what is, exactly, a warrior?

[Sky]

I dont think thats true. I think the benefits are too small and the disadvantages too great. I would grind the dungeob for hours just to get the cloak that activates for resistance, or else every great wyrm is a 800hp loss encounter.

[Pete Mack]

@sky--
The way to avoid that is by not fighting elemental Wyrms as a warrior (and not fighting great storm wyrms as a paladin or priest until your healing failure rate is low enough.)
If you must fight them, use archery from a distance to get their HP down. Breath attenuation makes a ridiculous difference (though this will be reduced very soon.)

Great Bile Wyrms aren't so much of a threat, since your equipment will limit the damage to at most 277HP, same as Great Swamp Wyrms.

[Derakon]

Two different concepts. Two different posts.

Right now the advantages over rogue is a small hit bonus and a small hp bonus.

You should pay attention to more than just the clvl-50 analysis. Of course warriors don't stand out very well in the endgame; that's when all the other classes have finished putting together their bags of tricks, everyone is at max stats, etc. But if that were all that mattered, we'd start the game at dlvl99 with perfect equipment and inventory.

The great advantage of warriors is that they're strong from the start of the game. The other classes, even the hybrids, have much slower starts. They have to split their stats more carefully, because they have a casting stat to support in addition to the physical stats. Their combat is therefore substantially weaker, and their other tricks aren't all that great (especially for the hybrids). Meanwhile, warriors come roaring out of the gate and can blitz the first 2000' at least with ease. Between their class modifiers and the lack of a casting stat to worry about, they have fantastic STR/DEX/CON.

I'm not saying you can't play quickly with other classes (you can certainly powerdive faster if you have a reliable means of stair detection), just that warriors handle a fast-and-loose playstyle much better than the other classes do, at least in the early game.

Once everyone's finished stat gain, warriors lose some of their shine. At that point all they really have going for them is a bigger hit die, a higher STR/DEX/CON cap -- which equipment modifiers eventually make largely irrelevant -- and a slightly better melee blows formula.

Incidentally, HP comparisons are easy to make. CON bonuses are identical for all classes, so if we assume that everyone maxes CON, then the only difference between classes is the hit die. Every extra side on your hit die (every +d1) is on average equal to +25 HP at the end of the game. Warriors have a +d9 hit die (on top of the racial hit die), mages have +d0, rogues and paladins have +d6. This is ignoring the fact that mages are more likely to play as gnomes (d8 hit die) and warriors more likely to play as half-trolls (d12 hit die).

[Sky]

So you are against both reinstating the extra blow, and the innate resistances? Would adding either make the warrior an unbalanced class?

[Derakon]

So you are against both reinstating the extra blow, and the innate resistances? Would adding either make the warrior an unbalanced class?

I'm not necessarily against the extra blow, but I'm less thrilled by the resists/protections. Bonus passives can be extremely powerful, especially when talking about status ailments, and I wouldn't hand them out lightly. I don't think they'd necessarily make the warrior unbalanced, but they'd make the "equipment minigame" too easy, which would make warriors less interesting to play as IMO.

[Sky]

well but the warrior isn't "interesting" by any stretch of the imagination. you go in, you bonk the mobs on the head with a big piece of steel.
also, pFear is already there, HLife isn't much of a game changer, pConf is great but you are likely to have that anyway. pStun is also not really a game changer, sure it's an additional safety and i know personally you can die to a pack of Plasma Hounds (maybe also to Master Mystic, but they won't make you go nostun->knockedout in 1 round), but it's one of those things you can do without, like pBlind, and very often you don't need to bother at all.

on the other hand, an extra blow can and will do more damage where it counts, in the fights against uniques.

i do think warriors should hurt in melee, and i do think rangers should hurt in ranged; i don't think rangers should get an extra shot but i do think a +1 shooting power should replace it, and i think warriors should have something similar.

[bio_hazard]

So like (+1 +1) [+5] for every 10 levels (or CL15,30,45)

[Nick]

Personally, warrior is the only class I wouldn't change

[luneya]

Personally, warrior is the only class I wouldn't change

But the main change that people have been pushing for isn't really a change, but more of a putting-things-back-the-way-they-always-were in the form of restoring the extra blow. Which I agree should happen. I also agree that the more radical changes suggested by others aren't worthwhile; just give warriors their extra blow back and consider them well-balanced.

EDIT: My understanding is that warrior didn't directly "lose" their blows bonus over other classes, but rather the blows/weight formula was changed so that they couldn't max out blows on most endgame weapons. If this is correct, then instead of changing warrior directly, an alternative solution that might be better is to simply add a line of code that if str and dex are both 18/**, characters receive their class-based max blows regardless of weapon weight. This seems like a fair compromise. The only thing that it will unbalance is Grond, and frankly, once you have that, balance doesn't matter.

[Sky]

Grond is bleh anyway.

[Derakon]

Grond is bleh anyway.

Grond is mostly a demonstration of how awful the "causes earthquakes" ability is. Even with a weapon that can easily deal north of 1000 damage/round, the earthquakes are such a huge negative that you may well not use it.

(Though the fact that the game is over by this point is also a factor of course)