Will berserkers remain offensive melee tanks?

[Ashroh]

<p>I'm a returning player (have not played for 1,5 years) and after careful and long consideration I've chosen the Berserker class. I love plate, I prefer dual wield, I adore decent melee DPS: sounds like the Berserker class is for me hey ?</p><p>Though, I'm still in a bit of doubt due to the announced fighter changes. More inclined on tanking then on dps, sounds logical if you think about it for TANK classes. But that's what I love about the berserker, he can tank but he is not shy of dealing damage.</p><p>Will this change the "offensive" nature or capability of the berserker ?</p>

[Costa]

<p>When SOE were trying to push through fighter changes for GU 51 they wanted ALL tanks to tank in defensive stance. That plan was shelved but they have now announced that they are still planning on altering things with the next expansion. They have really kept it very short with hardly any info other than they will be looking to merge some buffs and make alterations to our defensive stances so that they are viable for using all the time to tank with. Personally i hope they leave it so as Zerkers we can still tank as offensive tanks. I have the horrible feeling they are going to be looking to push out the previouse proposed changes and turn all tanks into taunt bots <img src="/smilies/9d71f0541cff0a302a0309c5079e8dee.gif" border="0" alt="SMILEY" /></p><p>At the moment there is no real knowing what will happen and a lot of what is being said and posted is speculation so unfortunatly we'll have to wait untill the next expansion hits test to find out exactly how they will screw us over next time.</p>

[Curs3]

<p>We will be gimpy guardians</p>

[LygerT]

<p>i've done everything in my power to be sure we stay as close to the same as we were at launch, being an offensive fighter. unfortunately it's difficult to balance that out and still be desired as a squishy tank, i do feel fighters will become more vanilla as time goes on but that is unavoidable in order to keep all ranges of play on an even playing field.</p><p>as far as i know this revamp won't be like the last, where defensive will just get a boost to be more desirable instead of the forced playstyle changes that were being forced upon us.</p>

[Costa]

<p>The only way i can see all of the fighters keeping the individuality is to have more class specific gear in game. Lets face it at the moment the only class specific armor is the end game raid set and currently our fabled epics/myths. I know it may create more work for the developers etc but why not have class specific legendary/fabled gear for the new T9 rather than the current subclass specific gear? With that kind of gear they can give us the flexibility to gear up to how we want to play and still maintain our offensive character style. Or if you need to go defensive have the sublass or even general fighter gear set up more like that.</p><p>I have to admit i can see that with that kind of thinking we would still have SOE dictating how a class would be geared and set up but it cerainly would give a lot more flexibility.</p>

[LygerT]

<p>class specific gear would do the exact opposite of give you more options in playstyle.</p>

[Costa]

<p>Yeah i just re-read what i wrote and i think what i was trying to get at is that if we had more class specific gear it would allow for each class to be more unique. Not saying it would cater for all play styles so by all means keep in the non specific items to allow for the flexibility but by having specific items that would allow for them to buff certain aspects of a class.</p><p>I'm just thinking it would be nice to see a piece of jewlery that dropped that increased dbl attack or crit whilst berserk or to have shields like the one in SoH that have affects on them increasing something to do with us. Just a couple of weak examples but i think you probably catch my drift <img src="/smilies/8a80c6485cd926be453217d59a84a888.gif" border="0" alt="SMILEY" /></p><p>Even something like what is done in WoE now where you can upgrade the jewlery to set items, why not have items that start off generic but can be upgraded with classes specific benefits? That way if you don't like what it upgrades to you just don't upgrade.</p>

[LygerT]

<p>zerkers need all the versatility that they can get to remain desirable. guard surpass us in tanking skill still and SKs surpass us in utility and AE DPS. we are a good mix of both but you still have to balance your character on your own for the job you are chosen to do. it would be nice to see more powerful adornments like the items from WoE but even those i still think have a limited range or no choice at all(i don't play a caster). basically you have AAs to balance your toon to your playstyle, that should be enough.</p>

[Bruener]

<p><cite>Lygerr@Kithicor wrote:</cite></p><blockquote><p> i do feel fighters will become more vanilla as time goes on but that is unavoidable in order to keep all ranges of play on an even playing field.</p></blockquote><p>This is what imo is going to be the worst.  Wait till crits are consolidated as well.  What is really going to be the difference between spells and CAs at that point.  Not to mention that the whispers of the tank adjustments sound way too much like the fighter revamp that they scrapped.  Buff consolidation, balance based on TANKING in defensive.</p><p>So, the all important question.  If all the tanks are playing like Guardians......which one do you think is going to be picked almost all the time....ding,ding nobody plays a Guard better than Guards.  Sounds fun for us other tanks.</p>

[LygerT]

<p>of course i agree with you, refer to my first post again and don't just pick out the part you don't like.</p><p>if we weren't given those defensive tools where do you think we would be right now? that's right. it's a nice change to see some skilled zerks out tank decent guardians, you never saw that in the past.</p>

[Trynnus1]

<p><cite>Lygerr@Kithicor wrote:</cite></p><blockquote><p>of course i agree with you, refer to my first post again and don't just pick out the part you don't like.</p><p>if we weren't given those defensive tools where do you think we would be right now? that's right. <strong>it's a nice change to see some skilled zerks out tank decent guardians, you never saw that in the past.</strong></p></blockquote><p>QFE. I am glad that my skill and, effort to gear up, get AAs, etc. plays a major role in my appility to MT. In the past, no matter how good my spec and gear was I could not be as effective as a mediocer Guard.</p>

[Bruener]

<p><cite>Lygerr@Kithicor wrote:</cite></p><blockquote><p>of course i agree with you, refer to my first post again and don't just pick out the part you don't like.</p><p>if we weren't given those defensive tools where do you think we would be right now? that's right. it's a nice change to see some skilled zerks out tank decent guardians, you never saw that in the past.</p></blockquote><p>Anyway I did read your post.  And yes some abilities had to be shared because Guards were put on a pedastel with them.  I mean look at how useful some of those abilities are, like ToS and Reinforcement....it took the other tanks a few more expansions to see the nice tank abilities that Guards had the luxury of owning.  Hence why there was no question about using Guards for content.</p><p>However, this post is also about whether Bezerkers will remain offensive melee tanks, and specifically with the fighter changes what will happen.  My comment was about that and how the fact that plate fighters in particular are going to get more and more alike.  To the point where with the upcoming changes in order to "tank" you have to play like a defensive fighter.....how well is that going to mix for the offensive fighters do you think?  if they even keep the idea of offensive/defensive tank.  Or maybe it will revert back to the AE/ST tank ideas...since everything else is reverting.  If so, lets hope they actually balance content for AE/ST.  Meaning 50/50 group content AE/ST and definitely 50/50 raid content AE/ST.</p><p>Honestly, I don't think any fighter is going to feel like an "offensive" fighter after these changes and will probably instead feel like an AE fighter or a ST fighter.</p>

[LygerT]

<p>no one can know what the devs are thinking until they give us a glimpse of what they have planned, until then there is no point assuming anything. yes, i am very well aware that they tend to make mistakes and very large ones at that but this really serves no purpose until then.</p>

[Costa]

<p><cite>Lygerr@Kithicor wrote:</cite></p><blockquote><p>basically you have AAs to balance your toon to your playstyle, that should be enough.</p></blockquote><p>I'm sorry Lygerr i have to disagree about AA's being the way of balancing our class to our playstyle. AA's go a way towards it but then gear makes up the rest of it. If we compared all of our AA specs i'm sure we'll find most of us have pretty similar specs. They may not be identicle but i'm sure we'll all pretty much have the same lines with maybe a couple points spent differently in those lines. I know a lot of guards that run pretty much the same KOS spec as myself which i find crazy when they are moaning they have no AE ability. I know the trees have nothing overly inspiring other than in a couple lines hence why everyone seems to take the same so for aa's to be an effective method of diversifying our class they need to have better options available.</p><p>I have played an SK to 80 then betrayed him to Pally and know when i look at their lines i can see different options for different roles i want to take, as a warrior those options seem to feel a lot weaker. If SOE want to have the aa's as the way of differentiation then they need a serious overhaul along with what other changes they plan to make.</p><p>As far as offensive tanks and defensive tanks go (in plate) then those lines need to be made clearer so that offensive tanks are out dpsing their defensive counterparts but having different taunt mechanics available to keep the agro. I tink the idea of AE and ST tanks is daft especially when they class Pally's as ST when they have exactly the same number of AE's as an SK. (Sorry going off topic)</p><p>Anyway what i'm saying is as a Zerk i never expected to have the taunts and snap agro ability as a Guard but i did expect to have the damage output to compensate for that. Currently i achieve that through a combination of gear, abilities and my AA spec. I would like to see that continue into the next expansion not to be a gimped tank if in offensive and to be forced to tank in defensive as thats the way SOE have now decided it's going to be. </p><p>As a side question do SOE actually consult people about how they would like to see the direction the classes would go in or is it purely an examination of the boards and pulling off ideas that are about a year out of date?</p>

[LygerT]

<p>they were, but no longer.</p><p>we all will be influential in the changes now.(at least i hope the devs keep this promise, but i really do think they will get in over their heads)</p>

[epyon333]

<p><cite>Lygerr@Kithicor wrote:</cite></p><blockquote><p>no one can know what the devs are thinking until they give us a glimpse of what they have planned, until then there is no point assuming anything. yes, i am very well aware that they tend to make mistakes and very large ones at that but this really serves no purpose until then.</p></blockquote><p>They need to let us know something already.  that revamp idea was what 6 months ago.  When im working on improving my zerker its always in the back of my mind that they have plans to make changes that could improve or ruin the class for me.</p>

[terrified kill]

<p>the worst part of all this is dps classes like brig/swash are allowed to tank yet its such a crime for a sk/zerker to be a dps class <img src="/smilies/69934afc394145350659cd7add244ca9.gif" border="0" alt="SMILEY" /></p>