era accuracy aside, uosa has the most luck based pvp out of any shard i've ever played. gm hallys that hit as hard as 50 without anat, ebolts that do between like 4 and 40 damage. chance based interrupts - something no other shard has - are just another thing to throw on the pile of RNG.
UOSA's pvp is fine, it's only luck-based for people who purposely play in a lucky manner. This includes dexers and also mages who imitate dexers by getting higher dex and spaming harm the whole fight. Their downfall is their own pvp style and/or template, not the mechanics of UOSA.
Chance based disrupts are not that bad, the problem is everyone's choice of disrupt aka harm. Harm should not be relied on as much as I'm seeing. Mages should be making better use of explosion, e bolt, lightning and fireball. Harm does less damage than all those spells as well as having a less chance of disrupt spells. The reason is in the mechanics, the higher the damage the better the chance of disruption.
Being able to insta-gib someone with explosion+e bolt+
GM hally is era accurate as we all know, without a decent hally hit it's more difficult. That would suck if GM weapons did less than they did now, feels perfect to me.
Pros of 100int t2a-style mage tactics:
1. Magic does massive damage fast, and if used nicely then a fight can be over fast.
2. Magic is RANGED, this is huge.
3. Magic can be timed and also have "delays" that can be used to advantage.
4. Magic resistance isn't as good as wrestling. This is great for mages obviously.
5. Doesn't require magic weapons to be effective.
6. Possible to kill opponents with the odds against you(1v2 and 1v3 especially)
Cons of 100int t2a-style mage tactics:
1. Costs mana(which means dexers and 35dex hally-spam mages can be a nightmare for your mana pool if you don't juke and/or defeat them quickly enough)
2. Takes longer to learn to use effectively than templates that rely on weapon damage since it requires mana, spell choice, timing and patience.
3. Can be disrupted easily by one hander dexers and to a lesser degree 35dex hallyspam mages.
4. Once out of mana(spell resisted, or got desynced ect.), you're forced to juke/meditate and this usually pisses off hallyspammers in the same way it pisses off dexers. But it's silly to blame anyone for juking if they're a mage, mages aren't meant to stand still and take constant damage they need to worry about casting spells and having mana.
Many things that are good about dexers are also good about 35dex hally spam mages, but along with that comes the cons of playing a dexer.
Pros of 35dex hallyspam mage tactics:
1. Requires less mana and can still be effective to some degree similar to an 'eval dexer'.
2. Easier to master cycling over spell choice, mana management and timing.
3. Effective at killing people who suck at cycling but try it anyway.
4. More effective in town where spells do 1 damage.
Cons of 35dex hallyspam mage tactics:
1. Luck-based because it resembles a dexer fighting style, the more you swing your hally the more you risk being hit in return(mage vs mage). Thus, one person has less mana cause the other hit more often due to getting lucky.
2. Non-ranged, this is one of the reasons dexers are easily juked and weren't as popular as mages in t2a. Same thing with hally spammers, easily juked and mini healed.
3. Requires items to be more effective, such as purple pots and high-end magic hallies. This is the same reason dexers need these items to be be more effective or ensure a kill.
4. Takes much longer to actually defeat an opponent of equal or even less skill
5. Less mana pool because of 35 dex, this also means slower regen rate.