I'm all for getting rid of vent, but that's obviously impossible. Even if they had some punkbuster-like program monitoring all the processes you're running, people would just start getting their guildies on the phone. This is already a better idea, as there's no noticeable lag like there is with vent.
But as for "hally hit gayness?" The only issue there is that no shard out there has the timing right. Divinity's staff intentionally changed it to make it more fast-paced. Other shards have done the same, or simply gotten it wrong as they pieced it together from memory.
If it were working as it used to, there wouldn't be anything cheap about a hally combo.
It had a long swing timer, based on the last time you swung anything (including a fist). Therefore, all you had to do was run into the attacker while he was casting, forcing him to throw a punch, and resetting his swing timer. That would buy you enough time to heal up and/or start a counter-attack if you timed it well. That's a great counter because it's available to everyone regardless of template. You could also disrupt the spells, put up RA or MR, parry if you had it, run while he's frozen, precast your own heal, or hope your resist works or the hally misses. Those could all save you from the decidedly over-hyped hally combo.
Purple potions are a different issue because they can't be resisted, or parried. Armor does nothing, nor does resist. They always hit if timed reasonably well (with a huge margin of error). They don't freeze the user in place, so you can't outrun them. There's nothing you can do to disrupt them, either. In short, they're cheap. The same goes for wands.
I'll also comment on the "necessary evil" line someone dropped back around page 7. It was something like "purple potions are needed to stop people from running away." It's true that it's too easy to run away from a fight in UO, but it wasn't always that way. I say the best solution to this problem is the historically accurate one. It consists of two parts:
1) Restore mount stamina to its Pre-UOR function. I could exhaust a horse then by running across one town on dial-up. Now I can run the entire length of the continent at a broadband sprint and my horse never fatigues.
2) Restore mount combat functionality. That is, "You cannot get on a mount while it is fighting."
This accomplishes so many good things for PvP in one blow. First, you fix this problem of endlessly running away. After sprinting a few screens, the runner will have to stop and dismount to feed his pet to restore its stamina. While he's dismounted, you'll have an opportunity to engage the mount in combat, stopping him from remounting to flee.
Secondly, you bring some balance to bola tamers in the form of "risk vs. reward." If they want to try and dismount you and then sick their nightmare on you, they're going to have to deal with the fact that they can't easily pull their mare out of the fight at that point. Of course, you'll probably see a lot more of them anyway, if mares continue to have significantly more stamina than horses.
You'll also get more non-tamer players to join factions so they can get warhorses, also for the additional stamina.
More combat will end up on foot, which is great for several reasons. Off-screening is much more difficult. It's impossible to "fastwalk" a horse to abuse the client prediction... so this is good for dexers. The animations are better, so it's more fun to watch.
Of course, the purple potion issue would only be exacerbated, since running is the vital part of either "defense" that currently exists for GE pots (breaking LOS, and closing with the user). Therefore, this change should come paired with a significant nerf to purple potions.
And to nerf purple potions, there are a ton of options. I'm not saying to do all of these, but rather to choose one:
One.
- Increase the cooldown timer by a good 5 seconds. Purples shouldn't be any faster than yellows.
- Freeze the user in place (as a spell) while cooking off a purple potion.
- Institute a delay when the potion lands before it detonates, a la divinity, making them less effective against moving targets unless the user is good enough to throw in front of his mark.
- Reclassify the damage. Either make it physical so RA, parry, and armor work; or make it magical so resist (and maybe MR) does.
- Give them a chance to miss. Increase this chance if the user is running while he throws it.
In short, give them some kind of drawback like everything else has. And, return the AoE rules to the old ones. As they are now they're confusing, unbalancing, and illogical, all for the sake of letting a few morons haphazardly throw bombs around town in the presence of innocents. That's taking strategy out of the game, and dumbing it down. The current AoE rules suck.
