Roll back GU51 [Archive] - EQ2 Forum Archive @ EQ2Wire

Maroger

01-22-2009, 12:18 PM

<cite>Junaru wrote:</cite><blockquote>Anyone else feel like SOE should take the data they learned on this test and go back to the drawing board? Clearly SOE doesn't fully understand how the changes they are making will effect everyone. Each patch the flip flop back and forth and often forget what and why changes were made. I personally see a major flaw in the Monk class that will not stop me from tanking in offencive stance since the latest change on test.Sorry SOE I know you put a lot of work into it but sometimes it's just better to cut your loses. The current build on test is a hacked together copy of GU51 and if you push it to live you will find that there are major bugs in the game.</blockquote>I would agree. They really don't know enought about what they are doing. They have not even scheduled a realistic test. Just show up and play is not my idea of a test. The problem with developers is too often they use live as their test bed which is why they have so man fiasco's with major changes - that requires months of patching and undoing.They should conduct some realistic tests with ALL playstayle and analyze the results and then redo this fiasco. If they push this to live ike it it is -- they will have a lot of people who will stop playing the game. THis is just another fiasco that will take months of repair to undo the damage.At the very least they should go with only increasing taunts and detaunts in the stances - see how that works before meddling with the buffs. THE BUFF SHOULD BE LEFT FOR NOTHER GU -- Just concentrate on AGGRO/TAUNTS/AND DETAUNT changes ONLY -- not work with the buffs.I can believe this is Smed's idea of improving the game and having a happy player base.

liveja

01-22-2009, 01:21 PM

<cite>Junaru wrote:</cite><blockquote>Anyone else feel like SOE should take the data they learned on this test and go back to the drawing board?</blockquote>I think they have a lot more work to do before GU51 goes live. I don't know if I think the whole thing should be "scrapped", but I'd be happier knowing they're going to take 3 more months (at least) to work things out.

Tandy

01-22-2009, 01:24 PM

Well considering the first pass of it with the de-aggro's was probably a bit better than the current one...I am almost scared to see what else comes along honestly.At the very least all the taunts in offensive should just have their threat increase nullified....and let any secondary effects go off as normal. that would solve a lot of problems people have with it.If that happens, offensive will be fine for its purpose. Its a bit more dmg than currently on live, and would let you DPS fairly well without tanking against 'heavy hitters' or tank with just a healer along to help keep you alive.

madha

01-22-2009, 01:37 PM

heard after the big test, like 9 people showed up, the dev said yheap all gtg. I cant see why they even need this change dps classes require like 3 other classes to dps, but after this change they wont want more dps casue they will die more. I cannot see any tank holding agro against a 100k dps raid force. And heroic groups where tank is about 30-40 % of the groups dps will suffer too, they think groups request coercer and dirg to much just wait only going to get worse now since they have the only + hate abilities now.Good tanks will still be good bad tanks will still be bad, dps will still die, and hate buffers will still be required. I dont see how this change, changes anything

Maroger

01-22-2009, 01:42 PM

<cite>madhatr wrote:</cite><blockquote>heard after the big test, like 9 people showed up, the dev said yheap all gtg. I cant see why they even need this change dps classes require like 3 other classes to dps, but after this change they wont want more dps casue they will die more. I cannot see any tank holding agro against a 100k dps raid force. And heroic groups where tank is about 30-40 % of the groups dps will suffer too, they think groups request coercer and dirg to much just wait only going to get worse now since they have the only + hate abilities now.Good tanks will still be good bad tanks will still be bad, dps will still die, and hate buffers will still be required. I dont see how this change, changes anything</blockquote>When did this big test take place? I thought it was posted for today the 22nd at 3PM? I never did see a place announced .

Terron

01-22-2009, 01:43 PM

I think the defensive stances are mostly OK, but the offensive ones need more thought as do paladins.Both reversing taunts and disabling some of them have problems.I think they should give up on getting them exactly right this update, restore enough old behaviour to make the new stances acceptable if not perfect, put the system in and work on finishing the changes for the update after.I think a -50% modifier on taunts in offensive stance would reduce such taunts to around the old values. Also letting Paladins keep the old amends until the update after (perhaps with the transfer amount reduced by 25 to 50% since their taunts have been increased).

Maroger

01-22-2009, 01:45 PM

<cite>Terron@Splitpaw wrote:</cite><blockquote>I think the defensive stances are mostly OK, but the offensive ones need more thought as do paladins.Both reversing taunts and disabling some of them have problems.I think they should give up on getting them exactly right this update, restore enough old behaviour to make the new stances acceptable if not perfect, put the system in and work on finishing the changes for the update after.I think a -50% modifier on taunts in offensive stance would reduce such taunts to around the old values. Also letting Paladins keep the old amends until the update after (perhaps with the transfer amount reduced by 25 to 50% since their taunts have been increased).</blockquote>Would you still merge the buffs into the stances knowing that the power of the buffs have been severly reduced from their stand-alone version? I think they should leave the buffs separate for now.

madha

01-22-2009, 01:50 PM

<cite>Maroger wrote:</cite><blockquote><cite>Terron@Splitpaw wrote:</cite><blockquote>I think the defensive stances are mostly OK, but the offensive ones need more thought as do paladins.Both reversing taunts and disabling some of them have problems.I think they should give up on getting them exactly right this update, restore enough old behaviour to make the new stances acceptable if not perfect, put the system in and work on finishing the changes for the update after.I think a -50% modifier on taunts in offensive stance would reduce such taunts to around the old values. Also letting Paladins keep the old amends until the update after (perhaps with the transfer amount reduced by 25 to 50% since their taunts have been increased).</blockquote>Would you still merge the buffs into the stances knowing that the power of the buffs have been severly reduced from their stand-alone version? I think they should leave the buffs separate for now.</blockquote>aye the buffs have been nerfed bad with the merger, give us the old buffs back, no tank has ever complained about casting 3 buffs instead of 1, thats furies and bards go merge their buffs, since they have like 15, and leave us alone.

madha

01-22-2009, 01:51 PM

<cite>Maroger wrote:</cite><blockquote><cite>madhatr wrote:</cite><blockquote>heard after the big test, like 9 people showed up, the dev said yheap all gtg. I cant see why they even need this change dps classes require like 3 other classes to dps, but after this change they wont want more dps casue they will die more. I cannot see any tank holding agro against a 100k dps raid force. And heroic groups where tank is about 30-40 % of the groups dps will suffer too, they think groups request coercer and dirg to much just wait only going to get worse now since they have the only + hate abilities now.Good tanks will still be good bad tanks will still be bad, dps will still die, and hate buffers will still be required. I dont see how this change, changes anything</blockquote>When did this big test take place? I thought it was posted for today the 22nd at 3PM? I never did see a place announced .</blockquote>someone in my guild said they went to it it might have been a unoffical sort of thing but not 100% now.

Dasein

01-22-2009, 01:52 PM

The only changes that should remain are the reductions in hate transfers/reducers (Amends, etc.), increased taunts and the new Aggression skill mechanics. Everything else, including the buff merges and changes to stances should be scrapped as it is causing more problems than it is solving. 4 year old games should not be undergoing paradigm shifts. That's something you do early in the design phase, not years after release.

liveja

01-22-2009, 01:56 PM

<cite>Dasein wrote:</cite><blockquote>4 year old games should not be undergoing paradigm shifts.</blockquote>Precisely.

SilentTrouble

01-22-2009, 03:15 PM

I for one love the changes that are coming... They are going to reaffirm my idea of tanking. Its been said again and again if you live and hold agro you did your job. If you dont like that being your job play a different class... If you dont like that.... well, can I have your stuff? *waves*

liveja

01-22-2009, 03:17 PM

<cite>SilentTrouble wrote:</cite><blockquote>Its been said again and again if you live and hold agro you did your job.</blockquote>Since that's happening now, I'm failing to see the big issue Aeralik thinks needs to change.

SilentTrouble

01-22-2009, 03:22 PM

i misquoted him its rather if you live and hold agro and do 1 DPS you did your job... the problem is they are doing the previous and as much if not more dps than mages and other dps classes

xKHONSx

01-22-2009, 03:26 PM

Watering tanking down into standing there and taunting is going to bore all of the tanks who have become accustomed to the changes soe has made to tanking over the years. You, the Dev team, has been pushing the game in this direction for four years and now this late in the game's life you once again want to completely reinvent the game for no real reason.It seems like sony purposely does these complete overhauls for the sole reason of reminding the customer whose vision this game is. It's almost like they think "Well we want to try this now and if you don't like it then too bad." All they usually end up doing is [Removed for Content] a lot of people off as they show they are not in touch with their customer base at all. In return they lose more subs and waste money that could have been better spent adding more content or fixing real issues.Who is going to [Removed for Content] you off more, someone who is standing there yelling at you or someone who punches you in the eye? Sure taunts distract you for a moment, but when that Brigand sneaks behind you and stabs you in the spleen there is no amount of taunting that is going to distract you from the wound he just inflicted. The only reason why taunts are in mmo's of this nature is due to the fact that they are so deeply ingrained in the lore of the genre. Sony, be different, leave dps tanking as an option and just fix defensive tanking since there are plenty of times you do need to be in defensive.Offensive tanking on live isn't too far off of what it should be. Some minor tweaks to the actual dps that tanks are doing was all that was needed to balance that aspect. Tanks should be able to put up T2 dps type numbers and if they are indeed doing more than T1 dps classes (the group that supposedly has complained that tanks do too much damage) then either the dps'ers suck, the buffs in the group benefit the tank significantly more than they benefit the dps'ers, the tank has an obscene amount of dps buffs on him or a combination of all three. Usually it is more of the former and the dps'ers just suck.As a Monk tanking in offensive stance I already run a much larger risk of taking damage since our mitigation boost as well as our uncontested avoidance is directly tied into the defensive stance. If they had just tweaked offensive tanking there wouldn't even be a need for the 5% increase to damage taken on offensive stance. All they would have had to do was make it so every tank's stances worked like a Brawler - everyone loses their mitigation bonuses and uncontested avoidance while in offensive stance and tie those very things in with defensive stance only. Problem solved without completely revamping combat/aggro mechanics.The only thing they would have had to overhaul was defensive tanking. They could implement the current changes on test and apply only the defensive tanking mechanics.Instead of taking this approach and slightly tweaking offensive tanking and fixing defensive tanking they are once again reinventing the wheel when it is completely unnecessary. Why focus the little bit of money from dwindling subs into redoing combat mechanics every 1 - 1.5 years instead of tweaking/modifying existing mechanics and offering more content?Personally I would have much rather seen them do what I've mentioned. It would give people more choices in how they want to go about things. Instead it is literally watered down into two choices....click this button for tanking and click this button for dps'ing. There really isn't much middle ground now and there certainly isn't a lot of choice.

Junaru

01-22-2009, 03:30 PM

<cite>SilentTrouble wrote:</cite><blockquote>I for one love the changes that are coming... They are going to reaffirm my idea of tanking. Its been said again and again if you live and hold agro you did your job. If you dont like that being your job play a different class... If you dont like that.... well, can I have your stuff? *waves*</blockquote>Well if SOE doesn't have any issue with it nor do I, but I can tell you right now both Brawler classes will be able to tank in offencive stance with little issue. The only thing GU51 does is lets me tank in defencive stance better then on live.My whole point is because SOE has flip flopped back and forth so much they have left too many holes in the game right now. They need to step back and look at the bigger picture. I for one see the Brawlers getting a big time nerf when other fighters see them tanking and putting up major DPS.

CrazyMoogle

01-22-2009, 03:43 PM

<cite>madhatr wrote:</cite><blockquote>heard after the big test, like 9 people showed up, the dev said yheap all gtg. I cant see why they even need this change dps classes require like 3 other classes to dps, but after this change they wont want more dps casue they will die more. I cannot see any tank holding agro against a 100k dps raid force. And heroic groups where tank is about 30-40 % of the groups dps will suffer too, they think groups request coercer and dirg to much just wait only going to get worse now since they have the only + hate abilities now.Good tanks will still be good bad tanks will still be bad, dps will still die, and hate buffers will still be required. I dont see how this change, changes anything</blockquote>Not to worry, I was just told in another thread that tank's can parse 600 and hold aggro over VP raiders, so this shouldn't be a problem with the amazing new taunts <img src="/eq2/images/smilies/3b63d1616c5dfcf29f8a7a031aaa7cad.gif" border="0" />

Kordran

01-22-2009, 04:16 PM

<cite>Junaru wrote:</cite><blockquote>Well if SOE doesn't have any issue with it nor do I, but I can tell you right now both Brawler classes will be able to tank in offencive stance with little issue. The only thing GU51 does is lets me tank in defencive stance better then on live.My whole point is because SOE has flip flopped back and forth so much they have left too many holes in the game right now. They need to step back and look at the bigger picture. I for one see the Brawlers getting a big time nerf when other fighters see them tanking and putting up major DPS.</blockquote>I don't play a brawler, but I imagine that if playtesting shows them able to effectively tank difficult content in offensive, it's going to be nerfed somehow (my guess would be a larger threat penalty in their offensive stance, but it could be any number of things). The vision that they've laid out, in principal, is pretty simple. It's the implementation that's proving to be tricky. But I think they're closer to the mark now than they were previously.Truth be told, eliminating the detaunts in offensive does amount to a nerf for those fighters who prefer a DPS role. The way things previously worked, it was a huge win for them because there was virtually no damage threshold for them; not only the detaunts associated with CAs, but the ability to shed large amounts of hate and lower their threat position immediately. A lot of Monks, Bruisers and Berserkers were probably enthusiastic about the idea that they could max out their DPS and never worry about ripping from the tank. With that gone, they're now worse off than scouts who have at least some detaunt capabilities.

liveja

01-22-2009, 04:23 PM

<cite>SilentTrouble wrote:</cite><blockquote>i misquoted him its rather if you live and hold agro and do 1 DPS you did your job... the problem is they are doing the previous and as much if not more dps than mages and other dps classes</blockquote>No, actually, the real problem is too many "DPS classes" act like their Mother has been ravaged & their little sister's honor questioned if a "tank" out-DPS's them.As a Swashy, I couldn't care less who tops the parse, ever. What I care about is: did the mob die? Did the group profit? If the answer to both questions is "yes", then there's no issue, & no reason for this ill-conceived patch.The only reason I can really think of is that things have gotten so far out of whack that they don't have room to expand itemization & spell/CA upgrades in future expacs, which tells me that things are being nerfed now, so they can be re-inflated later, only to be nerfed again sometime in 2010. This is standard SOE practice, so nobody should be surprised when it happens again.

Geothe

01-22-2009, 04:24 PM

In general,Most of the changes being introduced are so ill-thought out that it is laughable.I honestly cant understand how people incharge of adjusting such things can be so absolutely clueless.Its pretty darn sad when one person will be able to mess up the game to such a degree in such a short time.Ah well.

Arathy

01-22-2009, 04:46 PM

If a tank can manage 1 DPS and hold agro through taunts after this LU then I would say something IS terrribly broken. That is a horrible idea. Tanks in this game should need to be able to play their classes to the fullest in order to hold agro off DPS classes doing the same.Having some treasured tank just turned 80 holding agro off of raid geared toons reaks of failure to create a balance. I'm not saying that's the case of what is going to happen, but should it.. well then I view this experiment as a failure.To the person who said changes like this shouldn't be happening 4 years into a game cycle, you're absolutely correct.How about this latest change to the offensive stances, where while in offensive you cannot use taunts. That's all great until you've just negated a good portion of the CAs that shadowknights can use. Since they have taunt amounts attached to debuffs and damage, can they use those combat arts? What about death march? Can they use that while in offensive stance? More foresight needs to be used here. This late in a development cycle you CANNOT afford to screw up.

CrazyMoogle

01-22-2009, 05:22 PM

This game is over 4 years old. The guys at SOE realize this, right? That this game isn't in beta or early release. This is an established game that's over 4 years old. Is this really the time when you start making paradigm shifts?I think whoever came up with this ill-conceived revamp at SOE needs better supervision.

Kizee

01-22-2009, 05:26 PM

<cite>Flaye@Mistmoore wrote:</cite><blockquote><cite>Dasein wrote:</cite><blockquote>4 year old games should not be undergoing paradigm shifts.</blockquote>Precisely.</blockquote>It shouldn't go through 1 paradigm shift....never mind the 4 or 5 that we have been through already.Sit down and see where you want to take the game SoE instead of making all these shoot from the hip changes without knowing where you are going.

Xersu

01-22-2009, 05:26 PM

How many of you have actually TRIED the changes, versus just read about it and all the opinions (most seem to be baseless whining from people that have not even tried it).I have tried it on my SK, level 80, 160 AA. I absolutely enjoy being able to finally tank (see take damage better) and hold agro in a way that makes more sense than before. OR I can go into offensive stance and do everything I could before sans the agro and I'm doing more DPS. Switching stances is a crucial part of tanking now I feel.As long as I am not the star of the show or part of it (see MT or OT) I can do everything I could before, and switch when something is about to go awry and get on top of the hate list again.It means *gasp* I have to pay attention. If you think you can just jam on the taunt buttons and hold agro you are sorely mistaken. Your DPS does play into your hate, and the reactives you get from proper timings and spell orders still stay in play.Like what has been said before. This will still show who is a good tank, and who doesn't have a clue. Yes you might have to change your gear around, and yes, you may have to change your specs around.Why so resistant to change? Go try it, and come back with more specific valid concerns, maybe with numbers and balance concerns pertaining to specific skills and abilities.Here are some SK numbers fighting the single up wurms in skyfire. I fought 5 each and I show the highest and averageOffensive Stance: 4032 DPS highest (3453 Average)Defensive Stance: 2447 DPS (5232 Hate (Just pure taunt) per second) | 2123 (Average) with 4954 HPS averageI'm assuming you take DPS + any modifiers and then add the taunt per second and you get your total hate per second.The nice thing is the new UI bar tells you how well you are doing. So you now really know how much to step up your agro.I like the changes. Go do yourself a favor, go try it out tonight, and really familiarize yourself with the new agro management and come back with more specific concerns and feedback, and stop whining so much because of your own potential to resist change.

BleemTeam

01-22-2009, 05:28 PM

CrazyMoogle

01-22-2009, 05:33 PM

The fact of the matter is that tanking in offensive stance is fine the way it is. There's absolutely nothing wrong with it.The only thing that needed changing was defensive stance. Defensive stance needed to be altered so that it would lower your damage output while increasing your survivability and boosting your hate gain to compensate for what you lost in damage. That's it. That's all that needed done.

Kiljoi

01-22-2009, 05:35 PM

It has been said that...If you cannot bedazzle them with brilliance, baffle them with bull(bleep).

Mathafern

01-22-2009, 06:30 PM

I have no problem with the devs wanting to re-work fighters.I do have a problem with social engineering. This shows up when a dev wants players to play the game the way he envisions it, not the way they envision it. Quoting Karl Popper here: " the piecemeal engineer will adopt the method of searching for, and fighting against, the greatest and most urgent evil of society, rather than searching for, and fighting for, its greatest ultimate good." That's what I'm seeing- the whack-a-moling of what devs have identified as evil ways of playing the game, rather than working toward making good ways to play the game.Rather than break existing stances, that people use now and some are happy with- engineer new stances to deal with the needs of those who are currently unhappy. That way, those happy now will still be happy- and those who are unhappy now will have a new opportunity.More options, not less.

Maroger

01-22-2009, 06:38 PM

<cite>Xersues wrote:</cite><blockquote>I have tried it on my SK, level 80, 160 AA. I absolutely enjoy being able to finally tank (see take damage better) and hold agro in a way that makes more sense than before. OR I can go into offensive stance and do everything I could before sans the agro and I'm doing more DPS. Switching stances is a crucial part of tanking now I feel.</blockquote>Well that is great you have 160 AA - that makes a big difference. What about the people that DON'T HAVE 160 AAs - they are hurt a lot more by these changes and merger of our buffs than you are.Your numbers are for you - but I bet they are not what a lot of players without your AA's are doing.Try and think how this is affectiving other players without 160 AA - sure your AA's help you overcome the Aeralik Nerfs - but that kind of thinking does not help much if you don't have 160 Aas.This is not a well thought out change except for those who are level 80 and have a ton of AA - and apparently that is the only group Aeralik is concerned about.After 4 years the game does not need someone to take a sledgehammer to it and break it so smithereens.

Tandy

01-22-2009, 06:49 PM

<cite>Maroger wrote:</cite><blockquote><cite>Xersues wrote:</cite><blockquote>I have tried it on my SK, level 80, 160 AA. I absolutely enjoy being able to finally tank (see take damage better) and hold agro in a way that makes more sense than before. OR I can go into offensive stance and do everything I could before sans the agro and I'm doing more DPS. Switching stances is a crucial part of tanking now I feel.</blockquote>Well that is great you have 160 AA - that makes a big difference. What about the people that DON'T HAVE 160 AAs - they are hurt a lot more by these changes and merger of our buffs than you are.Your numbers are for you - but I bet they are not what a lot of players without your AA's are doing.Try and think how this is affectiving other players without 160 AA - sure your AA's help you overcome the Aeralik Nerfs - but that kind of thinking does not help much if you don't have 160 Aas.This is not a well thought out change except for those who are level 80 and have a ton of AA - and apparently that is the only group Aeralik is concerned about.After 4 years the game does not need someone to take a sledgehammer to it and break it so smithereens.</blockquote>The amount of AA's you have play a small part of this yes...but its a small part most times. Unless you live under a rock...lvl'ing up now you can usually get around 120 AA's by 70 or 80 at least. And once you earn an AA, you NEVER lose it.So again as long as you keep playing you will gain AA and have them and will be at 160 sooner or later, unless you quit playing.My sk has about 145 AA give or take....but even if I had 100 AA and all treasured gear with app 4 spells I dont think I would be in the same shape over things you are. The amount of AA's you have does not change fundamental game mechanics...no matter how much you think they do.

Junaru

01-22-2009, 07:09 PM

I'm not saying I don't agree/like the changes. In fact if you look at my posts I support most of them but the flip flop and radical changes have not been thought out well enough and SOE needs to take a step back.

Soefje

01-22-2009, 07:27 PM

I basically don't have a problem with the concepts that the devs are trying to implement. Defensive stance for tanking, offensive stance for DPS. I have problems with the implementation.What I was hoping to see was in increase in the hate generating abilities of all tanks in defensive stance along with a tweak in surviviability for some. The spike damage in some of the heroric zones is just too high for the way some tanks are currently configured. I find with my SK that if I can survive the 1st 10 secs of the named/boss fights, the healers can usually keep me up. What is frustrating to me is having to out DPS people just to keep aggro, while taunting, while trying to use my surviviability things. I thought, at least for SK, the defensive changes proposed would allow me to be a better tank, because I could focus less on having to max DPS to hold aggro and focus on hate and survivability.The issues I have are with the offensive stances. The de-taunts did not make sense to me. Fighters were gonna be on easy street, and if we could crank out the DPS, then the balance would be way off. But removing all the de-taunts was wrong too. To me the solution was making the taunts de-aggro spells in offensive. Here however, the devs have messed up from way back, because they have linked debuffs, damage, and all kinds of other things to certain fighters taunts. Were I the devs, I would move the debuffs, DOT, etcs of the taunts to other spells, CA, and make the taunts the de-aggro spells for offensive stance. I would keep the aggro on the CA, spells, etc as they have them now in defensive stance, but remove them for offensive stance. I would adjust buffs so that survivability was linked to defense, while DPS was linked to offensive stance. This way a fighter can be in defensive and be keeping the hate up and have an increase in surviviabillity. When in offensive be able to use the full complement of their spells and CA, and have aggro management tools on hand. Makes fighters play just like other DPS while in offensive stance.I also don't see the problem with stance dancing. I have tried it a few times in groups recently and find that I usually do better just staying in defensive stance and trying to maximize my DPS and taunts. I think there will be a few talented tanks that figure out the sequences to the stance dance, this might even become the mark of a good OT in raid scenerios, but the vast majority will pick one and stay with it.Now I will be honest, I have not moved a character to test to see for myself. I barely have enough time to play the game as it is, not wait for the testcopy and the mega update that is required to play on the test server.I hope that SOE takes their time and gets this right before they move it to live. I don't think it needs to be totally scrapped, but I do think a few more tweaks and more time on test would definitely be worthwhile.

lizard

01-23-2009, 03:12 AM

Danelin

01-23-2009, 03:26 AM

Unfortunately they made a change to the recast timers today that effectively not only nerfs the stance dance, it requires all raid tanks, offtanks, and off-off tanks to be in defensive on every pull if they want to be able to both grab aggro on a loose mob and survive the first hit or two.Poorly implemented. Unlink stance recast timers or make them overwrite so someone who needs to pick up a mob doesn't have to spend 5.5 seconds getting into defensive to be able to survive the initial hits.

Eugam

01-23-2009, 03:46 AM

<cite>Kraace@Everfrost wrote:</cite><blockquote>I basically don't have a problem with the concepts that the devs are trying to implement. Defensive stance for tanking, offensive stance for DPS. I have problems with the implementation.</blockquote>/sign pre hate transfer the game was about balance of tankage and dps. Both had to work together and the game was good that way.It would have been enough to raise the numbers on the taunts, lower the numbers on the hate transfers, put a damage modifier on the def stance and a defence modifier on the off stance.Everthing else from spell consolidation to stance timers or taunt modifiers on stances is useless and narrowing down gameplay. It might make sense in the eye of a programmer to consolidate source code. But for a gamer this is so wrong.I say it again: There is an endless number of players who are not raid tanks, raid healers. We have to work together and help out on each others weaknesses. Just finishing the shadow odyssee questline is for many of us an epic efford. We need those options and variety of possibilities. Lots and lots of medium guilds who cant set up the perfect group for every dungeon. Those need options to build new strats. Those players get the same adrenaline rush from a recovery then raiders. The same good feeling when achiving something difficult.Please think about this. I think it is clear that the players accept the changes on hate generation. Just dont take away gameplay elements.

liveja

01-23-2009, 01:57 PM

<cite>Tandy wrote:</cite><blockquote>Unless you live under a rock...lvl'ing up now you can usually get around 120 AA's by 70 or 80 at least. </blockquote>My 73 Troubie has 104 AAs, which I think is about right, considering that I have boat-loads of content left to get the next 96, & have never once XP-locked.

Hirofortis

01-23-2009, 02:07 PM

<cite>Eugam wrote:</cite><blockquote><cite>Kraace@Everfrost wrote:</cite><blockquote>I basically don't have a problem with the concepts that the devs are trying to implement. Defensive stance for tanking, offensive stance for DPS. I have problems with the implementation.</blockquote>/sign pre hate transfer the game was about balance of tankage and dps. Both had to work together and the game was good that way.It would have been enough to raise the numbers on the taunts, lower the numbers on the hate transfers, put a damage modifier on the def stance and a defence modifier on the off stance.Everthing else from spell consolidation to stance timers or taunt modifiers on stances is useless and narrowing down gameplay. It might make sense in the eye of a programmer to consolidate source code. But for a gamer this is so wrong.I say it again: There is an endless number of players who are not raid tanks, raid healers. We have to work together and help out on each others weaknesses. Just finishing the shadow odyssee questline is for many of us an epic efford. We need those options and variety of possibilities. Lots and lots of medium guilds who cant set up the perfect group for every dungeon. Those need options to build new strats. Those players get the same adrenaline rush from a recovery then raiders. The same good feeling when achiving something difficult.Please think about this. I think it is clear that the players accept the changes on hate generation. Just dont take away gameplay elements.</blockquote>Agro has been out of balance for a long time. The only way they have been able to work with it is by giving tanks more and more DPS. Then the DPS classes complain because the tanks are doing as much DPS as them. I am glad you thought that worked, but really, it did not. I for one am happy to see them working on the agro issues and have been very pleased with how much they have been listening to everyone. There have been a lot of updates already to what was originally put on test and they are refining it where it should be refined. After the lastest test I can see that they have been listening and things are getting a lot better. A few more tweaks and the system will hopefully be ready for live and we can be done with this part of the games evolution and be able to move on to doing more. <img src="/smilies/3b63d1616c5dfcf29f8a7a031aaa7cad.gif" border="0" alt="SMILEY" />

OutcastBlade

01-23-2009, 04:25 PM

You know, I am slowly becoming way disenchanted with "public opinion" on this issue. Everyone fails to see the big picture and they just focus on the stuff that really doesn't matter. They think that now that they don't need to dps to maintain hate that maintaining hate is ALL they are going to be doing.Shut up lol.A tank is going to be judged now on two things.1.) Can I keep the mobs on me.2.) Can I also dps.If I were a raid leader for instance, since raids are a balancing game of hate to such a level that most players don't find the constant pressure fun I would not take a tank who was only good at surviving the mob and keeping it focused on him unless all other tanks copuldn't do that. I would look for a tank that can do that AND dps because we still need to kill the mob.The fact is you have DPS classes that can churn out upwards of 15k/sec even in instances. Warlocks and swashies in Outer Stonghold for one. And tanks just cannot do that amount of damage to keep the hate without themselves being gooned out. They need to maintain hate another way.I think these changes are going effect the game positively in the long run. We're going to see lots of hotfixes and updates and some LU's dedicated to cleaning it up, but its a first step. And I'm sorry if you haven't realized that sometimes companies need to create deadlines so that they don't stagnate their own game. As a software dev myself deadlines are both a boon and a curse. But its an unfortunate truth that you cannot let devs take their time because then nothing will ever get done.PS.) Fix my epic SOE. Make it a toggleable effect.

Kurindor_Mythecnea

01-23-2009, 04:35 PM

irvisscott

01-23-2009, 05:25 PM

<cite>Krunck@Everfrost wrote:</cite><blockquote><cite>Eugam wrote:</cite><blockquote><cite>Kraace@Everfrost wrote:</cite><blockquote>I basically don't have a problem with the concepts that the devs are trying to implement. Defensive stance for tanking, offensive stance for DPS. I have problems with the implementation.</blockquote>/sign pre hate transfer the game was about balance of tankage and dps. Both had to work together and the game was good that way.It would have been enough to raise the numbers on the taunts, lower the numbers on the hate transfers, put a damage modifier on the def stance and a defence modifier on the off stance.Everthing else from spell consolidation to stance timers or taunt modifiers on stances is useless and narrowing down gameplay. It might make sense in the eye of a programmer to consolidate source code. But for a gamer this is so wrong.I say it again: There is an endless number of players who are not raid tanks, raid healers. We have to work together and help out on each others weaknesses. Just finishing the shadow odyssee questline is for many of us an epic efford. We need those options and variety of possibilities. Lots and lots of medium guilds who cant set up the perfect group for every dungeon. Those need options to build new strats. Those players get the same adrenaline rush from a recovery then raiders. The same good feeling when achiving something difficult.Please think about this. I think it is clear that the players accept the changes on hate generation. Just dont take away gameplay elements.</blockquote>Agro has been out of balance for a long time. The only way they have been able to work with it is by giving tanks more and more DPS. Then the DPS classes complain because the tanks are doing as much DPS as them. I am glad you thought that worked, but really, it did not. I for one am happy to see them working on the agro issues and have been very pleased with how much they have been listening to everyone. There have been a lot of updates already to what was originally put on test and they are refining it where it should be refined. After the lastest test I can see that they have been listening and things are getting a lot better. A few more tweaks and the system will hopefully be ready for live and we can be done with this part of the games evolution and be able to move on to doing more. <img src="/eq2/images/smilies/3b63d1616c5dfcf29f8a7a031aaa7cad.gif" border="0" /></blockquote>How is anything better for these people that are complaining after this update? If they are seriously getting out-Dps'ed by a tank now, I suppose they wont be after this update by the tank who is tanking, but then again will they even be invited to the group? The tank that was out Dps'ing them to start with will have their Dps spot with his better Dps and agro shedding abilities . Seriously, if this is true, how are those people better off after this update?

Novusod

01-23-2009, 05:36 PM

I have waited and reserved judgement on this until after I had a good and fair chance to test out these changes in a full group. Yesterday I got that chance and I did not like what I saw one bit. The whole idea behind these changes is to acheive class balance between the 6 fighters. This could be accomplished with minor tweeks to the existing fighters and agro management. What we got instead is a sledgehammer approach where they have atempted to reinvent the wheel by changing the core mechanics of tanking. The result is the tanks are even more unballanced than before in what now feels like a game still stuck in Beta. The class I tested in particular the bruiser is flat out broken. It has been gutted to the core like a turkey that was carved with a chainsaw.Bottem line is you put these changes live and the game will die.Roll Back in '09.

habby2

01-23-2009, 06:07 PM

<cite>Novusod wrote:</cite><blockquote>I have waited and reserved judgement on this until after I had a good and fair chance to test out these changes in a full group. Yesterday I got that chance and I did not like what I saw one bit. The whole idea behind these changes is to acheive class balance between the 6 fighters. This could be accomplished with minor tweeks to the existing fighters and agro management. What we got instead is a sledgehammer approach where they have atempted to reinvent the wheel by changing the core mechanics of tanking. The result is the tanks are even more unballanced than before in what now feels like a game still stuck in Beta. The class I tested in particular the bruiser is flat out broken. It has been gutted to the core like a turkey that was carved with a chainsaw.Bottem line is you put these changes live and the game will die.Roll Back in '09.</blockquote>What everyone has seemed to have forgotten is this is not a change to the core of the game, it is a change BACK to the core of the game. DPS was never supposed to be the main method of aggro control, but a SUPPLEMENT to it. Somewhere along the line it becamed skewed where all of a sudden threat was a supplement to DPS for aggro control. It wasn't an overnight thing, but a general movement away from the core mechanics of tanking. So honestly, this is a return to the core mechanics of tanking, with some tweaks to account for the massive increase in DPS.

Maroger

01-23-2009, 06:22 PM

<cite>Eugam wrote:</cite><blockquote><cite>Kraace@Everfrost wrote:</cite><blockquote>I basically don't have a problem with the concepts that the devs are trying to implement. Defensive stance for tanking, offensive stance for DPS. I have problems with the implementation.</blockquote>/sign pre hate transfer the game was about balance of tankage and dps. Both had to work together and the game was good that way.It would have been enough to raise the numbers on the taunts, lower the numbers on the hate transfers, put a damage modifier on the def stance and a defence modifier on the off stance.Everthing else from spell consolidation to stance timers or taunt modifiers on stances is useless and narrowing down gameplay. It might make sense in the eye of a programmer to consolidate source code. But for a gamer this is so wrong.I say it again: There is an endless number of players who are not raid tanks, raid healers. We have to work together and help out on each others weaknesses. Just finishing the shadow odyssee questline is for many of us an epic efford. We need those options and variety of possibilities. Lots and lots of medium guilds who cant set up the perfect group for every dungeon. Those need options to build new strats. Those players get the same adrenaline rush from a recovery then raiders. The same good feeling when achiving something difficult.Please think about this. I think it is clear that the players accept the changes on hate generation. Just dont take away gameplay elements.</blockquote>I couldn't agree more. There is so much more to this game than Level 80 tanking in TSO but that is the only Aeralik seems to be able to focus on. He doesn't seem to understand or care that he needs to redesign these changes and moderate their impact on lower level players in other zones.His "test" the other night - demonstrates that his only focus is Level 80 and TSO and the rest of us and our opinions are worhtless in his eyes.

Kiljoi

01-23-2009, 06:36 PM

this whole "get out dps'd by the tank" crap is rediculous. if this is your problem then your gear is subpar, your sequence and timing must be terrible, and you tank isnt fighting something trivial (so he/she can put on his best dps gear and go all out thus sacrificing survivability) and the tank is getting all the good buffs.the dps'rs i roll with exceed me by far on dps on any fight that is difficult (aka i have to withstand substantial inc damage). quite going on about this seems to be a waste of time to me.regardless many of us feel like we are getting shafted here... gu51.. bad idea.

Junaru

01-23-2009, 06:45 PM

<cite>Kiljoi@Blackburrow wrote:</cite><blockquote>this whole "get out dps'd by the tank" crap is rediculous. if this is your problem then your gear is subpar, your sequence and timing must be terrible, and you tank isnt fighting something trivial (so he/she can put on his best dps gear and go all out thus sacrificing survivability) and the tank is getting all the good buffs.the dps'rs i roll with exceed me by far on dps on any fight that is difficult (aka i have to withstand substantial inc damage). quite going on about this seems to be a waste of time to me.regardless many of us feel like we are getting shafted here... gu51.. bad idea.</blockquote>I don't mind being force to tank in defencive stance but I do have to agree with you. Half the issue with DPS classes being out DPSed by tanks is cause they lack skill to play the game and they don't bother to read up on their class. The other half is fighters reading up on their class and having enough skill to DPS and tank.I seen a player go from a fabled epic to a mythical epic and excepted to do crazy DPS. When he only improved a little only then is when he started to question how to play. I've seen a nakid Assassin out parse every DPS class in a raid. Lastly I have seen a healer crushing DPS class while keeping the group healed.Sucky people suck regardless.

ke'la

01-23-2009, 06:55 PM

<cite>Glacier@Kithicor wrote:</cite><blockquote><cite>Novusod wrote:</cite><blockquote>I have waited and reserved judgement on this until after I had a good and fair chance to test out these changes in a full group. Yesterday I got that chance and I did not like what I saw one bit. The whole idea behind these changes is to acheive class balance between the 6 fighters. This could be accomplished with minor tweeks to the existing fighters and agro management. What we got instead is a sledgehammer approach where they have atempted to reinvent the wheel by changing the core mechanics of tanking. The result is the tanks are even more unballanced than before in what now feels like a game still stuck in Beta. The class I tested in particular the bruiser is flat out broken. It has been gutted to the core like a turkey that was carved with a chainsaw.Bottem line is you put these changes live and the game will die.Roll Back in '09.</blockquote>What everyone has seemed to have forgotten is this is not a change to the core of the game, it is a change BACK to the core of the game. DPS was never supposed to be the main method of aggro control, but a SUPPLEMENT to it. Somewhere along the line it becamed skewed where all of a sudden threat was a supplement to DPS for aggro control. It wasn't an overnight thing, but a general movement away from the core mechanics of tanking. So honestly, this is a return to the core mechanics of tanking, with some tweaks to account for the massive increase in DPS.</blockquote>I can tell you why this evolution happened, it is very simple. Damage output increases every level on an exponential curve, while Taunt output increases on a Liniar curve(this is on live). Part of the reason for this is because Taunts are not tied it any skills or stats, unlike damage dealing and heals. This has caused Taunts to lag way behind damage when it comes to hate generation. This change is inpart to correct that design error that dates back atleast to LU13 if not befor then.

Gerras

01-23-2009, 07:12 PM

I appreciate that quite a few of you look at these changes with raiding in mind. Please keep in mind that a lot of us do not raid and have no ambitions to raid due to RL obligations.Now for my $.02... Based on information I have read, heard from other players and guildies but not from actual time on the test server (hey at least I admit it).I am a caster by nature, not a tank, though I have an 80 tank (sorry hate playing it). When I built the tank it was with the understanding that I was a meatshield, nothing more. My job was to hold agro while the casters nuked it down. I am watching tanks (now keep in mind, no raid gear and limited to no masters) out dps'ing a swashy, coercer and wizard at times. Ok that's broken big time, face it, that should never happen. In the beginning the casters were feared due to the high dps, tanks were afraid of losing agro to them and seeing them lying on their back and losing their dps. Now the casters nuke away without fear, I barely ever hit deagro anymore, and I parse at 2400+ most of the time, if fission is up 3400+. Some of you look at that and think, wow that's low, again, no fabled gear, very limited masters (the cheap ones), take those away from your raid wizard, he/she will probably parse there too. But take an SK or Pally the same way, no fabled or limited to no masters and they can parse that high or even higher. I was in a zone last night where the pally was parsing between 5 and 6k, ok that's broken. I know a 75 Pally that will solo about 10 solo mobs (his level) at the same time, or a single ^^^ heroic one level below him, without a healer. Tell me, that makes sense.It has come to a point that TSO groups are not looking for Wizards and Warlocks, they want a guard(or Pally/SK), bruiser (or bezerker), swashy (or assasin), dirge (or coercer/Illusionist) and 2 healers and can wipe most group TSO instances. Where is the dps, everyone in the group puts it out in some cases higher then the wizard. Groups don't look for cloth that much anymore, they can't take a hit and the dps can be gotten from an offtank (bruiser).I have since then rolled a Dirge and he is currently at 75 and because I have 3 other 80's he flew up levels, he now has 91 AA's... 91 AA's at 75, and I did almost every quest I could to get AA's, ok that's broken too. Once I get to 80, I am hoping to have 100 to 110 AA's, then I am going back to find and finish every grey quest I can, so I only get AA's.So my point? If they are trying to align the groups again where the tanks are meat shields and the scouts and casters are the dps'rs, maybe they are headed in the right direction. I think maybe they should have eased it in instead of deciding one day to go "Hey look lets completely re-work the game, we have a lot of dedicated people and they will put up with whatever we do, they have too much time and money invested in it."I think SOE like a lot of companies are no longer listening to their customers but making decisions they believe are right or in some cases thinking that what ever they do we will put up with. Look at the "Great Plat Exploit" from the last expansion. Ok who really believes SOE did a lot about that. We screamed and yelled for a roll back, what did they do, little to nothing.What SOE needs to do is work with us as customers to define the roles these classes play in groups, 2 group raids and full raids and begin to align the classes to what they are suppose to be doing, slowly not over night.Ok, so I am done with my soap box, anyone want it?

Xanrn

01-23-2009, 08:27 PM

As was said before Tanks out dpsing people because they out gear them or they just out skill them is not BROKEN.Broken is some noob dps who can't play for crap/nowhere near the gear of the Tank out dpsing them just because.And no a Paladin pulling 5-6k dps ain't broken, they have 6 aoes, 40% aoe autoattack with the highest auto table in the game(with AAs) and with their mythical they hit for obscene amounts.IF they are hitting 5-6k parses its because they have worked to bring their character to that level and its not broken.Its not our fault you have the stupid idea Tank equals Meat Shield.I suggest you look up Tank on the Internet, can't miss it. Its the big metal thing with the large cannon and multiple machine guns.Then I suggest you look up Knight, Roman Legionaire, Berzerker, Paladin.Then realise all these heavily armoured people/things are not mobile shields for the rest of the army, but the Shock Troops.

Gisallo

01-23-2009, 10:52 PM

<cite>Geras@Mistmoore wrote:</cite><blockquote>I am watching tanks (now keep in mind, no raid gear and limited to no masters) out dps'ing a swashy, coercer and wizard at times. Ok that's broken big time, face it, that should never happen. Sorry but the only time this happens is when A) the tank is much better equipped B) when those dpsers need to learn how to play C) all of the above. Under those circumstances it sure as heck should happen. A caster who does not know his casting order with adept Is and running mastercrafted gear versus a tank with ACT running, all AIII's, shard gear and legendary/fabled weapons. Yeah the tank is going to outdps and well sorry thats the way it should be. L2P includes learning itemization.It has come to a point that TSO groups are not looking for Wizards and Warlocks, they want a guard(or Pally/SK), bruiser (or bezerker), swashy (or assasin), dirge (or coercer/Illusionist) and 2 healers and can wipe most group TSO instances. Where is the dps, everyone in the group puts it out in some cases higher then the wizard. Groups don't look for cloth that much anymore, they can't take a hit and the dps can be gotten from an offtank (bruiser).this is a function of overall mob mechanics (more reflects etc) not a function of individual character class mechnics so I fail to see how its relevant to the conversation. Also from reading the various threads on this issue there are many casters who do not see the problems others due. Rather than saying l2p though I will give the benefit of thr doubt BUT If mob mechanics are the problem address them, you don't [Removed for Content] directly [Removed for Content] other classes in response.I have since then rolled a Dirge and he is currently at 75 and because I have 3 other 80's he flew up levels, he now has 91 AA's... 91 AA's at 75, and I did almost every quest I could to get AA's, ok that's broken too. Once I get to 80, I am hoping to have 100 to 110 AA's, then I am going back to find and finish every grey quest I can, so I only get AA's.That isn't broken its a matter of how you play. Did you also go and try to kill every single up named you could? Did you do instances and thus get more nameds and disco? If you primarily soloe him yeah you won't get as much but thats the price of soloing, fewer/slower AA's. At 75 I had about 95 AA's on my mystic, just hit 98. I expect with a mix of group/solo play to have 110 AA's once I hit 80 if not more. This is as it should be though. The point of adding 20 AA's for each tree from 70-80 was NOT to get 40 AA's in 10 levels, it was to give players something to do after they got the 10 adventure levels. The purpose of the AA's we get for TSO is to keep people playing without increasing the level cap. BTW you don't have to go do greyed quests. Said it before and say it again. Find a group of 40's and mentor down to any larger instance, RE or whatever. ALmost guarentee you a full AA point for the 30 minutes it will take with your 80 there powering them along.If they are trying to align the groups again where the tanks are meat shields and the scouts and casters are the dps'rs, maybe they are headed in the right direction. I think maybe they should have eased it in instead of deciding one day to go "Hey look lets completely re-work the game, we have a lot of dedicated people and they will put up with whatever we do, they have too much time and money invested in it."The problem is even if these changes still make it possible to tank as well (ad they may) many believe the changes to be inappropriate. This is not the tweaking of classes but a complete paradigm shift in how an entire school of classes operates. A game that is 5 years old with players who have been playing the classes this long should NOT be undergoing such massive changes. It potentially alienates the current player base, thus creating bad reputation thus reducing new subscriptions. </blockquote>

Noaani

01-24-2009, 12:17 AM

<cite>Geras@Mistmoore wrote:</cite><blockquote>I parse at 2400+ most of the time, if fission is up 3400+. Some of you look at that and think, wow that's low, again, no fabled gear, very limited masters (the cheap ones), take those away from your raid wizard, he/she will probably parse there too. </blockquote>You need to work on your spell priority.

xKHONSx

01-24-2009, 01:46 AM

Admitting defeat would go a lot further than forcing this live update upon us.Why is it so difficult for you to admit defeat and stop trying to force these changes on us? I think it's pretty obvious most of the population isn't thrilled with these changes and yet you still are trying to force it down our throats. I understand you have wasted, and I do mean wasted, many months of time and a lot of money in brainstorming and implementing these changes, but that doesn't justify pushing all of this to live. It's time to cut your losses and actually listen to some of the legitimately good ideas people have posted.All you are doing now is putting bandaid upon bandaid on each thing you mess up with these changes and then are feverishly trying to make every little flaw fit into your LU. You are making changes and then exposing major weaknesses in classes that currently aren't there on the live servers. Then you have to go back and patch in a fix to bandaid over your last mess up.On top of that you don't respond to constructive feedback from the players. It seems like you just pick and choose only a handful of positive feedback that affirms what you are doing is the greatest thing since sliced bread. The people who are all gung-ho for this update are by far the minority, but since they love what you are doing you just seem to be focused on their feedback. The only other feedback you seem to be listening to is from players who are finding ways around your changes (i.e. stance dancing) and then completely screwing those things over to fit into your grand scheme.Not only that but none of this is being tested properly. Your little test group was set up for you to confirm what you are doing is a positive change. In order to properly test these changes without bias you would need a third party involved to independently test the changes and provide feedback. In addition there are hardly ever any people on test for any of this to ever be tested properly. You are going to eventually push it live and then once again live servers will be acting as beta/test servers as usual.Above and beyond that these changes seem solely focused with level 80 in mind. It seems like lower level characters, soloers and small groupers are getting completely hosed by this update.Does the game function well in its current build? Sure it does but it needs tweaks. If all it needs are some minor adjustments why are you breaking out the sledgehammer instead of the screwdriver?You have pushed the game in this direction for years and now all of a sudden you want to reinvent the wheel this late into the game's life? Why? Why alienate so many of your customers? It would go a long way for you to admit you are wrong with these changes and not force them upon us. You guys admitted defeat with item scaling and the new ambiguous stat displays that you scrapped, so why can't you do that now? This underlined part is pretty important because it showed the players that you are human and capable of making mistakes. Being brave enough to admit defeat was much more admirable than forcing changes upon an upset population.There is absolutely nothing wrong with dps tanking. You made it this way since dps increases exponentially due to the fact that it is affected by a wide array of dps buffs, whereas taunts increase linearly since there isn't much in game to boost them.Leave offensive tanking the way it is and slightly adjust the dps levels some tanks are putting out. Then all you have to do is fix defensive tanking and actually make it a viable option for those who need to use it more often or for those who just prefer to tank that way.There are a lot of people in this game who take the time to better their characters and push the envelope of what their class can do. That's fine that people just enjoy logging on and playing without a care, but that doesn't mean tanks are broken when I regularly test gear and AAs to maximize my potential only to end up grouping with a Wizard who has their ego shattered when I trounce them on the parse since they are using adept I spells, just randomly click buttons instead of a proper casting order, don't know how to spec their aa's properly nor how to gear themselves properly. They should get stomped on the parse and they rightfully do.....except you actually listened to these people who whined that their T1 dps class was sitting on the bottom of the parse and a tank or properly played dps classes were sitting on the top of the parse.You say this update is giving us more options but no matter how hard you try to justify that by distorting the truth you are indeed taking options away.<ul><li>If I had a good healer I used to have the option of expediting the zone by doing more dps in offensive stance, but I took a hit in survivability. It was my choice to make. Doing so benefitted everyone in the group by shaving time off the instance when possible. Now that choice is gone.</li><li>If I was in a group with a Paladin tanking who had Amends on me I had the choice of putting my passive hate buff on or taunting to net them more hate, but if they weren't quite good enough to hold that much aggro I could take off my passive hate proc and stop taunting. With buffs being rolled into stances and taunts disabled in offensive this choice is gone, along with Amends itself.</li><li>You are now trying to make it impossible to stance dance while fighting. Honestly this is part of the skill of tanking. Knowing when you are able to be more dps oriented or more survival oriented was a skill tanks developed, and thus stance dancing was born. Now you want to take that choice away too.</li><li>Different tanks lost the ability to do different combinations of things. Honestly the list just goes on and on but yet you claim there are more choices now. You aren't fooling anyone but yourself when you say that. It is now press this button for tanking and this button for dps.</li></ul>Also, and this is important, tanks aren't there to just absorb hits, they are also there to do damage too. Look at warriors, crusaders or brawlers in any film/book/video game/mythological lore and they dish out damage. Why take this away from people who have become accustomed to YOUR mechanics? From a realistic perspective dps makes more sense from an aggro standpoint than taunting does. Just because taunts/battle cries are so deeply ingrained into the lore of this genre of game doesn't mean you have to follow suit, or should I say realize four years after the game launched that this is what you really meant the game to become.Lastly, overall dps is going to suffer because of this. Not just because the tank is doing less damage but also because the dps classes are going to have to watch their own dps/aggro much closer now and will without a doubt have to back off more than they currently do. How are you going to address fights that have certain dps requirements like Librarians in Palace, King in Lower Corridors, Master T'Lon in Ravenscale or even Curator in Mistmyr? If you are hurting overall dps as much as you are by directly affecting tanks, and indirectly affecting dps, are you going to then go and fix/adjust an entire expansion of content to work around your live update? If so what is the point? Obviously things are working pretty well now. It seems like an awful lot of work to do just to "prove" to us that these changes are good for the game just because your ego is too big to admit you are wrong.

Kordran

01-24-2009, 05:41 AM

<cite>xKHONSx wrote:</cite><blockquote>You have pushed the game in this direction for years and now all of a sudden you want to reinvent the wheel this late into the game's life? Why?</blockquote>I think they answered this indirectly, in terms of scalability, how items and spells upgrade and they're looking down the road towards the next expansion when the level cap hits 90. Just consider Amends. It's a spell that literally has not been upgraded for since the release of the game (it topped out at 49, and just sat there throughout all of the expansions) because the ~40% transfer was already so close to the 50% cap. When you have a core class spell where there's no practical reason to update it over the course of 5 expansions, something is broken.As someone who plays a Paladin, I wasn't terribly pleased with the change to Amends at first. But I've come to have a bit of a different perspective. Amends was so powerful, I think it became a justification to "paper over" some of the other defects of the class. It could be said that there was this issue or that issue, but then it would be follwed up with "Yeah, but then again, they have Amends". There has been, and continue to be, legitimate issues with the class that should be addressed. With the hate transfer removed, there is little justification to continue to put those issues on the back shelf. If anything, Aeralik knows the class was hit pretty hard by these changes and how unpopular it was going to be, and I'm hoping that he keeps in mind when prioritizing what needs to be dealt with when. Perhaps I'm just trying to see a silver lining in the cloud, but he has been pretty responsive to issues that people have raised. This idea that he's just ignoring everyone's feedback and doing his own thing isn't borne out by the facts.In any case, it seems pretty clear that the long term goal of this is to give the developers (both combat mechanics and itemization/content) proverbial room to breathe for future expansions with level and AP cap increases. Since the beginning of EQ, tanks were tanks because of the damage they could take, not the damage they could deal. When you have tanks wearing a choker, chain pieces with scout stats and dual wielding -- doing their job as a tank, holding aggro and floating near the top of the parse -- something is unbalanced. That's what they're trying to address. I still have issues with the implemention, and there's a lot of things that need to be straightened out before this goes live, but I find myself agreeing with the intent of the changes, even though it does impact my own playstyle. I'll simply have to suck it up and adapt to the new paradigm just like everyone else.Edit: As for DPS output, initially I think you will see an overall drop in DPS in groups and raids as people adjust to their new reality. Over time though, folks will learn what they need to do to compensate and they'll start pushing the envelope. I don't think anyone is arguing that this is going to be a "seamless" transition where no one is going to have to change anything about their current playstyle. Both tanks and DPS classes are going to have to learn, through trial and error, what those new boundaries are and how to best maximize their performance. It's not going to be an instantaneous transformation. As for specific encounters, if enough people send them feedback, I'm sure it's something they'll take a look at after the "breaking in" period is over and they're sure it's really a mechanics issue, and not just the players feeling their way through the changes.

Nero

01-24-2009, 09:37 AM

<cite>Ummudien@Guk wrote:</cite><blockquote>Its not our fault you have the stupid idea Tank equals Meat Shield.I suggest you look up Tank on the Internet, can't miss it. Its the big metal thing with the large cannon and multiple machine guns.Then I suggest you look up Knight, Roman Legionaire, Berzerker, Paladin.Then realise all these heavily armoured people/things are not mobile shields for the rest of the army, but the Shock Troops.</blockquote>Well said."A tank is a tracked, armoured fighting vehicle designed for front-line combat which combines operational mobility and tactical offensive and defensive capabilities."from Wikipedia.<a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tank">http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tank</a>"combines operational mobility and tactical offensive and defensive capabilities"Tank is designed for not only defence, but also offence.Tank is never a meat shield or a sandbag which just absorbs an attack.Tank has high offensive capability.It is same even in the case of Knight, Roman Legionaire, Berserker, and Paladin.If a fighter can do only 1dps though he has a sword, for what the sword exist?Doesn't a sword exist for inflicting damage to an enemy, does it?For parrying, a shield and plate armors are enough.Why do we have swords?I want to damage while I tank with defensive stance and taunt.Is it such an unreasonable hope?

Strade

01-24-2009, 12:19 PM

I've seen something coming up many times: the group DPS will suffer. Well maybe if the tank stop playing rambo the need fore 2 healers for most groupe will be gone? You will be able to hire an extra DPS.Remeber I said maybe! In case of a brawler tank, I think 2 healers is needed even in Def. The good thing though is that brawler will be able to tank trash in middle stance wich will make DPS suffer less when having a monk or a bruiser tanking your way to the shards.I for one done some testing with my copied monk and can tell you that soloing isnt affected at all since I seem to kill mobs faster in off than I do on live server. I never had problem tanking instances (with the right group) on live server and on test it seem I will be able to hold agro on these [Removed for Content] mobs encounters wich was my nightmare in this expention. Pickup Grouping will be less tedious for healers in my opinion cause the tank will have no choice but do his job: TANK! This change was needed bad seriously guys stop complaining ... the changes are great as I can tell and I'm not worried anymore about brawler's future. You all knew something was very wrong when analyzing the parse.If it can help some classes to groupe (lets say guardian, monk and bruiser) in TSO than why are you worried? Cause some of you will not be on god mode anymore?

Ahven

01-24-2009, 12:25 PM

<cite>Ummudien@Guk wrote:</cite><blockquote>As was said before Tanks out dpsing people because they out gear them or they just out skill them is not BROKEN.Broken is some noob dps who can't play for crap/nowhere near the gear of the Tank out dpsing them just because.And no a Paladin pulling 5-6k dps ain't broken, they have 6 aoes, 40% aoe autoattack with the highest auto table in the game(with AAs) and with their mythical they hit for obscene amounts.IF they are hitting 5-6k parses its because they have worked to bring their character to that level and its not broken.Its not our fault you have the stupid idea Tank equals Meat Shield.I suggest you look up Tank on the Internet, can't miss it. Its the big metal thing with the large cannon and multiple machine guns.Then I suggest you look up Knight, Roman Legionaire, Berzerker, Paladin.Then realise all these heavily armoured people/things are not mobile shields for the rest of the army, but the Shock Troops.</blockquote>I knew someone was going to break out the old "You just suck" line. You have no idea what you are talking about. I am currently a non raider, but I used to raid hardcore, topped parses and have been playing my class for 4 years (Swashy). My point there is, I DO know how to play my class and still I currently get matched or outparsed at times by equally geared (non raid gear these days) tanks. Oh yea, except Guardian, haven't met one of those yet that can come close to the other tanks. Paladins and SK's destroy me on AE dps. So it's ok for tanks to out dps an AE dps scout?To tell the truth, none of this has mattered much to me, I tested the changes on my monk and on my swashy, the impact in group dynamics hasn't changed much. Lower group dmg output, but not much else. I will continue testing on the monk when I have a chance.

Strade

01-24-2009, 12:26 PM

Strade

01-24-2009, 12:32 PM

<cite>Ahven wrote:</cite><blockquote><cite>Ummudien@Guk wrote:</cite><blockquote>As was said before Tanks out dpsing people because they out gear them or they just out skill them is not BROKEN.Broken is some noob dps who can't play for crap/nowhere near the gear of the Tank out dpsing them just because.And no a Paladin pulling 5-6k dps ain't broken, they have 6 aoes, 40% aoe autoattack with the highest auto table in the game(with AAs) and with their mythical they hit for obscene amounts.IF they are hitting 5-6k parses its because they have worked to bring their character to that level and its not broken.Its not our fault you have the stupid idea Tank equals Meat Shield.I suggest you look up Tank on the Internet, can't miss it. Its the big metal thing with the large cannon and multiple machine guns.Then I suggest you look up Knight, Roman Legionaire, Berzerker, Paladin.Then realise all these heavily armoured people/things are not mobile shields for the rest of the army, but the Shock Troops.</blockquote>I knew someone was going to break out the old "You just suck" line. You have no idea what you are talking about. I am currently a non raider, but I used to raid hardcore, topped parses and have been playing my class for 4 years (Swashy). My point there is, I DO know how to play my class and still I currently get matched or outparsed at times by equally geared (non raid gear these days) tanks. Oh yea, except Guardian, haven't met one of those yet that can come close to the other tanks. Paladins and SK's destroy me on AE dps. So it's ok for tanks to out dps an AE dps scout?To tell the truth, none of this has mattered much to me, I tested the changes on my monk and on my swashy, the impact in group dynamics hasn't changed much. Lower group dmg output, but not much else. I will continue testing on the monk when I have a chance.</blockquote>I think this is the main problem. You realize that I put a 5k DPS on najena (when I know I did 8k dps in this zone like a week ago) cause the SK (very well equiped but not raided gear) is rolling a famous 5.5 k while tanking?? What does that meen for other players in the group? That they suck?I really think some people need to sit down, stop looking at themself and put a little reflexion over the actual tanking mechanic. Do not look at what you lost (dps) but what other class can feel like (crappy).EDIT: Sorry for the multi posting

Froed20

01-24-2009, 01:49 PM

They're doing this because tanks were too reliant on their dps and hate transfer/gain buffs. A tank's #1 role in group or raid is to take the hits while everyone else makes the mob dead, not to dps it down. This is how it was from the start, and in general, this is what a tank is in all MMO's. If you have more than one tank in the group... great. Have one go offensive, and they can go all out and do dps. But if they're taking the hits, their primary aggro should come from taunts, as that is what taunts are there for. Now as for soloers or duos... that's another story. There needs to be some sort of compromise for them, because going one extreme or the other is either gonna get you smacked to hell and back, or slow your progress to an agonizing crawl. Maybe if they made a third stance that gave you reduced benefits of both stances, but significantly reduces your taunts as well. I don't know, just a suggestion.

Novusod

01-24-2009, 01:51 PM

<cite>Glacier@Kithicor wrote:</cite><blockquote><cite>Novusod wrote:</cite><blockquote>I have waited and reserved judgement on this until after I had a good and fair chance to test out these changes in a full group. Yesterday I got that chance and I did not like what I saw one bit. The whole idea behind these changes is to acheive class balance between the 6 fighters. This could be accomplished with minor tweeks to the existing fighters and agro management. What we got instead is a sledgehammer approach where they have atempted to reinvent the wheel by changing the core mechanics of tanking. The result is the tanks are even more unballanced than before in what now feels like a game still stuck in Beta. The class I tested in particular the bruiser is flat out broken. It has been gutted to the core like a turkey that was carved with a chainsaw.Bottem line is you put these changes live and the game will die.Roll Back in '09.</blockquote>What everyone has seemed to have forgotten is this is not a change to the core of the game, it is a change BACK to the core of the game. DPS was never supposed to be the main method of aggro control, but a SUPPLEMENT to it. Somewhere along the line it becamed skewed where all of a sudden threat was a supplement to DPS for aggro control. It wasn't an overnight thing, but a general movement away from the core mechanics of tanking. So honestly, this is a return to the core mechanics of tanking, with some tweaks to account for the massive increase in DPS.</blockquote>Maybe a guardian such as yourself could hold hate being at the bottom of the parse but NOT a bruiser. Bruisers have always held hate by having dps just a step or two below the top parsers. Doing 2k damage and 2k hate per second will not hold agro off someone doing 5k dps. Bruisers have ALWAYS had the weakest taunts and agro generating abilities in the game. Over time dps has gone up by leaps and bounds but taunts have stayed the same. Now they are making the same mistake AGAIN cutting dps exponentially and increasing taunts linearly.The whole point of this revamp is create ballance in the fighter classes NOT change Core game mechanics four years After the game was released. The changes being presented are compelety uncalled for. To ballance brawlers with the plate tanks all that would be needed is to increase the taunts. This would give the brawler tank the choice of either doing 1k Combat art or doing a 5k taunt. If hate was low do the taunt. If hate was holding then do the CA and help kill the mob faster. Simple changes are the kind of changes that are needed here not this crazy sledge hammer aproach. Don't try to force all tanks to tank like guards especially when not all tanks have the same tools a gaurd has.

liveja

01-24-2009, 01:56 PM

<cite>Geras@Mistmoore wrote:</cite><blockquote>I have since then rolled a Dirge and he is currently at 75 and because I have 3 other 80's he flew up levels, he now has 91 AA's... 91 AA's at 75, and I did almost every quest I could to get AA's, ok that's broken too.</blockquote>My Troubie is 73rd level with 105 AAs. The toon has never been level-locked, & has solo'd probably 70 of those 73 levels.Note that I've only got 1 level 80, too. I honestly have to wonder what you've not done to have 14 fewer AAs than I do.

de lori

01-24-2009, 02:01 PM

Mentalep

01-24-2009, 02:10 PM

<cite>Nero wrote:</cite><blockquote><cite>Ummudien@Guk wrote:</cite><blockquote>Its not our fault you have the stupid idea Tank equals Meat Shield.I suggest you look up Tank on the Internet, can't miss it. Its the big metal thing with the large cannon and multiple machine guns.Then I suggest you look up Knight, Roman Legionaire, Berzerker, Paladin.Then realise all these heavily armoured people/things are not mobile shields for the rest of the army, but the Shock Troops.</blockquote>Well said."A tank is a tracked, armoured fighting vehicle designed for front-line combat which combines operational mobility and tactical offensive and defensive capabilities."from Wikipedia.<a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tank">http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tank</a>"combines operational mobility and tactical offensive and defensive capabilities"Tank is designed for not only defence, but also offence.Tank is never a meat shield or a sandbag which just absorbs an attack.Tank has high offensive capability.It is same even in the case of Knight, Roman Legionaire, Berserker, and Paladin.If a fighter can do only 1dps though he has a sword, for what the sword exist?Doesn't a sword exist for inflicting damage to an enemy, does it?For parrying, a shield and plate armors are enough.Why do we have swords?I want to damage while I tank with defensive stance and taunt.Is it such an unreasonable hope?</blockquote>If you look back at pen and paper RPGs like D&D, characters who weren't directly focused on combat were still useful. A fighter was generally better at dealing and taking melee damage than a rogue, but every adventuring party still wanted a rogue because of everything else they could do - find and remove dangerous traps, for example. Mages and clerics, too; yes, they could learn potent combat spells, if they chose to do so, but they could also create magic items, divine information, purify dirty water, and so on. Nobody complained that fighters did too much damage, because in D&D, that was their purpose.The problem with translating balance like this to an MMO is that adventuring in an MMO is generally pretty unsophisticated: you kill things and take their stuff. As such, balance centers entirely around combat, with offense, defense, buffs, debuffs, and healing being the only real factors. This combined with weak AI is what brought about the "tank vs dps" paradigm, and "taunts" along with it.I'm not saying that's the only way it can be done, but that's how the genre has evolved.I don't see why tanks won't be able to put out at least moderate dps while tanking after GU51. I will. Plus, with the detaunts gone, you aren't being outright prevented from tanking through pure dps... you'll just have to put out more of it in order to do so.

Xanrn

01-24-2009, 02:14 PM

<cite>Strade@Storms wrote:</cite><blockquote><cite>Nero wrote:</cite><blockquote><cite>Ummudien@Guk wrote:</cite><blockquote>Its not our fault you have the stupid idea Tank equals Meat Shield.I suggest you look up Tank on the Internet, can't miss it. Its the big metal thing with the large cannon and multiple machine guns.Then I suggest you look up Knight, Roman Legionaire, Berzerker, Paladin.Then realise all these heavily armoured people/things are not mobile shields for the rest of the army, but the Shock Troops.</blockquote>Well said."A tank is a tracked, armoured fighting vehicle designed for front-line combat which combines operational mobility and tactical offensive and defensive capabilities."from Wikipedia.<a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tank">http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tank</a>"combines operational mobility and tactical offensive and defensive capabilities"Tank is designed for not only defence, but also offence.Tank is never a meat shield or a sandbag which just absorbs an attack.Tank has high offensive capability.It is same even in the case of Knight, Roman Legionaire, Berserker, and Paladin.If a fighter can do only 1dps though he has a sword, for what the sword exist?Doesn't a sword exist for inflicting damage to an enemy, does it?For parrying, a shield and plate armors are enough.Why do we have swords?I want to damage while I tank with defensive stance and taunt.Is it such an unreasonable hope?</blockquote>Omg you are not comparing a RL Tank to a Guardian I hope?I dare you to wear a full plate armor and try swinging a sword like a monk would punch a target. I think you will understand that afther all, this big bad a** armor got drawback.Seriously this is geting unrational ... I pity the poor devs that are actually bringing some great change to fix a long time broken mechanic witout reinventing the wheel like you think they do.</blockquote>And yet there were these things called Knights...Who *shock* wore Full Plate and killed people easy enough.You know nothing about fighting in plate armour, fighting in plate is easier than fighting in chain...You utterly failed to acknowledge the fact, that the most heavily armoured unit in any army since Ancient Greece. Were the Shock Troops, the front line soldiers tasked with leading attacks.You can trace the lineage of the Tank all the way back to the Ancient Greek Hoplites.Also I find it hillarious a Swashbuckler is saying Tanks should Tank and not DPS, yeah and you should Debuff and not DPS.But no all you crybabies are whining because you A)suck, B) the Tank is better player than you C)the Tank out gears you and so they are stealing your thunder by topping the parse.Swashbucklers shouldn't worry about their DPS, they should be doing their jobs and debuffing the mob.Apparantly every Class except the Tanks are allowed to do more than 2 things at once, but Tanks are only allowed to Tank.

Dorieon

01-24-2009, 02:59 PM

<cite>Strade@Storms wrote:</cite><blockquote>I've seen something coming up many times: the group DPS will suffer. Well maybe if the tank stop playing rambo the need fore 2 healers for most groupe will be gone? You will be able to hire an extra DPS.Remeber I said maybe! In case of a brawler tank, I think 2 healers is needed even in Def. The good thing though is that brawler will be able to tank trash in middle stance wich will make DPS suffer less when having a monk or a bruiser tanking your way to the shards.I for one done some testing with my copied monk and can tell you that soloing isnt affected at all since I seem to kill mobs faster in off than I do on live server. I never had problem tanking instances (with the right group) on live server and on test it seem I will be able to hold agro on these [Removed for Content] mobs encounters wich was my nightmare in this expention. Pickup Grouping will be less tedious for healers in my opinion cause the tank will have no choice but do his job: TANK! This change was needed bad seriously guys stop complaining ... the changes are great as I can tell and I'm not worried anymore about brawler's future. You all knew something was very wrong when analyzing the parse.If it can help some classes to groupe (lets say guardian, monk and bruiser) in TSO than why are you worried? Cause some of you will not be on god mode anymore?</blockquote>I'm kinda tired of people acting like the parse was why most tanks were tanking in Offensive stance. Well I guess it was in a round about way, it was just not our own parse. I'm sure there are a few that tank in O stance just for their personal parse but for the most part I bet it happened like this...With the exception of a few very easy zones, I actually would prefer to tank in D stance. The reason most tanks had to start using O stance was because the DPSers (yes probably the same DPSers that complained tanks were outparsing them) could not learn how to hold back a little. Since they refused to hold back, we had to switch to O stance and maintain hate via dps. We then got very good at maximizing our dps/hate because we are all competing for much fewer spots than the other classes and we have to be better than the guy to our left and right or we get left out.So, yeah we might be able to bring another dps in to help get back what we lost but, DPSers are gonna have to learn to control their personal agro better. But that should be easy now that we have a hate meter right?

Maroger

01-24-2009, 03:37 PM

<cite>Fayle@Mistmoore wrote:</cite><blockquote>They're doing this because tanks were too reliant on their dps and hate transfer/gain buffs. A tank's #1 role in group or raid is to take the hits while everyone else makes the mob dead, not to dps it down. This is how it was from the start, and in general, this is what a tank is in all MMO's. If you have more than one tank in the group... great. Have one go offensive, and they can go all out and do dps. But if they're taking the hits, their primary aggro should come from taunts, as that is what taunts are there for. Now as for soloers or duos... that's another story. There needs to be some sort of compromise for them, because going one extreme or the other is either gonna get you smacked to hell and back, or slow your progress to an agonizing crawl. Maybe if they made a third stance that gave you reduced benefits of both stances, but significantly reduces your taunts as well. I don't know, just a suggestion.</blockquote>This has been my point. Aeralik has made no effort at compromise for soloers and duoers. He is entirely too focused on Group and Raid and TSO zones entirely. TSO is a mess and some changes need to be made to that expansion before he focuses on the players.Wasn't Aeralik the lead designer for TSO?

Moonlance

01-27-2009, 02:50 AM

<div><a href="../user/profile.m?user_id=132748">"xKHONSx</a></div> Loremaster Joined: Dec 29, 2004 Messages: 90 Offline Watering tanking down into standing there and taunting is going to bore all of the tanks who have become accustomed to the changes soe has made to tanking over the years. You, the Dev team, has been pushing the game in this direction for four years and now this late in the game's life you once again want to completely reinvent the game for no real reason.It seems like sony purposely does these complete overhauls for the sole reason of reminding the customer whose vision this game is. It's almost like they think "Well we want to try this now and if you don't like it then too bad." All they usually end up doing is [Removed for Content] a lot of people off as they show they are not in touch with their customer base at all. In return they lose more subs and waste money that could have been better spent adding more content or fixing real issues.Who is going to [Removed for Content] you off more, someone who is standing there yelling at you or someone who punches you in the eye? Sure taunts distract you for a moment, but when that Brigand sneaks behind you and stabs you in the spleen there is no amount of taunting that is going to distract you from the wound he just inflicted. The only reason why taunts are in mmo's of this nature is due to the fact that they are so deeply ingrained in the lore of the genre. Sony, be different, leave dps tanking as an option and just fix defensive tanking since there are plenty of times you do need to be in defensive.Offensive tanking on live isn't too far off of what it should be. Some minor tweaks to the actual dps that tanks are doing was all that was needed to balance that aspect. Tanks should be able to put up T2 dps type numbers and if they are indeed doing more than T1 dps classes (the group that supposedly has complained that tanks do too much damage) then either the dps'ers suck, the buffs in the group benefit the tank significantly more than they benefit the dps'ers, the tank has an obscene amount of dps buffs on him or a combination of all three. Usually it is more of the former and the dps'ers just suck.As a Monk tanking in offensive stance I already run a much larger risk of taking damage since our mitigation boost as well as our uncontested avoidance is directly tied into the defensive stance. If they had just tweaked offensive tanking there wouldn't even be a need for the 5% increase to damage taken on offensive stance. All they would have had to do was make it so every tank's stances worked like a Brawler - everyone loses their mitigation bonuses and uncontested avoidance while in offensive stance and tie those very things in with defensive stance only. Problem solved without completely revamping combat/aggro mechanics.The only thing they would have had to overhaul was defensive tanking. They could implement the current changes on test and apply only the defensive tanking mechanics.Instead of taking this approach and slightly tweaking offensive tanking and fixing defensive tanking they are once again reinventing the wheel when it is completely unnecessary. Why focus the little bit of money from dwindling subs into redoing combat mechanics every 1 - 1.5 years instead of tweaking/modifying existing mechanics and offering more content?Personally I would have much rather seen them do what I've mentioned. It would give people more choices in how they want to go about things. Instead it is literally watered down into two choices....click this button for tanking and click this button for dps'ing. There really isn't much middle ground now and there certainly isn't a lot of choice."I agree. All they needed to do was tweak the system, not reinvent the wheel.

Trojenn

01-27-2009, 03:07 AM

<cite>Ummudien@Guk wrote:</cite><blockquote>And yet there were these things called Knights...Who *shock* wore Full Plate and killed people easy enough.You know nothing about fighting in plate armour, fighting in plate is easier than fighting in chain...You utterly failed to acknowledge the fact, that the most heavily armoured unit in any army since Ancient Greece. Were the Shock Troops, the front line soldiers tasked with leading attacks.You can trace the lineage of the Tank all the way back to the Ancient Greek Hoplites.Also I find it hillarious a Swashbuckler is saying Tanks should Tank and not DPS, yeah and you should Debuff and not DPS.But no all you crybabies are whining because you A)suck, B) the Tank is better player than you C)the Tank out gears you and so they are stealing your thunder by topping the parse.Swashbucklers shouldn't worry about their DPS, they should be doing their jobs and debuffing the mob.Apparantly every Class except the Tanks are allowed to do more than 2 things at once, but Tanks are only allowed to Tank.</blockquote>First of all, instead of calling all swashbucklers out, maybe you should point a finger at the one who stated this. Not all of us think this way therefor make your satements true.Aside from that, I completely agree about tanks. Its is crap that on how they have approached the reasoning behind this. Since KOS SoE has been upping the DPS for most classes and left a few behind and would go back and give them a boost. With RoK the dev team seriously upped the DPS of most classes including tanks. They put enough tank gear into the game that allowed Fighters to go offensive and still have good stats. Yes DPS went up and fighters needed to up there dps to hold agro. But please, name 1 fighter that used DPS souly to hold agro, did you all not still use taunts and rescues and insolent and reinforce and holy ground and death march. Am I wrong in stating that even though you were tanking in O-Stance, those taunts were just as needed, also that when you came to a harder mob you went defensive and your raid held back there DPS as to not pull agro. SoE has pushed DPS to an all time high and I for one realize this. But for fu*ks sake, is it realy neccessary to nerf all classes to hell.And for the person I quoted, you bash swashbucklers and tell us to debuff, well by all means tell me what to debuff and what we have left for a raid. Our Hate Transfer is gone, we got stuck with a crappy effect on our Epics, we do not have near the DPS of T1 classes but yet we are not considered a utility class. Brigands bring alot to the table and swashes well we bring good looks <img src="/smilies/3b63d1616c5dfcf29f8a7a031aaa7cad.gif" border="0" alt="SMILEY" />.that is all.

Moonlance

01-27-2009, 03:15 AM

The problem with swashes is that their debuffs are only seen as useful to struggling guilds that have a hard time with raid content. Swash debuffs are a crutch for healers. For "instance groups" swash debuffs are fairly useless, except maybe TS which all rogues get for those really hard fights. And the greater your DPS gets, and the more well geared your MT becomes (group or raid) the more useless offensive debuffs become. IN the end it is all about DPS.

TalanRM

01-27-2009, 03:58 AM

<cite>Scayre@Oasis wrote:</cite><blockquote>And the greater your DPS gets, and the more well geared your MT becomes (group or raid) the more useless offensive debuffs become. IN the end it is all about DPS.</blockquote>Agree with the above. I tend to think of offensive debuffs and offensive buffs as a way for compensating for a lack of a second healer, or to assist with overpulls.In respect of the it's all about DPS, this is becoming increasingly true as these days it appears that every group - even in instances, not just raids - runs a parse. If everytime a persons groups they are effectively and publically being graded in a parse that is bound to become the defining measure of success for many people. DPS has always been an important factor, but these days we seem to be conditioning ourselves and grading each other around it.

Malaqai

01-27-2009, 04:10 AM

Buff merging is so awesome w000.Can I, as an assassin, get all my DPS CAs merged into one button so I don't have to worry about timing everything??IMO, that would rock.I'd also like that you could autoattack on follow... So on raids, I just press one button here and there and top parse.Oh yes.Seriously... If they don't do this right, 5 years in, it could be the end of EQ2.People won't take much more of this crap.

Yimway

01-27-2009, 12:22 PM

ke'la

01-27-2009, 02:13 PM

<cite>Malaqai wrote:</cite><blockquote>Buff merging is so awesome w000.Can I, as an assassin, get all my DPS CAs merged into one button so I don't have to worry about timing everything??IMO, that would rock.I'd also like that you could autoattack on follow... So on raids, I just press one button here and there and top parse.Oh yes.Seriously... If they don't do this right, 5 years in, it could be the end of EQ2.People won't take much more of this crap.</blockquote>There is a HUGE differance between buffs cast only following death, and then never cast again... as they are toggles and CAs or buffs that only last a short time befor requiring recast. The buffs that are getting consolidated are those that only ever get cast on themselfs at the start of the fight... that said moving them to Stances is a bad Idea, why can't they have them in both stances like they do now?

Ceolus

01-27-2009, 03:51 PM

Some of you are acting like in defensive stance all your combat arts will be disabled.

Buckminster

01-28-2009, 05:07 PM

<blockquote>And yet there were these things called Knights...Who *shock* wore Full Plate and killed people easy enough.You know nothing about fighting in plate armour, fighting in plate is easier than fighting in chain...You utterly failed to acknowledge the fact, that the most heavily armoured unit in any army since Ancient Greece. Were the Shock Troops, the front line soldiers tasked with leading attacks.You can trace the lineage of the Tank all the way back to the Ancient Greek Hoplites.</blockquote>...[flame=ON] Can we please get over the comparisons between EQ2 mechanics and historical combat? This is a fantasy role-playing game, not an historical MMO. No Greek hoplite, Varangian guard, Saxon huscarl, or Teutonic knight ever had to deal with fireball-tossing gnolls, venemous crabs the size of Volkswagens, or lizardmen named Venril Sathir. If you want historical combat mechanics in your computer game, you're in the wrong place.And before you're going to make claims about what type of armour is "easier" to fight in, you'd do well to establish some credentials. The number of people world-wide with extensive experience in unchoreographed sparring (let alone fighting) in duplicates, or even close replicas, of historical armour is a whole lot smaller than the population of EQ2. I'll guarantee that the majority of those people don't play any MMOs regularly, let alone EQ2. [flame=OFF]Let's keep this discussion to the MMO mechanics, rather than diluting it with overwrought attempts to tie in historical analogies. I agree with the folks who say that more choices of tanking techniques beats fewer choices. I haven't had enough time to really play my SK (or any other toon) on test long enough to really get a feel for how the changes will work (or not work) across solo, duo, group, and raid play, so I've stayed out of the rest of the discussion - I think actual play-time is the only way to figure that out.

ke'la

01-28-2009, 11:30 PM

<cite>Buckminster wrote:</cite><blockquote><blockquote>And yet there were these things called Knights...Who *shock* wore Full Plate and killed people easy enough.You know nothing about fighting in plate armour, fighting in plate is easier than fighting in chain...You utterly failed to acknowledge the fact, that the most heavily armoured unit in any army since Ancient Greece. Were the Shock Troops, the front line soldiers tasked with leading attacks.You can trace the lineage of the Tank all the way back to the Ancient Greek Hoplites.</blockquote>...[flame=ON] Can we please get over the comparisons between EQ2 mechanics and historical combat? This is a fantasy role-playing game, not an historical MMO. No Greek hoplite, Varangian guard, Saxon huscarl, or Teutonic knight ever had to deal with fireball-tossing gnolls, venemous crabs the size of Volkswagens, or lizardmen named Venril Sathir. If you want historical combat mechanics in your computer game, you're in the wrong place.And before you're going to make claims about what type of armour is "easier" to fight in, you'd do well to establish some credentials. The number of people world-wide with extensive experience in unchoreographed sparring (let alone fighting) in duplicates, or even close replicas, of historical armour is a whole lot smaller than the population of EQ2. I'll guarantee that the majority of those people don't play any MMOs regularly, let alone EQ2. [flame=OFF]Let's keep this discussion to the MMO mechanics, rather than diluting it with overwrought attempts to tie in historical analogies. I agree with the folks who say that more choices of tanking techniques beats fewer choices. I haven't had enough time to really play my SK (or any other toon) on test long enough to really get a feel for how the changes will work (or not work) across solo, duo, group, and raid play, so I've stayed out of the rest of the discussion - I think actual play-time is the only way to figure that out.</blockquote>Accually the poster is correct, a properly fitted set of plate armor is easier to fight in then your average piece of Chain Mail armor.The reason that is, is because Chain Mail was used mainly by the Pesent "Cannon Fodder" troops and they didn't have the money for properly fitted armor, so basically they war a Tunic of Chain.That said, what EQ2 calls "Chain" armor is really Brigadin armor wich, when proporly fitted is easier to fight in then Plate armor.

Maroger

01-29-2009, 01:00 AM

New patch for fighters tonight - SK's nerfed -- our damage lowered on offense below what it was on Jan. 11 when this round of buff/merges started.

liveja

01-29-2009, 11:49 AM

<cite>kela wrote:</cite><blockquote>Accually the poster is correct</blockquote>The poster to whom you responded is MORE correct: this is a FANTASY game. Please either leave your "Magikal Realism" at the door, or else return to kindergarten for remedial lessons in Imagination 101 <img src="/eq2/images/smilies/69934afc394145350659cd7add244ca9.gif" border="0" />

Mathafern

01-29-2009, 12:05 PM

<cite>Maroger wrote:</cite><blockquote>New patch for fighters tonight - SK's nerfed -- our damage lowered on offense below what it was on Jan. 11 when this round of buff/merges started.</blockquote>Yeah offhand I'd say the reason for forcing people into one stance or another (a bad idea IMO) was so that they would then have an easybutton for "balancing" (we won't use the n-word here) classes. SK's doing too much damage in O stance? Dial that one down. It's one-stop-shopping for balance. At least they didn't try to hide the n- ah, balancing. They could have as easily put multipliers behind the scenes for each class and dialed those up and down.Given all the QQing about SK DPS I'm not suprised- it would be nice to get more mit in D stance in return or maybe a slightly lower power cost somewhere. So far I'm seeing a lot of take and not a lot of give with this update- then again I'm not having any aggro problems atm, so I'm happier without any changes.

ke'la

01-29-2009, 08:35 PM

<cite>Flaye@Mistmoore wrote:</cite><blockquote><cite>kela wrote:</cite><blockquote>Accually the poster is correct</blockquote>The poster to whom you responded is MORE correct: this is a FANTASY game. Please either leave your "Magikal Realism" at the door, or else return to kindergarten for remedial lessons in Imagination 101 <img src="/eq2/images/smilies/69934afc394145350659cd7add244ca9.gif" border="0" /></blockquote>I agree that in a fantasy game, like EQ2, RL stuff like what kind of armor you can fight easier in is unimportaint. As a game needs rules to be fun for all, there has to be limitations placed some where, and in the case of EQ2 they desided the more protective the armor is you can ware the lower the damage you can dishout, makes good sence IMO and does not need to have any baises in reality.I was mearly informing the person I quoted that IRL standard Chainmail is infact harder to move in then standard plate armor. That said the type of "chain" armor that we wear in EQ2 is not Mail, but fitted Brigidine armor, and Brigidine armor allows almost as good movement as not wearing armor, while providing very good protection, and unlike Mail movement in it was faily quite. Heck, modern body armor is moving back to Brigidine style armor with the new <a href="http://www.pinnaclearmor.com/body-armor/dragon-skin.php" target="_blank">Dragon Skin</a> armor