Eq2 hall of commons Chat june 19 2008

[Giral]

<p>Link  <a href="http://eq2.stratics.com/php-bin/show_content.php?content=27915" target="_blank" rel="nofollow">http://eq2.stratics.com/php-bin/sho...p?content=27915</a></p><p><b>Venom -</b> <blizzil> Question: The overall balance of all the fighter classes is totally messed up. The Guardians in snap aggro, survivablity and tank ability is night and day compared to all classes. Currently there is little or no need for Crusaders on a raid and almost no use for a Bruiser on a raid due to their buff. Any changes to the fighter class balance anytime soon? <b>Ilucide -</b> Sorry to hit a third 'vague' answer after so short a period. We've been having a lot of internal discussion about the mechanics behind the tanking classes, and how they work together. We don't have a concrete plan for how changes will work, but there are things that we want to address - we just want to make sure we do it right. We do have two shadowknights and a monk on the team who'd like to see a more viable tanking role though... </p>

[stahlej]

Well since they have not solid ideas for how things would work differently it will probably take over a year for things to change...How I would envision thingsGuardian - Focus on raid tanking & cold resist specialized tank. The best mitigation, low ability to hold aggro and needs aggro buffs from other classes. This would also make raids more interesting and give room for other tanks.Berserk - High single target and AoE DPS and revert down to chain or leather armor for a boost in their DPS. How dose one do efficient damage on a full plate suite when one is in a frenzy? Also fire resist specialized tank when in tank gear.Paladin - Raid off tank & divine resist specialized tank, better ability to hold aggro than a guardian but lower HP and mitigation to offset healingShadowknight - Hate buffer & disease specialized tank, have the best ability to increase other classes ability to gain, divert hate and draw hate to itself. Better harm touch damage.Monk - Avoidance & mental resist specialized tank.Bruiser - DPS, crippling & poison specialized tank.I really would like to see resist specialization be use during raids. It would give all fighter classes a tank focused viable roll.

[Mr. Dawki]

<p>Not to be a downer on your SK idea, but with a coercer and dirge in the MT group a guard is near hate mod cap already, even if a SK could buff hate, there would be no use for it as other classes already do that and have other utility.</p>

[stahlej]

I know, but it isn't as if their ability can't be tweaked to be in line with fighter changes to make a better overall balance.

[Nakash]

<cite>stahlej wrote:</cite><blockquote>Well since they have not solid ideas for how things would work differently it will probably take over a year for things to change...How I would envision thingsGuardian - Focus on <span style="color: #ff0000;">raid tanking </span>& cold resist specialized tank. The best mitigation, low ability to hold aggro and needs aggro buffs from other classes. This would also make raids more interesting and give room for other tanks.Berserk - High single target and AoE DPS and revert down to chain or leather armor for a boost in their DPS. How dose one do efficient damage on a full plate suite when one is in a frenzy? Also fire resist specialized tank when in tank gear.Paladin - <span style="color: #ff0000;">Raid off tank </span>& divine resist specialized tank, better ability to hold aggro than a guardian but lower HP and mitigation to offset healingShadowknight - Hate buffer & disease specialized tank, have the best ability to increase other classes ability to gain, divert hate and draw hate to itself. Better harm touch damage.Monk - Avoidance & mental resist specialized tank.Bruiser - DPS, crippling & poison specialized tank.I really would like to see resist specialization be use during raids. It would give all fighter classes a tank focused viable roll.</blockquote><p>This part off putting raid focus on a few class(es) has brought us to the mess where the balancing Tanks have now in EQ2.</p><p>Suggesting it again is not a really clever thing ... Sry</p>

[stahlej]

<cite>Azzaroth@Valor wrote:</cite><blockquote><cite></cite><p>This part off putting raid focus on a few class(es) has brought us to the mess where the balancing Tanks have now in EQ2.</p><p>Suggesting it again is not a really clever thing ... Sry</p></blockquote>Just because a fighter class don't soak up melee damage doesn't mean it has no raid focus. What I want to see is a broader rage of raid only utility and resist perks for each class. What the SK dose nowadays is to only buff itself and then it is more or less done with the buffing functionality. There are some debuffs but they have no greater impact. Even if I think the Despoiling Mist, most don't care for it.I have never viewed the SK as a class which takes melee damage during a raid. It should have more of crowd control like abilities to help manage what monster hit on and deal a decent amount of DPS with 2H melee and spells/abilities.The issues with the current balancing is that too many classes are dipped in the same base class and try to fill the same roles. All fighter class abilities are an extension of the sub level 20 skills of the base fighting class from the launch of the game. A major gameplay overhault for all class abiliteis would probably be greatly beneficial if done right.Everyone has a different view of what is right for the class. Most of my desires are colorued of the old EQ1 SK since I greatly enjoyed it and the best way to try and push things in a better direction is to try and give constructive views and ideas of how one would like to see the class be played instead of saying how things should not be.

[Margen]

<p>Well at least we know they are actually finally looking at the issue FINALLY, problem is its been pretty much an issue since LU13.  Its just been getting worse and worse and finally became HUGE since ROK came out.  </p><p>Our dps has been effecitively nerfed and we always have had problems in the striaght agro department (weak taunts and aa lines).  While we can do the job in groups, we are not really shinning in that area at the high end of the game.  Raiding is even worse!</p><p>They seem to see the problem but they don't seem to understand how big an issue it is.  Non-Guardian tanks are either betraying for beserkers, quiting completly, or making so called raiding classes.  Which is also effecting the group game, how many post have been about non-raiding players complaining about the lack of tanks willing to group anymore.  </p><p>Before ROK Guards where the king of tanking, but the other tank classes could fill in other roles such as OT or DPS.  Since ROK came out excluding monks, non-gaurdian tanks have been slowly melted out of the raid seen.  Paladins are well built for the OT role, but then again so are Guardians.  Many guilds now just run with two Gaurds for the tank roles and maybe a monk due to their buff.</p><p>They really need to make this a top priority IMO, they looked at rangers and coercers, but lets be honest both of those two classes had no major issues filling raid slots.  But the tank community, specially us SK have a huge problem filling a raid slot.</p>

[Giral]

<p>in my own opinion they should add in Dexterity as a new stat needed for Guardians and Zerkers, so they would need to Raise both STr and Dexterity in order to do Great Dps or focus on Str Agi Sta for just Tanking , this way they also would have to choose one or the other. </p><p> i agree that Resists in this game should mean Alot more, was hopefull that when they redid resists way way back and gave each tank a Specific Resist type (and paladins 2 cuase they always need more then everyone cuase they are weak suace) That it would actualy be put to use, but instead resist caps are easy to hit with buffs and maybe a couple pieces of gear swapped and resists realy dont play that big a role in 99% of the game </p><p>but i think it needs to be taken one step further and Each tank class should also have a secondary ability that they are more proficient in  :  Guardians could get Block, Paladins Could get Parry, Shadowknights could get Reflect , Berserkers could get Reposte, etc,,, </p><p>this way each tank has 2 diffrent specialties , the other classes could get gear and items with Block/Parry/reflect/reposte but would never be able to come even half way equal to the class that specializes in it, and also would be extremly hard for them to Increase there Resist to a certain type at the same time, they would have to [Removed for Content] one or the other and both would be Much less then the Tank that specialized in that resist and block/parry /etcc... </p><p>the Large problem with eq2 is that all you need to raid Mt 99% of the mobs is Aviod/Mit/HP and Buffs , anytank can tank any mob , i have Mt'd plenty of raids and if i can survive and keep agro we win its that simple.  the second largest problem is that guardians have All of the above +tools and skill to do it the Easiest out of all. </p><p> what needs to happen is that Guard's shouldnt be the easiest tank for Everything (and some times already they are not" BUT " they can still do it without much issue even tho it would be Slightly easier with another tank) and they should actualy be the Hardest tank to use for 1/3 of the Raid encounters in the game , we have 6 Tank classes , why is Guardian Always 99% of the time usable as the MT ?????? becuse of the simplicity of what is needed to MT ..... add in a few more factors like Resists and Parry/Reflect etc,.... and now each tank type has Encounters and Names and "Entire Raids"  that they are hands down the Easiest tank to use over all other tanks,  then all Tank classes are in Equal realms that the Guardian has always been in, "This raid has Realy High Disease and Casts alot of spells we need to Sk to tank this Zone, BUT the adds and some of the Split name ancounters require a Tank thats high in Cold resist and Blocks  Crushing damage ,so Guardians still can bring there [Removed for Content] azz along : ) </p><p>anyway ,,its wishfull thinking ,,just like resists actualy meaning something,,,,they will likely make All tanks be able to transfer there hate to another tank so that the MT never looses agro in groups(thats a whine on guardian forums atm, Sk's pulling agro of guards in groups) heaven forbid that an Sk can actualy get agro off a Guardian OMG OMG /chuckle..... and Sk's if there lucky will get syohon hate bumped up to 10%,some agility boost/agro help on def stance, and minor tweaks to single target Dps. </p><p>anyway  any changes if they come at all are a long way off (and apparently Somehow SK Tweaks are lumped into those Far far off changes) ..... it is sad that they cant give us tweaks we need now and when they do change how Tanks work together they cant make minor adjustments after the fact IF they are needed .  id like to Play my Sk NOW ,,,not some time in the far off Future that might never happen <img src="/eq2/images/smilies/9d71f0541cff0a302a0309c5079e8dee.gif" border="0" alt="SMILEY<img src=" width="15" height="15" />" width="15" height="15"> </p><p>P,S, as for Dirges and Hate ... why does a guitar plucking ,song singing,court jester give such great hate ? i agree that dirges should be able to buff it a bit(learn to hate from getting things thrown at them for there lousy music) but Hate and Agro manipulation should be mostly in the hands of Tanks, if they did Hate/agro between the tank classes properly you could have each tank class able to use skills to help out other tanks in raids, and IF every tank type had entire raid zones crafted around them and offtanking crafted around various tanks, then finaly in eq2 you would have Each tank needed for almost every raid in the game IF it was all done correctly so you couldnt do without a certain tanks agro/hate skills.     like everything else there are so many ways they could do things ...but my money is on Easy mode ...Guards are MT 100% of the time, raids are uninspiring and repetative and eq2 will just seep more and more poeple who get bored of tank and spank </p>

[Tiberuis]

<p>Nice to see the Dev's have tanking mechanics on thier radar, and a couple of SK's in the group.  I'll bet those SK's are [Removed for Content] too, lol  <img src="/smilies/3b63d1616c5dfcf29f8a7a031aaa7cad.gif" border="0" alt="SMILEY" /></p><p>Here's to hoping they fix the SK's DPS, to balance with the rest of the plate tank classes.  This really is the key issue with the SK class since the launch of ROK, no question.</p><p>Survivability and aggro would be nice too, and is also needed badly.</p><p>And if they address utility, great, although there is no mention of that.  I personally won't care, as long as they fix our DPS, lol</p><p>Good news of the Mythical "tweaks" coming in upcoming GU.  The SK version needs an improvement, something special to actually give it "mythical" quality.</p><p>It would be nice if the Dev's addressed some of these SK issues in thier own "official" forums, without having to hunt in third party websites to find this info, yes?     <img src="/smilies/3b63d1616c5dfcf29f8a7a031aaa7cad.gif" border="0" alt="SMILEY" /></p>

[Melodar]

The classes need to be fixed for group usage all of this raid this raid that doesn't even come close to addressing the majority of players in EQ2. Raiders are the minority in this game and Sony needs to stop catering to their wishes and fix stuff for the majority of the community. Sure raiders can toss in their 2 cents but treating each raider post as a million dollar donation that gives them more influence is becoming annoying. If classes are fixed properly in groups first most of the raid problems will go away. The majority of them will still follow the plan someone posted online and use it as gospel as the only way to do an encounter and use only a certain core raid group make up so the number of tanks in a raid will STILL be limited. Groups always have a varied make up and they show the strengths and weaknesses of tanks quite well. Since 95% of EQ2 doesn't raid maybe just maybe their method of play should be what you gear classes to .

[Giral]

<p>Melodar said " Since 95% of EQ2 doesn't raid" </p><p>Sorry but that is an extremely bad Guess, its more like 95 % of people have tried Raiding at one time or another, some people raid just to help friends out by filling a slot they need, some people do occasional pick up raids, some poeple are in raid alliances, and some are in casual, mixed,semi hardcore,hardcore raid guild's </p><p>Looking thru All the server Forums on This forum and on Eq2 flames every one has numerous raid guids recruiting people , and constantly raids lose poeple and get new ones </p><p>some people raid just for fun, i know i do</p><p>some people raid for the loot</p><p>some people raid just to see the zones or the Names </p><p>etc..etc... </p><p>the DEV's have the real Numbers on how many people have actualy Raided in Eq2 , and i can Guarantee that its more then 5 % of the population. (P.S. the "Minority" word is so 2006 , its realy Old , please play a diffrent card kk Tnks) </p><p>If you have any Input on Sk's for Group content then please Add it to this discussuon (BUT leave the Raider Bashing at the door Please, as We all Group Tank and Solo we dont just Raid!!!)     Never said this was a RAID only topic in this thread , like to hear what you think about Sk's in Rok Tanking group instances compared to the other tanks </p>