Traps and Rogue Utility

Haenir

Haenir

Dalayan Master
Traps seem to be a fertile place to develop Rogue-flavored utility. I like aspects of the system currently, but still think it could be further developed. So here are some ideas (bear in mind some are mutually exclusive/alternative):
  • What if Rogue trap kits summoned no-rent clickies which could be traded? Also when a Rogue disarms a trap it creates a (permanent? lore? no drop?) clicky with an appropriate (diminished? parallel?) effect of the disarmed trap. The clicky directly summons the trap rather than having the clunky unarmed trap pet thing.
    Examples:
    • Rogue gives an AoE trap to a tank >> tank then uses the AoE trap as a clicky to build AoE aggro.
    • Rogue gives a snare trap to a monk >> clever monk uses this enhance his pulling
    • Rogue disarms a summon NPC trap >> receives a swarm pet trap *cough* angry Halflings *cough*
  • Instead of assigning hate to the Rogue, traps assign hate to the nearest PC/NPC. I get the reason mechanically (i.e. assistance penalty, etc.) why this isn't a thing, but it doesn't really make sense to me logically (do I put my name on my traps or what?). Of course, using this to trick a mob to attack another player could be problematic (traps in Athica bank anyone?) -- maybe restrict traps from certain areas?

  • More trap effects (I realize some of these have been posted before -- as well as other trap ideas -- see this post)
    • Mana/life tap traps that give a recourse to group members.
    • Reverse DS traps
    • Silence trap (mainly want this for PvP)
    • Blind trap (mainly want this for PvP)
    • Etc.
  • Instead of acquiring trap types by shelling out plat to an NPC, make trap acquisition tie into disarming traps in Dalaya. I.e. you gotta find the traps and successfully disarm them in order to use them.

  • Make the unarmed trap pet mobile. The current system is a PITA as far as positioning goes, not to mention in tight quarters half the time the pet will summon into the walls. and the Rogue will be unable to talk to the pet to activate the trap.
Thoughts?
 
Cool ideas, but its a very difficult and controversial thing to implement more in game.

Players tend to hate when more traps are added to the game because they provide a largely random penalty to play that require one specific class to deal with. What about the groups/raids with no rogue? They kind of get screwed on any content with traps.

Additionally, most of the effects you listed would either have to be so minimal they are essentially worthless, or they would upset game balance, because you are essentially giving free power to players with no downside/cost. The game is balanced around how much AE agro tanks can generate, what mobs a monk can actually pull, and how much dps a rogue can do (additional swarm pets).

Mana/lifetaps, reverse DS, silence, etc would all add free "power" to groups/raids if they are clickies.

Like I said its a cool idea in theory, but really hard to implement in a desirable and balanced way.

You could do something simple like adding a few no drop flavor items a rogue receives for picking locks like illusions. I wouldn't be opposed to rogues having a FD clicky (induced death state poison) as long as it had a long recast just to be used in wipe recovery, but again it becomes a balance issue.

Rogues do some of the highest dps in the game, so its hard to argue they should have any more substantial utility or buffing (giving others clickies) ability. It gets a bit boring sometime, but would you want to give up your damage for this stuff?

Wizards are in a similar place, we can port, RBOW, and root/snare. Those get used in combat maybe 1% of the time. We also have terrible survivability, but I like doing high damage numbers so I live with it.
 
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Pretty much how solo put it. Rogues lack utility because they are consistently one of the best DPS, similar to wizards (Wizards can port root/snare and rbow, but are gated by mana and take more physical damage). If you want to be a top level DPS with the best buffs, debuffs, and utility, I would consider rolling an enchanter.
 
Tevinter said:
Pretty much how solo put it. Rogues lack utility because they are consistently one of the best DPS, similar to wizards (Wizards can port root/snare and rbow, but are gated by mana and take more physical damage). If you want to be a top level DPS with the best buffs, debuffs, and utility, I would consider rolling an enchanter.
Click to expand...

Then app to our guild because our Enchanter hates his job. End child labor!
 
Silosobi said:
Cool ideas, but its a very difficult and controversial thing to implement more in game.

Players tend to hate when more traps are added to the game because they provide a largely random penalty to play that require one specific class to deal with. What about the groups/raids with no rogue? They kind of get screwed on any content with traps.
Click to expand...

I'm not sure what you mean by random penalty. Traps do tend to spawn in the same spot and have the same effect. Are people currently getting screwed on content with traps or is that something that happened but got removed?

Silosobi said:
Additionally, most of the effects you listed would either have to be so minimal they are essentially worthless, or they would upset game balance, because you are essentially giving free power to players with no downside/cost. The game is balanced around how much AE agro tanks can generate, what mobs a monk can actually pull, and how much dps a rogue can do (additional swarm pets).
Click to expand...

I'm skeptical. Is balance really narrow enough that the aggro from a single AE trap (let's assume they are lore, and Rogue's can only create them by disarming a specific trap in game, and that the Rogue has to set it where the tank wants the aggro) is going to seriously upset game balance? Would it still be useful under those constraints (basically a 1 per Rogue per raid)? I haven't seriously played a tank so I'd love to hear about that from someone who does.

Silosobi said:
Mana/lifetaps, reverse DS, silence, etc would all add free "power" to groups/raids if they are clickies.
Click to expand...

So make these traps have a dps cost. Make cast time on the clicky 4-6 seconds (basically what it is currently with the Thurgadin trap kit) and make them only usable in combat (is that technically even possible?). Assuming Rogue is the toon setting the trap, cost is now equal to 4-6 seconds of Rogue dps -- if the effect is powerful enough there may be good strategic reasons to forgo the dps for the effect.

Silosobi said:
You could do something simple like adding a few no drop flavor items a rogue receives for picking locks like illusions.
Click to expand...

No drop prank traps would amuse me endlessly. E.g. Spreading Baldness Trap - illusion gnome spreadable disease.

Yeah I wish that breaking and entering developed further. As it is it is pretty awesome (thievery essentially leveled me from 10 to 45) but kind of peters out (e.g. breaking and entering in Erimal has no rewards). Would be interesting to have a fence/smuggler/burglar questline open to all classes, maybe tied in to the NP ring smuggling sub-quest. But that's a whole different post.

Silosobi said:
I wouldn't be opposed to rogues having a FD clicky (induced death state poison) as long as it had a long recast just to be used in wipe recovery, but again it becomes a balance issue.
Click to expand...

I'd oppose that on grounds of FD being a silly mechanic for a Rogue. Not to mention we already have escape.

Silosobi said:
Rogues do some of the highest dps in the game, so its hard to argue they should have any more substantial utility or buffing (giving others clickies) ability. It gets a bit boring sometime, but would you want to give up your damage for this stuff?
Click to expand...

I would absolutely give up being a 1-button dps machine for further development of Rogue flavor. My favorite part of raids is not DPS, but things like scouting ahead, mapping out traps, or coordinating with pullers. Besides isn't a situation where Rogues = "highest DPS" a recipe for making Rogues a must-have class?

Silosobi said:
Wizards are in a similar place, we can port, RBOW, and root/snare. Those get used in combat maybe 1% of the time. We also have terrible survivability, but I like doing high damage numbers so I live with it.
Click to expand...

Honestly, I'd probably be tossing out suggestions no matter what class I rolled. One of the things I really dig about this server is the ongoing development. Sure there are things that are orphaned / misdeveloped / pick-your-problem, but overall there's a lot of good uniqueness to SoD. And I gotta think that some of that originated from player suggestion.
 
I think rangers and rouges put out the same numbers, rangers have lots of utility, rogues have escape(lol?), i think if you made a nice trap system and made it a plat sink like arrows all previous game precedents have been followed and you wouldn't be breaking anything there has been so many various nerfs that a small buff somewhere is going to go almost un-noticed game balance wise.
 
Traps aren't entirely random, but when I think of traps, I think of randomly loosing all my mana, or getting feared into trash, while running around Spires, or having random adds spawn and instakill me because im a cloth class. They aren't a fun part of the challenge of the game to me, or most players I think. They just penalize us for not memorizing exactly where every trap in every zone is.

I don't actually think it would upset game balance, I just think its hard to convince devs that rogues, who are already a desirable class, should have more utility.

I'm sure it could be done in a way that was fun and useful and not OP, but with other classes being way more out of whack at the moment, its a hard sell.
 
Not opposed to rogues getting a little more than pressing autoattack, and backstab on refresh. But I think we should first finish fixing monks, and take a look at beastlords.
 
darksabbath said:
Not opposed to rogues getting a little more than pressing autoattack, and backstab on refresh. But I think we should first finish fixing monks, and take a look at beastlords.
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I don't disagree with you as far as priorities go (not that I have an informed opinion on beastlords/monks as they are), however I think that arguments along the lines of "Don't do X because we need to do Y or Z" can be used as an excuse to stall anything. Not to mention if ideas are generated / troubleshot ahead of time in posts like this, that is all for the better.
 
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