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5% damage reflected per point is too small. Even on a Lone Wolf character this would take considerable investment before the damage starts to actually kick in (and there are far better options on where to put these skill points).

This skill would need to go above 200% or 300% damage reflected (or even more) to actually start feeling as a decent investment (and in tactician mode, where enemies have ridicolous amounts of armor and health i cannot even imagine the viability of such investment).

One would say too much reflected would be too strong -- perhaps yes, maybe less on tactician, but consider some ot the points i'll address below.

By the time the character reach that amount of reflected damage it would require many points invested in this skill, which means you are leaving the character "naked" with little options in other skills, versatility and damage wise (it's perhaps the only thing the character would be good at).

Also keep in mind that the reflective damage can still get countered by life-steal amounts and some enemies would heal from it (like the fire slugs) so it could be counter-productive to have that much damage reflected.

Then a question -- is enemy AI ever going to attack that character? So the next thing one would add to the build is the Taunt skill and anything else that could help to invite the enemies to attack you more.

Consider making a toggle to activate the reflective damage, or choose what type of damage will be reflected.

Or consider making some skills or ways to make a build around it (additional effects applied when the character is hit, like apply poison/bleeding/burning etc.

Some other users suggested a talent with "reversed" stench effect, or that would increase the likelyhood of enemis targeting the character, that wouldn't be a bad idea.

Last edited by 3lackrose; 26/09/17 02:28 AM.
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All the skill needs is a small flat amount of damage added on top of the reflected %.

Something like [Level]*[Rank] would be plenty enough.

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The real problem with retribution is how a lot of enemies ignore your tanks and rush straight for rogues / mages, who by their nature don't want to level retribution. If the game worked off of the classic 'aggro' formula then retribution would be fine, as is you can make it deal 10000 damage back and it would still be bad because enemies will just ignore you.

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Everything is already perfectly summarized.
- The [5]% per point is too low value. To have significant damages later on, you would have put everything in retribution and be naked with no other points in your character. Furthermore, the retribution skill is useless for at least the 8 first levels since the enemy damages are low and so is your retribution skill. At those levels, you often do between 1-10 damages with retribution. I really like the previously proposed solutions to add a flat value to the reflect like "Damages=(Retribution rank*5% damages received)+(retribution rank*5)". It would really help during the first levels to notice the impact of retribution in the fight since you would at least reflect 6 damages instead of 1 and the scalling later in the game would not be too huge.
- The last problem is that there is no aggro system for the player to cleverly use. Taunt is blocked by physical armor and has a low radius range. Moreover, the AI will always gank on the less tanky character, avoiding your tank all the time. This issue is way more complexe to fix because it needs some redesign of the AI.

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Originally Posted by N0x
- The last problem is that there is no aggro system for the player to cleverly use. Taunt is blocked by physical armor and has a low radius range. Moreover, the AI will always gank on the less tanky character, avoiding your tank all the time. This issue is way more complexe to fix because it needs some redesign of the AI.


This is false.

Perhaps in part due to my unorthodox builds(my Retribution character is a utility rogue), but I can always reliably have the AI target precisely the party members I either want it to strike, or can afford it to strike(there's only one of them that has no business attracting attention).
At the absolute worst, I can usually at least predict who's going to take the hit, and it's easy enough to ensure that it'll be the tank.

It's also ridiculously easy to manipulate, since there's plenty of skills that gain either partial or complete immunity, or put a character out of range(be it friend or foe), or obscure enemy pathing.

You have tools other than the archaic "aggro" mechanic used in games where there's no real AI to think for the enemy, and you should learn to use those. Clouds and surfaces are your friends.

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Originally Posted by Naqel
This is false.

Perhaps in part due to my unorthodox builds(my Retribution character is a utility rogue), but I can always reliably have the AI target precisely the party members I either want it to strike, or can afford it to strike(there's only one of them that has no business attracting attention).

At the absolute worst, I can usually at least predict who's going to take the hit, and it's easy enough to ensure that it'll be the tank.

On what difficulty are you playing ? It may changes things.
I play on classic and I can assure you that the target system looks something like :
AI Prio 1°) Is it possible to AE several characters (like by using a surface, a spell, a grenade or a special arrow)
AI Prio 2°) Is there an undead in the team ? If there is, use a healing spell on him.
AI Prio 3°) Which character has the less armor/hp then focus it.
You can try to use every tactic that you want like the clouds or else, the enemy will just jump/teleport/move toward your weakest player and attack him. ALWAYS ! Thus making the tanking absolutely useless. There are already several topics on the forum regarding this problem.

On a funny part, i play kitting games with AI using one of my mages while my 2H warrior utterly destroys the enemy ranks without being targeted once. Funniest part, they still continu to follow my mage even at the price of giving my warrior a free attack of opportunity.
There is no tanking in the game, but there is kitting !

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Originally Posted by N0x
Originally Posted by Naqel
This is false.

Perhaps in part due to my unorthodox builds(my Retribution character is a utility rogue), but I can always reliably have the AI target precisely the party members I either want it to strike, or can afford it to strike(there's only one of them that has no business attracting attention).

At the absolute worst, I can usually at least predict who's going to take the hit, and it's easy enough to ensure that it'll be the tank.

On what difficulty are you playing ? It may changes things.
I play on classic and I can assure you that the target system looks something like :
AI Prio 1°) Is it possible to AE several characters (like by using a surface, a spell, a grenade or a special arrow)
AI Prio 2°) Is there an undead in the team ? If there is, use a healing spell on him.
AI Prio 3°) Which character has the less armor/hp then focus it.
You can try to use every tactic that you want like the clouds or else, the enemy will just jump/teleport/move toward your weakest player and attack him. ALWAYS ! Thus making the tanking absolutely useless. There are already several topics on the forum regarding this problem.

On a funny part, i play kitting games with AI using one of my mages while my 2H warrior utterly destroys the enemy ranks without being targeted once. Funniest part, they still continu to follow my mage even at the price of giving my warrior a free attack of opportunity.
There is no tanking in the game, but there is kitting !


Or you can just make characters who you want to be hit standout, whole those who you don't want to be hit be unreachable, this way either enemies will waste a lot of time trying to reach elevated and obstructed backline or hit tank. Works fine.

Yes some can teleport or have ranged ability, but you can use Teleport as well to toss them to Africa and your ranger to strip armor if the casters/rangers fast and then have tank lockdown those with knockdown and cripples.

A lot of the fights can be made flow as you want it by putting tank upfront and everything else at the back.

I am playing on Tactician and it works just fine, almost all fights can be predicted except for ambushes where you can use tank to scout ahead and if he gets in combat, others won't be and can be positioned to make it pain in the ass to reach.

Last edited by Gaidax; 26/09/17 10:43 AM.
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Originally Posted by Gaidax
Or you can just make characters who you want to be hit standout, whole those who you don't want to be hit be unreachable, this way either enemies will waste a lot of time trying to reach elevated and obstructed backline or hit tank. Works fine.

As I said, I already do that since I kite them with my mages and I agree it works fine. But they still do not attack my tank.
Originally Posted by Gaidax
Yes some can teleport or have ranged ability, but you can use Teleport as well to toss them to Africa.

What is the point to teleport a ranged or caster enemy ? He still we able to attack you from afar...

Anyways, we should come back to the main topic which is the use of the retribution skill and your feedbacks about it.

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You Teleport melee away while you strip ranged of armor to cc them.

As for retribution answer me this, does your tank not getting damaged at all? Is it immortal? Because in my experience it is getting damaged just fine and even killed at times, yes enemies prefer softer targets, but they won't shy away from bashing the tank if that is all what's readily available and you can make it that way with positioning, armor stripping and CC.

Like I went against Mordus in Tactical and it was a difficult fight with him at full power and yes eventually tank got killed and it had a whole shitton more HP and armor than other party members, so even if others get damaged, tank also takes a good punch.

As for Retribution itself and maybe things like Leadership and so on that start with tiny %, with mirror existing it's hardly an issue, because you can instantly dump a bunch of points where you want to make that ability worthwhile. There is no other real solution, you could say make earlier levels give more %, but then you will start having various bastard builds cropping up as well as diminishing returns on investment which is kinda counter productive.

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Originally Posted by Gaidax
As for retribution answer me this, does your tank not getting damaged at all?

Of course he does, but once almost all the team is already dead so the retribution skill will not be really usefull since the fight is already lost anyways.

If you want to maximise the retribution skill, you need to pair it with a healer (or anything giving you armor), not when you are the last one standing.

Originally Posted by Gaidax

As for Retribution itself and maybe things like Leadership and so on that start with tiny %, with mirror existing it's hardly an issue.

If you need at least 5 points to start noticing an impact on the gameplay, it means you need to tweak the mecanic a little bit.
Originally Posted by Gaidax
There is no other real solution, you could say make earlier levels give more %, but then you will start having various bastard builds cropping up as well as diminishing returns on investment which is kinda counter productive.

Of course there are solutions but it will need tests and a lot of thinking from the dev team. But having a little flat damages on the skill can make it usefull at low level without breaking it at high level.

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Originally Posted by N0x
Originally Posted by Gaidax
As for retribution answer me this, does your tank not getting damaged at all?

Of course he does, but once almost all the team is already dead so the retribution skill will not be really usefull since the fight is already lost anyways.


Then I can only reiterate, as one playing on Tactical, that this is your problem. Outside some freakish curve-balls, for me, tank never dies last and if most of the team is dead it's not lost either, because you can chain rez people no problem, especially if you pack Morning Person.

Now I won't claim that tank always dies first for me, but usually it's 2nd/3rd death if it comes to that, after which prompt rez comes with Morning Person.

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Originally Posted by Gaidax
Then I can only reiterate, as one playing on Tactical, that this is your problem.

Not really. A lot of people like the original poster noticed the difficulty to "properly" tank in the game. There are already many topics on the forum like the ones saying that taunt should bypass the physical armor or the need to add the reverse stench skill, etc...
All those thoughts are born from the same initial observation : "Tanking is not as efficient as other playstyles".

Originally Posted by 3lackrose
Some other users suggested a talent with "reversed" stench effect, or that would increase the likelyhood of enemis targeting the character, that wouldn't be a bad idea.

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Y'know you can become borderline invincible by stacking retribution and necromancy, right?

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Originally Posted by Poobah
Y'know you can become borderline invincible by stacking retribution and necromancy, right?

It was changed since the EA. It does not work anymore.

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Originally Posted by N0x
Originally Posted by Gaidax
Then I can only reiterate, as one playing on Tactical, that this is your problem.

Not really. A lot of people like the original poster noticed the difficulty to "properly" tank in the game. There are already many topics on the forum like the ones saying that taunt should bypass the physical armor or the need to add the reverse stench skill, etc...
All those thoughts are born from the same initial observation : "Tanking is not as efficient as other playstyles".


A lot of people notice the "difficulty" with just about anything, especially when it comes to Tactician.

Whole taunt thing is just a dumb gimmick, I already told you how you can shake off things off your squishies and make tank take it instead - it involves proper positioning and removing other viable choices for enemies which is not really that difficult to do with a bit of planning and yes AI is built to counter that and it's a good thing, as opposed as some cheap shit like taunt which basically shuts it down.

Things like having your team on higher ground with a layer of slow/CC walls in between and removing threats gunning for squishies will make AI focus what it can then, which will be your tank if you play your cards right. And no it won't be 100% focus, but it won't be ignore at all.

You have smarter tools and ways to shift attention and it is up to you to utilize these.

Last edited by Gaidax; 26/09/17 03:52 PM.

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