I think that unholy weapons should not be able to be touched by anyone outside your pk range. They are far too important and too difficult to get for some punk rank 10 to pick up your unholy weapon or sacrifice it. They are more important than leader weapons since if you lose your leader weapon to a crash, you just e-mail the imm and get it back.

Maybe just make it so that above a certain number of charges, nobody out of pk can touch your weapon. Group goes to fight ap and tells some lowbie, rank 14 newbie buddy to spam "sac axe". Its just lame.
Its the same as having muter spam fumble and some lowbie spamming "sac axe", or having your unholy weaponbroken by some half naked axe spec.

ALso getting powerful unholy weapons stolen is lame. How would an ap not realize that his most prized possession is stolen. It should burn you if you try to steal it from an AP or something *shrug*.

IMHO unholy weapons over a certain amount of charges (15?!), shouldnt be touched out of PK and the more powerful the weapon is, the more damage it does to out of pk char trying to pick it up/sac it.

Such a change would only improve game balance.

Everyone else is shooting you down..but...

People beneath your PK range should not be able to grab a disarmed holy weapon. An IC reason would be that the unholy weapon is too powerful (with enough charges) for a lowly adventure to touch. OOC, though, I really hate when people gather around a fight, mouths watering, waiting to pick up a few scraps. Its pathetic and annoying.

Perhaps the real issue here is looting disarmed weapons though. I find it a little absurd that someone would be able to grab a weapon that is at the feet of two people fighting to the death. It seems more realistic that this person would chance being trampled or get a "gods protect" message. (Perhaps a new thief skill.)

In the case of unholy weapons, it is a moot point. After playing 3 hero rank APs...with a few hundred hours at hero, I can honestly say that disarming was never a problem with that Iron Grip thang.(See Zulghinlour's post.)

I could probably make a decent case for characters with no PK range (e.g. sub-11th characters and ghosts other than the appropriate A-P) being unable to take or destroy an unholy weapon if I wanted to do so. I'm not sure I do.

The rest, I just don't agree with.

but for the sub pk chars, under 11, i think that would be good. Ive seem it happen twice in the past 2 weeks. One char was rank 2 and another was rank 7. The first one sacrificed the weapon and the other picked it up and gave it to some other ap. That just aint right. I guess if i was an ap i could pay someone to kill that guy or something, which you cant do with with sub 11 chars. I didnt think about ghosts, that would fall under then un-pkeable character category.

As for the rest, fair enough. Would make it too easy for an AP to keep an axe.

>I think that unholy weapons should not be able to be touched
>by anyone outside your pk range. They are far too important
>and too difficult to get for some punk rank 10 to pick up your
>unholy weapon or sacrifice it. They are more important than
>leader weapons since if you lose your leader weapon to a
>crash, you just e-mail the imm and get it back.

In terms of sheer power, yes, an unholy weapon is going to be more important. However, that is part of the reason an unholy weapon is going to be much easier to lose. Leader weapons have some very nice benefits, which is why they also are often considered less powerful than most weapons.

>Maybe just make it so that above a certain number of charges,
>nobody out of pk can touch your weapon. Group goes to fight ap
>and tells some lowbie, rank 14 newbie buddy to spam "sac axe".
>Its just lame.
>Its the same as having muter spam fumble and some lowbie
>spamming "sac axe", or having your unholy weaponbroken by some
>half naked axe spec.

Personally, I find this idea horrid. It goes along the same lines of 90% of the AP unholy weapon posts I see. "Imms, I hate losing my unholy weapon all the time! Can you please make it so I can't lose my weapon by X, Y, and Z?" If it's such a big problem, no-one is forcing you to use unholy blessing to make your weapon grow more powerful with the only drawback being to lose it...which 90% of the time happens when you die anyways (With the removal of taking damage as a ghost when it's sacrificed, the double-death doesn't happen as much). Which means they might even hold it until you unghost, and you can get it back. Otherwise, you've lost everything...which is something that happens to people without unholy weapons pretty often anyways.

FYI: I'm somewhere around 99% certain (Give or take 1%) that your unholy weapon is never going to be weaponbroken by any axe spec, half-naked or not. Even if I had both your axe spec and transmuter coming after me, the only reason I wouldn't want them spamming fumble and weapon breaker is I might be laughing too hard to fight.

>ALso getting powerful unholy weapons stolen is lame. How would
>an ap not realize that his most prized possession is stolen.
>It should burn you if you try to steal it from an AP or
>something *shrug*.

I'm rather confused here. By what reasoning do you see this weapon, hungering for souls, to not be stolen? I'm still trying to figure out why you're not wielding your weapon to begin with (a simple way to prevent theft). Or maybe get creative, and find another way to keep it from being stolen. I can think of a simple way off the top of my head.

>IMHO unholy weapons over a certain amount of charges (15?!),
>shouldnt be touched out of PK and the more powerful the weapon
>is, the more damage it does to out of pk char trying to pick
>it up/sac it.

Now, I *CAN* see the argument of making an unholy weapon more difficult to be destroyed, making those significantly weaker than you unable to destroy it easily. Personally, I've always liked the idea of seeing more unholy weapons floating around for blackmail anyways. It still wouldn't be hard to find someone who *CAN* destroy it, anyways. Also, I might suggest if you want to avoid having your unholy weapon destroyed by lowbies...run away from fights that you think you might lose hold of your weapon, if you see said newbies hanging around.

>Such a change would only improve game balance.

Actually...I'd find to be horribly destructive to game balance. Is there *ANYONE* who would argue that Tikar or Palin were *NOT* the sort of thing people wanted to see? The sort you want to be, yes. But not the sort people want to fight. You're arguing to make this *EASIER*? Keep in mind, game balance is from *MANY* different angles. Heck, I'm just talking from my own player perspective, because that's left up to the much more experienced Imms anyways.

Now, hopefully I didn't sound too harsh, but this is one of those discussions that's been done quite often, and I shudder to think of CF if sickeningly powerful APs start running rampant. But then again, I'm more in favor of orcs having barrier and haste. Oh, and can shapeshift into vicious wolverines. And fly. And have acute vision. And...well heck, just give them slay.

FYI: I'm somewhere around 99% certain (Give or take 1%) that your unholy weapon is never going to be weaponbroken by any axe spec, half-naked or not. Even if I had both your axe spec and transmuter coming after me, the only reason I wouldn't want them spamming fumble and weapon breaker is I might be laughing too hard to fight.

Yup.

Especially with the changes to Iron Grip. And Weaponbreaker hasn't worked on unholy weapons for years.

To echo some of the other posters: Unholy Blessing is not nearly the be-all and end-all of the class. APs can and have done fine without them. And there's supposed to be some element of risk to having one.

valguarnera@carrionfields.com

>FYI: I'm somewhere around 99% certain (Give or take 1%)
>that your unholy weapon is never going to be weaponbroken by
>any axe spec, half-naked or not. Even if I had both your axe
>spec and transmuter coming after me, the only reason I
>wouldn't want them spamming fumble and weapon breaker is I
>might be laughing too hard to fight.
>
>Yup.
>
>Especially with the changes to Iron Grip. And
>Weaponbreaker hasn't worked on unholy weapons for
>years.

Nope...not since Komier weaponbroke my axe back when I was mortal and Cador fixed it.

So long, and thanks for all the fish!

>Personally, I find this idea horrid. It goes along the same
>lines of 90% of the AP unholy weapon posts I see. "Imms, I
>hate losing my unholy weapon all the time! Can you please
>make it so I can't lose my weapon by X, Y, and Z?"

If people are losing something that's a big part of what their class brings to the table, and they're losing it due to people exploiting their out-of-PK status...that could be a bad thing. Could.

>Now, I *CAN* see the argument of making an unholy weapon more
>difficult to be destroyed, making those significantly weaker
>than you unable to destroy it easily.

I agree, but it would be hard to code. Just have a merc grab it then nofol. As a partial measure, though, I think sacrificing unholy weapons should be strenuous to the sacrificer. Maybe have it halve their hp. Take them to 1hp. Or maybe lag them for a couple of rounds. Just a thought.


>Also, I might suggest
>if you want to avoid having your unholy weapon destroyed by
>lowbies...run away from fights that you think you might lose
>hold of your weapon, if you see said newbies hanging around.

That's alot of fights. Anybody who can sleep you becomes a threat, assuming they have friends. Those friends needn't be with them at the time of combat either.

>I shudder to think of CF if sickeningly powerful APs start
>running rampant.

Then I'll roll a trap thief and hook up with a transmuter. Problem solved.

that fumble and weaponbreaker were changed with regards to unholy. They were only changed however when an ap (important once) lost his axe in such a pathetic way. I doubt they would have been changed if any lesser ap's would have complained about the issue.

I know that fumble and weaponbreaker were changed with regards to unholy.

Then why are you proposing scenarios where an AP is wrecked by those? Just to prove that in 1997 or so you could lose an unholy weapon to an axe spec?

I doubt they would have been changed if any lesser ap's would have complained about the issue.

You've harped on this kind of thing a couple times now. It irritates me.

Read the bug forum. Check the archives. Thousands of mistakes have been corrected there, and we allow anonymous posting. We often don't even know who the character reporting the bug is, let alone the player.

valguarnera@carrionfields.com

that sometimes things are 'by design' but they are not ok. If something is 'by design' it doesnt mean its taboo. It doesnt mean it should not be questioned and there is no reason for the stuck up and overbearing attitude regarding a suggestion.

About iron grip, yeah i know about it. There is no reason for Zulg to refer to it 3 times, which is basically ####. Its pre-iron grip that I was refering to, and he knew it. If you get your axe disarmed after you get iron grip, well you deserve whats coming to you. Just like a mage bein tripped to death after he gets fly. Valg, the bug board is for different issues and you know that well.

I did not say its a conspiracy and i never 'harped' about such things before. But we all know exactly how things work. Once enough people bitch about something being lame/overpowered/cheap/abused, it usually gets changed. Hardly ever does it get changed when one person complains unless its obvious that the said skill/power etc is indeed out of whack. No lag on assassinate was such an issue. Nobody really cared when one person complained. Once Padgett and that drow deleted and a zillion other assassins popped out, all trying to assassinate, it got changed.
Sylvan powers is another example. Nobody gave a damn about them being totally out of whack. Once 50 people complained about it, it got changed. Sunray/black panther/falcon the same, nobody cared because there were hardly any druids/panthers around. Nobody gave a damn about the lag on 'rescue' until Arolin and his buddy abused it trying to kill Dullameh. Then it changed. These were not bugs but were things subject to abuse.

The reason nobody complains about this issue is that you dont see many APs out there who have this problem. Why? Because 85% of them suck and never get an axe worth a damn. This issue however can be subject to severe abuse. Basically an out of PK range character can kill the ap. (AP can die to someone who isnt even in PK, period.)

Its not something that happens so often that its a problem but it could become one if enough people play APs and get some nice axes.
I could pay some rank 6 guy who wont get pkd being with me, and i'll tell him to spam 'sac axe' while i spam 'disarm'while being too small to bash and flying. The guy who's sacing the axe is facing ZERO risk, and the guy whos disarming gets another character who cant touch the AP to basically kill his enemy.
Thats just wrong.

who have had enough charges to get killed by losing my weapon(s) (and have died a few times like this), I can tell you that in that situation you summon the guy in your pk away from the one not in your pk. Then you get him blinded before the guy out of your pk catches up.

That's harder than not dealing with it, agreed. That's why it would affect game balance. That's one of the ways in which a high int ap race can be better than a high str ap race, because they have more mana for things like summonings.

As I said, I would be very pissed off if some lowbie sacced my weapon, but I still think it is good for game balance purposes. If, as you said, you've built up 500 charges, it seems only right that you should still have to watch out for losing your weapon to these cheap tactics. ie you can't just kill everyone you see (which would, I contest, be overpowered).

And at the end of the day, you could rank up to 40 to get iron grip. Why don't you do that? Because it is easier to get charges at lvl 36 than level 40. That is part of the game balance that would be affected by preventing lowbies saccing weapons.

>that sometimes things are 'by design' but they are not ok. If
>something is 'by design' it doesnt mean its taboo. It doesnt
>mean it should not be questioned and there is no reason for
>the stuck up and overbearing attitude regarding a suggestion.

No...but it does mean we've thought about lots of the scenarios that you bring up and still agree it is by design. Just like this one.

>About iron grip, yeah i know about it. There is no reason for
>Zulg to refer to it 3 times, which is basically ####. Its
>pre-iron grip that I was refering to, and he knew it. If you
>get your axe disarmed after you get iron grip, well you
>deserve whats coming to you.

So you're complaining about level 36-40. Oddly enough...this too was a conscious decision by the immortal staff when we decided what level the spells come in at.

>The reason nobody complains about this issue is that you dont
>see many APs out there who have this problem. Why? Because 85%
>of them suck and never get an axe worth a damn. This issue
>however can be subject to severe abuse. Basically an out of PK
>range character can kill the ap. (AP can die to someone who
>isnt even in PK, period.)

And the Immortal staff has no problem with this specific case.

>Its not something that happens so often that its a problem but
>it could become one if enough people play APs and get some
>nice axes.

No...not really...

>I could pay some rank 6 guy who wont get pkd being with me,
>and i'll tell him to spam 'sac axe' while i spam 'disarm'while
>being too small to bash and flying. The guy who's sacing the
>axe is facing ZERO risk, and the guy whos disarming gets
>another character who cant touch the AP to basically kill his
>enemy. Thats just wrong.

If that's really your concern...wait until you get iron grip before trying to build up a weapon.

So long, and thanks for all the fish!

>>Leader weapons have some very nice benefits, which is why they also >>are often considered less powerful than most weapons.

Explain to me how that makes any sense whatsoever?

In terms of raw power, as you said, unholy weapons are superior and thus easier to lose. How does that make any sense? How do you justify playing for 500 hours and killing 200 people to have your axe saced by a rank 5? As i posted to Zulg, there are MANY ways to lose your axe, im just trying to point out one.

>>Also, I might suggest if you want to avoid having your unholy >>weapon destroyed by lowbies...run away from fights that you think >>you might lose hold of your weapon, if you see said newbies hanging >>around.

Yeah, so avoid any class that can disarm. Sometimes you cant see newbies hanging around, also sometimes you have no choice.

>>You're arguing to make this *EASIER*? Keep in mind, game balance is >>from *MANY* different angles. Heck, I'm just talking from my own >>player perspective, because that's left up to the much more >>experienced Imms anyways.

By that reasoning the tougher you become the easier it should be to kill you, because of course there must be a drawback to your power. The only drawback is having to kill huge amounts of people and risking your neck and everything you have in doing so. By killing lots of people you get gangs after you and pretty much everyone else. Isnt that a drawback?

>I think that unholy weapons should not be able to be touched
>by anyone outside your pk range. They are far too important
>and too difficult to get for some punk rank 10 to pick up your
>unholy weapon or sacrifice it. They are more important than
>leader weapons since if you lose your leader weapon to a
>crash, you just e-mail the imm and get it back.

That's what iron grip of azazel is for.

>Maybe just make it so that above a certain number of charges,
>nobody out of pk can touch your weapon. Group goes to fight ap
>and tells some lowbie, rank 14 newbie buddy to spam "sac axe".
>Its just lame.

And a viable tactic (as is iron grip of azazel)

>Its the same as having muter spam fumble and some lowbie
>spamming "sac axe", or having your unholy weaponbroken by some
>half naked axe spec.

Did I mention iron grip of azazel...

>ALso getting powerful unholy weapons stolen is lame. How would
>an ap not realize that his most prized possession is stolen.
>It should burn you if you try to steal it from an AP or
>something *shrug*.

Now if only there were a spell that would make that weapon unable to be disarmed...

>IMHO unholy weapons over a certain amount of charges (15?!),
>shouldnt be touched out of PK and the more powerful the weapon
>is, the more damage it does to out of pk char trying to pick
>it up/sac it.

That's part of the beauty of unholy weapons...they can get really powerful, and they can be destroyed. If they just got powerful, there isn't a drawback to the power at all. May as well just give anti-paladins a spell that makes a weapon +15/+15 +150 hp/+150 mana.

>Such a change would only improve game balance.

This statement proves you don't understand game balance.

So long, and thanks for all the fish!

Then I'd actually have to rank past level 36 without stopping to build an uber powerful weapon

>>That's part of the beauty of unholy weapons...they can get really >>powerful, and they can be destroyed. If they just got powerful, >>there isn't a drawback to the power at all.

We both know that 99% of the time an AP will lose his axe by dying. By pure and simple PK. You saying that if such a change were to take place it would make AP's uber poweful, is bull. We know thats not true. It would just make them untouchable by out of PK people. This is the way everything else is. Healers cant gate to out of pk unless they have permission, no summon out of pk unless you have permission..etc. Why have permission to instakill out of PK? Even with this out of pk thing, there are a 100 ways for an AP to lose his axe. Im just trying to eliminate one in which out of range characters are involved directly, since the sacing of a powerful weapon will insta kill the AP. Why should anyone out of AP pk have the power to do that?

>>May as well just give >>anti-paladins a spell that makes a weapon >>+15/+15 +150 hp/+150 mana.

Yeah right. Why would you do that, he can do that on his own if he manages not to die and kill enough. Most APs lose their axes long before 15 charges, and it aint by lowbie sacing. But of course, you knew that. Thats just overbearing sarcasm.

It is much easier for an ap of lvl 36 to get charges if he can attack groups where one is in his pk and two are not, knowing the others can't sac his weapon.

This would make it easier for ap's to get charges (and controls) off of ranking groups.

This would make ap's more powerful. And that power would in turn make the ap gain in power still faster afterwards.

It would make game balance worse.

It would make it easier for ap's, an already lethal class, to get kills. They don't even need those kills and charges to be lethal. They don't need a/b/s to be lethal either. They don't need a nicer pk range to be lethal.

I'm not saying ap's would get more kills than any other class, but a well played ap can seal someone's doom like no other class.

Yes, I would be very annoyed if someone in my range disarmed me and someone I couldn't touch sacced my weapon. So I take steps to avoid it. I use summon to keep them apart from the others. I keep them blind so they don't disarm me.

I also think unholy weapons should be stealable. There are huge advantages to be gained by having multiple unholy weapons, or not wielding your unholy until you have someone slept etc. The risk of theft is the price you pay for doing this.