think part of why archers feel tanky in pvp, is cause they have to be able to take a hit in 'group' boss fights.
since they dont have magicshield like wiz's do,they cant rely on a skill to take those 'rare' huge dmg hits, so they have to have enough defense to survive them
This, and more.
I play a 42 archer (and a 40 tao which i started the server with) and on all other servers i have played a wizard. I can honestly say they feel about the same vulnerability wise when it comes to PvE. The other day i went BDD wth a few archers and wizards, TSing and SSing and it was the first chance i had to see the differences at the same time. My health bar was far from constant and i had to rely on Tao heals as i could not outpot on my own when we had the whole of IZT in one lure (thanks for that JJP, though i did ask for it :P) . I nearly died quite a few times even when inside the circle of TS. However, when i compare it to my fellow wizz, at 40, his health remained fairly constant with tao heals and i dont think he potted that much. He even gave me some of his HP towards DD when i brought a good 60 L with me, and we all know that wizzies have no space for HP with how much TS takes in MP.
When it comes to bosses, archers have absolutely no chance of withstanding hits if they are the tank, and as such i wouldnt be able to call them tanky. Wizards can withstand a lot though, being designed to be inside the middle of lures for there mass spells (TS FF).
Now PVP - (kit- g bead, d rings, k braces, dc 1 helm, WG shoes, lion belt, carbon tunic, prime stone L [edit: i was wearing plat arrows]) i bumped into Adaephon (who im using as an example because i doubt he has bad kit even though i didnt get the chance to look at it, and happened to be there at the rght time and place) in Mongchon PvP spot, and i was hitting him with fairly comfortable 70s-80s with his shield down, but once he put it up that was dropping to 20s and lower. Though there is room for error here as i didnt have much oppertunity to get an average, this evens the battlefield a great deal. While using ice bolt (i think, i get confused with other server names for spells - the one that slows you) he was doing 50s or so. Now i have around 320 HP, so thats 6/7 hits, and i believe he has around 200, which would be 10 hits with shield or 3 hits without. so say his shield is down for half of it, being generous as Adaephon never forgets, would even out at about 6/7 hits, the same as wizard on archer.
-Bagweight - I would say wizards need more. even if its just to save me money so i dont have to keep giving them my god damn mp on the way to ZT. Sins are fine now they have MP eater. Warriors are a little short, but then thats probably partly to blame having slaying turned off. now they mash mobs quicker they use mp more and its a sacrifice thats clearly worth making for XP gain. Archers can carry a lot but then they need mp a lot too. I would say wizards should be upped to keep this fair. Taos - clearly fine and always have been.
Bodyweight - archers shouldnt be able to wear highly defensive items and should be a pure offence class.
I think when balancing characters people need to think of their classes primary functions -
warrior - the tanker
wizard - the mass killer
tao - the support class
assassin - as its name suggests, can sneak in and take someone out and stay undetected.
archer - purely offense high damage dealer
thats how i see it and each class excels at their task as it is. classes are not meant to always be balanced in every single aspect of mir and hopefully they never will be.
Now obviously there are a tonne of things that i hvnt mentioned that can change these facts, but i thought i would just put my two scents in...
sorry for the length of the post. :P
