The ShadowDancer is broken now.
Emeus
Member Posts: 64
In the patch 1.2 hide in plain sight has a 6s cooldown after shadowdancer out of stealth, whether it is a success or failure hide, this makes shadowdancer becomes very fragile and the backstab adjustment makes it even worse.
Basically, no damage, no self protection against ranged attack and spells, lack of team contribution, this is over balanced! At least give shadowdancer a normal backstab adjustment like other kit.
Basically, no damage, no self protection against ranged attack and spells, lack of team contribution, this is over balanced! At least give shadowdancer a normal backstab adjustment like other kit.
1
Comments
http://forum.baldursgate.com/discussion/22354/tweaking-the-thieves-shadowdancer-assassin-bounty-hunter-and-thief/p1
@Dee gave greater detail: http://forum.baldursgate.com/discussion/comment/373649/#Comment_373649
In short the Shadowdancer is not meant to be a class for dealing lots of high-damage backstabs or going toe-to-toe with tougher monsters. They're all about mobility, scouting and flexibility. You can for example use them to engage archers rapidly using stealth (forcing them to melee) then shadowstep away when your tank arrives to do the real damage. Similarly you can stab an enemy mage with a dagger of venom and then Stealth and run away while the poison does its work.
There's already a big discussion on this over on the "Road to v1.2" forum.
It's not there to fill in those roles.
Stealth has always been once per round... And normally you would need to run behind a corner or something to even attempt it.
One can mod them to whatever they feel appropriate (don't go over 5).
A 6 second cooldown is absolutely fine when you think about how often you can use this very powerful ability.
Let team go in, backstab again.
The fact that you can remove a dangerous enemy from a group and disappear before even starting a fight is incredibly powerful.
The Shadowdancer isn't supposed to be a one man army.
Assassin: backstab a mage, mage simply died, job's done~
Shadowdancer: backstab a mage, can not HiPS, take a lot of damage or simply died under mage's evil spell in the next 6 seconds, (if it survived)relocate.
Swashbuckler: "Enemies!Waaaaaaaagh!"
Shadowdancer: "Backslap!Waaaaaaaagh!"(run across the map for 6 seconds)
Bountyhunter: "Let's set up a trap."
Shadowdancer: 0-0
I admit there are something shadowdancer can do for its team but it can never provide the same contribution like other kits do, it's ability is extremely valuable when it is exactly a one man army.
There are few safer ways to deal with a mage who's ready to spit magic missiles at anything he sees.
They get 2 new tools that no other thief has. Think about what they can do and adapt your playstyle. If you don't like it then maybe playing an assassin with a lot of potions of invisbility would be better for you, it's a legit choice.
I am not broken up 'If' Shadow dancer can't be abused in that manner anymore. Although, from what I have read thus far in this thread, I suspect that you simply have to have the correct strategy to make it a useful character. I'd suggest that the OP try out different ways of doing things to see what works. But if they are merely looking to replicate the unlimited abuse invisibility of NWN2, I'd say they are kind of out of luck.
I tried using a Shadowdancer but they just don't appeal to me. Not being able to use Shadowstep or HiPS for a few seconds is not insurmountable and is why I usually give all potions of invisibility to my thief character and run their hiding by script ("if I don't see an enemy and I am not looking for traps then hide" etc). My wife likes Shadowdancers and will probably build one when she finally gets around to trying BGEE but I prefer assassins.
My suggestion generally for the class would be to add shadow themed debuffing powers, as in stat and level drain powers. Maybe all just rolled into one "shadow strike" or some-such. This would give the class a different design space from the other thief kits. Assassins for backstabbing, swashbucklers for frontline support, bounty hunters for trapping, and shadowdancer for debilitating.
Depending on the nature of the debuffs it could also make the shadowdancer play a little differently from other steath and backstab styles. While mages are most likely always going to be the primary target, a properly set up debuff suite might make targeting enemy warriors more tempting for the shadowdancers. Basically attack the equation at the other end- instead of waxing the mage and cleaning up the warriors, make the warrior(s) feeble to allow your party to ignore them and mob the wizard.
Once the assassin kills his one target whats he going to do? Run away from any other enemies ? Engage them? A shadowdancer has 40 more skill points than an assassin by level 4 and 70 by level 10. Not only are you going to have to worry less about standing around waiting for your shadowdancer's stealth to even work initially before combat (compared to an assassin) but in general you can get more utility out of the kit.
For combat a shadowdancer is going to be better at distracting enemies while your other party members for instance attack with ranged weapons and spells.
Theres actually currently (and I say currently because I'm sure somebody will report this hehe) a way you can use to get the shadowdancer to be able to immediately hide in shadows again after attacking. When you are in stealth and are about to attack just switch weapons (and switch back) in the main (non-inventory) screen. You'll start leaving stealth but you'll stay invisible for a time (depends on your HiS/MS). You will still be able to backstab in this state, but the timer for when you can next use stealth will start (you can also get this by attacking and missing but its less controllable). So you can backstab a target (or normal damage a target) and then hide immediately (if timed right).
Not every class is intended to be 'Balanced' such that they can PvP against any other class and have a fair chance. Is it possible that a shadowdancer's abilities lend themselves more to another strategy and thus a different role in the group than combat? Just a thought.
Once the assassin kills his one target, he doesn't need to do anything more, his purpose is to disposal powerful enemy so his teammates can fight straight away after the assassinate. This is not a role play problem, like I said before, "There are something shadowdancer can do for its team but it can never provide the same contribution like other kits do". If there are some ways to make shadowdancer glowing again I think it is in the solo way,not in the group anymore.
By the way, I've noticed the little trick since I played shadowdancer in v1.2,but still thanks xD
But if you dislike the play style of the shadowdancer that much why not just roll an assassin.
I think having it start out with a x2 bs and end with either x3 or x4 would be fine.