Avoidance / Mitigation Completely Borked

[Yimway]

I've shleved my swash who has been my main since release date cause I'm just too frustrated by the class now.  My opinion is these days we're a fricken wizard with a sword unless our defense stance is up.First off, my 70 Warden alt with less fabled and lower level legendary than my swash self buffs at over 800 more mitigation.  W T F? I mean, I know he gets a mitigation buff, but that makes leather on a priest class come out to 800 more than chain on a rogue?  Am I the only one that thinks things are completely broken?So, on a whim lastnight I started some parsing.  Guess what, a 70 illusionist can take hits better than a 70 swash.  Thats right with my 500 self buffed agility, my avoidance is 2800 points LESS than an illusionist.  Granted I've got him beat by about 1100 mitigation, but parsing melee dammage, 2800 avoidance is MUCH better than 1100 mitigation.This is completely borked!I realize this doesn't affect all swashes, as they play a role where they don't ever get agro.  I however don't play that role, nor have I ever.  I always off tank when things get hairy.  I know I'm not the best tank, but if I krank up engard, inspiration, haste, etc I have always been able to tear down an add while catching a few group heals.With the new combat system, I go down faster than cloth casters...Now this all magically gets better when I switch to defensive stance, but my point is the mitigation / avoidance of a 500agi swash shoiuld parse less dammage on agro than an illusionist, and its just the opposite now.So last night, I decided to reconfigure my toon.  I switched to a robe, cloth pants, some leather pieces in a few areas, but cloth mostly.  Suddenly my avoidance is way up, and I'm able to take incoming dammage a lot better.Today, I read the patch notes and see I just wasted about 15p reconfiguring lastnight.  And that I'm now stuck with both crappy mitigation and crappy avoidance.Until such time as something changes regarding the melee aspect of this class, I have shelved my swash.  I dont really expect there to be enough people to agree with my interpreation of the changes to our class so I'll assume this is a permanent shelving.I realize I still have a raid role as I can still krank 1400+ dps on raid mobs, but my ability to play the class the way I have consistently for 3+ years while grouping is completely gone, and it frustrates me when I do play to the point that I log off and load an alternate MMO's beta.Yimster of Unrest<div></div>

[Steve11418]

<div></div><p>I am not a big number cruncher… I started my swashy post EOF release and am now 37.</p><p>Before the little avoidance fix I was soloing ok. After the fix it was touch and go with a blue con solo mob. Got myself killed 3 times against a named white single arrow solo mob before I gave up. The night before I killed him with about 25% health left.</p><p>I have mostly Master 1 and a mix of Mastercrafterd and treasured equipment... with legendary leather gloves.</p><p>Maybe I should respect away from wis and get myself a shield?</p><div></div>

[Cocytus]

<DIV>So avoidance and mitigation are screwed up as of today's patch or are you referring to the EOF patch?</DIV>

[Steve11418]

I am not 100% sure as I have not looked at numbers... but as of todays patch I feel things got a lot harder. It may be because I had Lether gloves?... Maybe boosting my aviodance higher than it should have been. I have only ever played a swashy post EOF release so not sure what it was like before diminishing returns. I normaly play a 70 Guard but have shelved him to try somthing diffrent and explore the EOF content. <div></div>

[Syrano]

Checking my toon right now between last night and today, my base avoidance and mitigation hasn't really changed.    Still have 30.6 avoidance and 40.5 mitigation (percntages) in offensive, and 39.6 and 44.5 in defensive.  Self buffed mind you.Most likely if you're relying heavily on cloth or leather armor pieces, you might have seen a big change after the patch.As anecdotal evidance, I tank solo mobs just as well today as I always have, white, blue or green con.  Haven't tried heroic mobs yet but my numbers haven't changed so I'll assume the results are the same.<div></div>

[Turb]

Spending 15pp to buy gear to take advantage of something that was clearly going to be fixed was a bit silly.I'm soloing yellows OK today, but maybe the 'nerf' hasn't hit Splitpaw yet <img src="/smilies/3b63d1616c5dfcf29f8a7a031aaa7cad.gif" border="0" alt="SMILEY" />

[Yimway]

<div><blockquote><hr>Turb0T wrote:Spending 15pp to buy gear to take advantage of something that was clearly going to be fixed was a bit silly.I'm soloing yellows OK today, but maybe the 'nerf' hasn't hit Splitpaw yet <img src="/smilies/3b63d1616c5dfcf29f8a7a031aaa7cad.gif" border="0" alt="SMILEY" /><hr></blockquote>Um, I wasn't trying to take advantage of any bug.  I just wanted to get the avoidance / mitigation numbers that cloth wearers get to wear.  The bug your refering to existed on plate wearers that got huge mitigation increasers, buffs, aa, etc.  They could wear 1300 mitigation worth of cloth, and with buffs get to 4400+ buffed mitigation and avoidance at the cap.  This however, wasn't possable for us as we don't have the tank mitigation buffs as they did.Since day 1, it has been true that you could chose to wear different armor types, and if you chose to wear leather you would gain avoidance at the sacrifice of mitigation.The problem i'm refering to has existed since EoF launch.Here is a sample:Level 70 Guardian self buffed:Mitigation 5300Avoidance 7900Level 70 Illusionist self buffed:Mitigaiton 1300Avoidance 6400Level 70 Swash self buffed:Mitigation 2180Avoidance 4180What happens here is both the tank and cloth wearer avoids significantly more swings than we do.  And when the swings land via even or yellow cons, there is little difference in what the illusionist mitigates vs what the swash mitigates.  The additional 19% avoidance the illusionist gets FAR more outways the extra 6% mitigation we have.  I should note that all 3 of these toons are mine and have relatively the same progression level of equipment.  None is more legendary / fabled than the next one.So Chain classes are deeply penalized with the new Mitigation / Avoidance system, and in fact we take dammage WORSE than most cloth classes.All in all, this isn't a huge impact to solo play where swash dps is just going to kill the mob so fast it doesn't matter.  However it has very debilitating consequences when you get agro in multiple heroic encounters, which with engarde, huricane, inspiration, etc it is sort of built into the class that we will.Before EoF, the swash would be 15% less mitigation with roughly the same avoidance as a tank class.  After EoF we've taken huge penalties in both.  I suspect if you had a bunch of chain gear with + parry and + defense on it, you could get avoidance back where it was, however, I've seen VERY little gear for swash that has these stats.  More so, I'm not keen on regearing yet again now.</div>

[._Jammer]

Dude, your lvl 70, you should know that offensive stance is for when you wont get hit and defensive stance is for when you might get hit.  You are not suppost to offtank in offensive stance, just as tanks are not suppost to tank in cloth armor OK?<p>Message Edited by ._Jammer_. on <span class=date_text>12-06-2006</span> <span class=time_text>09:52 AM</span>

[Cocytus]

<DIV>Actually I take hits better than pretty much any non tank..only non-tank class that take hits better is brigand, and that's because of their self mit buff.</DIV> <DIV> </DIV> <DIV>I have 52% avoidance and 51% mit in def stance. (adept III)</DIV> <DIV> </DIV> <DIV>I can't really recall my avoidance and mit in off stance....as I only go into it for raids/groups where I'm not tank. (no, I'm not STA specced.). I just turn it on and don't really pay attention to avoidance/mit. I think my avoidance is about 41% and mit drops to about 43%. (also adept III)</DIV><p>Message Edited by Cocytus on <span class=date_text>12-06-2006</span> <span class=time_text>04:09 PM</span>

[Dakkon_10]

<P>You're forgetting that the Illusionist has way less hp than a swashbuckler. Sure the mob will miss them a bit more, but they will still go down fast.</P> <P>Besides, avoidance is still way less important than mitigation vs heroics and up, even after the combat changes. </P>

[Cocytus]

/agree

[Thunnda]

<P>I have already cancelled my account.</P> <P>SOE has totally screwed up this game, and im done with it.</P>

[Rokjin]

<DIV>I don't know about you.. but self buffed my numbers are:</DIV> <DIV> </DIV> <DIV>Offensive Stance:</DIV> <DIV>2375 Mit (41.8%)</DIV> <DIV>6279 Avoid (45.3%)</DIV> <DIV> </DIV> <DIV>Defensive Stance:</DIV> <DIV>2767 Mit (45.5%)</DIV> <DIV>7812 Avoid (56.1%)</DIV> <DIV> </DIV> <DIV>That's quite good for a class that does as much DPS as we do with as much utility. I regularly backup tank if the main tank goes down.</DIV>

[Steve11418]

<P>Just going back to my previous post... it might have just been a run of bad luck? As I spent all last night in Enchanted Lands and was doing ok against blue and white mobs.</P>

[khurath]

<P>There is actually a big flaw in the game mechanics about the avoidance/mitigation concept.<BR>The "fix" addressed that but actually made things worse.</P> <P>The Mitigation is armor-dependant, as it should be, but this is true also for avoidance, and this is the flaw.<BR>In the real world avoidance depends on one's skill and reflexes; heavy or cumbersome clothes renders it more difficult to exercise your skills.<BR>In the game this is the other way around, with clothes giving you avoidance.<BR>If we assume that all people are more or less equal at avoiding blows, this is equivalent: instead of decreasing a fixed value depending on clothing there was a fixed value for each clothing.<BR>Now the fixed value is not anymore dependent on clothing but on class, regardless of what you are wearing.<BR>This is not equivalent anymore, and gives way to funny things.<BR>Assuming that it is true that now avoidance base is depending on the heaviest armor you CAN wear, it means that avoidance is worse for tanks than for scouts, and worse for scouts than for wizards.<BR>This is crazy as it should be the other way around; after all tanks are used at dodging blows, and scouts also, even if to a minor extent (but surely more than wizards).</P> <P>I don't think it was really necessary to "fix" the leather tanking issue, but since it was decided to do so it should be fixed the right way, that is:</P> <P>- Avoidance should depend on Agility and class (not every class has the same martial training) and<BR>- clothing should subtract from that base (heavier clothing should obviously subtract more).</P> <P>Just my 2 cents.</P>

[liscio]

<P>Soloing has become harder after the 5th dec patch for me. i seem to get hit more often and/or take more damage. Im all chain btw. Even upgraded my armor for another 100 or so mitigation but its definatly harder.</P> <P>Another thing. I did the Jboots run and got two lvls from the exploration xp making my skills in defense/parry and attack skills fall behind. this had tremendous effect on my avoidance. it dropped from 30% to 15%. that made soloing the same mobs I did at 31 harder at 33. This seem broken to me. I spent an hour or so just melleing green mobs and getting my skills maxed to see if that was the only problem but its definatly abit harder to solo now. I used to take on yellow solo groups but now my hp drops alot faster.</P>

[Sanamien]

<div><blockquote><hr>liscio wrote:<div></div> <p>Soloing has become harder after the 5th dec patch for me. i seem to get hit more often and/or take more damage. Im all chain btw. Even upgraded my armor for another 100 or so mitigation but its definatly harder.</p> <p>Another thing. I did the Jboots run and got two lvls from the exploration xp making my skills in defense/parry and attack skills fall behind. this had tremendous effect on my avoidance. it dropped from 30% to 15%. that made soloing the same mobs I did at 31 harder at 33. This seem broken to me. I spent an hour or so just melleing green mobs and getting my skills maxed to see if that was the only problem but its definatly abit harder to solo now. I used to take on yellow solo groups but now my hp drops alot faster.</p><hr></blockquote>That's not how it works. The percentage value is versus equal level mobs, so you will still avoid and mitigate better vs. lower level mobs.</div>

[Cocytus]

<P>I like the concept of the avoidance changes - but I still want my pre-EOF mitigation and avoidance, lol. Was 60% avoidance and 55% mit. <img src="/smilies/9d71f0541cff0a302a0309c5079e8dee.gif" border="0" alt="SMILEY" /> (in def stance)</P> <P> </P> <P>edit - Nothing seems significantly harder to me other than the new raid zones. Everything else is pretty much the same for me, honestly, I just wish I didn't have to lose avoidance/mitigation for things to be the same. There are a few isolated heroics and soleos outside of CMM (which is just plain hard in general) that are difficult for me, but most soloes/heroics are of the same general difficulty, for me at least.</P><p>Message Edited by Cocytus on <span class=date_text>12-07-2006</span> <span class=time_text>03:18 PM</span>

[liscio]

I didnt say I was fighting lower lvl mobs I said I was fighting same lvl mobs as I was at 31. 33-34. 

[Yimway]

Just to be clear. Nothing I posted had anything to do with fighting solo mobs.  The problems come from the now impossible ability to off-tank adds in heroic content.  The numbers I parsed Swash vs Illusionist was with heroic mobs.Someone said something about Swash having more HP to make up for it.   Thats honestly not very true.  We have slightly more, but nearly every piece of caster gear has a large STA stat on it where as 'swash' gear is mostly str and agi.Agility seems to play little role in avoidance anymore. or at least not a significant amount.I do use offensive stance all the time except when tanking, always have.  However, I'm dieing to heroic adds faster than I can change stances these days, but thats not really the point.The point is cloth classes (now mage classes after knee jerk patch), have better parsed ability to stand infront of a heroic mob than we do, unless we put on a shield and deffensive stance.  I personally feel its borked, but thats more to how higher avoidance parses out much better than having higher mitigation after all the changes.  Being mediocre in both skills puts chain classes at a disadvantage to all other classes.And I still think a warden with mediocre gear self buffing out to more mitigation than a better geared swash (regardless of stance) is flat out busted.  <div></div>

[Luk]

Sorry, but I can't see it, cloth wearers have a base avoid of 24% but thats it, they get no defense skill and no parry skill, how is that they get higher avoidance than us.I took out a level 68 heroic named yesterday, duo'd with a dirge bearly went into orange, damage spike at the end of the fight and the dirge healed me, but was pretty stable for most of it, AND I wasn't in my full kit cause I was in some resist gear from the previous nights raiding.<div></div>

[liveja]

<P>Since EOF came out, I've upgraded my armor from Cobalt to Xegonite. I would NEVER don cloth armor, just for more avoidance, even if it was bugged to so happen. & guess what? Wearing chain armor, I was still able to off-tank a heroic add for just as long as I've ever been able to, which isn't very long. IMHO, nothing of any significance has changed.</P> <P>I don't want to say something nasty, so I'll stop there ... but seriously, I just don't see the issues some of you are complaining about.</P>

[Yimway]

<div>I would sure like to know how your base avoidance is that high.  If I had 6200 avoidance in offensive stance, I would not be posting the issues I'm having.I'm in a combination of 67+ legendary and relic armor atm.  Yet, your showing more than 2000 more avoidance than I'm getting with close to the same mitigation.  The only way I got my avoidance up that high was to don leather / cloth.<blockquote><hr>Rokjin wrote:<div>I don't know about you.. but self buffed my numbers are:</div> <div> </div> <div>Offensive Stance:</div> <div>2375 Mit (41.8%)</div> <div>6279 Avoid (45.3%)</div> <div> </div> <div>Defensive Stance:</div> <div>2767 Mit (45.5%)</div> <div>7812 Avoid (56.1%)</div> <div> </div> <div>That's quite good for a class that does as much DPS as we do with as much utility. I regularly backup tank if the main tank goes down.</div><hr></blockquote></div>

[Cocytus]

<BR> <BLOCKQUOTE> <HR> Yimway wrote:<BR> <DIV>I would sure like to know how your base avoidance is that high.  If I had 6200 avoidance in offensive stance, I would not be posting the issues I'm having.<BR><BR>I'm in a combination of 67+ legendary and relic armor atm.  Yet, your showing more than 2000 more avoidance than I'm getting with close to the same mitigation.  The only way I got my avoidance up that high was to don leather / cloth.<BR><BR><BR> <BLOCKQUOTE> <HR> Rokjin wrote:<BR> <DIV>I don't know about you.. but self buffed my numbers are:</DIV> <DIV> </DIV> <DIV>Offensive Stance:</DIV> <DIV>2375 Mit (41.8%)</DIV> <DIV>6279 Avoid (45.3%)</DIV> <DIV> </DIV> <DIV>Defensive Stance:</DIV> <DIV>2767 Mit (45.5%)</DIV> <DIV>7812 Avoid (56.1%)</DIV> <DIV> </DIV> <DIV>That's quite good for a class that does as much DPS as we do with as much utility. I regularly backup tank if the main tank goes down.</DIV><BR> <HR> </BLOCKQUOTE><BR></DIV><BR> <HR> </BLOCKQUOTE> <P>Coule, Blackguard's defense, and various parry/defense boosting gear can make quite a difference.</P> <P>I don't remember the number itself, but my avoidance in off stance is roughly in the 44% range somewhere (the number 44.7% sticks in my head).<BR></P>

[Rokjin]

As Above poster wrote.. a good chunk of that is from Freehand Reversal (+4% riposte frontal/360 parry), Coule and 4 points of Blackguard's Defense. I also have some +defense and +parry on my equipment.

[Yimway]

I've not found parry / deffense off swash gear as of yet, and my desire to go get new gear is severely diminished with how my toon plays now vs 3 weeks ago.I do have the wis line done for the parry there, but I've not picked up any of the EoF AA that might further bolster it, but again thats for the same reason as above, I can't stand to play my swash more than about 30 mins or 3 deaths, and thats usually one and the same.<div></div>

[liveja]

<BR> <BLOCKQUOTE> <HR> Yimway wrote:<BR>I've not found parry / deffense off swash gear as of yet <HR> </BLOCKQUOTE> <P>Pristine Forged Xegonite Chainmail tunic has +1 Defense. I believe the leggings do, too.</P> <P>Granted, it's not "swashbuckler" gear, per se, but it is very much Swashie usable, & it is there.<BR></P>