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Strongest of Talithar – 14

Strongest of Talithar – 14 published on 27 Comments on Strongest of Talithar – 14

“I wanted to hurt people while not getting hurt so I maxed out my defense stat and now dark elf rogues struggle to even hurt me. Hue hue hue” The much more mean spirited light novel than Bofuri- XD (It’s a thing- look it up).

27 Comments

> Bofuri

Absolutely, 500% agree with looking this up. Great story, and now 2 seasons of great anime.

(Weird, comment didn’t post the first time. Trying again…)

I guessed something about this on a prior page – that he chose a tanky build to prioritize his survival, and now he’s able to lord over everyone that can’t hurt him. It’s a strategy that works well until you encounter either A) an enemy that you aren’t strong enough to beat because you prioritized defense so highly, or B) an enemy that can turn your defense into a liability. Some MMOs have weapons with inverse defense scaling – i.e. the stronger an enemy’s defense stat, the more damage it does. I doubt Kaylin has such a weapon, but maybe in Rune Aria there’s a similar skill instead?

The pacing thus far definitely has Kaylin on the ropes. I hope we’re not building to Kaylin getting to experience ‘death’ – and possibly finding that the resurrection shrine is either a trap or something worse. This king character talked about the adventurer being his ‘prize’ and he’s been well-coached for exactly this encounter. Since he can’t use the shrine himself (I dont think?) then its presence is deliberate Chekhov’s gun material.

It could also be a remnant of old times, a shrine right before a boss room. Perhaps this used to be a boss room back in the game, and he may even know that and be using it for that very reason, plus a boss room is just a great area for a fight from a practical standpoint.

Or something that targets what he sacrificed for all that defense. He could have given up dexterity/agility bonuses by wearing all that heavy metal. Which can royally hurt when he’s up against an attack that needs those traits to roll a saving throw against.

Maybe he’s extra vulnerable to status debuffs.

Maybe he’s particularly prone to receiving damage from environmental factors.

Maybe he can only lumber on at a crawl when the castle he’s in is crashing around his head.

Then again, he’s wearing METAL, so a good electrical attack will do him in.

I like tanking in MMOs at least in part because I was never a particularly good ‘twitch’ player and I’m old enough to be slower now on the reaction times, and this sort of build is a LOT more forgiving of lagged timing. It’s definitely not a fast damage build, true… also means that two people with this build pretty much can’t hurt each other.

Wouldn’t doubling down on tanking mean he’s barely able to do any damage, though? He’s just a big, ignorable piece of canned meat. She can just walk away if she can’t beat him.

I don’t get why people think tanks can’t do damage. I’m mostly a dungeon and dragons player. Paladins are the most common tanks. They also do huge damage. I guess some MMOs thought it would make sense to have a character have a crazy high defense with taunts but can’t deal any damage themselves, but how would a tank ever solo anything other than weaker enemies? Rune Aria is supposed to be a game that lets you decide how you want to play it. There might be places you are expected to work with a team but there are ways a solo player can help a team. Recon missions, solo sabotage runs, infiltrations and assassinations. The tanks of Rune Aria can be built for solo play or group play. And while one might have to sacrifice atk for more defense that’s not the only option to sacrifice. Oh. And second most popular tanks in dnd, Barbarians! XD

Mainly because most contemporary MMOs and MOBAs that have adopted the older D&D terminology of “The Tank” rebalanced them to do less damage, and not make a single all-in-one best combat class. And so designers can try to make balanced team mission/raids. Also you don’t get First Order Optimal Oops All Paladins Party.

So ya, Video Game MMO tanks are often missing one of the most important aspects of the classic TTRPG Tank. The Main Gun. They have more kinship with armored personnel carriers, to only having the role of protecting the party squishies.

Which is also why VG Tanks often have artifical “Agro” and “taunt” mechanics. Because in Old-school D&D you couldn’t just ignore the Tank Fighting-man, they’d beat you to death with metal sticks if you ignored them. It wasn’t “burst” damage of Wizards and Thieves, but steady non-stop beating. Turn after turn. You don’t run out of “Sword”.

TTRPGs also get live balanced for busted builds by the governing Game Master. There isn’t always kryptonite laying around, but every time Superman shows up so does just enough kryptonite to debuff the Super down to Good. While he plays with the Justice League.

Which is where a “General AI” overseeing a MMO with open and deliberate design imbalances would be useful … 🙂 . Oh look, a passing Etherial Flicher just happened to drop a Perfect Tank Buster it had stolen, so clumsy.

Depends on the game, but it´s common to have classes specialising in one aspect, and TANK is meant to soak up damage in most games i know.
There´s even a great manga with that theme: https://chapmanganato.to/manga-nh990916
About them doing damage, usually it´s like a second mode in which the tank cannot keep aggro but deals damage instead, most popular depiction of that is probably in World of WarCraft, where you enter a certain “Stance”, “Berserker” for damage, … i don´t know the english names for the others… sorry…
Basically, one to feneral use, one for actual tanking and one for soloing where you aren´t supposed to keep enemies bound and deal additional damage while you´re alone.
Stuff like D&D are usually meant for groups, so one not doing damage is no issue if they contribute by protecting their friends by binding the attention of any foe.
You can see this even in games like BattleTech, where an Atlas is capable of taking insane amount of damage while only dealing limited amounts of unless it reaches ideal range, meanwhile pther mechs are free to run into the backs of the opposite forces and attack their vulnerable rear, harrass artillery units, supporters ect.

I don’t necessarily think that tanks can’t do damage, but I would expect that from the person who invested absolutely everything into tanking. If he can also do damage, how is his build not the most played build?

I think it’s a simple case of personal taste. Some people like being the extremely hard to kill hard hitter, feels godlike when a bunch of enemies are helplessly wailing on you and you just tear through them like your playing Diablo or something. Naturally they probably don’t have the highest possible attack, and they have other limitations. So naturally some people might like playing evasive stealthy characters. Stealth Archers are really popular in first person fantasy games, because it’s a safe way of playing, safer than probably heavy armor fighter, right? Yet- we still have mages, because some people want to cast cool magic spells! Then you can have all different kinds of mages, illusion magic (done right) can be crazy powerful, necromancy- creepy- but powerful once you have your … friends? Allies? Bodies- Resources. Blasters are a ton of fun, and you can even mix some of these. Mage tanks- can be a thing! It’s hard, but they can work. The build possibilities can be massive, and not only do many players find particular things they like, you also have people who just want to find out “What can I make if I combine these classes, these unique abilities, and these gear pieces?” which proliferates builds all across the game.

No one build is the best- Kaylin has a weakness, this guy- has a weakness too. Kaylin also has some suboptimal conditions. All that have been hinted at in the start, and even in the previous chapter.

Unless everyone feels “godlike” someone feeling “godlike” is a big ol red flag of poor game balance. Game balance has never been D&D’s strong suit…
There is definitely a disparity in terminology between MMORPGs and TTRPGs, what a MMORPG calls a Tank a TTRPG would often call a Turtle, which is considered a more extreme archetype/subarchitype. Turtles are not effective by themselves.

some of us also change oru play style based on our mood, or if we plan to play with others. Like on my own I like to be a tanky type who can take and dish lots of damage, heavy armor and a great sword. I also like to be a redmage type with lots of options and choices in battle. Though when I am with others I go to a support style, using buffs, debuffs and healing to keep the party going.
“when alone.. I am Heavy or sniper.. when with team.. I am Medic or Engineer.”

Why am I getting the impression that overconfidence is going to be this guy’s undoing? Sure he’s tanked and has an impressive amount damage, but in the end he’s an NPC. D&D played well depends on the ingenuity and creativity of the players in selecting, combining and using their attributes in unique ways that even the creators didn’t think of. NPCs do not have this ability and I think this is what may give Kaylin the eventual advantage.

how exactly would a gorgon fight other than petrification? also season 2 of borfui felt weaker

Bofuri Season 2 was Great, but it did feel weaker, because you are comparing ‘Great’ to ‘God Tier Amazing!’ It also had a bunch of wonderful small bits that each rose to the same heights as Season 1, but they couldn’t keep it up as consistently. I think that’s inevitable when so much of the charm is that the characters are brand new to it, and then in 2 they already know most of the stuff and have OP things. It’s amazing that they managed to make not only a season of a noob becoming OP, but also an entire season of teams of OP characters still so compelling without any ‘high stakes’ at all.

Gorgon is underlined, Italicized, and bolded to emphasize- it’s a keyword, not just a “Gorgon- creature with snakes for hair that petrifies creatures with it’s horrific gaze, see Medusa”. His response to it is also a key- Kaylin is on record mostly playing doing bounties and quests that involved dealing with players. Which put her often on quests going after Player Killers and Players that killed Peaceful NPCs. So Gorgon in this case – as will be mentioned in the next page – is a name of a notorious Player Killer Guild.

“Damn your build is annnoying.”
*proceeds to describe my Monster hunter build*
Hey! There is nothing wrong with a bit of survivability. Besides, I don’t often do multiplayer stuff anyway, so as a solo-ist I take every advantage I can get and if that advantage leads to turning 300 points of damage into 5 points then all the better

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