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The REAL problem with swashbucklers

AuthorMessage
Gunner's Mate
Sep 30, 2009
240
This is how most buckler pvp matches go. First because you are cloaked that means that for the most part I cant hit you (( for explanation purposes I am going to talk as a buck. Though these are issues for privateers, witches, etc too)) Then the critical boost…why because it allows poison to critical! Then the poison begins. So with the number of 190 for 5 rounds that is equal to 950 damage and cloak still has 2 rounds on it at this point. ((Again this is assuming that the poison didn’t critical which it can and does very often with that critical boost up increasing you by 10-15% depending on which was used. If THAT happens one poison does 1900 damage and your still in the shadows. Does this seem unfair yet? If not I am just getting started)) Next comes the shield. Because as death wiz pointed out there are a few tiny windows in which to strike back. So most bucklers use their last free cloak round to shield up in preparation for that. Then comes the assassin strike. Which as I pointed out is DOUBLE the damage because you are cloaked. Oh but wait…all his compaions are cloaked too because of fog so the odds of getting hit from 4 different directions is very high. Also keep in mind that poison had has 2 rounds to work now.

Gunner's Mate
Sep 30, 2009
240
((To keep things form getting too confusing I will address the buck counter measures after doing the numbers so bare with me. )) ((Also to fair to both sides and because the topic of this post isn’t about black fog lets ignore the companions and the 4 way onslaught since there is no guarantee how they will be used. Instead I will pretend like it is more 1v1. Even though fog really does do lethal amounts of damage to the pirate or the companions.))

Gunner's Mate
Sep 30, 2009
240
So now comes the double powerful assassin strike. Which has a great chance to critical again thanks to the earlier buff. Ill round down to 750 damage from the hit, (Hope that’s an acceptable average for you all even if it is on the low side) that doubled is 1500 damage + 250 bleeding times 2. That equals 2000 damage. Now I am going to pause here to separate physical damage from magic damage. Keep in mind poison and bleeding are both magical damage and thus not effected by moves like leviathans call or krakens lament at all. So as the 950 poison I mentioned earlier is still ticking away the buckler has just added 500 extra DoT damage on top of that. Poison has worked for 3 rounds now. At this point the cycle starts over. The buck cloaks again (poison 4 rounds) the buck buffs again (poison has now run for all 5 rounds)…then comes another batch of poison…yay! So that is 1450 magic damage with another 950 on the way. Again this is assuming that poison never criticales which with flans agility boost and the bucks on critical boost is VERY unlikely.

Gunner's Mate
Sep 30, 2009
240
So now that the buckler is cloaked for another 5 rounds the process is continuing. Keep in mind any buffs the privy or buck may have used to level the playing field are also wearing off while they slowly loose health all while the buckler is safely hidden. Now to shorten things up I am just going to say…this does continue for another 5 rounds. Then ANOTHER 5 rounds. As Deathwiz101378 pointed out for someone to be alive after 15 rounds of that insanity is highly unlikely and thus making my entire point. But allow me to crunch the numbers for anecorbie’s sake and any other still not getting it. Three rounds of poison and 3 rounds of cloaked assassin strike equals 4350 magical damage and 4500 physical damage from the hitting part of strike. ((Don’t believe me? Here is the math using the above mentioned numbers. 950 + (250)x2 = 1450 x 3 (the number of times pattern repeats) = 4350 1500 x 3 (the number of times pattern repeats) = 4500 )) So that is 8850 damage.

Gunner's Mate
Sep 30, 2009
240
There are the numbers anecorbie…happy? Now I know that is I tiny bit lower than the 9300 I said at the beginning but I did use the symbol approximately and said give or take a few hundred. At any rate that is the new number with the accepted averages (and even below average with the assassin strike numbers both for bleeding and the hit.) Now how you expect people to survive that level of MIXED damage is beyond me. And you still don’t think that its over powered? Keep in mind your hidden for most of that with only 3 tiny little windows to counter attack and the inability to heal during 5 of those 15 rounds. Not to mention the fog onslaught but I wont bring that up except to point out it hasn’t vanished its still an issue.

Gunner's Mate
Sep 30, 2009
240
At this point allow me to address your guys’ other counter statements. So yes bucks can shield stack…thank goodness because a four-way onslaught from fog while poison is going would be impossible to face without it. Too bad for the other schools like witches and muskets who don’t have that level of shielding. Also keep in mind again that the magical damage portion of that isn’t effected by buck shields at all. Which means they get the full brunt of it. Now Anecorbie mentioned Magic resist. Might I point out that bucks HAVE NO resist. In fact bucklers and bucks are the only ones that don’t get any base of magic resist at all. In fact bucks don’t even get base armor other than what we learn. (while other schools gain resist ONTOP of learning even more but that is an issue for another post) Yet the buckler weapons give more armor AND pierce.

Gunner's Mate
Sep 30, 2009
240
Which brings me to ane’s other statement about armor. Bucklers are the only ones who’s weapons give pierce and armor. The boarding kinves give like 30 pierce and 14 armor if I am not mistaken ((as well as the 3rd or 4th assassin strike. Here ill count them out. One naturally. One from the totem. One from ring. One from weapon. The ring also gives another poison. So for those of you who say “no they don’t have that many” I have just show how they do. Now they might not have all 4 if use a different weapon or totem or whatever. But again average means what most do. And yes most have 3 assassin 3 5 round cloaks and 3 poisons)) So even if bucks did have an armor advantage that is reduced thx to pierce.

Gunner's Mate
Sep 30, 2009
240
Now…onto the armor ad shield stacking! Now as I mentioned the buck shields do not stop magic damage. Well the midnight pirate pointed out farmed gear and someone else pointed out valor fort. So now I will address those. Now that 15 rounds of being cloaked REALLY comes in handy now. You see even if a buck is clever enough to bring some valor fortress gear in with him he is still FORCED to make a choice. He either has to try and block the poison and use up his shields faster or try and save the shields and try stop the hits. You remember how I mentioned the idea of “mixed” damage? Well since half of that 8850 is magic and half is physical it makes it very hard to block all of it. If I choose to fort early to counter act the poison then the buckler will simply use his long cloaks to and poisons to wear out the number of shields. Keep in mind most bucklers have 3 5 rounds poisons AND a 3 round poison. Am I expected to bring in 4 valor fortress? Not to mention the fog forces a buck such as me to burn through shields early on. Other wise the 4 way fog will kill in that one round.

Gunner's Mate
Sep 30, 2009
240
So now I have burned through 2 buck shields and a fort. And the buckler is only on their first round of the cycle. At any rate by the third round (round 15-17) I am all out of shields half dead and wide open to cloaked assassin hits. While the buckler has worn down any accuracy debuffs I put on him and has basically stayed hidden and healed up most of the game. So they typically have max health by the time we are both running out of card. Keep in mind that bucks also don’t have any natural means of healing. I try to bring in a healing companion but fog gets him/her killed for sure. I have learned and try to bring in 2 more heals but those are limited and if the cursed poison is timed right then I cant even use them for 5 rounds.

Gunner's Mate
Sep 30, 2009
240
So in summary…there is no way to stop that much offense with so few consequences. 8850 mixed damage is too hard for most schools to stop. Privy can stop it but they have such lame offense they still loose. Witches and muskets…forget about it. They have horrible chances of surviving a skilled buckler who uses this strategy. Granted they have more magic resist…but less chance of surviving the strikes themselves. Hence the danger of this mixed damage system and poison having no consequences. It allows bucklers to effectively counter everyone but their own kind. If poison broke the cloak this would level the playing field by forcing them to choose between magic damage or physical damage. Witches use magic damage…yet they cant cast mojo storm (which only does 600 magic damage) from the shadows and keep the hidden. Muskets use magic damage and they cant use bombs from the shadows and keep their hidden. How come bucklers are the only ones that can do damage with no consequences? That’s why I called it FREE damage. In fact even if you ignore the numbers…that notion itself is so unfair. Like it or not poison is indeed broken.

Gunner's Mate
Sep 30, 2009
240
Oooh. I did forget one other point when mentioning the shields portion at the end there. Purge! Bucklers can purge from the shadows as well without removing their fog. So that burns through even more shields and leave an opponent WIDE OPEN for fog hits and poison...not to mention forcing them to burn through even more shields. So if poison isnt broken the purge is. But personally I think they are both broken. I would say cloak is a positive effect and should be removed. And free magic damage that no one else can do while staying cloaked is also unfair.

Lieutenant
Nov 28, 2014
138
Koi the Fish on Sep 11, 2015 wrote:
My friend John Walker a Privateer is a champion.
Ok, one privateer, again what I said was a rough estimate of how many of each class are champion

Gunner's Mate
Sep 30, 2009
240
Hmm so I noticed there were a lot less objections when I took the time to REALLY lay things out in my massive texts. But I am not surprised. When the "official" numbers are laid out like that its kind of hard to deny. With the moo robe change I packed ANOTHER fort onto my gear as I replaced my robe and I still couldn't beat a skilled buckler. Sure enough I was poisoned 3 times and bled to death and my shields were purged. So between fog and 3 extra cloaks all the poison being unable to heal and bleeding and now purge...lol my helplessness was laughable. Im sorry but there is no holes in that buckler strategy. They really need to fix poison. That would be the best. There are other options like cleanse or something that removes poison. But that would be a terrible cop out.

Pirate Overlord
Mar 16, 2012
10631
Thomas Sunhammer on Sep 19, 2015 wrote:
Hmm so I noticed there were a lot less objections when I took the time to REALLY lay things out in my massive texts. But I am not surprised. When the "official" numbers are laid out like that its kind of hard to deny. With the moo robe change I packed ANOTHER fort onto my gear as I replaced my robe and I still couldn't beat a skilled buckler. Sure enough I was poisoned 3 times and bled to death and my shields were purged. So between fog and 3 extra cloaks all the poison being unable to heal and bleeding and now purge...lol my helplessness was laughable. Im sorry but there is no holes in that buckler strategy. They really need to fix poison. That would be the best. There are other options like cleanse or something that removes poison. But that would be a terrible cop out.
There were no objections from me, because I'm done with the subject; you're whistling to the wind, mate.
Poisoned 3 times? Purge? And bleeding? I would like to shake the hand of that awesome buckler, he ( or she ) demonstrated superior strategy.

Gunner's Mate
Dec 16, 2009
212
Thomas Sunhammer on Sep 19, 2015 wrote:
Hmm so I noticed there were a lot less objections when I took the time to REALLY lay things out in my massive texts. But I am not surprised. When the "official" numbers are laid out like that its kind of hard to deny. With the moo robe change I packed ANOTHER fort onto my gear as I replaced my robe and I still couldn't beat a skilled buckler. Sure enough I was poisoned 3 times and bled to death and my shields were purged. So between fog and 3 extra cloaks all the poison being unable to heal and bleeding and now purge...lol my helplessness was laughable. Im sorry but there is no holes in that buckler strategy. They really need to fix poison. That would be the best. There are other options like cleanse or something that removes poison. But that would be a terrible cop out.
I can't speak for others but I know I didn't respond because I found your premise ludicrous but I suppose I can address your arguments.

Gunner's Mate
Dec 16, 2009
212
Thomas Sunhammer on Sep 11, 2015 wrote:
This is how most buckler pvp matches go. First because you are cloaked that means that for the most part I cant hit you (( for explanation purposes I am going to talk as a buck. Though these are issues for privateers, witches, etc too)) Then the critical boost…why because it allows poison to critical! Then the poison begins. So with the number of 190 for 5 rounds that is equal to 950 damage and cloak still has 2 rounds on it at this point. ((Again this is assuming that the poison didn’t critical which it can and does very often with that critical boost up increasing you by 10-15% depending on which was used. If THAT happens one poison does 1900 damage and your still in the shadows. Does this seem unfair yet? If not I am just getting started)) Next comes the shield. Because as death wiz pointed out there are a few tiny windows in which to strike back. So most bucklers use their last free cloak round to shield up in preparation for that. Then comes the assassin strike. Which as I pointed out is DOUBLE the damage because you are cloaked. Oh but wait…all his compaions are cloaked too because of fog so the odds of getting hit from 4 different directions is very high. Also keep in mind that poison had has 2 rounds to work now.
Ok so lets analyze your scenario as presented

Round 1- Cloak
Round 2-Critical Buff(4 cloak rounds left)
Round 3-Poison(3 cloak rounds left)- This I have an issue with because it assumes the swash is in range to poison your team in one round. How did a swash get close enough to reach a bucc team without being demolished by the charges?
Round 4-Single Shield(2 cloak rounds left)
Round 5-Assassin strike(Exposed)

In the mean time the swash is doing all this why didn't you-
a)Set up a barricade?
b)Shield?
c)Spread out?
d)Hide yourself?

Here's a counter using your round system:
Round 1- Swash Cloak's- you move to barricade position
Round 2- Swash Crit buffs- you set a barricade
Round 3-Poison- you hide
Round 4- Single Shield- you Single Shield
Round 5-Swash can't assassin anyone due to barricade and hide.

Gunner's Mate
Dec 16, 2009
212
Thomas Sunhammer on Sep 11, 2015 wrote:
So now comes the double powerful assassin strike. Which has a great chance to critical again thanks to the earlier buff. Ill round down to 750 damage from the hit, (Hope that’s an acceptable average for you all even if it is on the low side) that doubled is 1500 damage + 250 bleeding times 2. That equals 2000 damage. Now I am going to pause here to separate physical damage from magic damage. Keep in mind poison and bleeding are both magical damage and thus not effected by moves like leviathans call or krakens lament at all. So as the 950 poison I mentioned earlier is still ticking away the buckler has just added 500 extra DoT damage on top of that. Poison has worked for 3 rounds now. At this point the cycle starts over. The buck cloaks again (poison 4 rounds) the buck buffs again (poison has now run for all 5 rounds)…then comes another batch of poison…yay! So that is 1450 magic damage with another 950 on the way. Again this is assuming that poison never criticales which with flans agility boost and the bucks on critical boost is VERY unlikely.
At this point as I have expressed you had full capability to avoid the assassins strike altogether but let's keep going assuming for some reason you could not avoid it. Double damage assassin's strike hits a shielded fort bucc- both take damage from vengeance/bladestorm-fs/riposte exchange. That's 750+125 damage*2=1000 damage. Now the buckler is exposed and it's your turn. You go with a super hit triggering at least one bladestorm and deal even more damage to the swash. Your companions then attack and deal even more damage to the swash. At this point the swash has lost far more than 1000 health since as you stipulated he only placed one shield. All this is of course assuming the bucc for some reason didn't use the available countermeasures.

Gunner's Mate
Dec 16, 2009
212
Thomas Sunhammer on Sep 11, 2015 wrote:
So now that the buckler is cloaked for another 5 rounds the process is continuing. Keep in mind any buffs the privy or buck may have used to level the playing field are also wearing off while they slowly loose health all while the buckler is safely hidden. Now to shorten things up I am just going to say…this does continue for another 5 rounds. Then ANOTHER 5 rounds. As Deathwiz101378 pointed out for someone to be alive after 15 rounds of that insanity is highly unlikely and thus making my entire point. But allow me to crunch the numbers for anecorbie’s sake and any other still not getting it. Three rounds of poison and 3 rounds of cloaked assassin strike equals 4350 magical damage and 4500 physical damage from the hitting part of strike. ((Don’t believe me? Here is the math using the above mentioned numbers. 950 + (250)x2 = 1450 x 3 (the number of times pattern repeats) = 4350 1500 x 3 (the number of times pattern repeats) = 4500 )) So that is 8850 damage.
This is assuming
a)The buckler is alive to repeat the pattern 3 times
b)The buccaneer forgot what shields were
c)The buccaneer's companions are somewhere in lala land.

Gunner's Mate
Dec 16, 2009
212
Thomas Sunhammer on Sep 11, 2015 wrote:
Now…onto the armor ad shield stacking! Now as I mentioned the buck shields do not stop magic damage. Well the midnight pirate pointed out farmed gear and someone else pointed out valor fort. So now I will address those. Now that 15 rounds of being cloaked REALLY comes in handy now. You see even if a buck is clever enough to bring some valor fortress gear in with him he is still FORCED to make a choice. He either has to try and block the poison and use up his shields faster or try and save the shields and try stop the hits. You remember how I mentioned the idea of “mixed” damage? Well since half of that 8850 is magic and half is physical it makes it very hard to block all of it. If I choose to fort early to counter act the poison then the buckler will simply use his long cloaks to and poisons to wear out the number of shields. Keep in mind most bucklers have 3 5 rounds poisons AND a 3 round poison. Am I expected to bring in 4 valor fortress? Not to mention the fog forces a buck such as me to burn through shields early on. Other wise the 4 way fog will kill in that one round.
Or the buccaneer realizes that fort blocks the physical and magical aspect of the hit and uses that to defend himself. He then saves his other fort's for other poisons and uses his natural buccaneer shields to defend against physical strikes. So in that case it's -50% bleeding and -75%+ physical strikes.

Gunner's Mate
Dec 16, 2009
212
Thomas Sunhammer on Sep 11, 2015 wrote:
Which brings me to ane’s other statement about armor. Bucklers are the only ones who’s weapons give pierce and armor. The boarding kinves give like 30 pierce and 14 armor if I am not mistaken ((as well as the 3rd or 4th assassin strike. Here ill count them out. One naturally. One from the totem. One from ring. One from weapon. The ring also gives another poison. So for those of you who say “no they don’t have that many” I have just show how they do. Now they might not have all 4 if use a different weapon or totem or whatever. But again average means what most do. And yes most have 3 assassin 3 5 round cloaks and 3 poisons)) So even if bucks did have an armor advantage that is reduced thx to pierce.
Pierce at most is 30% and still leaves a buccaneer with an armor advantage.

Gunner's Mate
Dec 16, 2009
212
Thomas Sunhammer on Sep 11, 2015 wrote:
So in summary…there is no way to stop that much offense with so few consequences. 8850 mixed damage is too hard for most schools to stop. Privy can stop it but they have such lame offense they still loose. Witches and muskets…forget about it. They have horrible chances of surviving a skilled buckler who uses this strategy. Granted they have more magic resist…but less chance of surviving the strikes themselves. Hence the danger of this mixed damage system and poison having no consequences. It allows bucklers to effectively counter everyone but their own kind. If poison broke the cloak this would level the playing field by forcing them to choose between magic damage or physical damage. Witches use magic damage…yet they cant cast mojo storm (which only does 600 magic damage) from the shadows and keep the hidden. Muskets use magic damage and they cant use bombs from the shadows and keep their hidden. How come bucklers are the only ones that can do damage with no consequences? That’s why I called it FREE damage. In fact even if you ignore the numbers…that notion itself is so unfair. Like it or not poison is indeed broken.
Except that people have been stopping that damage all this time. Poison from the shadows is an important part of swashbuckler's repertoire. If poison' broke the cloak this would leave the fragile buckler class even more fragile and would serve to push the top tier buccaneer class even further to the top. As such I do not support the concept of poison breaking cloak. Witch's and musket's can deal magical damage from the shadows because their attack's spike damage. Poison is a slow attack that gradually builds up and more so already has a built in limit(it cannot stack). In conclusion poison is no more broken than any other unique class tool.

Gunner's Mate
Dec 16, 2009
212
Thomas Sunhammer on Sep 11, 2015 wrote:
Oooh. I did forget one other point when mentioning the shields portion at the end there. Purge! Bucklers can purge from the shadows as well without removing their fog. So that burns through even more shields and leave an opponent WIDE OPEN for fog hits and poison...not to mention forcing them to burn through even more shields. So if poison isnt broken the purge is. But personally I think they are both broken. I would say cloak is a positive effect and should be removed. And free magic damage that no one else can do while staying cloaked is also unfair.
If
-You stay in purge range
-You don't spread out

Also remember a swash that is purging is also denying himself shields and buffs.

In conclusion I do not believe the class with the most limits on their powers should gain even more limits especially since the consensus among top players(and the developer) is that buccaneer is the top tier class- not swashbuckler.

Gunner's Mate
Aug 08, 2010
288
Thomas Sunhammer on Sep 11, 2015 wrote:
Now…let me begin by stating the “pattern” of buckler attack that I have seen. Thanks to the moo macho tower gear a bucklers ring amulet and totem have extra spells. Now no one uses all 3 but I think its safe to say that “ON AVERAGE” most bucklers carry at least one or two of them. Giving them an extra cloak extra assassin strike and extra poison. ((Deathwiz101378 that means that they have more than just two 5 rounds poisons and one 3 round one. It means that ignoring the 3 round one bucklers have three 5 round poisons one of which stops healing)). Now the pattern I have seen bucklers use is cloak > buff (critical or other stat) > poison > shield > assassin strike. This is the pattern. Now to simplify things I am going to break it down into steps since several of you have commented on it going for “15 rounds” or whatever makes it somehow less dangerous. Well most of my buckler matches last that long at least biased on that pattern…which I will now elaborate on.
"on average most bucklers carry at least one or two of them".
And "on average" most privateers should carry at least one or two extra forts from the tower of moo. Every class has special gear which can benifit them and counter others. I'm sorry, but I don't think that you know exactly what you're talking about.

Gunner's Mate
Sep 30, 2009
240
Eric Stormbringer on Sep 20, 2015 wrote:
Ok so lets analyze your scenario as presented

Round 1- Cloak
Round 2-Critical Buff(4 cloak rounds left)
Round 3-Poison(3 cloak rounds left)- This I have an issue with because it assumes the swash is in range to poison your team in one round. How did a swash get close enough to reach a bucc team without being demolished by the charges?
Round 4-Single Shield(2 cloak rounds left)
Round 5-Assassin strike(Exposed)

In the mean time the swash is doing all this why didn't you-
a)Set up a barricade?
b)Shield?
c)Spread out?
d)Hide yourself?

Here's a counter using your round system:
Round 1- Swash Cloak's- you move to barricade position
Round 2- Swash Crit buffs- you set a barricade
Round 3-Poison- you hide
Round 4- Single Shield- you Single Shield
Round 5-Swash can't assassin anyone due to barricade and hide.
I guess Ill talk about yours in order you posted them. First of all its kind of hard to rush anyone when bucklers just use fog. I did say I wasn't complaining about fog but you can't ignore it either. So now my companions are left to sit there twiddling our thumbs for 4 rounds while the buckler gets all set up.

Second most bucks don't have a barricade. That strategy is great for muskets and witches but most bucklers and bucks I have seen don't have those cause they need other stuff. Unless your suggesting that i leave myself open to all the other schools by catering every aspect of my being to just countering bucklers.

Another issue is hide doesn't do much against a buckler. You can't hit them with hide because they all have first strike 3. AND they can still poison you while you are hidden without exposing themselves

Finally by the time they do hit and expose themselves they are already shielded and taken the advantage with the double hit and all the DoT stuff thats been going on this whole time.

Gunner's Mate
Sep 30, 2009
240
Eric Stormbringer on Sep 20, 2015 wrote:
At this point as I have expressed you had full capability to avoid the assassins strike altogether but let's keep going assuming for some reason you could not avoid it. Double damage assassin's strike hits a shielded fort bucc- both take damage from vengeance/bladestorm-fs/riposte exchange. That's 750+125 damage*2=1000 damage. Now the buckler is exposed and it's your turn. You go with a super hit triggering at least one bladestorm and deal even more damage to the swash. Your companions then attack and deal even more damage to the swash. At this point the swash has lost far more than 1000 health since as you stipulated he only placed one shield. All this is of course assuming the bucc for some reason didn't use the available countermeasures.
Ok so its not 125 x 2 its 250 x 2. AND bleeding isn't effected by buck shields at all. And neither is poison. As for my companions...well I could cloak at which point they are dead because by the time a buckler comes out of fog he has hit mega with all 4 companions. Basically fog ensures that either I die from a 4 way hit...or...all my companions die as i try to protect myself. So my companions CANT hit really. Because ontop of the poison and bleeding doing their work I am trying to keep up with cloaked flan, nauisica, toro...AND the pirate ontop of everything else.

So really its mixed damage ontop of fog. Everyone else is complaining about fog so I choose poison. But that doesn't mean its not an issue.

Again not all countermeasures apply to everyone.

Basically the entire point of this thread is that bucklers have too many different types of weapons. The can cloak the whole team, do mixed damage, poison over time without ruining cloak, remove healing chances with assassin mist, double the damage of their hits from all the hidden. Like how many different types of weaponized benefits does one school really need? All I am trying to do is get KI to limit ONE of them.