Hybrid is great because it's so diverse.

[The One They Hate so Well]

Originally Posted by travis-hybrid

Bola tamers have weaknesses tho... Bond yourself a mount and you're remounted in two seconds. Wear good AR armor and the mare cant eat you as fast. etc.

two seconds is a long time... long enough to kill just about any mount. That and I'm more afraid of firebreath and flamestrakes than bites so i don't think AR has much to do with anything.

Besides alchys have a weakness as well... Gheal wand and run like a little girl. You can also dip behind buildings and the like and they will often hit themselves, or you can even run into them and bam you're an alchy to.

[The Monarch]

Originally Posted by The One They Hate so Well

two seconds is a long time... long enough to kill just about any mount.

I ride a bonded beetle and unless you sink drop explo ebs on it with a partner nothing can kill it in two seconds. I've been bola'd countless times and have always been able to remount without losing my mount. I cant even recall a time ever when my mount died while i was bola'd.

[orange thing]

Originally Posted by The One They Hate so Well

two seconds is a long time... long enough to kill just about any mount. That and I'm more afraid of firebreath and flamestrakes than bites so i don't think AR has much to do with anything.

Besides alchys have a weakness as well... Gheal wand and run like a little girl. You can also dip behind buildings and the like and they will often hit themselves, or you can even run into them and bam you're an alchy to.

The weaknesses current alchy's have is laughable in comparison to the weaknesses that should be incurred for evenly balanced gameplay. There won't always be a building around you to hide behind. And what do you do if the biatch is swinging a gold large battle axe? Are you going to run into him to counter purple potions?

It should be changed to the way it was. At least then, it was somewhat fair.

[LKP]

I never liked bola tamers, and I hate fighting nightmares because of the firebreath taking away over half my HP instantly. I think tamers wield a ton of power, and maybe it would be problematic if it were still rampant... but I've only seen one or two bola tamers lately, compared to a couple of years ago when I was knocked off my horse at every turn.

Fortunately, bola tamers were something I was able to adapt to. I simply bonded a couple of horses, and I had the same horse for over a year until some dildo trapped it in a mare trap a few weeks ago. Anyway, using bonded mounts and a Razor macro to mount up, I've been dismounted as many as six times in a single fight and gotten right back on my horse every time. If the bastard wants to carry 9k worth of bolas and fight in the field where he risks losing his mare, let him take those risks.

There are the drawbacks and/or positive externalities to bola tamers when they assume those risks. Either they risk losing a mare, and a well-trained one is pretty valuable... or they donate to the shard for a pet summoning ball, and the shard benefits. Bola tamers take huge risks, and garner huge rewards. That's perfectly fine with me. As long as they run the risk of losing their precious mares, it's not unlike a dexer fighting with a perfect weapon. Eventually, he's going to die and lose it, or it's going to break.

That said, I would like to see the return of "You cannot get on a mount while it is fighting." Then while the tamer could simply engage your horse before you could mount up again, you could paralyze his mare and kill him, as you should have the advantage when the animals are out of play, as the bola tamer will find half his skills useless once he can no longer use bolas or command his pet. Of course, it would help if the mare couldn't also continue to sling fire breath at you while paralyzed.

Bola tamers are undoubtedly very powerful, but there are at least a few ways to mitigate the risks of fighting one. This is not really true of purple potions, because any "counter" that may exist to explosion potions is highly conditional. What can you do about purple potions?

Counters to GE Potions

1) Charge your opponent in an effort to make him hit himself, too. This is less than ideal for several reasons.

- First, it doesn't help you avoid taking damage. You will still be hit every bit as hard, and chances are you're in worse shape than your opponent if he's throwing purple potions at you, because he's also going to be dropping offensive spells, or worse...
- Your opponent may be an alchy dexer, holding a very powerful (usually two-handed) weapon. Closing with him is going to give him a swing at you, which is playing into his hands.
- It's not always possible. Since purple potions don't freeze you in place like spells do or require you to stop for even a split second as archery does, your opponent should be able to keep clear of you. He can run as fast as you can, and if he's mounted he can take advantage of UO's notoriously bad client prediction and total lack of inertia to throw you off his trail.*

2) Break his line of sight before he can throw the potion.

- Again, this is not always possible. In duel pits, forests, parts of town, jungles, most dungeon areas, open areas without housing, caves, and most of T2A, it's very difficult if not impossible to break the line of sight. I suppose one could cast wall of stone, but that costs regs and mana, which will likely run out before the potions do.

- This may temporarily protect you from the purple potion, but it also removes any chance you might have of putting together an offense. It's just delaying the inevitable.

3) Run/Offscreen.

- Once again, running may or may not be preferable to dying. It's losing either way.

- You're not any faster than the alchemist, and if he can stay within about a screen and a half of you, he can continue to spam potions. Unless you get a substantial head start, or he's laggy, or he just sucks at chasing, you're probably worse off than standing your ground.

- Similar to above, since potions have a longer range than magery or archery, you're also removing your own weapons from the fight before his.

4) Try to dodge the potion.

- This is only effective against a newbie alchemist who hasn't figured out how to time them yet. Ten minutes of practice will make him perfect, and this tactic doesn't work against well-timed potions.

If you can suggest any more counters to purple potions, I'll break them down and tell you why they're not effective. Alternatively, if you can tell em any other combo that doesn't involve purple potions and is as powerful as they are, I'll give you a list of legitimate counters to it.



* To observe this, watch another player walk (not run) in circles or zig-zags on his mount. You should see him skip around the screen pretty often. I'm unsure whether this applies to Sallos.

[orange thing]

[e clap x1000 for the highly intelligent post directly above.

I truly hope that someone of authority takes those words seriously. It would most definitely benefit Hybrid, and take away the bad reputation of the PvP era that it currently holds.

[fonis]

Alchy = gold sink, if minor, and gold sinks are always preferred.

[LKP]

I don't think anyone is suggesting getting rid of alchemy or purple potions. As I opened with, I like that there are a variety of templates out there, and alchemy-based templates have their place. I'm just suggesting there should be some drawbacks to put it on an even playing field with all those other templates. That would be much more beneficial to the shard, especially the PvP community, than an insignificant gold sink.

[jorn]

LKP, I agree 100 and 10 percent.

Several years ago, you would see all kinds of templates on the field. Now? pretty much all alchy mages and dexxers with a few tamers here and there.

Its summertime! tons of old players are coming back, tons of vets are playing more often. Time to shake things up a bit!

Turn down alchemy slightly and all kinds of oldschool templates will re-emerge!

Ah, one can dream can't they? But, alas, I doubt this will ever happen. The powers that be and the "elite" pvpers with connections to the powers that be <3 their alchy characters too much.

[jimmydude]

bola tamers are far worse and way gayer. all the complaining seems to be done by people trying to run away and unable to do so. i mean in an actual fight its pretty easy to combat purple pots. it is however pretty difficult to run down all the pussies who run, without either pots or para or a weapon skill or bolas. all of which get called down. so the real problem seems to be not enough people wanting to fight so people need a way to cut down all the runners. i agree the pots are a quick fix but that's what they are an attempt to fix a problem not a problem in themselves.

[LKP]

Originally Posted by jimmydude

...they are an attempt to fix a problem not a problem in themselves.

Trying to fix the "problem" of people running from fights by making one skill insanely powerful is akin to getting rid of the termites in your house by burning your house down.

You just said it's hard to kill a runner without:

...either pots or para or a weapon skill or bolas...

Let's rule out pots, since that's the issue at hand. What have you got left?

Other ways to stop runners

- Paralyze. This is a 5th level spell. That means you need 50 magery and 15 mana to cast it. Alternatively, you can stun someone with wrestling and anatomy, or a spear.

- A weapon skill. That could be swordsmanship, fencing, archery, macefighting, or wrestling if you've got stun punch.

- Bolas. If you have tactics and the item at hand, you simply need to dismount your opponent with one of these bad boys, then take his mount out of the fight. It's pretty easily done against anyone but a tamer.

- Wands. You didn't mention this one, but they basically allow you to cast offensive spells while moving, so I'm gonna go ahead and add them to the list.

So to summarize, you can't stop someone from running away if you don't have magery, or a weapon skill, or a bola, or a wand. How exactly were you planning on killing the guy on your screen without any of those things if you could stop him from running away?

I do see your point though. It's been difficult to stop people from running away ever since the mount stamina bug was first introduced somewhere around the UO:Renaissance publish (April 3, 2000). Prior to that date, mounts would run out of stamina in the course of sprinting a few screens. This was changed, presumably by mistake, as there's no documentation of it ever having been done, but anyone old enough to remember UO before that date will tell you the same. It happened, and the trammies (read: non-pvp community) liked it so much that it stuck. Nine years later, mounts still have near-infinite stamina. You can run from Minoc to Trinsic and back at a full gallop without ever tiring your horse.

Pre-Ren, you'd see people stopping periodically to feed their mounts, as it was necessary to keep them fed to replenish their stamina. Each piece of food would restore one third of the pet's stamina, so 3 feedings would fully restore it. It wasn't uncommon for a player on the run to ditch his horse when it got tired and continue to flee on foot. Mind you, most of us were playing on dial-up connections too, so being mounted really didn't make you that much faster.

I would say, why not find that bug now and squash it for good? Revert mount stamina to its 1990's decay rate. Unfortunately, that would probably make tamers the new must-be template, as a horse's stamina certainly wouldn't stack up to a nightmare's... or there would be a whole new set of complaints if it did. Hell, there'd be whining all around and a whole new issue to deal with.

Still, you said yourself that you should be able to catch and kill someone as long as you've got a weapon skill, magery, or a bola (/wand). We all know that in practice, it's not that easy. But you know what? I'm okay with that. I'm a PK. I've learned in which of my favorite haunts I can go in guns blazing, and where I'd better use paralyze first or my target will get away. If my targets get away, it can be frustrating, but good for them! They weren't looking for a fight.

It's infinitely more irksome when someone picks a fight with me, dumps all his mana while I heal through it, then takes off as soon as I have the right of way. I hate chasing people in circles around a building or halfway across the world. I think it would be great if there were some way to stop aggressors from running away from a fight they started, but there are simply too many variables to plan for. (What if the defending player has friends in the area? What if he calls in? etc.)

It's gotten to the point where I usually refuse to chase someone, unless he's got something that I definitely want to kill him for. Running away from a fight you started means you lost. You know it, I know it, and everyone with the slightest grasp of logic knows it. Running away 1v1 is worse than dying in my book. At least the guy who dies 1v1 has fought like a man.

That said, I'll live with the termites. Just don't burn down my house.