by Moorgard on 2001-05-11
Note: This editorial was actually a post I made to the official EverQuest forums a couple days ago. Since it has not received a response, I thought I would post it here for general feedback.
Recently Verant has made many gameplay changes to things that, in the past, they said would never be changed. Overall, such things as the removal of the class experience penalty have been tremendously beneficial to the game.
I think the time has come to change something else that would benefit players in a direct way. The time has come to drop the curtain, at least a little, that blocks us from understanding some of the melee combat specifics in EverQuest.
I'm not talking about an absolute revelation of combat formulae here. That, I agree, would be too much, and would result in vast amounts of players changing gear and tactics to meet some sort of "best" standard for how to play their characters.
But there are a couple specific things that could change without, I feel, adversely affecting the gaming world. Specifically, I'm talking about improving the AC and ATK numbers we see displayed on our inventory screens.
It is well known that these numbers are actually amalgamations of different kinds of data, and as such are really of limited usefulness in their current form. The AC number we see is made up of two factors--avoidance and mitigation--while ATK is a combination of "to hit" and a damage modifier.
It is also known that during beta AC and ATK were shown as divided into these four factors, but it was decided to change the way these numbers were displayed when the game went live.
I request that, instead of having the meaningless "/1000" after the AC and ATK numbers, that Verant once again divides AC so that it shows avoidance/mitigation and ATK so that it shows to hit/damage modifier.
This change would certainly benefit melee classes, and would shed some light on the choices Verant makes with regards to equipment. For example, monk armor has always had considerably lower AC because, we have been told, the
monk's avoidance AC is so much greater than a warrior's. Comparing the stats of high-level warriors and monks on paper, the AC of warriors is far ahead of monks, yet we are assured by Verant that this is not as black and white as it seems.
Seeing the direct effect that a piece of equipment or a weapon has would allow the player much more freedom to decide what kind of fighter their character wants to be: someone who avoids damage but hits hard, or someone who absorbs a lot of damage and hits often, for example.
This change would allow players to understand their melee characters more without ruining any of the secrets of the game mechanics. Please, in the months before Luclin, consider this request.