Shattered Kingdoms

Here's my gut reactions and predictions. I think that bash is now suicidal to use against even a moderately prepped PvP opponent unless you're absolutely not going to lose even if you miss. It is probably the worst skill to lose unless you're trying to get lucky securing a kill, otherwise almost any other combat skill is probably better. In many cases, one will be better off using kick than bash now, even in PvP. Healing potions are going to be a must in PvP because knocking someone prone should no longer be guaranteed. Disarming is going to be extremely overpowered (it already was very strong) because of the 1 round lag and the fact that bashing is perhaps among the worst options.

Hellions and shamans got a huge buff, but barbarians and mercenaries got the short end of the stick, barbarians moreso because their only prone-move has extremely high lag and is a diceroll as to whether they're going to gain from it or totally screw themselves. Warlocks evened out IMO because even though MR won't help against them anymore, it's going to be much more common to enchant for reflex now.

All MR races took a huge hit in this update and didn't gain anything from it. There were already downsides to playing a halfling, elf, deep-elf or sprite for many classes, and one of the biggest upsides was the ability to take reduced damage from all spells, especially warlocks as magma can easily 1-shot casters. While they still take less damage from key spells like BoG, Harm, FoD and holy word, I'm not initially too fond of the idea of nerfing those races.

I predict that hellions and shamans will be much more successful, and that PvP battles with prepped opponents will be much more elongated and involve many different skills besides bash, primarily disarm and dirt kick.



What about you? Bonus internet points if you are able to predict the next flavor of the month!

There are no downsides to playing elf.

after the nerf to racial mp, halflings and elves are dumpster tier cuz their stat distribution is bad. deep-elf has omniscient int as a major draw and sprites have innate flight, which is still useful in a lot of situations. the reflex change to prone was a gross over nerf / over adjustment to bash and trip, but that's what happens when u get no input from the player base before u make a major change like that.

with magma spray as powerful as it is now due to recent buffs and the change to racial mp, the good guys have a huge advantage cuz they have two items that give resist elementz to an entire room - those two items need to be changed to only affect the user or more appropriately have the resist elements buff removed from the item. with the change to prone, if u die in pk now it's cuz u either offended rngesus / got unlucky or u went johnny rambo suicide mode.

Hammer Griffon MR Barb isn't looking any worse with the ability to evade bashes due to gearing solely for reflex/AP, especially considering the innates on some of the limited griffon eq and some of the great front row weapons that have popped up!

I disagree with the assertion on elves. Halflings have always been terribad for the blunt weakness, but with the high dexterity stat elves are one of the least likely to get knocked prone. They also have strong charm resistance which removes one I win skill from the pool. Elf bard for instance with their high charisma in the current game environment are going to enjoy a huge advantage.

Notably in the dreamscape where the NPCs violate characters for fun, I enjoyed such a massive advantage in tanking for having a bonus to racial mp, which hasn't changed.

Warlocks were trash tier for lightning/cold/fire being nerfed by racial damage resistance. If you died as a race that was strong to damage spells, then your parents should have received instructions on how to love you less.