Class Balance and the current state of Rappelz.

[(QA)Tharja]

From what I have observed, Rappelz doesn't appear to be doing too badly at the moment, however there are certainly issues that players have strong feelings about.

To put it bluntly, a lot of players are expressing that they are somewhat bored. It feels like a long time since Rappelz has really changed, the fact that the Rondo Citadel was such a massive disappointment of an expansion makes it feel like even longer since Rappelz had a worthwhile addition. I am aware that this is due to Gala rather than Webzen though and hopefully Gala have been working on something new and interesting that will appeal to players.

Another issue is the class balancing project. Which unfortunately after Nazgul's departure. Has stopped in its entirety. Personally, I put this down to the fact that Nazgul was moved above any other reason. I like [GM]Syr, I feel he is doing his best as the new GM to do what is necessary. I see him log on to the Discord every morning to see what is happening. He might not say much, but I take comfort in the fact that he is paying attention to the wants and needs of players.

I, as both a QA and player would very much like to see the class balancing continue, and I'm more than happy to provide any support necessary to facilitate it as I did when Nazgul was in charge. The class balancing needs to be an ongoing process and there needs to be time between each wave so that the changes made can be evaluated.

There is one class that never really got rebalanced however and really deserves some changes. some players are quite vocal about it, since it is a class which embodies one of the most integral aspects of the game. The Master Breeder.

Can the Rappelz community please get more communication between themselves and Webzen/Gala? It feels like we have been thrown back in to the past, not knowing if and when any updates will come, where as previously we were far better connected with what was happening.

Despite it's age, 13 years! Rappelz still has a base of players who love/hate the game in equal measure and want to continue playing it for all it's interesting features. But as things are right now, the game feels stale.

I want Rappelz to keep going, I want it to be the best game it can be and I'm willing to do what I can to make it happen.

As a player, Webzen have my support. But, I want to know what is happening and what the future holds in exchange for my support and I doubt I am alone.

Tharja.

[Realize]

You're not alone at all. Your statement probably is telling what's going on in all of our heads.

We did not have a real change in the past year. I don't really have a goal that i want to achieve ingame.
All these years something new to discover came up and made it interesting and i just miss exploring new maps and quests.

The equipment itself is so specialized that you can't really play any onther class without spending hundreds of dollars/euros or a fortune of ingame money. (i would love to see changes in that direction via item availability ingame).


I would also love to see more communication between us (the community) and webzen/gala in the future just as Tharja said.
The game could be way better with some small changes that everybody has been bragging about the last few months or even years.

Please don't let us down and show us that we're still worth some attention.

Thanks for your post Tharja!

[UnderTheInfluence]

By availability you mean, you would like to be able to change your items more often if you want to play another class? (just llike i would like?)
For example i have reviac gear i would like to see a cs scroll/item/npc/anything that can change it back to lvl160 gear and materials get back to me or 80% of the materials gets back to me This would also mean perfect enchant scroll perma in cash shop.. (gala would get *** load of money out of that)
Or you meant that we need a lot more fresh gears, because it is too hard to find the desired piece :/ Eitherway i would support your suggestionts, just wanted to point out that aspect of the game is really needed (i think)
I personally feel like, when people get bored, they want to try another class, but they won't sacrafice a well built char just to try something else.. So this also could be a way of eliminating the boredom, isn't it ? This way you would have to spend, but not as much as starting from fresh.

[AllSeeingEye]

Unfortunately the player base is not strong enough for GALA to even support quite frankly "a dying game".

Yes you hit the nail on the head on many things but when it comes down to it. It really is not about class balance as to why the game is dying.

There is no new content.

Brand new masteries for each class rather than a rework of the old skills would be far better and easier to implement. That will revive the game. That will bring the old players back including myself.

There is a lot of credit thrown to Nazgul of doing a good job but I don't support it. I think he has done damage to the game instead by not realizing the more important issues which is ultimately... by pushing GALA for new content rather than catering to the needs of the few complainers.



Here are a few examples of what important issues I am referring to:

New class (maybe a spear and a 2h sword class?) - LONG OVERDUE and would be a new flavor for the game

New Continent with new dungeons.

Should probably keep max level as 200. (When PvErs hit lvl 200. They stop playing, so encourage a lvl 200 dungeon instead to perhaps increase JP to get new skills to the next below topic..) Like this is honestly a stupid system.

BRAND NEW MASTERY. Like something else beyond a void mage for example. Like wizard or witch class for example. Each class needs brand new skills and can leave it up to imagination at this point.

PvP damage should be reduced even more and remove all boss cards and equipment that has the ability to cc upon receiving damage. Stop coming out with new gear as well. Enough is enough. Perhaps create more decoration items instead for cash shop revenue, players want to look unique.

Make Old pets useful again. BP, Angel, etc..


I challenge the new GM to review this and actually listen. Something Nazgul could not do.

[Sunali]

Can only agree to everything here.
Sadly i have no insight on how its going in Korea, but from the past i know statements like "with pressure from Webzen/Nazgul etc they finally changed this and that" and that seems to not work at all anymore without said "pressure".
This is only my guess, but i think GALA is more occupied with their new cashgrab game "Rappelz Mobile The Rift" which is really sad, but that seems to be the trend...

i was always sceptical about the class balance project which was initated by Webzen/Nazgul because i thought it would hinder the big changes every new EPIC patch.
Now ofc, i wish Nazgul would still be here so we would atleast get SOMETHING.
Because it seems the Devs have no interest.

There are illegal servers out there (Look through videos on Youtube), which far from being perfect, even create whole new Zones and Dungeons on their own! Why is nothing coming from Gala?
There really is nothing positve to look forward to right now and there isn't even any confirmation that the communication with Korea works to a point where our feedback counts. Till then, it's a waste of time to get serious with change requests, imo.

[Fainewedd]

Thank you very much for this post Tharja.

I play my MB since the beginning and even continued in the last month because of the little changes they made (CP was the most helpful).
Personally, I do not need that much more new content because I play mostly just a few hours per week and I'm still missing a ton of things (MB is a slow class to play and pretty expensive), nothing compared to a real grinder but what I think every MB deserves is a balancing of this class which as well could entail a tone down of the ol.
Stupidest part of this balancing: MB has a lot pet Buffs (most of them are utterly useless to be honest), as well as a shared Toggle. OL got (except resistance) by far better self Buffs, including double atk and such high stats on pets, that they don't even need an armour or healing course the 4% will be good enough in most cases. If you boost all MB Buffs you will make the OL even more OP.
To give the MB back its meaning, it schould have the best stats on pets and the best tanking ability but not the most dmg. Compared with all pet classes, I still see MB as some kind lowest dmg wise but highest survivability/tanking ability, OL highest dmg but lowest survivability and the BM in the middle of both.
Therefor, if we take the Char into the equation:

MB: Healer/ Support + tank and dmg dealer
OL: Mage/DD + two dmg dealer pets
BM: Hybrid of DD+Tank with two pets to support in dmg/healing.

Atm we have
MB > Buff / toggle slave
OL > Char as toggle slave, pets do the rest
BM > I think pretty much ok, not perfect, but ok (what I understand from comments by Mino)

Nobody wants a second OL, but a MB able to do some more than provide resistance buff would be great.

But anyway, who cares 😂


PS:
LF DT buff.
Options: make it buffable from a second account, but with at least 30 min duration. New duration like the voting suggests. or go on with the interesting idea to equip a dt like the booster to be able to use this buff without summoning the dt. (which will in any case strengthen the ol much more than the mb)

ANY signe of life of a dev would be highly appreciated.

Over and out

[Confusion]

I personally was not a fan of the "balance" but with time I have learned to accept it. As for GM-Nazgul leaving us, I believe he is much needed elsewhere. As for GM-Syr, He is doing the best that he can do. I have seen him always trying to keep up with many of our requests about bugs and so on. He is really trying. Yes, he is not as vocal as GM-Nazgul was but I am giving him the benefit of the doubt.

As for Master Breeder. For a very long time Master Breeder was an OP class. When ranged pets were out, they were the best pet class to even play. Do I find it unfair that they did not get a "balance"? Yes. Is it fair that everyone else got a "balance"? No. If Master Breeder is going to be anything like Overlord (overlord needed love for a verrrry long time) is now, I find that to be unfair. What a pet class can do now is beyond ridiculous.

As for the state of the game. A lot of us are very bored. We are not bored because the events are recycled or because the cap level is 210. It comes down to DD being the only dungeon now for over 2 years. You cannot tame the bosses in DD. The death gladiators in DD were interesting, but when they went and screwed up the tame rate and drop rate of empties. That killed the whole process for a lot of people. Basically the ones that tamed it got away with getting what they wanted and the rest of us got screwed.

We are finding a lot of unfairness in the game. For example the bags, some have the OP dark purse and others the nerfed purse. Also, when asking GMs to have the nerfed purse on sale, we have to wait and wait. So basically asking GMs to put something on sale becomes frustrating. As if we are like here take our money and GMs are like Nah... maybe later. Another issue is there is no real community based excitement. Why not let the community come up with a NEW event? Something that excites the players. Where they feel they contributed to something.

Other adds that make zero sense... You cannot trade god mother bottles when you are dead. Farming for Ancient white steel to get level 30 gears but only receive such a minimal reward in return of all the time you put in. Reviac dropping 60+ basic cards... lol? Why not have Reviac a chance to drop everything that you can get in the dungeon, like 5-10 scale pieces or full scales. DT buff still 7 mins (many players raised that for years). UG exp nerf to get to 160. And the list goes on...

As much as I love this game. I have played off and on for 5 years. Each year I hope for something better, but my hope is dwindling. I do not really see any Gala/Webzen/Community based communication. It is getting at best frustrating. I do hope for the sake of the Master breeders that you do get a "balance". I also hope that someone in the Gala/Webzen company reads these forums. Because if it isn't for nostalgia or our friendships we made along the way... Nothing else will keep us here.

[Gouron]

i know many people always say it, but i think that the game is now really dieing. there are so many good ideas for the rebalance and nothing happend, specially to THE main class of the hole game - the masterbreeders. i only play that class. i could play other classes, or chnage the class for my main, but i dont want to, coz i dont know how to play another class that well then MASTERBREEDER.

[JustBrowsing98]

There are a lot of small quality of life changes that could be done to make the game more fun. Stopping to rebuff both gnoll and DT buff every 8 minutes or less is both bad design and breaks the flow completely. There are several other self buffs that could also do with a boost to timers: divine whatever on temp/merc, blessing, active guard just off the top of my head. Tiny changes that would make the game play smoother.

The lack of gears on the market is now becoming an issue and new players or a new toon you will struggle to find even crappy stat two slots as older players don't awaken armors and new players try dozens or hundreds and give up in frustration. There is money to be made in changing the system so you could make it easier to get the skill you want on armor, etc and then have a reroll system on the stats and a cs item to add slots.