Balance and newbies and you.

Omneer

Hello new friends.

I played Imperian briefly long ago, and before that I played another IRE MUD that I'll refrain from sharing for now. It has been roughly over 4 years since I've played but I've got a bit of the itch so I figured I'd dabble and see if it still holds my attention.

My goals are pretty simple to start with - bash, learn, have fun. But I know myself too well, and I suspect that at some point I'd like to do some more PK type stuff.
So with that in mind, is it possible to get a list of the worst profession for each 'alignment' in these catagories (Bash/PK)? I don't need to be the best profession, but for now I'd like to avoid being greatly disadvantaged. I'd also appreciate a headsup if a large number of credits are required to be good in one particular profession.

So who's the worst at bashing in the anti-magick circle? Who's the worst at PK?
What about magick circle?
What about the demonic circle?

Thanks, new friends.

Caelya

I won't speak for the other circles, but for demonic it's really hard to go wrong with summoner. It's definitely our best class for bashing, and arguably the best overall, though that may have changed. As for PK, Summoner is pretty versatile, and yet easy enough to figure out that you can string together a murder combo with ease, with some help. It's also probably one of the few classes where you don't -need- to drop a lot of credits outside of the initial learning cost, but if you do it'll definitely enhance your game.

As for the rest of demonic's classes, I'd say they're in a really solid place in terms of both bashing and PK. I can't say much about the revamped diabolist, but I'm sure it's just as well off.

That aside, I'd like to welcome you back to Imperian, and if you ever need anything, you can always ask me or any of the other Khandavans in-game!

Good luck!

Dimitri

For antimagick, I'm putting my money on Outrider. It's a very straight forward class, with a passive damage boost later on in the main skill. Combine it with a different skill from Trailblazing and you're going to be destroying things left right and center while bashing. Plus you can fly with the wyrm, that's always fun - and a great 'oh god, about to die because i did something stupid' skill to have.

Baasche

Lol. Question was who is worst at things.

As far as bashing goes, Imperian has over time fixed a lot of the outliers, so everybody should be relatively close at low artifact levels, although some classes really shine with artifacts to pump up their bashing power.

AM: Don't know that anyone is that bad at bashing? I think Ranger felt low on bashing DPS last I checked, and I don't remember how much artifacts helped. Other people are more qualified to answer this question.

Magick: Renegade was bad at bashing last I saw, but a recent classlead round might have boosted the DPS up to respectable numbers. The class is squishy though. Hunter felt low on bashing DPS last I saw(partly cause its bashing attack uses STR, while it's primary damage in combat(iceblast) uses INT), but that could be changing soon(or at least in the next classlead round). Everything else should be more than usable.

Demonic: Assassin = Renegade, same points to be made. Other than that, I don't think any classes in Demonic are really bad bashers at all? Most get solid DPS when they buy the right arties, and they're all relatively tanky for bashing.

PvP. Things are less even. There are classes that aren't very good for 1v1(Predator), others do poorly in some matchups(Mana-users vs Druid), but most can find some sort of use in teams(which is the majority of combat). The 3 knights are all solid for getting into teamfights(some are good at 1v1 too), and don't require artifacts to be tanky.

AM: Predator is pretty widely considered unusable for 1v1 and not very useful for team-fights. Being even remotely effective requires a lot of coordination that could be spent doing quicker, more damaging things. Monk might be useless vs knowledgeable people in 1v1, but has solid team use.

Magick: If you don't have an aff-tracker, Hunter and Renegade will be useless in 1v1. If you don't have the arties or an aff-tracker, Mage probably won't do much damage against tanky people. Everything is useful in teamfights though, so no super-wrong choices here.

Demonic: Assassin = Renegade, same things apply. Wytch might not be viable 1v1 at all without an aff tracker now, but you might be able to fix that with enough arties? Not sure how Diab plays 1v1 now, but I can't imagine it's too strong without artifacts, and you can't just code your way around the artifacts like you can with Wytch and Assassin. Everything has some way to contribute to teamfights, so again, no super-wrong choices here.

Septus

For am, worst bashing profession might actually be ranger or templar. Monk, Predator, outrider, berserker, priest are all really solid. I don't know the definitive answer but you basically can't really go wrong with am for bashing when it comes down to it. Paging @Khizan, he's our bashing stats man (oh the irony).

Can't help you bashing wise on any of the other circles, other than to say summoner is likely still demonic's hands down best bashing prof.

Pk:

Am:

Predator is solid garbage tier. Worst prof in the game. Don't play it if you have any interest in pk; even if you think you'll throw artefacts at it, still don't play it. You'll be worse than most (all?) unartefacted professions even if you completely max out. Its one of those things we basically straight up recommend newbies with pk inclinations to switch class from the get go.

Most of the rest are all fairly well rounded. Outrider is probably still the overall best. Monk is a good team prof. Knight is a great team prof but the one v one bar is significantly higher than most of the newer profs (no smart tracking etc). My vote would almost certainly go to outrider for bashing + casual to serious pk.

Magick:

Worst prof is probably hunter, imo. Bashing isn't great, the kill is pretty fiddly and though it has some cool concepts its a lot of complexity/work for a fairly standard payout. Druid is a very good pk prof and has an easy entry level with a high skill cap: this is what I'd recommend for Magick.

Demonic:

I wouldn't say there are any bad profs here to be honest. If you had to pick one its probably a toss up between defiler and assassin, just due to being fairly linear. They're both good professions though. I'd say the no brainer for demonic is summoner, its pretty accessible and has great team support. I'd say the one v one isn't anything incredible without artefacts. With artefacts its very, very strong.

Jules

Khizan is the worst. This answer covers everything. It might not make much sense now, but soon, you will understand.

And yeah, no Predator for AM pvp. Poor Predator. Outrider so neat and fun, and more straightforward, and I don't think arties strictly necessary.

Oh, and monk bashing is insanely good. And also, Septus ninja-posted and you should definitely listen to him.

Shou

I need a "this makes me sad" button to vote with

Ultrix

Khizan probably has better numbers than me, but the last time I checked on bashing DPS for AM classes (in April or so), it came out to:

Priest > Templar > Predator > Berserker.

Khizan

General rankings for AM:

Predator: F---. Garbage tier. Terrible. Unworkable. I don't care how good you think you are or how many artifacts you have. You will not get predator to work in PvP. It can't be done. If all you care about is bashing and roleplay, though, this class has a ton of flavor and it's a bashing powerhouse. Most people will be better off as not-predator, though. It's so bad in PvP that my main teamfight tactic when I am predator is using an artifact sword and "SLASH TARGET".

Outrider: A++. Strongest overall profession in AM. Great utility. Great 1v1 potential. Great team synergy and group combat potential. A lot of its afflictions are 'smart' afflictions so the coding barrier is pretty low. Very easy to get working. Doesn't require many artifacts. Basically you cannot go wrong with Outrider.

Monk: A. Best bashing in AM, great utility, scales ridiculously well with artifacts. Mediocre 1v1 combat, relies heavily on a few certain gimmicks against anybody who can parry. Strong group utility. Group synergy is strong but heavily reliant on Kai Strike/Kai Cripple for limb gimmicks. Not an affliction fights so does not require much code

Berserker: B. Decent bashing. Strong group utility, strong team synergy. Scales poorly with artifacts due to its primary damage source being unaffected by artifacts outside of +strength. 1v1 combat has a very slow buildup and is not practical against most people. Group combat is very strong. Most afflicting it does is 'smart' so the coding threshold is low. Your main weapon for bashing is the artifact shield, which means you have the cheapest offensive artifact in the game.

Templar: A+ if you can code. B if you can't. Good bashing. Good utility. Strong group synergy. If you can code an affliction tracker you can perform well in 1v1. If you can't, your 1v1 potential is negligible, but you can still be a strong presence in a teamfight.

Priest: C. Great at bashing, decent utility, Mediocre PvP. 1v1 is boring and predictable, group combat is mediocre due to low symmetry. I would not pick Priest. Low coding threshold due to straightforward offense.

Ranger/Amazon: B-. Limb offense is good if gimmicky, but it's their only real offensive path. Good parry can be frustrating. Worst bashing in the circle. Strong utility. Decent group synergy, decent group damage.

My recommendation for AM is Outrider, which excels at everything, but as long as you don't go Priest or Predator you should be good.

Omneer

Thanks for all the insight guys and gals! That does bring me to a follow up question, however: I've noticed the client seems pretty decent about autocuring. How does it perform compared to the average system for PK? Will I want to install Mudlet and start setting one up, or is the web client going to be about the best I can get? Any advice in that area?

Jules

Use the autocuring, and probably Mudlet as the client. Despite some flaws, it is the most widely used client and you won't have all of two already harried people to ask questions of.

You will eventually want to set up at least some different priorities. Imperian does not have full out of the box systems like some other games, and yet, you're more likely to get the kind of help that will actually get you through the basics here than maybe anywhere else I have seen.

Khizan

Autocuring is excellent and it's all the curing you'll ever need. Top-tier fighting will require some client-side coding to shift priorities and such around depending on what you have, but autocuring will handle all the hard stuff. Autocuring is also a part of the game, not specific to the webclient; you can use autocuring with any client at all.

For clients, Mudlet is probably the best to go with. The webclient is honestly pretty good, but nobody uses it so there's practically no real support for it here and it's hard to get help with.