On Fri, 1 Oct 1999, Sheldon, Colin wrote:
> From: "Sheldon, Colin" <Colin.Sheldon@...>
>
> With those points made, I believe that Verant gave magic-users and priests
> the ability to bind anywhere because making the 2 - 3 zone run to fetch a
> corpse can be darn near impossible. Magic-users are roughly 40% less
> effective in melee combat because of their reduced OFF/DEF, and priests are
> down 20%, and neither group has any special melee attacks like the melee
> classes.
>
I've heard many arguments against the melee classes being able to
bind anywhere, but this argument is silly. This is a naked wizard vs a
blue:
root
run
Casting classes have an plethora of utility spells and abilities
at their dispolsal, which a melee class does not. Does a warrior get
invisibility? No, but a wizard sure does.
> Having played a wizard up to the mid-teens before becoming a full-time bard,
> I can tell you how hard it can be for a naked wizard to handle a tough blue
> that has latched onto you when you are making the run-of-shame to your
> corpse -- and this is with the best root and DD spells in the business.
When you don't have your corpse, your purpose isn't to solo blue
creatures. Your purpose is to get your corpse. And even if both classes
were many zones away, wizards have a MUCH easier time getting back.
> For a melee class, the run is an inconvenience, but without nearly as much
> risk, as you can either outrun any problems that may arise (bards), hide and
That's completely wrong. Unless you're a bard, or a lvl 39+
ranger, you're slow. And running through a zone slow, with no way to slow
or stop an creature because your hand to hand skill isn't magical, is much
more dangerous as a melee class.
I'm sorry, but playing a wizard up to the low teens just isn't
enough experience with a caster to have an accurate judge of these things,
and since your only experience with melee classes seems to be with the
bard (which is about as un-melee as you can be for a melee class), I think
your personal experience have skewed your opinion somewhat.
> With all the work that Verant has done to balance the various classes, I do
> not believe that one can reasonably expect them to make this major change to
> the game without a compelling need. I believe that it is also important to
> consider the outcry Verant would get from the seven classes that can bind if
> they let everyone bind. Can't you already hear Namby Pamby the Necromancer
Ahem, lvl 50 cleric, who honestly believes all classes should be
able to bind anywhere. The fact that class A or class B would whine is
totally irrelevant to whether they should get bind or not.
> My parting thought is this: sure I'd love to have bind. I'd also like to be
> the flying cuisinart of death, but I'm not. I'm a bard. I've been endowed
> by my creators with a wide variety of marvelous abilities (most of which
> work), but bind is not one of them. Being adaptable, I make do with what I
> have, and frankly, I do pretty well.
My argument wasn't that you should have the ability to cast bind
affinity, but that when a caster casts it on you, it would take no matter
what zone the spell was cast in. The "melee binds in city only" was a
quick-fix to the complaint that being allowed to bind other people could
result in malicious binds. To justify it it now with "it's because you're
a melee class" is silly.
Miriana Windryder
Lvl 50 Cleric
Lvl 12 Bard
Innoruuk Server