I've been thinking about how to balance weapons and classes and I realized there are two concepts needed, one for every class what kind of weapons it has and one for the weapon slots in general. Weapon concepts: 1) The two weapons using the same mana color either shouldn't be similar (with the Marine for example, curently both the shotgun and the super shotgun use the same ammo). Or alternately, it could be done on purpose, meaning weapons 5-7 are upgrades of 2-4 and you use 2-4 only when you don't yet have 5-7. This is a basic question that should be decided upon before details are worked out. 2) Every weapon slot should do a comparable damage across the player classes. The current concept is faulty, because it doesn't take points into consideration that influence the outcome in the game, like how fast the weapon's discharge rate is, how often you hit a target with it on average etc. There should be a basic formula for it so weapons can be balanced easily. Class concepts: 3) Classes should differ more from each other and be more consistent within themselves. Right know, every class has a more or less similar mixture and it doesn't matter that much what character you play. I think first there should be a basic concept for all 6 classes and then we should go and reassign weapons from one class to another. Please post your ideas and discuss your opinions on this so we can quickly go to the next step (effectively creating the new weapon matrix and damage values).

OK here is one idea for the weapon slots: slot 8 weapons should have area damage, meaning a successful hit not only surely kills the target (i.e. it should have enough damage to kill a level 10 target with full armor in one hit) but also other players within a certain radius (similar to the Redeemer in UT). slot 7 weapons should be an instant kill with one perfect hit, even if the player is LVL 10 and has full armor slot 6 weapons should instantly kill a medium character (LVL 5 and lower with 50% or less of max possible armor) with one perfect hit slot 5 weaons should instantly kill a weak character (LVL 2 or lower with 25% or less of max possible armor) with one perfect hit slot 4 weapons should kill a weak character in two hits, a zero character in one hit if successful (LVL 1, no armor) slot 3 weapons should kill a zero character in 2-3 hits slot 2 and slot 1 weapons should kill a character in 4-6 hits (slot 1 is always melee with no mana usage, slot 2 is always ranged with low blue mana usage) Mana/ammo usage should be adjusted to following guideline: every weapon in the same slot across the classes should need a similar amount of ammo to score a killing hit, i.e. for a spraying fast-fire weapon with projectile effect like the hellstaff the ammo usage should be lower than for a single-projectile weapon or for a puff weapon where you waste less shots to nail a target. Notes: - perfect hit means hitting the target squarely, i.e. not just a splash damage when shooting a wall next to the player - a "hit" means here a baseline, not an actual weapon hit. It is based on, say, the rocket launcher, which is one single projectile doing all the damage, or Timon's Axe, which does all its damage on the target it hits in melee. This base should go for simple weapons that are either melee or projectile. For weapons with puff effect that can't be dodged there should be a reduction in max damage to accomodate for this advantage. Similarly, weapons with splash damage should have a slightly lower damage to compensate for the minor area advantage. Same goes for homing weapons (e.g. Wraithverge). OTOH there should be a compensation in the other direction for handicapped weapons like the fighter's hammer that shoots a single slow projectile that is easy to dodge, as well as for the spray effect of some weapons where you as good as never hit targets with all projectiles/puffs (shotgun, machine gun, crossbow, etc). Maybe it should also be taken into consideration whether a weapon can be reflected (this goes for projectile weapons mostly, puff and melee weapons can't be reflected with a Disc or Repulsion)

About the classes: The fighter should have a profile where no matter what weapon, all he needs is being fast with good footwork, running up close to a target and deliver a well-aimed blow and knock the foe out. Meaning his weapons should support this, delivering a huge punch at one shot/hit. None of them should have a spraying effect, none of them should have a high fire rate. The mage should have spells with wide spraying and area effects, so he can easily fight multiple enemies at once at a distance. I'll post when I think through the other classes too. IMPORTANT! Not to forget: classes in KA differ only in weapons and optically. Every class has the very same attributes that increase the same way from one level to another. Meaning a LVL 5 fighter and mage have the same mount of hit points and run same fast. They also profit the same way from armor and get the same AP from the same piece of armor when picking it up. The fighter will wade into a battle and try to hit enemies up close, be it other players or a horde of monsters, while the mage will hang back and spray them with cover fire. But it's only a difference in the kind of weapons they have - all the other differences in gameplay come from the person who plays and his/her personal style. The fighter won't have better armor or more HP than a mage, a mage will be able to soak up the same amount of damage than a fighter in a melee. But the fighter has weapons that are better suited to wading into the thick of battle - this is the only difference, but an important difference. You should pick your class depending on how you normally play, because only with the class best suited to your particular style will you be really good against others.

I think there has been a HUGE improvement in balance on the latest test version, but I think that the post you made about the weapon slots and the damage they inflict it's a bit too exagerated, don't you think? I mean, weapons that kill in 1 shot?? that's just too much... I prefer to shot 2 or more projectiles to the enemy than to be killed in the back with something I don't even see before dying, heh! I think that if we manage to make same slotted weapons to work similarly, we will be able to make them use very similar amounts of mana for every class, but we might need to fix and even discard some of the actual weapons, depending the class characteristics we discuss and settle here. I think the fighter should be a melee fighting guy, he has melee weapons mostly, but like 2 projectile weapons, maybe the darkness missile to distract and blind enemies to hit them easily. The cleric could have both melee and long ranged weaponry, meaning he has both melee and mid-long ranged weapons. The mage just uses long ranged weapons (no melee), and makes low damage in the lower levels, but as he increases his exp level, he willl deal critical damage for other enemies. The marine could the most hitscan weapons in the game (pistols, shotguns, etc), which give him a somewhat advantage from other classes, but his weapons having great accuracy, deal low damage (no matter it's level), he also has some medium, long range weapons too. The heretic could have magical weapons that make much spread damage, that increases as he advances in experience level. The witchaven could be similar to the cleric (has both melee and mid-long range weapons), but the stronger weaopns are few, (since he has those homing projectiles), it could be a tricky attacker. That's my thinking about the classes, as for a general formula, I think we already have some of them, but we could adapt them better for the gameplay. BTW, do you think these weapons are still to unbalanced??

LOL in case you haven't noticed, the slot 8 weapons have been killing players in one shot before, remember? 10K damage and similar stuff. <!-- s;) --><img src="{SMILIES_PATH}/icon_wink.gif" alt=";)" title="Wink" /><!-- s;) --> One thing you shouldn't forget: to make a single shot with a slot 8 weapon, you need to collect 100+ mana of all three colors, and that's just for a single shot which might well go awry, meaning you just wasted all that ammo for nothing. It's very much like the Redeemer in UT, which is also an instant kill, in a lucky case even a multi-frag for you. But once you took a single shot with it, it's gone. My concept here is similar, you won't get that many shots with a slot 8 weapon in any game, but when you get one and you aimed right, you'll feel great. <!-- s:) --><img src="{SMILIES_PATH}/icon_smile.gif" alt=":)" title="Smile" /><!-- s:) --> After all, such an MP game is about fragging and being fragged, in any really balanced match where players are more or less same good, even if you are the winner in a DM with a frag limit of 50, you might've been killed 20-30 times too. DM is not about staying alive thirty minutes with your initial life. The fighter shouldn't be completely melee, that's not the point - weapons like the original Hammer from Hexen are great, they need few shots but those have to be well-aimed and that with a low-speed projectile, which means the only realistic chance to hit another player with it is to get pretty close to him/her. Which is in a way melee, yes. <!-- s;) --><img src="{SMILIES_PATH}/icon_wink.gif" alt=";)" title="Wink" /><!-- s;) --> But still not the kind of "shit there is a double-window between us, I can't hit him with any of my weapons" melee. I think the Cleric could be one with part of his arsenal being melee weapons and the rest mostly fast-fire ones (think things like a big bad morning star with a lot of punch power or the Serpent Staff). Yep, the Heretic could be the guy with all those magical weapons. Oh yes, another thing we should discuss, I've named the character from Witchaven "Hero" from the beginning, but nobody picked up the name, if you don't like the name we should pick another one, but definitely not "Witchaven" which is a place. <!-- s:P --><img src="{SMILIES_PATH}/icon_razz.gif" alt=":P" title="Razz" /><!-- s:P --> I just realized something regarding the leveling up system, I'm not even sure what exactly does change from LVL to LVL? Can you give me a complete, detailed list (only in case the changes are not always the exact same on every LVL)? Thanks.