MO1 used to be skill would outclass all. Gear, numbers, etc. Sure there are some odds that were unbeatable, but in the waning years of MO1 we came to see the more people you had the easier a 'win' would be achieved. This is because new playstyles opened up that allowed for more automated and straight forward game play.
People could be mounted, and basically never die as long as they played smart.. playing smart doesn't mean it was hard. So don't get the two confused, mounted play was very easy; it was mostly just PvE a lot and dump gold into it to compensate for skill.
People could invest into magic like Elementalism and Necromancy for large battle-like spells. Necromancy pets had shades spitting at people for 60+ through their armor, death knights quite literally could survive 6-8 people beating on it for a minute plus, even the bugs from Sard. offered AoE attacks and ranged spits that could 4 shot players.
People could make foot fighters that invested into something super straight forward like spears or daggers. Spears were incredibly fast and very forgiving if you were parried in a group fight, as you could just keep spamming; or switch targets. Daggers could weakspot and just ignore armor entirely.
People could build pallisades basically anywhere and station inside of them NPC guards which would zap other players with heat seeking missiles through the walls.
Before, if your group was caught out somewhere; you'd have to retreat back to where you could either be safe or at a better strategic advantage. For anti-pk groups that usually meant running back to a blue town which made the game more dangerous for them, same for pk groups that weren't in their preferred terrains / regions.
But even in the past it didn't matter if a group of 3 from a PK group showed up to Meduli and a group of 7 anti-pk players came out, the 3 could still win. In MO1's current state? You'd probably have three pets put on you, guards rushing out, and a mounted slapping your head for 60 with no ability to do anything.
What if a group of 7 anti-pk players showed up to Kranesh and 3 pk players were to engage them? You could still have pets put on you, because they quite literally just laser-sight through buildings and will even disappear going through objects.
Point being, the game has given players way too many methods of competing via combat that I feel automate and take away the players input.
If you argue gold = damage, you're the problem. Just because you dump 1000 gold into a characters 'set', doesn't mean you should just absolutely demolish everyone. Skill should always outclass gold. Does that mean a guy who is naked with a worn short sword is going to beat an ogh foot fighter with a DK? Probably not. His best chance of surviving is running. But there were just SOME THINGS added to MO1 that really just gave players WAY too much of an advantage for very little input during the actual fight.
Skill should always beat zergs, skill should always beat gear.. Under the right circumstances as these situations have so many variables it is impossible to give a straight answer.
