aeon (Wane) while the Shadowdancers got 'passive' aeon (Choke).

Ok, Here's my issues with complaints about choke in groups.

1) It affects BOTH the caster and the target - while there is an advantage to Glom for choosing when to use choke, it also is a double edged sword. There is a message when someone chokes someone else, telling EVERYONE in the room who is choked (both the caster and the target). It's incredibly simple to make an announce to call out when someone on your side is choked, who did the choking and have people focus the choker.

2) Group fights are groups. This means there is multiple people on your side, responsible for helping each other out. If I see Vadi getting chasmed, and he's being hindered out the wazoo, it's my responsibility to stop the chasm by gusting/peacing/blinding whatever. Same goes for Judge, decap, pinleg trains, massive focusing on team member. Same goes for choke. You can move either the target or the caster out of the room and choke will fade. It requires you to take my first point into consideration, then act appropriately. If it's bonded, use beastkick, tackle, scissor, fear, whatever to make the target or caster leave the room. It's not hard at all in groups, nor is it unreasonable to expect groups to work together for success.

3) The only time where choke is truly it's most overpowered, is when it's a group vs 1 or 2. But this falls under the case of all other situations. Groups vs 1 is typically overpowered and you better be running as quick as you can to begin with. Multitudes of other skills are just as bad in these situations.


I think it's pretty agreed upon that choke is fine 1v1, it has a long balance time, can be turned upon the caster pretty easily and escaped from pretty easily too.

In Groups, it requires pro-activeness of the group to combat it. Lack of teamwork to prevent and stop chokes in general, does not mean it's overpowered, it means you need better teamwork. It only affects 1 person, and while that 1 person needs to be proactive as well, the group needs to be assisting each other too. A good group will get around choke pretty easily, but they need to be aware that it's likely going to happen and take appropriate actions.

Just a note: if you agree on making Choke active aeon (like Wane), return us a passive manadrain attack (like Succumb). The whole point of the Succumb-Lash exchange was because the Moondancers had active aeon (Wane) while the Shadowdancers got 'passive' aeon (Choke).


This.

Room-wide Choke should slow everything ticking in the room, especially demesnes and ents. (Yes, that's a big pain code-wise.)

There is no counter to shadows released in a room. There is no counter to the room-wide Choke that is set in a room, especially before the other group enters. There is no defense (i.e., speed) to delay the effectiveness of Choke. It's incurable, and it's often inescapable because of the nature of the thing.

Personally, I doubt a viable version of Choke can be found that would be truly balanced for group combat.

Zarquan:

Room-wide Choke should slow everything ticking in the room, especially demesnes and ents. (Yes, that's a big pain code-wise.)

There is no counter to shadows released in a room. There is no counter to the room-wide Choke that is set in a room, especially before the other group enters. There is no defense (i.e., speed) to delay the effectiveness of Choke. It's incurable, and it's often inescapable because of the nature of the thing.

Personally, I doubt a viable version of Choke can be found that would be truly balanced for group combat.

It's not inescapable ever, I've pointed out several ways to reliably escape choke in groups in my previous post. It's easy to escape 1v1, the only time where it becomes difficult is the gank situations that I pointed out and many other skills fall into that same category.

There doesn't need to be a counter for releasing shadows, shadow cost power to collect and can only be collected during night on prime outdoor areas. Quite a few Night skills rely on shadows to work and the only negative effect that enemies have is having those skills cast on them (ie choke).

Honestly, room-wide choke will make it even easier to use against people. There's a reason it was changed from before, I believe the current form of choke is by far better and more balanced for the reasons I've stated.

Sidd:

1) It affects BOTH the caster and the target - while there is an advantage to Glom for choosing when to use choke, it also is a double edged sword. There is a message when someone chokes someone else, telling EVERYONE in the room who is choked (both the caster and the target). It's incredibly simple to make an announce to call out when someone on your side is choked, who did the choking and have people focus the choker.

The problem is that the choke target usually will instadie, giving no one time to switch to the choking target to do anything about it. The easiest thing to do is gust the choker or chokee, but in distort that doesn't fly (and you can drop room distort). It's not as easy as say... point cleanse to remove sap.

Yes, it's mostly the incurable part of choke that makes it really a pain, and the fact that nothing can be done to stop it or defend against it. Ditto for dropping shadows. I suggest that the balance on dropping shadows be extended to a mage/druid terrain change, because shadows does essentially the same thing. It changes the layout of the room to allow you to use a set of skills including passive buffs and cheap attacks. It doesn't prevent others from dropping their effects, but that is balanced by it being undispellable.

EDIT: Uh.. Forestcasting forest costs power, and you can hold less power then you can shadows in a cauldron? There is a counter to this, however.

EDIT: And really? You are the same person who says that brumetower is easypeasy to bypass, then later says you couldn't do it in a wargames because a single other person was hindering you (that other person being a warrior who wasn't pinlegging you).

That would gimp Shadowdancers, though, who are heavily reliant on fae. Maybe slow fae down, but not as much as it slows active commands?

Also, list of ticking things: druidry effects (demesne and out-of-demesne), bard songs, fae, healing auras. Which should be affected and by how much?

EDIT: in response to Iasmos' "slow ticking things in Choke" idea.

I'm not saying it is inescapable all the time, but there is a good reason it's used in a majority of encounters.

Enyalida:

EDIT: And really? You are the same person who says that brumetower is easypeasy to bypass, then later says you couldn't do it in a wargames because a single other person was hindering you (that other person being a warrior who wasn't pinlegging you).

Brumetower is easy to bypass 1v1 (as usual). In the time that it takes a Shadowdancer to cauldron release;shadowdance brumetower, the druid could have gusted/beastkicked him to another room. It's happened to me that I released shadows and was gusted while I was still regaining equilibrium, then the effects hit, including Treelife (Brumetower can only be cast on ground level). Granted, it may have been just out of luck.

Enyalida:


The problem is that the choke target usually will instadie, giving no one time to switch to the choking target to do anything about it. The easiest thing to do is gust the choker or chokee, but in distort that doesn't fly (and you can drop room distort). It's not as easy as say... point cleanse to remove sap.

Yes, it's mostly the incurable part of choke that makes it really a pain, and the fact that nothing can be done to stop it or defend against it. Ditto for dropping shadows. I suggest that the balance on dropping shadows be extended to a mage/druid terrain change, because shadows does essentially the same thing. It changes the layout of the room to allow you to use a set of skills including passive buffs and cheap attacks. It doesn't prevent others from dropping their effects, but that is balanced by it being undispellable.

EDIT: Uh.. Forestcasting forest costs power, and you can hold less power then you can shadows in a cauldron? There is a counter to this, however.

EDIT: And really? You are the same person who says that brumetower is easypeasy to bypass, then later says you couldn't do it in a wargames because a single other person was hindering you (that other person being a warrior who wasn't pinlegging you).

No one in choke instantly dies. It takes several seconds to kill anyone. Those several seconds are plenty of time to save the person. You'll notice that I listed several group methods of getting the person out of choke that works outside distort and bonds.

Shadows don't need to be defended against, unless you want to start having every other skill require the same kind of effect. If you want to compare to foresting, then there needs to also be ways to help you maintain shadows in the room as well. Not to mention that foresting gives you passive attacks while shadows do nothing of the sort, they only enable active attacks. Shadows are fine as is.

I find it funny that you bring up me not being able to deal with brumetower fighting 1 against 2 against a BC who was constantly kding, breaking legs and stunning. Yeah, it was a bit difficult to deal with brumetower in that situation. And honestly, after dealing with it, giving the circumstances, it should have been more difficult. When you are fighting 2 people by yourself, it -should- be harder. I've dealt with brumetower 1v1 just fine. There's also this little thing that if you don't want to fight in brumetower, you don't have to. I could have just sat outside of that room (demesne was unbreakable there), but I was choosing to fight.

Edit: @Iasmos: Yes, the reason is because it is powerful, it's an aeon that requires the target or the caster to be removed from the room to get rid of. Typically powerful skills are used in the majority of encounters, like pinleg, aeon (even if it is curable), ectoplasm etc.

Powerful skills generally cost power commensurate with their effectiveness.

And, by no means would I want to see the room-wide version return to replace the current version, either. :P

Never said that shadows need a dispel, actually, so they won't need a way to protect them from said dispel. I said they should take longer to drop.

Real (group) battles are not fought 1on1.

Not going to address the 'choose to fight' thing, because it won't lead anywhere but "choose to not play".

Zarquan:

Powerful skills generally cost power commensurate with their effectiveness.

And, by no means would I want to see the room-wide version return to replace the current version, either. :P

Right, Choke costs power and I think given the fact that it chokes both caster and target, it's a reasonable cost

Enyalida:

Never said that shadows need a dispel, actually, so they won't need a way to protect them from said dispel. I said they should take longer to drop.

Real (group) battles are not fought 1on1.

Not going to address the 'choose to fight' thing, because it won't lead anywhere but "choose to not play".

Real group battles are also fought with more even numbers and not by yourself, so bringing up me struggling by myself against 2 people is disingenuous.

If I'm in a wargames fighting 2 people, why am I choosing not to play by standing by myself waiting for them to come to me than me go to them? If it's ok for them to sit in a brumetower room, why is it not ok for me to sit in a non-brumetowered room?

As far as shadows, you compared them to foresting so I pointed out reasons why the comparison falls flat. Shadows are fine as is, they don't need to take more balance, by themselves, they literally do nothing to you, it's the active skills that require them are what people complain about and what needs to be addressed. If you want to make shadows take a bit more time to feel some sort of personal victory, I can get behind that, but it won't stop the complaints about the skills in the slightest.

I considered that choke on a target will always ream the target, choke in a room will always favour the person who brings the most passives or has the most passive curing (hi drink). Anyway here are some ideas, some of which may be recycled.

- (Targetted) Being choked should cause a delay on all attacks trying to hit you as the shadows choking you (both) interfere in their attacks. This could be extended to every skill as the shadows get in the way of magic and make it harder for your psionics to reach them. Treat this as the attacker being under a choke for the attack, that is you cannot stack attacks on a person who is choked. If you swing left swing right the right will finish. This will limit the action swap for people choked and give them a little more leeway to offset attackers. Passives should be slowed down by 20-25% or so for this.

That idea would leave you in a better position to survive while choked and remove its assured gank potential.

- (Room) Choke works normal for 4- people in a room, if more arrive, you see something like "The shadows here begin to spread, weakening their grasp" at which point the delay from choke is reduced to say .7s or .75s. If more than 8 people are in the room you see "You sigh in relief as the shadows clinging to your form spread thinner." which makes it a .5s delay. At max delay passives should be slowed 1-2 seconds. .5-1s at mid level, no delay at thinnest. This would be to offset chokemesne.

This would maintain its smaller form but make it weaker in groups. This may or may not require a target still.

- (Target) Choke becomes contagious. Attacking someone choked makes you choked if in the same room as the shadows latch onto you.

Just a bad brand of fun, although it quickly becomes room you get 1 free attack on someone before being choked. This may or may not be a good thing.

Just some fast ideas!

EDIT: Shadows could be changed to have a real eq of like 2.5 but I cannot see them being much higher. As to the succumb thing, I am not sure that a change back is required, though there are issues either way.

A reminder this topic is choke and its direct relations. Brumetower does not belong in this thread, take it elsewhere.

What passive attacks does forest grant, all on its own, without a meld?

Zarquan:

What passive attacks does forest grant, all on its own, without a meld?

Why do you forest in the first place? so vines works? You forest so you can meld or so the other team can't.

Enyalida:

Never said that shadows need a dispel, actually, so they won't need a way to protect them from said dispel. I said they should take longer to drop.

Real (group) battles are not fought 1on1.

Not going to address the 'choose to fight' thing, because it won't lead anywhere but "choose to not play".

Didn't you say shadows were fine 1v1? If so, what would extra delay on dropping shadows accomplish? In 1v1, it'd seriously weaken SDs, and in groups, SD1 drops shadows and SD2 chokes. End result? Choke (and other shadow-related abilities) are hampered in 1v1 and mostly unchanged in groups.