Eternal Knights waaaay too strong.

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In my opinion, with how threatening the reflected projectiles are, if GGG were to keep this implementation of the knights, they should add a loud sound cue when the reflect is triggered, anywhere on the map, so we can react to their presence and stop shooting projectiles and prepare to dodge the already triggered reflect, and then swap to a more careful playstyle.

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nnilfoest#6766 wrote:

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Shrodin#0981 wrote:

Why melee class have to feel inferior to range? That is better question, exile.

Because ranged combat is fundamentally more effective. Ever realize how range is also "the meta" in real life? We used to have wars where melee was everything. Then came ranged. Now, almost everything is ranged.

This is why balancing melee vs ranged is hard in game, because the core principles of the nature of them makes ranged more effective. (side note: same thing with AoE vs "range" -ie. bombs versus bullets, leading to the ultimate AoE - the nuke).

So boil it down to the 1v1 scenario: an archer vs a swordsman starting across a field. Obviously if the archer can hit the knight 50 times before the swordsman reaches the archer, that's a dead swordsman. Conversely, if the swordsman reaches the archer, it is a dead archer.

So, how do you "balance" those two (which we broadly will call an even chance for victory)? Lets start with the archer. There are two ways to reduce the effectiveness of range:
1) fewer damaging hits
2) less damage per hit

Sure, seems obvious. But how to do that to achieve both of them having an equal chance is far from simple, because this isn't chemistry - there are no solutions only tradeoffs.

Range needs to win before melee gets in range, because the melee will kill them, and melee needs to close the gap before dying. Again, that should be obvious. Where people tend to slip, is in realizing one of them is a boss.

So make it a tournament, and you can see the problem. Essentially when we talk about balance, what we are saying is that there is a "target" in a tournament and we want both styles to have an equal chance.

But, if range can't do enough damage to defeat the boss before the boss closes the gap and wrecks you, you lose. And if melee can't survive closing the gap, they lose. So in games we tend to find ways for melee to close the gap faster and with less risk (ie. WoW warrior's charge, or PoE's shield charge - somewhat).

Where the big problem thus occurs is that the boss has both range and melee. Which means melee closing the gap doesn't mean they win because the boss can melee them back. It also means range can't stay at range and win because they can be hit at range as well. Thus if could get range vs melee to an even chance, adding the other to the boss ruins the equation. Here is why.

In range v range it means that to make them even they have to have even range capabilities however you accomplish that. But bosses are, by definition, not even. Same applies to melee. Thus, when you combine the two, your previous start of 50/50 now is heavily biased.

And this takes us back to the start, all else being equal, range vs melee naturally and inherently favors range. Which is why in virtually every game the scenario presents itself you either go with standard roles (tank holds aggro and takes it to the face, healer keeps tank up, and DPS takes down from range), or you fake melee by making swings effectively a ranged mechanic, or the "dash attack mechanic" dominates "melee" because it is really a form of ranged attack, or range beats out melee.

And the same reason why in RPGs such as Skyrim or CP2077, stealth range beats stealth melee, beats range, beats melee. And why real world special forces are stealth melee with stealth range.

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Frequency#6127 wrote:

Even with 75 chaos resist one knight melt me ...