Black wrote:
Reward: High damage, keeps distance from enemy wielding a melee weapon.
I would question this "reward": more often than not, you will fail to kill the enemy jedi with just a single saberthrow. Sure, you can one hit gunners most of the time, but that is irrelevant when discussing jedi versus jedi combat.
Black wrote:
With no disarm the negatives change to only being slightly vulnerable when the saber is in the air = small risk with high rewards.
I think spending 40 forcepoints on an attack that may not even kill your enemy, and ending up dealing 0 damage is a pretty huge risk in itself. It takes a while to get your forcepoints back, and as you said, you are vulnerable when the saber is in the air.
Black wrote:
Losing your saber is a big negative of course but I think it works competitively. There has been an upsurge in being disarmed as people play defence Jedi more particularly on urban. I think it goes to show that being disarmed isn't disadvantage enough to deter picking the class and I think it adds skill to playing Jedi.
Well I wouldn't say it's just urban, it happens on all maps we play bar hoth. I have seen it happen on nar and bespin as well, and especially on cargo, where d jedi is often picked to deal with o jedi.
Also, you can't just not pick jedi classes. It doesn't matter that you are susceptible to disarm, you will have to pick the class anyway, to counter enemy scouts. Bespin is a great example what happens when d jedi is not able to counter o scout: defence has to run the mirror class to counter it, and you end up with a d and an o scout shooting at each other for ages while moving around the map as unpredictably as possible.
Black wrote:
Removing this element that works, in that it is intentional, not bugged and, adds to gameplay, would be a mistake. At the end of the day you don't need to throw your saber to get kills but it is the easiest way to play the class and making it easier to do lowers the skill ceiling.
The only map where I frequently see a jedi class get kills without saber throw is cargo, everywhere else you will be throwing your saber. And mind you, I actually genuinely enjoy normal saber versus saber combat on cargo, but I feel if I attempted it on any other map , other jedi would just back away a bit and saberthrow me. Not because that requires less skills, but because that is the
safest approach when dealing with enemy jedi.
Black wrote:
That's a problem for me. Playing as a Jedi you should be conscious of disarm and time saber throws to prevent disarm as much as possible using push/pull, avoiding saber or attacking when they are swinging their saber.
I feel you are only thinking of strictly jedi versus jedi scenarios, and not taking into the other teammates. While on paper it may sound plausible to play around the weaknesses of saber defence, I think it's actually really hard to do if the jedi's teammate is not braindead.
ceasar wrote:
I'm afraid I'll have to side with Black on this one. IMHO, the disarm mechanic has a similar effect as rocket hp, in that it (should) be cause for consideration before attacking. When I play HW and the opposing team has a tech I find myself hesitating to fire for fear of blowing myself up. Similarly, when combating splash classes (as HW) I find myself firing slightly off center to avoid hurting myself should the splash cause the rocket to explode.
The comparison with rocket hp actually surprised me, not that it isn't a valid one, just that I think they are the exact opposites. D HW will try sitting in a position where he cannot be easily attacked, but still able to fire rockets at the enemy. This usually involves staying close to the objective, and just in general, staying as far away as the attackers as possible. This playstyle is further reinforced by the slow mobility of the class, and its vulnerability, that comes from rocket hp. Jedi classes on the other hand, are the exact opposite. They are mobile, low hp classes, that usually want to play on the front, leading the charge/pulling aggro.
While rocket hp can also be annoying, it actually contributes to HW's role, and keeps the class in check (just think of how threatening urban o hw is without rocket self damage). A jedi losing his lightsaber on the other hand just straight up renders the jedi incapable of fulfilling its role. And once again, they are usually on the front when this happens, in close proximity to the enemy team.
Black wrote:
Currently it compares saber throw level and saber defence level. Assuming the sabers contact:
Throw > Defence - never disarm
Throw = Defence - RNG for disarm
Throw < Defence - Always Disarm
If this is true, then it's actually really sad, considering jedi classes are useless without defence level 3, while the only map that has a class with level 3 saber throw is bespin.
Grab wrote:
Before we "fix" rng and fix saber blocking disruptor, can we see if this happens on basejka server? I think it might be happening because of broken blocks on modded server.
I was not aware modded servers might have an issue like this. Though while we never tested disarm in ctf, alpha did spend a lot of time examining how saberdefence worked, and iirc the conclusion was that raven just half assed the entire thing, and it worked the same regardless of basejk or b_e. This is further reinforced by his surprisingly excellent saber defence thread.