Are Parrying & Macing Worth It?

[morganm]

Been reading all the guide and threads. Several SAY that parry is a good option but then you read on in later posts and people knock it down and recommend other skills in it's place. Same with mace fighting; some say it's great because of stamina loss and armor damage in PvP but others say the damage per sec of fencing or even swords plus poisoning far out weigh those benefits.

Just trying to finalize my template for a warrior that will be doing mostly PvM but may find himself in PvP from time to time.

Please advise; thanks!

[Pirul]

I am among those that support parry. It has kept me alive more than once, and my dexxer is still a bitch to kill. Can I give you a detailed numbered analisis of why parry is the shits? No, I just like it .

As far as Fencing vs. Swds vs. Macing, each has it's own quirk, and a dexxer using a hally or a spear is a formidable opponent for sure, but I've seen people do nasty things with a q-staff too. I think it all boils down to personal selection, what do YOU like to play. What I WOULD advise against is combining parry + macing. Good macing weps are 2 handed.

For further reference on weps, and to help you make an informed decission, I think this is an extraordinary guide.

[Mikel123]

Parrying is bad. Don't listen to Pirul. When you get good, you'll have high-end magic armor. And, in such, Parrying is only useful if you're taking enormous hits in quick succession. For example... I run around in invulnerable armor, and I can stand next to a drake for 30 seconds taking hits without it doing one single point of damage to me.

Here is why parrying is bad... we have a one-second object delay here. That means, you can't do anything faster than one second. So if you're healing yourself, and you get poisoned and need to drink an orange potion, here's what happens:

Disarm shield
pause 1 second
drink potion
pause 1 second
Re-arm shield
(can't do anything else, like start a new bandage, for 1 more second)

So you're without the shield for two full seconds... best case. And if you're in big trouble and you want to drink an orange and yellow potion, or a yellow and a red, you have to disarm the shield manually, drink your potions, then re-arm. (i.e. drinkin the potions with the razor auto-unequip will not work, because after the first potion it will try to put the shield back on).

I love macing, and have done my best to use it effectively here, but it's just not that good.

Here's the thing... most pvp battles are short. Either someone recalls, dies quickly to a better player, or dies quickly to multiple players. There are very rare cases, I've found, in which two fairly well-matched foes will face off. The reason for this is that with two skilled and prepared opponents, no one will die, until someone runs out of reagents/potions/etc. And, usually they've Recalled before then.

You cite the two benefits of macing... the armor damage isn't really a factor since as I said above most fights don't last long. And the stamina hit isn't much of a factor since a red Total Refresh potion can be consumed any time to completely refill stamina. And, once someone is out of red potions, or near that point, they will recall. Not to mention, in practice the stamina loss (3-5 points extra) from macing isn't much when you're already losing 10-20 stamina from spells and weapon damage depending on your health.

Macing, too, has very consistent damage (see my guide linked by Pirul above) which is BAD against heavily-armored foes. The opposite of this is the war fork, which varies in damage tremendously. And, the kryss is by far the fastest weapon, useful for disrupting mages (and surprisingly effective at penetrating armor too).

There is however one instance in which the drawbacks of macing - namely, short battles and people recalling - does not apply. This is the Trammel Tournaments. You're enclosed in a 14x14 or so space with your opponent, and I think it's like 9 minutes of dueling (or when someone dies, whichever comes first). There, slowly beating the crap out of someone's armor is effective, since no one carries an extra set in their pack. And, while Trammel rules state you can eat as much food as you want to replace stamina, that's a slow process and your enemy may well run out.

Once the archery bug is fixed, I think macers might well be the dominant template for the potions and potions/magics tournaments.

So in short... for real UO, I'd pick fencing for the war fork and kryss. For tournaments, I'd probably give macing a shot.

[morganm]

Sounds like the dequipping/requipping is a deal breaker for me with regards to parrying.

About macing... I understand what you mean for PvP. However could you analyze it from a PvM perspective? That will be what I engage in most with this character. I won't be in any tournys or duels. The only PvP I'll be in with this character will be from PKs. Usually I'll just be trying to escape safely =) Otherwise I'd be in a group lending support; not necessarily trying to win a 1vs1.

[Mikel123]

I would choose swords then.

Swords has the most number of weapons, and it seems to me that every melee weapon type has an equal chance of spawning. So if there's 10 sword types, 7 maces and 3 fencing weapons, 50% of all weapons will be swords. So, they're more common and thus extremely cheap (not to mention, balrons for example drop a magic broadsword every time they die, so those things are so all over the place they're essentially free).

Anyways, swords has a good variety of weapons, they're cheap, and most of them are usable for pvm. You might get a little better damage over time out of the fencing weapons - war fork, spear and short spear - but while you're learning the shard I'd advise swords on your first character, and stick to using one-handed sword weapons for pvm so you can get used to drinking potions when needed.

[Pirul]

Parrying is bad. Don't listen to Pirul. When you get good, you'll have high-end magic armor. And, in such, Parrying is only useful if you're taking enormous hits in quick succession. For example... I run around in invulnerable armor, and I can stand next to a drake for 30 seconds taking hits without it doing one single point of damage to me.

Here is why parrying is bad... we have a one-second object delay here. That means, you can't do anything faster than one second. So if you're healing yourself, and you get poisoned and need to drink an orange potion, here's what happens:

Disarm shield
pause 1 second
drink potion
pause 1 second
Re-arm shield
(can't do anything else, like start a new bandage, for 1 more second)

So you're without the shield for two full seconds... best case. And if you're in big trouble and you want to drink an orange and yellow potion, or a yellow and a red, you have to disarm the shield manually, drink your potions, then re-arm. (i.e. drinkin the potions with the razor auto-unequip will not work, because after the first potion it will try to put the shield back on).

Ok, just to elaborate a bit on this. (1) It is true you need to de-equip shield to drink pots, but it's 2-3 seconds you are without a shield (I always do it manually since razor seems to hang for me), any hard hitting weapon's cycle is greater than 2 secs (and in any case you would not care because the alternative is not having a shield, so...). (2) In my experience, hardly ever have I encounter pk's who roll around with poisoned weps (or who use poison). (3) I too roll around with high end magic armor, as mikel should know ( ), but a good armor set with an invuln shield will push your AR over (at least close to) 70, and at GM parry vs. a GM swdsman you can parry 50% of the shots, which means, when you're at 30HP's, your bandage is 3 secs away from sticking, and that tank mage is rushing in with his hally equipped spamming attack last, you have a 50% chance of surviving and put him on the defensive.

Plus, wearing a shield looks really cool!!

In any case, I know I'm in the minority here, I guess it just boils down to your own personal playing style, and what you like.

I do agree with mikel on the swords issue, you can get dirt cheap power broadswords with decent tactics mods, and it's not a bad wep.

[archaicsubrosa77]

PVP happens on the field too not just in boxes.
Create any temp you want, just find some friends.
Don't worry about creating the "perfect temp" because everything has an archilles heel.
I avoided the tank mage for a long time for this reason...it's soloist and made more for sport then interactive gameplay. Too often you see tanks getting whomped solo. Most PKs are decked and dexxed.
A lightning strike with a magic quarterstaff is more reliable and faster as an interrupt on the field then an instahit in a no magics tournament. Or being able to heal yourself without expending mana or chance of interrupt when getting banged up.
Some people want the trophy or title, others are in this for fun...which most attribute to chaos at any moment, not finding out who can stand toe to toe ,one on one, but hardly ever beyond thunderdome.
It's your guy though.
Soloing with parry and macing is a challenge. If you are with a few friends though you can x-heal and slow the hits on your buddy or yourself and being able to take the full frontal when it comes to heavy hits it isn't at all a bad option.

[MatronDeWinter]

I have to say, that parry is pretty good if your other hand is free to drink the potions (ie: wrestling). You obviously aren't going to kill anyone like that however.

[Azural Kane]

Mike123, or anyone, what is the Archery bug that is currently standing, that is going to be fixed?

[Mikel123]

Currently, the maximum amount of time between swings or shots of an arrow is 5.0 seconds. So, regardless of stamina or the speed of your weapon, you will swing or shoot every 5 seconds at most.

However, the era-accurate number is 10 seconds, so that's what it's getting changed to. For the most part, it only really impacts archery, since no other weapons are slow enough to take more than 5 seconds between swings anyways.

[Mad Max]

I agree with Mikel. I use to always have GM parry on my old pvp dexxers but in the end I found I could find better ways to use those 100 points. I mean it can be very good against dexxers and sometimes against tank mages but you need to get at least 60+ AR to really start reducing damage from hally hits. Yeah parrying is an almost skill but I've learned to do without it and it's helped me a lot, in pvp at least. If your using it strictly for PvM though it can be worth it at times, especially against things like liches where your focusing on healing from the magic spells and don't have to worry as much about the melee damage.

Macing is awesome, the first char I made on this server was a macer. I don't have one now but I plan on making one next. The stam damage is great, also breaking their armor is great, you just need to stay in the fight and stay on them. Sooner or later they will run out of stam pots. And if your going with shield, your shield+war axe is good for PvM for speed and can always use magic maces and mauls that are usually pretty cheap. Personally I love the quarterstaffs and the war hammers the most in the macing area, I hate war axes. Quarterstaffs can be fast as hell and do some great damage, but war hammers pack quite a punch..

So I would say parrying - PvP- No. PvM - Yes.
Macing - Yes for both.