oday, we will present you our plans to balance the vocations which have already been awaited eagerly by many of you. Please note in advance that all innovations will affect only the damage a character can deal out. None of the changes applies to healing runes or healing spells!

To reduce the disadvantage in the damage output of characters that wield a weapon, all melee and distance attacks have generally been raised a good deal. Moreover, to ensure a much more balanced gameplay for all vocations, your level will be of much less importance to make damage with spells or runes. Instead, every few levels you will receive a slight damage bonus, no matter if made with a weapon or with magic items or spells. For damage made with magic, the magic level will be the most important factor. Characters that fight with weapons will mainly see a damage increase if their weapon skill raises. Druids and sorcerers up to level 70-80 will hardly experience any changes in their gameplay, but the damage high level sorcerers and druids can deal out was reduced. Please understand that this has been necessary to balance the vocations.

As the level has played a very big role for the magical damage, also the damage made with runes by knights and paladins will be lower than it has been before. To make up for the ability to use attack runes effectively, they get several new special attacks which cost mana. However, different from runes, the damage of these attacks depends on the weapon you are wearing and the weapon skill.
The groundshaker allows knights to make area damage, while the whirlwind throw hurls your weapon towards the enemy marked in the battle list from a distance similar to a boomerang. As the magic formula has been changed, the current exori would be of little use for knights. For this reason, the new berserk spell will, like all special attacks, depend on your weapon and your skill and requires a constant amount of mana. Additionally, a fierce berserk spell has been added.

As already explained, the weapon and the weapon skill are of much more importance now and the damage output made with weapons will be a good deal higher than before. For this reason, we had to introduce level requirements for most melee weapons. Otherwise, nothing could stop a young knight fresh from Rookgaard to borrow the best weapon, train his skill and then dish out damage almost like a high level knight. However, note that the damage you will deal out with weaker weapons now will be higher than the damage you have made with even better weapons beforehand. You will still be able to use all weapons, but if you do not have the required level, you will have a drawback in your damage output. To provide you with enough weapons for all levels, the summer update will bring more than 60 completely new weapons. As only knights are strong and skilled enough to handle 2-handed weapons, all other vocations will not be able to use them anymore with the exception of staff-shaped club and polearm-shaped axe weapons.

Paladins will be glad to hear that distance weapons, like spears, are not falling to the floor anymore to avoid any theft. Just like weapons, also bolts and arrows will have a level requirement. For this reason we have added several new ammunitions for paladins which can either be bought in a shop or produced with new spells. Moreover, paladins obtain a new spell to turn their regular spears into so-called "enchanted spears" which are much more powerful. Another new spell, the ethereal spear, comes in handy when you are out of any ammunition as this spell allows you to create a spear just with your willpower and to shoot it on your opponent marked in the battle list. The damage of all bolts and arrows depends on the paladin's distance skill, including the burst arrow.

For the current concept we have received and used many proposals and suggestions from the community. Of course, the vocation balancing is not finished yet. We are well aware that further changes are needed that we will introduce in later updates.

Finally, we invite you to share your opinion about this update with your fellow Tibians and give your feedback in a dedicated thread on the proposal board.

Get ready for the changes!
Your CipSoft Team