Class Balance: A New Approach [Archive] - EQ2 Forum Archive @ EQ2Wire

RootXArtemis

12-05-2009, 01:16 AM

So there has been a lot of talk about fighter balance and the issues associated with it.There have been a lot of suggestions on the forums on how to improve certain imbalances currently present, but the improvements have mainly been focused around moving things around between classes (e.g. aggro, dps). My idea is a different approach - differentiate between mobs and tanks used for them (not only aoe vs st).My idea: Make crusaders (as caster-tanks) be particularly strong against caster mobs - and similarly warriors strong against melee mobs.With healers we already have some differentiation in this regard, (e.g. defiler miti buff wards against magic, mystic against melee dmg -ignoring that defiler one is better). As an example: if you gave crusaders for instance a buffs that let them absorb spell damage or mitigate it much better and warriors absorbing more melee then for raids you would use a crusader against a caster mob and a warrior against a melee mob (given mobs changed so that a caster mobs dps really mainly comes from the spells and not auto attack being most of it on all mobs). For groups this would mean you could have a bias on zones towards caster or melee - of course on a group level zones should be able to be completed with any tank, but the bias could give certain tanks a little advantage in doing that zone. (Of course Sony would need to be careful to not make a zone only be tankable by only one type of tank).I haven't decided how I would approach brawlers yet, although I am open to input on this. I was considering making them either a hybrid - or monk = spells, bruiser = melee or some other way of managing this.Conversely also we could have brawlers = anti melee, crusaders = anti spell, warriors be hybrids with overall better survivability but not better survivability against a specific caster mob (if mob is hybrid like most are now then warrior would be best b/c of survivability - but if a mob's dps is 80-90% spell then have a crusader tank it, reverse for brawlers).REMEMBER: I am speaking of giving a class an edge and I would still want heroic zones to be tankable by any tank, but if the last 2 bosses in a zone are melee mobs (assuming the last 2 bosses are the hardest) then it would help having a melee tank. (of course spread the melee/spell biased zones equally, still have hybrid zones and make sure the loot is distributed biased towards this as well)---> This would give a level of differentiation between tanks that is not just dps and aggro - I would like a differentiation here b/c I feel there is too little differentiation in kinds of survivabilityOn a side note:Brawlers: What I never quite understood was why brawlers were not made to be AoE tanks? High avoidance low mitigation --> best used if there are a lot of weaker mobs hitting at once, i.e. fast hits with little damage per hit. What is bad for brawlers is the main x4 epic boss who hits him for 20k with one hit of which only 40% are mitigated (ignore the numbers, only an example). However a whole bunch of little hits are much more comfortable with avoidance, particularly with a druid healer (health goes down as if a DoT was on the brawler with a bunch of little attacks). --> Why not make brawlers be masters at AoE tanking?Other Ideas to think about:-Implement good/evil mobs that either pally/monk/guardian tank better or bruiser/SK/zerk tank better (an idea tho with the current game design I would not suggest it, though give me your input)These were some of my ideas, feel free to judge, and also feel free to add ideas of your own.

Aull

12-05-2009, 02:13 AM

Neat ideas. For me making brawlers solely aoe tanks is not the answer. My ideas would be that all tanks would have better but not the same aoe skills either in aoe threat abilities for say the guardian, monk, and paladin while zerkers, sk's and bruisers being aoe damage.EqII was great in allowing potential individuality for all classes. Making all tanks have the same in durability, threat, dps, utility, ect would be infringing on this so called indiviuality.If a fighter class has great durability and decent utility then their dps should be lower than say a tank who has less durability, decent group utility, and higher dps. Threat generation for each either in actual threat for one and the other using dps as threat should be very close allowing each to do their job as the tank. Basically tank x generates higher threat and lower dps while tank y uses higher dps and lower threat abilities to accomplish the same goal of hold aggro.Aggro seems to be where tanks are in disarray. Once all tanks have better aggro no matter what the situation may be will we see that other classes welcome them with open arms to a group. Right now tanks that hold aggro better shun out tanks who have difficulties. That shouldn't be the case.Waiting for a such and such class to be in a group is usually based on what sub-class tank is present and that sometime takes forever it seems just to get the group rolling along.

RootXArtemis

12-05-2009, 03:09 AM

Thanks for the response Aull - Making brawlers AE tanks wasn't meant to be the solution to their problem, rather it is just that it would make sense and would also give them increased desirability in raids and make them possibly more desirable than the other tanks for the AE zones. would just be one element of adding balance (and giving brawlers an advantage in something tank-related)Back to the main idea:My main idea was to add another level of differentiation between tanks that is not unbalancing (not like dps were one class has high dps the other has low dps...) - they would just have elements they were particularly good at - this would balance overall desirability between the different tank classes (assuming the zone bias is balanced - i.e. 5 for this 5 for that, etc).Furthermore for raids: From there you can continue working as well. For example SK could be aggro masters for the crusaders and pallies the master survivalists - i.e. SKs would tank aggro bouncing spell-based bosses, or spell-based bosses that need insane dps burning so need super hate management, while paladins would tank the ones that hit like trains but are easier to manage aggro-wise.The same could be done for guardian/zerker and monk/bruiser.Note that this would be mainly for raid-boss tank differentiation.

RootXArtemis

12-05-2009, 03:14 AM

Forgot to address your aggro argument.For the heroic level all tanks should be able to tank any zone. It shouldn't be equally difficult, but it shoudl be possible and not insanely harder for one tank than the other. Thus in this sense aggro needs balancing.The SK vs pally, aggro vs survivability idea i brought up was concerning primarily raids where we maximize/minimize. Trash mobs would also need to be addressed somewhat in this regard, so that killing trash mobs is not only about maximizing dps, but have a fair amount that need survivability but die quickly enough even with more aggro-aware dps'ing.Of course once you have all the top gear from the raid zones your survivability will go up for all tanks and as raidmobs don't scale with the gear you're wearing it becomes more of a side issue and burning through zones as fast as possible is the main concern. That however is always a problem (for some guilds earlier in the expansion than others)

Ambrin

12-05-2009, 03:19 AM

I actually had an idea similar to this a while ago, but it had more to do with the control effects various bosses did. The idea was you could make each archetype immune to a different type of control effect, so you would therefore want a certain archetype to tank a certain boss if a boss used one type of control effect a lot.An example of how this might work is:Brawlers -> Immune to knockbacks, knockdowns, throwbacks, roots and snares.Warriors -> Immune to stuns, stifles and dazes.Crusaders -> Immune to Fear, charm and mesmerize.* While brawlers do get a slight adventage in this breakdown in the number of this they would be immune to, but in my mind I associate knockback, knockdowns, and throwbacks as being pretty much the same thing. This way each archetype is immune to 3 different control effects.** This doesn't take into account PvP where the immunities might need to be revoked or toned back, for example: instead of immunity the effects would have their duration reduced by 50%.*** Crusaders already sort of have this as they can spec to be immune to fear. If this is implemented I would think it would be as a AA choice. The crusader AA that specifically makes them immune to fear would probably need to be modified so that it is still useful.I believe this would help the each archetype in raids as you could design raid zones and encounters with a specific archetype(s) in mind, making having one of each archetype in a tanking role a desirable raid setup.This does run into some issues with heroic zones. If one zone favoured a particular type of control effects the archetypes who aren't immune to it would be at a huge disadvantage. The developers would have to make sure they don't make a zone that is only effectively tankable by one archetype. I'd hope that in any given zone the amount of control effects would be balanced so that no one archetype has any kind of advantage.

RootXArtemis

12-05-2009, 03:59 AM

Awesome idea Ambrin, thank you!That's something I hadn't thought about, but it's great.I agree, this would give a fair edge for each class in a certain area, without any favoritism.On a side note: this may be a bit controversial depending on how badly the individual player wnats to tank bosses on raids as a brawler. However I thought that if brawlers were the aoe OT masters, whenever they aren't OTing they could be dps'ers with similar benefits like furies get with their mythical - i.e. the more the bruiser dps'es the more teh tank can avoid, or if the monk dpses then the mob's next CA deals less dmg or something of this sort.However I realize this should by no means be their main role, as I would definitely also want to tank bosses as a brawler, but if they were made AE OTs then this could help them be more needed whenever there is no OTing to be done.Going back to my original idea : if warriors were anti melee and crusaders anti spell and brawlers aoe monsters with capable ST abilities (for heroic and occasional, tho rather less common raid MTing) and these added dps->raidbenefit buffs (and also Ambrin's idea of the control effects), brawlers could see a nice increase in desirability, and get a fixed role as tanks on raids (and not just as dps'ers).PS: Another cool thing would be if the two brawlers suplement each other in terms of dps or avoidance or both. I.e. if both brawlers are in a raid then they deal extra dmg when in offensive stance or get even higher avoidance or higher mit or so when in defensive. This would also help towards having both monk and bruiser desirable. This of course shouldn't be the only element, as they should both be wanted for more reasons than to suplement each other, but everything helps.(If they can both be made desirable enough to be in a raid at the same time without this, then that would be the better idea. This is just a nudge in that direction.)

Siatfallen

12-05-2009, 05:29 AM

On AoE tanking and brawlers: I couldn't begin to explain why some classes in this game are AoE tanks and some are not. I'm sure that, on some level, there was a plan with how and why which class was deemed to be what - but I certainly do not see it.Mechanically, you make a valid point on AoE tanking for brawlers - given that strikethrough chances are toned down on the "smaller" mobs in an encounter and seeing how they all do less damage individually spiky avoidance would hurt less. If the brawler could hold aggro as well as a comparatively geared crusader on this, then there'd actually be a role for them - that's just not the current state of affairs.On an added note, I'm not sure I like the AoE/ST divide in tanking in the first place. It's the source of the most signifigant imbalance in group tanking this expansion to begin with.Differentiating tanks, while a good idea, runs into a problem, though. It may just be my personal experience, but I find that the raid leaders I've run with in my time playing this game will seek out one approach that works (that is, one prefered MT class) and will then stick with it. It's easier than relying on two players and creates less fuss in an encounter.Of course, making all tanking classes simply not viable for at least some encounters might work - but would that be fun? I'm not saying this because I think it would not, but because I'm frankly not sure.Finally, differentiated mobs is all good and well, but if tanks are not tanking in a given encounter, you'd need to make sure they've some way of making themselves useful. Here, a class like the guardian really falls short and the bruiser is not much better.Reworking offensive stance to be more DPS and less survivability could work on that count - but as I'm sure you recall, that idea was not popular when it was on test.Alternately, you'll see tanks being pulled into the raid for one encounter and changing back to the "bread and butter" tank.

BChizzle

12-05-2009, 09:07 AM

Balancing around dps vs taunt threat is really imbalanced in the first place because all things considered you will always go with the highest possible dps as more dps means the stuff dies faster means more loot. That isn't balanced. What is balanced is all tanks should put out near similar dps/threat and all tanks should be able to tank any mob as effectively as other tanks.Single target vs Ae tank is another tricky one because they way things are right now an ae tank can still hold just as good single target agro on a mob while a single target tank can't hold ae mobs as effectively. TBH, tho I just don't see how this will ever get balanced.The fact is if you are a tank class you should be able to do your job just as good as any other tank, how you get that job done might differ but the end result should be the same. Nobody should be amazingly better at anything else maybe a slight advantage here and there but thats about it.

Bruener

12-05-2009, 11:54 AM

<cite>BChizzle wrote:</cite><blockquote>Balancing around dps vs taunt threat is really imbalanced in the first place because all things considered you will always go with the highest possible dps as more dps means the stuff dies faster means more loot. That isn't balanced. What is balanced is all tanks should put out near similar dps/threat and all tanks should be able to tank any mob as effectively as other tanks.Single target vs Ae tank is another tricky one because they way things are right now an ae tank can still hold just as good single target agro on a mob while a single target tank can't hold ae mobs as effectively. TBH, tho I just don't see how this will ever get balanced.The fact is if you are a tank class you should be able to do your job just as good as any other tank, how you get that job done might differ but the end result should be the same. Nobody should be amazingly better at anything else maybe a slight advantage here and there but thats about it.</blockquote>The problem with making all tanks do everything equal is that you basically just make one class and fighters become very bland.Or, most likely what ends up happening if you give all the tanks the same threat potential for ST/AE than it is an easy choice to take the most durable tank period.Really besides a few tweaks which seem to be addressed on the new producer letter....things are pretty close to where they should be. They are nerfing the 2 Crusader abilities that are pretty insane, but the compensation won't be so bad....SK especially since the ability was really quite situational when playing with other tanks. The producer also mentions that classes will be more balanced across all levels of game-play....solo,heroic, raid. The trick is that making sure the giving in one area doesn't make them OP'd in the other. Example, boosting up Guards a little in heroic has to be done without making them OP'd at the raid level. Beefing up some Brawler abilities at the raid level has to be done without making them gods in solo/heroic.

Aull

12-05-2009, 12:06 PM

The best way to fix this is make all tanks have the same survival, dps, aoe dps, utility, ect. This way no player will feel inferior to another. Nothing will be distinguishable between guardian, zerker, sk, paladin, monk and bruiser but all will be more than capable of doing exactly the same content.Trying to have individuality cannot work with six tanks. Any tank that has a class defining ability cannot work because other tanks not having any ability that clones it would not be a good thing.Monk tsunami should have been "monk tsunami" and no other tank should have anything remotely close to this ability. However with time and complaints other tanks received abilities that mock the tsunami in gear (bruiser myth) and through aa. That was just an example.For me imbalances will need to exsist simply to allow some individuality but some do not see it this way. So again guardians should have every right to be parsing as high as a monk while keeping their survivability and monks should have guradian survivability as well. Oh all fighters need fd, evac, and heals too so noone is left out.

BChizzle

12-05-2009, 01:16 PM

<cite>Bruener wrote:</cite><blockquote>The problem with making all tanks do everything equal is that you basically just make one class and fighters become very bland.</blockquote>Actually I don't think all things being equal makes anything bland. There is enough diversity in playstyle between the classes that each have their own unique feel to them. Its like saying we all push buttons 1-0 on the keyboard this game is bland.<cite>Bruener wrote:</cite><blockquote>Or, most likely what ends up happening if you give all the tanks the same threat potential for ST/AE than it is an easy choice to take the most durable tank period.</blockquote>This is imbalance again just instead of dps wise you are creating a scenario where one tank can tank better then another.<cite>Bruener wrote:</cite><blockquote>Really besides a few tweaks which seem to be addressed on the new producer letter....things are pretty close to where they should be. They are nerfing the 2 Crusader abilities that are pretty insane, but the compensation won't be so bad....SK especially since the ability was really quite situational when playing with other tanks. The producer also mentions that classes will be more balanced across all levels of game-play....solo,heroic, raid. The trick is that making sure the giving in one area doesn't make them OP'd in the other. Example, boosting up Guards a little in heroic has to be done without making them OP'd at the raid level. Beefing up some Brawler abilities at the raid level has to be done without making them gods in solo/heroic.</blockquote>I agree on the tweaks needed not sweeping changes. I think that SK skill is horrible in the fact that I can hit every single agro trick I have when grabbing a mob like Ykesha out of a group of mobs and an SK just has to hit sacrement and will hold it and the rest of the mobs on him and pretty much ignore everything I throw at it.

BChizzle

12-05-2009, 01:17 PM

<cite>Aull wrote:</cite><blockquote>Oh all fighters need fd, evac, and heals too so noone is left out. </blockquote>Every fighter can do all these things. FD be a tinkerer, evac get a root, heal use a pot.

RootXArtemis

12-05-2009, 01:18 PM

A lot of good points have been brought up.Siatfallen: You addressed the problem of the aoe/st divide creating group tanking imbalance. My plan was not to create an imbalance of the sort that now SKs just click Grave Sacrament and everything is glued to them while brawlers have to cycle through all the mobs. The idea was on a group level aggro is manageable for all tanks, with some having the edge here and others there. Where this differentiation would show would be more on a raidlevel, in order to give brawlers a fixed tanking role.So: group--> aggro balanced in the sense that all tanks can tank any zone, with slight preferences here and there (e.g. my idea of spell based mobs and melee based mobs, ambrin's idea of control effects, and some aoe/st bias).Raid-->if brawlers really were aoe monsters then they would be the aoe offtanks, plate tanks could still OT single or two x4 adds (take into account differentiation I mentioned earlier, so this would also mix up who OTs what etc)Now you said that raid leaders would only pull in tanks for certain mobs. To counter this several things coudl be done. First, as I mentioned for brawlers, they could have that type of 'fury-type clicky' for when they're not tanking, similarly every tank could get something of this sort, not necessarily all dps based but something of that sort. Secondly, I think fighter group buffs should be made raidwide, this would increase their overall utility for the raid (think berserk procs, hp buffs, etc)Third I think Sony should implement more offtanking in general. Currently a mob only occasionally has an add or so that needs to be OT'ed. I think if most mobs had elements that need an OT (could also be done by forcing a temporary MT switch during encounters, or so - give me some input on this) this would increase overall fighter desirability on raids. Also this would give an extra challenge to healers, rather than cure spamming they need to keep multiple tanks alive (of course mobs would need to be scaled that it is possible, etc).On a side note: to balance group level aggro for tanks: currently guards (as an example) need hate increasers and/or feeders in a group with heavy dps classes in the group - why not reverse this idea --> make dps'ers more dependent on the group setup for high dps -- this shouldn't of course be the primary way to deal with the issue, but as an element this could help balancing out aggro managementBchizzle:DPS vs aggro: I agree that aggro needs to be more balanced, but I don't agree that all tanks should have the same aggro. I think taunts need to be substantially increased for tanks that don't put out as much dps, to make them more viable for grouping. However I think that there could be the difference between super aggro management+less survivability vs good aggro management + more survivability -- this is what I addressed in an earlier post. This woudl mean for instance zerkers are aggro masters (through higher dps) and are used for pingpong aggro mobs, mobs that need a super high dps output, etc, and guards are the survivability masters, i.e. they can hold aggro well enough but can't manage pingponging very well, but have significant survivability. Note that this is for the raidlevel, on group level it should be balanced. Here my original idea comes into play again so that it's not always guards and zerkers, but that for instance paladins have better survivability on spellbased mobs than guards, etc.Also I would like to see more dps control for some raid encounters. Currently it's burn as much as you can. DPS classes shouldn't just be drones, but I would like to see more dps burst situations (think vampires in MMIS), or managing dps like with the Pedestal of Sky dragons in DoF (not just burn but watch mob hp etc), of course these are just examples and there are more ways of adding challenge to dps'ing. In terms of survivability vs aggro management, when you have OTing and split dps it becomes much easier for the individual tanks to hold aggro, so this could be an element of the versatility of survivability vs aggro management.Bruener: as stated above I agree with not making bland tanks and that there should be a difference in aggro, dps and survivability. However on the group level this difference should only be marginal and not affect choice to the degree that there is a favorite (again, different dungeons with endbosses, or last 2 hard bosses being melee/spell based, would give an equally spread advantage but on a group level again all should be doable by any tank, even if it involves a bit more healer skill and tank skill in on zones vs the other)Aull: I agree as stated and what you gave as an example (Tsunami, Divine Aura, etc) could be used to give the edge in melee vs spell - i.e. melee tanks get a tsunami type ability and spell tanks get the spell-avoidance/resistance counterpart. This again jsut an example, this would need to be refined.

BChizzle

12-05-2009, 01:32 PM

<cite>RootXArtemis wrote:</cite><blockquote>Bchizzle:DPS vs aggro: I agree that aggro needs to be more balanced, but I don't agree that all tanks should have the same aggro. I think taunts need to be substantially increased for tanks that don't put out as much dps, to make them more viable for grouping. However I think that there could be the difference between super aggro management+less survivability vs good aggro management + more survivability -- this is what I addressed in an earlier post. This woudl mean for instance zerkers are aggro masters (through higher dps) and are used for pingpong aggro mobs, mobs that need a super high dps output, etc, and guards are the survivability masters, i.e. they can hold aggro well enough but can't manage pingponging very well, but have significant survivability. Note that this is for the raidlevel, on group level it should be balanced. Here my original idea comes into play again so that it's not always guards and zerkers, but that for instance paladins have better survivability on spellbased mobs than guards, etc.</blockquote>I'll be honest I didn't read your whole post just this part...What you are describing here is making a niche role for each type of tank, the problem with that is that what happens if the crusader takes the night off a mob won't die? Thats not fun. You should be able to plug any tank into any scenario and get the job done with little or no difference. And the whole agro vs dps issue it just doesn't work that way if one class puts out more dps they will just end up being the class used.

RootXArtemis

12-05-2009, 02:20 PM

Bruener

12-05-2009, 02:28 PM

<cite>BChizzle wrote:</cite><blockquote><cite>RootXArtemis wrote:</cite><blockquote>Bchizzle:DPS vs aggro: I agree that aggro needs to be more balanced, but I don't agree that all tanks should have the same aggro. I think taunts need to be substantially increased for tanks that don't put out as much dps, to make them more viable for grouping. However I think that there could be the difference between super aggro management+less survivability vs good aggro management + more survivability -- this is what I addressed in an earlier post. This woudl mean for instance zerkers are aggro masters (through higher dps) and are used for pingpong aggro mobs, mobs that need a super high dps output, etc, and guards are the survivability masters, i.e. they can hold aggro well enough but can't manage pingponging very well, but have significant survivability. Note that this is for the raidlevel, on group level it should be balanced. Here my original idea comes into play again so that it's not always guards and zerkers, but that for instance paladins have better survivability on spellbased mobs than guards, etc.</blockquote>I'll be honest I didn't read your whole post just this part...What you are describing here is making a niche role for each type of tank, the problem with that is that what happens if the crusader takes the night off a mob won't die? Thats not fun. You should be able to plug any tank into any scenario and get the job done with little or no difference. And the whole agro vs dps issue it just doesn't work that way if one class puts out more dps they will just end up being the class used.</blockquote>Lol, funny because I really didn't read the whole thing either. As soon as I saw the niche role idea I ignored the post. SOE tried doing that with resists and that idea was thrown out the window. Not to mention the fact that physical mob tanks will always win over spell based mobs because on all mobs Physical damage > > > Spell damage on the tank.I am under the school of thought of AE v ST v Utility. AE tanks should be kings of agro and specifically wanted for that position because they are given more agro tools. Their survivability would be less but the mobs they are handling isn't the huge boss mob pluggin out the big hits. Enough survivability to handle any type of multiple mob situation. ST have less agro but the best survivability. They are also given some good trick tools to handle ST, like ST hate position increaser on long recast. Utility should be the tank that is brought for that emergency pick up. More of a jack of all trades type of tank that is wanted explicitely for his versatility. Buffs to increase those around them and decent DPS contribution. Agro control not as good as the AE tanks but better than the ST tanks.Now what I have described above is how mechanics are designed today only needing some tweaks in a few areas. The ST tank right now only Guard is falling into that category. However this is seriously their role and they do own it. Right now a Guard can produce more than enough hate to hold off of any raid force on STs and they have the most tools for survivability. AE tanks are somewhat right. They do have the best agro control. Really though there are 3 competing for this spot right now when it should be 2 for ST and 2 for AE. Amends nerf and a couple other tweaks may be where SOE is going for the changes to make it a 2 v 2 in these categories. Utility tank is where SOE really needs to put the most tweaks. There is the mention of Brawlers given a unique avoidance buff. Possibly something available for the group like this would help out quite a bit. And giving them an AE auto attack to help round mobs up.Now I know that people are going to cry and say well that is only at the raid level. Well the producers letter explained they wanted it balanced across all levels of game play. That means changing something in heroic should not OP another class at the raid level. So speaking from a balance at raid level position this is what would be ideal imo. Heroic level....well good luck trying to distinguish one level of game play without affecting another.

RootXArtemis

12-05-2009, 03:00 PM

<cite>Bruener wrote:</cite><blockquote>Lol, funny because I really didn't read the whole thing either. As soon as I saw the niche role idea I ignored the post. SOE tried doing that with resists and that idea was thrown out the window. Not to mention the fact that physical mob tanks will always win over spell based mobs because on all mobs Physical damage > > > Spell damage on the tank.</blockquote>Well that's easily addressed, simply by removing that bias from mobs.What I'm trying to address is that a tank's role is to tank and currently you just have 1 MT and maybe 1 OT. Giving the other tanks utility to make them wnated for raids isn't enough - they need something that lets them tank in raids. Furies don't heal as well as templars so they work on dps, BUT they still heal. A bruiser who is in a raid to give utility and dps is not a tank.Tanks and mobs need to be designed so that all fighters have an element in a raid where they tank - this is what I'm trying to address.I personally want to tank when I play either monk or guardian or SK in a raid (not necessarily a specific raid but in general), of course there will always be some bias as to who is officially the raid MT (i.e. trash clearing, etc) but when it comes to bosses and OTing it should be spread equally.--> Make all fighters generally viable for tanking, but give every fighter an element they excel at, so that for the future tiers, at any given tier overall fighters all get to tank (this doesn't need to be true for specific zones, but at least overall when looking all the zones).

circusgirl

12-05-2009, 03:32 PM

Personally, I like the idea of setting up things with content and mechanics so that the best raidforce needs one crusader, one brawler, and one warrior to be most effective. If crusaders were immune to fear, then you'd choose a crusader for that mob with a 1 minute curse effect every time he hits you. If brawlers were immune to knockback, then you'd be able to have the brawler have his back to the open and put the rest of the raid in the corner for that mob that punts you halfway across the zone every time you hit it. If warriors were immune to stifle, then you'd go for a warrior for the mob that perma-stifles whoever is at the top of his aggro list.Of course, it does mean that raid guilds would have to have 3 fighters, and rely on them, which I think is fine. We rely on our healers to be there. We rely on our MT to be there. Why not our OTs? The major issue is that it would require content devs and balance devs to make sure that there were just as many mobs that let crusaders shine as there are mobs that are designed for brawlers or mobs that are designed for warriors. They'd have to get that much RIGHT.Also, in terms of survivability, why not take away plate tank's avoidance lends and give them a mitigation lend? Instead of a 40% chance to use their avoidance if their target is about to be hit, how about a 40% chance to use their mitigation instead of the target's if it is higher? Makes for one easy way to help increase brawler's survivability up to the level of plate tanks.

Grumpy_Warrior_01

12-05-2009, 04:55 PM

<cite>Vinka@Antonia Bayle wrote:</cite><blockquote>Personally, I like the idea of setting up things with content and mechanics so that the best raidforce needs one crusader, one brawler, and one warrior to be most effective. If crusaders were immune to fear, then you'd choose a crusader for that mob with a 1 minute curse effect every time he hits you. If brawlers were immune to knockback, then you'd be able to have the brawler have his back to the open and put the rest of the raid in the corner for that mob that punts you halfway across the zone every time you hit it. If warriors were immune to stifle, then you'd go for a warrior for the mob that perma-stifles whoever is at the top of his aggro list.Of course, it does mean that raid guilds would have to have 3 fighters, and rely on them, which I think is fine. We rely on our healers to be there. We rely on our MT to be there. Why not our OTs? The major issue is that it would require content devs and balance devs to make sure that there were just as many mobs that let crusaders shine as there are mobs that are designed for brawlers or mobs that are designed for warriors. They'd have to get that much RIGHT.Also, in terms of survivability, why not take away plate tank's avoidance lends and give them a mitigation lend? Instead of a 40% chance to use their avoidance if their target is about to be hit, how about a 40% chance to use their mitigation instead of the target's if it is higher? Makes for one easy way to help increase brawler's survivability up to the level of plate tanks.</blockquote>The flaw with this argument is that now you have to gear up multiple MT's just so you can get through your current tier. No raid force wants to stay mired down 3x as long as necessary. If you are a raid MT, you already know it has nothing to do with who "shines." It's about getting your force into and through the current zone to the next one, and then the next one. If we have to stop and wait for everybody to "shine" we'll be in TSO until the year 2030.

RootXArtemis

12-05-2009, 06:25 PM

<cite>Grumpy_Warrior_01 wrote:</cite><blockquote><cite>Vinka@Antonia Bayle wrote:</cite><blockquote>Personally, I like the idea of setting up things with content and mechanics so that the best raidforce needs one crusader, one brawler, and one warrior to be most effective. If crusaders were immune to fear, then you'd choose a crusader for that mob with a 1 minute curse effect every time he hits you. If brawlers were immune to knockback, then you'd be able to have the brawler have his back to the open and put the rest of the raid in the corner for that mob that punts you halfway across the zone every time you hit it. If warriors were immune to stifle, then you'd go for a warrior for the mob that perma-stifles whoever is at the top of his aggro list.Of course, it does mean that raid guilds would have to have 3 fighters, and rely on them, which I think is fine. We rely on our healers to be there. We rely on our MT to be there. Why not our OTs? The major issue is that it would require content devs and balance devs to make sure that there were just as many mobs that let crusaders shine as there are mobs that are designed for brawlers or mobs that are designed for warriors. They'd have to get that much RIGHT.Also, in terms of survivability, why not take away plate tank's avoidance lends and give them a mitigation lend? Instead of a 40% chance to use their avoidance if their target is about to be hit, how about a 40% chance to use their mitigation instead of the target's if it is higher? Makes for one easy way to help increase brawler's survivability up to the level of plate tanks.</blockquote>The flaw with this argument is that now you have to gear up multiple MT's just so you can get through your current tier. No raid force wants to stay mired down 3x as long as necessary. If you are a raid MT, you already know it has nothing to do with who "shines." It's about getting your force into and through the current zone to the next one, and then the next one. If we have to stop and wait for everybody to "shine" we'll be in TSO until the year 2030.</blockquote>I'm sorry but the problem currently is not gearing up a tank at all. Right now there are guilds that can kill any mob but Munzok with raidmembers having 6/7 t4 setpieces. Gearing up 3 tanks only slows down the beginning. Some of these guilds accept new members and get them a full t4 set within 2-3 weeks, because gearing is not the problem, but rather the mob (in this case Munzok). Furthermore considering set armor, the only aspect where tanks have to gear up competetively is with jewelry (assuming warriors and crusaders don't share the same patterns).What you're saying is basicly that we should resign to the fact that only 2 fighters are needed for raids and really only one fighter should tank. Fighters are a tanking class and having an ultimate tank every expansion only leaves room for 1-2 people tanking. This is what I think is flawed with the system currently - there is only a real need for 2, max 3 fighters, one tanking almost all the mobs.If you need all scout classes in a raid, all healer classes (once they get fixed), etc then you should need all fighters. Now you might say that only templars and defilers are always in the MT group - true but the other healers heal as well (they just have a little extra time to dps, debuff, etc) -- currently you only have 1 MT, occasionally 1 OT and otherwise fighters are just there for dps and buffs (--> not there at all b/c dps and utility is inferior to other classes).

Jemoo

12-05-2009, 07:41 PM

I've been following this and felt I should put in my two sense as a raid healer and lowbie tank. I have stopped leveling almost every tank I have because only one or two is ever needed in a raid, the third and fourth tanks would only be there to fill spots 90% of the time. Raids require multiple healers, multiple enchanters, and multiple bards that need to be geared so why is requiring one extra tank such a huge deal? As of right now brawlers have a very very small role in many raiding guilds and in groups and the other four tanks definitely have their favorites. As for roles for tanks I don't feel that a certain tank class should be required to kill anything, including bosses, in zones but making it easier for a certain tank is completely doable. I think that making certain archtypes better as MT, OT, and creating a utility tank would be a good idea (warrior as MT, brawler as OT, and crusader as UT is how I see it) but that puts one type above others. Every class should be able to MT just as I personally think that every healer should be viable for the Mt group. This is not how it is and not how I believe things are going to work. What does need to happen is creating roles for each archtype which is not something that has happened. However they do that each tank should be able to tank everything and that is the bottom line.

Aull

12-05-2009, 10:08 PM

<cite>Pattywak@Kithicor wrote:</cite><blockquote>I've been following this and felt I should put in my two sense as a raid healer and lowbie tank. I have stopped leveling almost every tank I have because only one or two is ever needed in a raid, the third and fourth tanks would only be there to fill spots 90% of the time. Raids require multiple healers, multiple enchanters, and multiple bards that need to be geared so why is requiring one extra tank such a huge deal? As of right now brawlers have a very very small role in many raiding guilds and in groups and the other four tanks definitely have their favorites. As for roles for tanks I don't feel that a certain tank class should be required to kill anything, including bosses, in zones but making it easier for a certain tank is completely doable. I think that making certain archtypes better as MT, OT, and creating a utility tank would be a good idea (warrior as MT, brawler as OT, and crusader as UT is how I see it) but that puts one type above others. Every class should be able to MT just as I personally think that every healer should be viable for the Mt group. This is not how it is and not how I believe things are going to work. What does need to happen is creating roles for each archtype which is not something that has happened. However they do that each tank should be able to tank everything and that is the bottom line.</blockquote>This would be fine with me but there are off tanks and utility tanks that want the spot light of MT. I don't think it puts one type above another because the warrior MT will not have the crusader utility and vise versa.Any tank that has higher dps and better utility should not be having the durability of a tank that is lesser dps and utility. Sacrifices will have to be made. To gain in one area will cause a loss in another.

RootXArtemis

12-05-2009, 10:21 PM

<cite>Aull wrote:</cite><blockquote><cite>Pattywak@Kithicor wrote:</cite><blockquote>I've been following this and felt I should put in my two sense as a raid healer and lowbie tank. I have stopped leveling almost every tank I have because only one or two is ever needed in a raid, the third and fourth tanks would only be there to fill spots 90% of the time. Raids require multiple healers, multiple enchanters, and multiple bards that need to be geared so why is requiring one extra tank such a huge deal? As of right now brawlers have a very very small role in many raiding guilds and in groups and the other four tanks definitely have their favorites. As for roles for tanks I don't feel that a certain tank class should be required to kill anything, including bosses, in zones but making it easier for a certain tank is completely doable. I think that making certain archtypes better as MT, OT, and creating a utility tank would be a good idea (warrior as MT, brawler as OT, and crusader as UT is how I see it) but that puts one type above others. Every class should be able to MT just as I personally think that every healer should be viable for the Mt group. This is not how it is and not how I believe things are going to work. What does need to happen is creating roles for each archtype which is not something that has happened. However they do that each tank should be able to tank everything and that is the bottom line.</blockquote>This would be fine with me but there are off tanks and utility tanks that want the spot light of MT. I don't think it puts one type above another because the warrior MT will not have the crusader utility and vise versa.Any tank that has higher dps and better utility should not be having the durability of a tank that is lesser dps and utility. Sacrifices will have to be made. To gain in one area will cause a loss in another.</blockquote>A problem I see with only defining tanks through general survivability and general utility/dps is that I feel that this will at first make guardians the defacto MTs for everything and then once the raidforce is geared and has things down the dps tank will take over as they do not need the survivability edge.I would prefer a scenario where all fighters get to tank, even if some get to tank a bit more than others. That's why I thought you could split mobs between crusaders and warriors depending on melee vs spell and then let brawlers be aoe masters for OTing encounter adds. This way crusaders would MT some, warriors would MT some and brawlers would OTI agree with Pattywak - there is no reason you should need 6 healers, 6 scouts, 6 mages but not 6 fighters, and people become fighters to tank so that is what they should be given an opportunity to do on a general basis (I don't mind a bias towards one class as long as it's not excessive).

BChizzle

12-06-2009, 02:28 AM

<cite>RootXArtemis wrote:</cite><blockquote>I agree that currently that is how things work out, but that is because raids are so heavily dps dependent and there is no significant need for survivability so right now you just take the tank that hold aggro the best.Also the problem with what if your crusaders aren't online? Well...what if your clerics aren't online? You have the same exact problem right now. With anti spell, anti melee differentiation and then the further difference in survivability vs aggro management (if mobs addressing those are spread out equally) you would just give tanks the same kind of versatility as healers have - i.e. if you don't have your templar in the raid you'll put in the inquisitor, but the inquisitor isn't quite as defensive (as would be SK vs paladin or zerker vs guardian) - if you don't have a crusader with you at all, well that's the same problem as not having a cleric in your raid, or no shammy in the raid - this is not an unfair problem but just the same problem raids currently have with healers.</blockquote>And if you change it to survivability then you are just creating an imbalance in another area, I don't understand why you can talk about balance then suggest imbalances as ways to make it happen.

Rahatmattata

12-06-2009, 04:42 AM

<cite>Siatfallen wrote:</cite><blockquote>On AoE tanking and brawlers: I couldn't begin to explain why some classes in this game are AoE tanks and some are not. I'm sure that, on some level, there was a plan with how and why which class was deemed to be what - but I certainly do not see it.Look at sorcerers. In theory a warlock has more potential for dps than a wizard. The more mobs there are, the more dps the lock does. Versus single targets though, the wizard wins. I think this is the kind of balance SOE imagined for AoE vs ST classes. In theory a single target tank would "do better" than an AoE tank on single mobs, but have to individually target mobs to hold aggro in a multi-target situation... and would probably not be expected to hold every single mob. They would hold the "main" mob really well, and most of the others, but not every single one.In practice, this isn't how it works though. Hence why AoE vs ST tanks are not balanced.</blockquote>

Aull

12-06-2009, 12:00 PM

<cite>RootXArtemis wrote:</cite><blockquote><cite>Aull wrote:</cite><blockquote><cite>Pattywak@Kithicor wrote:</cite><blockquote>I've been following this and felt I should put in my two sense as a raid healer and lowbie tank. I have stopped leveling almost every tank I have because only one or two is ever needed in a raid, the third and fourth tanks would only be there to fill spots 90% of the time. Raids require multiple healers, multiple enchanters, and multiple bards that need to be geared so why is requiring one extra tank such a huge deal? As of right now brawlers have a very very small role in many raiding guilds and in groups and the other four tanks definitely have their favorites. As for roles for tanks I don't feel that a certain tank class should be required to kill anything, including bosses, in zones but making it easier for a certain tank is completely doable. I think that making certain archtypes better as MT, OT, and creating a utility tank would be a good idea (warrior as MT, brawler as OT, and crusader as UT is how I see it) but that puts one type above others. Every class should be able to MT just as I personally think that every healer should be viable for the Mt group. This is not how it is and not how I believe things are going to work. What does need to happen is creating roles for each archtype which is not something that has happened. However they do that each tank should be able to tank everything and that is the bottom line.</blockquote>This would be fine with me but there are off tanks and utility tanks that want the spot light of MT. I don't think it puts one type above another because the warrior MT will not have the crusader utility and vise versa.Any tank that has higher dps and better utility should not be having the durability of a tank that is lesser dps and utility. Sacrifices will have to be made. To gain in one area will cause a loss in another.</blockquote>A problem I see with only defining tanks through general survivability and general utility/dps is that I feel that this will at first make guardians the defacto MTs for everything and then once the raidforce is geared and has things down the dps tank will take over as they do not need the survivability edge.I would prefer a scenario where all fighters get to tank, even if some get to tank a bit more than others. That's why I thought you could split mobs between crusaders and warriors depending on melee vs spell and then let brawlers be aoe masters for OTing encounter adds. This way crusaders would MT some, warriors would MT some and brawlers would OTI agree with Pattywak - there is no reason you should need 6 healers, 6 scouts, 6 mages but not 6 fighters, and people become fighters to tank so that is what they should be given an opportunity to do on a general basis (I don't mind a bias towards one class as long as it's not excessive).</blockquote>I understand what you are saying. I am speaking for myself here but I have no issues with say a guardian being the absolute toughest tank and everyone else being lesser. I feel that is the way it was meant to be from the beginning.Now that time has passed other plate tanks have seen increases in their durability and their dps giving them durability that is almost as good as the guardian but dps to hold aggro far better than a guardian could ever hope for. Now guardians are asking for better aggro abilities (not dps) and many other tanks are threatened by this thinking they will take a back seat. Guards do need better aggro abilities and guards are not asking for the best aggro either. Just better than what they have currently. Anyway that is another story and sorry I got off track. Most of this from what I am reading is basically on the raid level. Right now all plate tanks are more than capable of tanking raids. As a matter of fact a raid with zerker mt, sk ot, and pally ot has better potential than say a guardian mt, sk ot, and zerker ot.I do agree that having raids with mobs that different tanks had better success with would be nice.

RootXArtemis

12-06-2009, 01:32 PM

<cite>BChizzle wrote:</cite><blockquote><cite>RootXArtemis wrote:</cite><blockquote>I agree that currently that is how things work out, but that is because raids are so heavily dps dependent and there is no significant need for survivability so right now you just take the tank that hold aggro the best.Also the problem with what if your crusaders aren't online? Well...what if your clerics aren't online? You have the same exact problem right now. With anti spell, anti melee differentiation and then the further difference in survivability vs aggro management (if mobs addressing those are spread out equally) you would just give tanks the same kind of versatility as healers have - i.e. if you don't have your templar in the raid you'll put in the inquisitor, but the inquisitor isn't quite as defensive (as would be SK vs paladin or zerker vs guardian) - if you don't have a crusader with you at all, well that's the same problem as not having a cleric in your raid, or no shammy in the raid - this is not an unfair problem but just the same problem raids currently have with healers.</blockquote>And if you change it to survivability then you are just creating an imbalance in another area, I don't understand why you can talk about balance then suggest imbalances as ways to make it happen.</blockquote>What I'm saying in what you quoted is that by making certain fighters be better at certain mobs just means that when your crusaders aren't online it's the same problem as when your clerics aren't online. The mob will be possible, sure, but it'll definitely be more difficult (speaking on a raid level not group/heroic). There's no reason why raids should depend more on which healers they bring than on which tanks they bring.What I'm suggesting with tanks having better survivability against a certain type of mob (on raid level mainly. heroic level should not matter) is not unbalancing as I'm suggesting each class gets their own field and of course mobs would need to be spread somewhat equally. I'm just trying to suggest something that would require all tanks to tank at some point in that expansion.

Bruener

12-06-2009, 01:59 PM

<cite>Aull wrote:</cite><blockquote><cite>RootXArtemis wrote:</cite><blockquote><cite>Aull wrote:</cite><blockquote><cite>Pattywak@Kithicor wrote:</cite><blockquote>I've been following this and felt I should put in my two sense as a raid healer and lowbie tank. I have stopped leveling almost every tank I have because only one or two is ever needed in a raid, the third and fourth tanks would only be there to fill spots 90% of the time. Raids require multiple healers, multiple enchanters, and multiple bards that need to be geared so why is requiring one extra tank such a huge deal? As of right now brawlers have a very very small role in many raiding guilds and in groups and the other four tanks definitely have their favorites. As for roles for tanks I don't feel that a certain tank class should be required to kill anything, including bosses, in zones but making it easier for a certain tank is completely doable. I think that making certain archtypes better as MT, OT, and creating a utility tank would be a good idea (warrior as MT, brawler as OT, and crusader as UT is how I see it) but that puts one type above others. Every class should be able to MT just as I personally think that every healer should be viable for the Mt group. This is not how it is and not how I believe things are going to work. What does need to happen is creating roles for each archtype which is not something that has happened. However they do that each tank should be able to tank everything and that is the bottom line.</blockquote>This would be fine with me but there are off tanks and utility tanks that want the spot light of MT. I don't think it puts one type above another because the warrior MT will not have the crusader utility and vise versa.Any tank that has higher dps and better utility should not be having the durability of a tank that is lesser dps and utility. Sacrifices will have to be made. To gain in one area will cause a loss in another.</blockquote>A problem I see with only defining tanks through general survivability and general utility/dps is that I feel that this will at first make guardians the defacto MTs for everything and then once the raidforce is geared and has things down the dps tank will take over as they do not need the survivability edge.I would prefer a scenario where all fighters get to tank, even if some get to tank a bit more than others. That's why I thought you could split mobs between crusaders and warriors depending on melee vs spell and then let brawlers be aoe masters for OTing encounter adds. This way crusaders would MT some, warriors would MT some and brawlers would OTI agree with Pattywak - there is no reason you should need 6 healers, 6 scouts, 6 mages but not 6 fighters, and people become fighters to tank so that is what they should be given an opportunity to do on a general basis (I don't mind a bias towards one class as long as it's not excessive).</blockquote>I understand what you are saying. I am speaking for myself here but I have no issues with say a guardian being the absolute toughest tank and everyone else being lesser. I feel that is the way it was meant to be from the beginning.Now that time has passed other plate tanks have seen increases in their durability and their dps giving them durability that is almost as good as the guardian but dps to hold aggro far better than a guardian could ever hope for. Now guardians are asking for better aggro abilities (not dps) and many other tanks are threatened by this thinking they will take a back seat. Guards do need better aggro abilities and guards are not asking for the best aggro either. Just better than what they have currently. Anyway that is another story and sorry I got off track. Most of this from what I am reading is basically on the raid level. Right now all plate tanks are more than capable of tanking raids. As a matter of fact a raid with zerker mt, sk ot, and pally ot has better potential than say a guardian mt, sk ot, and zerker ot.I do agree that having raids with mobs that different tanks had better success with would be nice.</blockquote>You are wrong. A serious raid force, meaning actually killing mobs that are a challenge for them and not farm status, Guard -MT, Crusader/Zerker - OT is definitely the de facto and guilds that actually do worry about progression mostly follow that set-up. There are a few exceptions to the rule, but the majority of guilds know that a good Guard in the MT spot is the way to go. Of course there are also a few exceptions with guilds using Guards as OT.Back to the topic. Having certain mobs require certain tanks based on the simple fact one might be a spell tank one might be a melee is a terrible idea. What will happen is that when one tank is needed over the other they will simply swap sitting spots. Oh, we are on the spell mob....go ahead and sit Guard we need to bring in the SK. Oh back on a melee mob, go ahead and sit SK we need to bring the Guard back in. This is exactly what will happen because the fact is the raid only needs a couple tanks.SOE atm is doing a great job leaning some tanks towards MT and some towards OT. This way they don't have to share a role and can actually be a part of the raid full-time. SOE needs to step it up for the utility tank though like Monks had back in RoK....and yes, brawlers should be the more utility type tank. Utility should be in survivability for others they bring. All fighters need to bring some utility though, hence raid-wide buffs and group buffs, for the simple fact that keeping 3 fighters in a raid is actually worth it through all content instead of sitting a couple when they are not needed to just bring in extra DPS on the majority of the content.

discrat

12-06-2009, 02:02 PM

someone plz read my post and help me

Aull

12-06-2009, 02:50 PM

<cite>Bruener wrote:</cite><blockquote><cite>Aull wrote:</cite><blockquote><cite>RootXArtemis wrote:</cite><blockquote><cite>Aull wrote:</cite><blockquote><cite>Pattywak@Kithicor wrote:</cite><blockquote>I've been following this and felt I should put in my two sense as a raid healer and lowbie tank. I have stopped leveling almost every tank I have because only one or two is ever needed in a raid, the third and fourth tanks would only be there to fill spots 90% of the time. Raids require multiple healers, multiple enchanters, and multiple bards that need to be geared so why is requiring one extra tank such a huge deal? As of right now brawlers have a very very small role in many raiding guilds and in groups and the other four tanks definitely have their favorites. As for roles for tanks I don't feel that a certain tank class should be required to kill anything, including bosses, in zones but making it easier for a certain tank is completely doable. I think that making certain archtypes better as MT, OT, and creating a utility tank would be a good idea (warrior as MT, brawler as OT, and crusader as UT is how I see it) but that puts one type above others. Every class should be able to MT just as I personally think that every healer should be viable for the Mt group. This is not how it is and not how I believe things are going to work. What does need to happen is creating roles for each archtype which is not something that has happened. However they do that each tank should be able to tank everything and that is the bottom line.</blockquote>This would be fine with me but there are off tanks and utility tanks that want the spot light of MT. I don't think it puts one type above another because the warrior MT will not have the crusader utility and vise versa.Any tank that has higher dps and better utility should not be having the durability of a tank that is lesser dps and utility. Sacrifices will have to be made. To gain in one area will cause a loss in another.</blockquote>A problem I see with only defining tanks through general survivability and general utility/dps is that I feel that this will at first make guardians the defacto MTs for everything and then once the raidforce is geared and has things down the dps tank will take over as they do not need the survivability edge.I would prefer a scenario where all fighters get to tank, even if some get to tank a bit more than others. That's why I thought you could split mobs between crusaders and warriors depending on melee vs spell and then let brawlers be aoe masters for OTing encounter adds. This way crusaders would MT some, warriors would MT some and brawlers would OTI agree with Pattywak - there is no reason you should need 6 healers, 6 scouts, 6 mages but not 6 fighters, and people become fighters to tank so that is what they should be given an opportunity to do on a general basis (I don't mind a bias towards one class as long as it's not excessive).</blockquote>I understand what you are saying. I am speaking for myself here but I have no issues with say a guardian being the absolute toughest tank and everyone else being lesser. I feel that is the way it was meant to be from the beginning.Now that time has passed other plate tanks have seen increases in their durability and their dps giving them durability that is almost as good as the guardian but dps to hold aggro far better than a guardian could ever hope for. Now guardians are asking for better aggro abilities (not dps) and many other tanks are threatened by this thinking they will take a back seat. Guards do need better aggro abilities and guards are not asking for the best aggro either. Just better than what they have currently. Anyway that is another story and sorry I got off track. Most of this from what I am reading is basically on the raid level. Right now all plate tanks are more than capable of tanking raids. As a matter of fact a raid with zerker mt, sk ot, and pally ot has better potential than say a guardian mt, sk ot, and zerker ot.I do agree that having raids with mobs that different tanks had better success with would be nice.</blockquote>You are wrong. A serious raid force, meaning actually killing mobs that are a challenge for them and not farm status, Guard -MT, Crusader/Zerker - OT is definitely the de facto and guilds that actually do worry about progression mostly follow that set-up. There are a few exceptions to the rule, but the majority of guilds know that a good Guard in the MT spot is the way to go. Of course there are also a few exceptions with guilds using Guards as OT.Back to the topic. Having certain mobs require certain tanks based on the simple fact one might be a spell tank one might be a melee is a terrible idea. What will happen is that when one tank is needed over the other they will simply swap sitting spots. Oh, we are on the spell mob....go ahead and sit Guard we need to bring in the SK. Oh back on a melee mob, go ahead and sit SK we need to bring the Guard back in. This is exactly what will happen because the fact is the raid only needs a couple tanks.SOE atm is doing a great job leaning some tanks towards MT and some towards OT. This way they don't have to share a role and can actually be a part of the raid full-time. SOE needs to step it up for the utility tank though like Monks had back in RoK....and yes, brawlers should be the more utility type tank. Utility should be in survivability for others they bring. All fighters need to bring some utility though, hence raid-wide buffs and group buffs, for the simple fact that keeping 3 fighters in a raid is actually worth it through all content instead of sitting a couple when they are not needed to just bring in extra DPS on the majority of the content.</blockquote>Good post. I will say that yeah before 200 aa's were achieved that raids still wanted a guard as the mt. Now I do not have a toon in every guild world wide and I can't answer for them all but I bet come next expac zerkers, paladins, and sk's will be more than able to go into a new raid area and do well. Not saying that it will be that way but I am going on a hunch. I could be so wrong though.Excellent point about the spell tank and melee tank scenario.Monks were great utility even pre-RoK and I do agree that they should be brought back up to where that is one of their strong points. If I remember correctly in RoK raid leaders wanted monks and not bruisers in raids since monks could do every bit the dps a bruiser could if not more plus could off tank and had much better utility appeal. So I am not sure what to do with bruisers since they never had any utility that a raid or group could not live without. It will be interesting to see what happens with bruisers. Anyway monks or at least their raid wide should be increased to like it was in RoK and superior repostie should be group aoe blocker. That would be very nice.

RootXArtemis

12-06-2009, 05:57 PM

<cite>Bruener wrote:</cite><blockquote>You are wrong. A serious raid force, meaning actually killing mobs that are a challenge for them and not farm status, Guard -MT, Crusader/Zerker - OT is definitely the de facto and guilds that actually do worry about progression mostly follow that set-up. There are a few exceptions to the rule, but the majority of guilds know that a good Guard in the MT spot is the way to go. Of course there are also a few exceptions with guilds using Guards as OT.Back to the topic. Having certain mobs require certain tanks based on the simple fact one might be a spell tank one might be a melee is a terrible idea. What will happen is that when one tank is needed over the other they will simply swap sitting spots. Oh, we are on the spell mob....go ahead and sit Guard we need to bring in the SK. Oh back on a melee mob, go ahead and sit SK we need to bring the Guard back in. This is exactly what will happen because the fact is the raid only needs a couple tanks.SOE atm is doing a great job leaning some tanks towards MT and some towards OT. This way they don't have to share a role and can actually be a part of the raid full-time. SOE needs to step it up for the utility tank though like Monks had back in RoK....and yes, brawlers should be the more utility type tank. Utility should be in survivability for others they bring. All fighters need to bring some utility though, hence raid-wide buffs and group buffs, for the simple fact that keeping 3 fighters in a raid is actually worth it through all content instead of sitting a couple when they are not needed to just bring in extra DPS on the majority of the content.</blockquote>This is a whole different problem - the reason they would switch out tanks is because currently it is better to have only 2 fighters in a raid. What I'm addressing is that all fighters should have a tanking role - this needs to be complemented by the fact that it needs to be beneficial to actually have all the fighters in a raid. What you're saying is: given the current system of only wanting 2 fighters in a raid to begin with, this would only mean switching out tanks.The problem is that SoE first needs to address the fact that raids prefer to have as few fighters as possible, THEN if something of this sort was implemented what you spoke of wouldn't occur because you would just switch crusader from group 3 to group 1.I think you didn't quite understand that I want to first have fighters be in raids be useful (I gave examples of possible ideas such as a fighter version of fury myth clicky, etc) - thus the situation begins with 5-6 fighters in a raid and THEN you need different tanks for different mobs.This would make fighters just equal to all other archetypes and on top of that let the individual fighters actually do what they're meant to - tank.

Grumpy_Warrior_01

12-06-2009, 07:54 PM

<cite>RootXArtemis wrote:</cite><blockquote>This would make fighters just equal to all other archetypes and on top of that let the individual fighters actually do what they're meant to - tank.</blockquote>All fighters fight. Part of fighting is tanking, part of fighting is protecting your allies, and part of fighting is doing respectable damage to the enemy. As long as players keep plucking the same string that all fighters must be tanks 24/7, you will continue to be disappointed when raid forces take only 2 or 3 to do just that: tank. All fighters need to get over the apparent emotional scarring that comes from standing on the back side of the dragon every now and then. It will get you into more raids, I promise.

Lethe5683

12-06-2009, 07:58 PM

I think that AoE vs ST tanks was the worst idea ever. AoE vs ST dps... ok. But all tanks should have the tools neccissary to keep hate reguardless of AoE or not. Additionally brawlers have the worse AoE DPS is rediculous since they make the most sense as being the highest DPS AoE tanks.I like your idea about differentiating the mobs but as it is. Warriors would probably be the best vs pure physical mobs and brawlers would be the more in between tanks.

Jemoo

12-06-2009, 09:08 PM

<cite></cite><blockquote><cite>Aull wrote:</cite>SOE atm is doing a great job leaning some tanks towards MT and some towards OT. This way they don't have to share a role and can actually be a part of the raid full-time. SOE needs to step it up for the utility tank though like Monks had back in RoK....and yes, brawlers should be the more utility type tank. Utility should be in survivability for others they bring. All fighters need to bring some utility though, hence raid-wide buffs and group buffs, for the simple fact that keeping 3 fighters in a raid is actually worth it through all content instead of sitting a couple when they are not needed to just bring in extra DPS on the majority of the content.</blockquote>I wasn't around to see monks be utility so I can't comment about that but I do have something to say about this. If monks are utility then either bruisers need to be too or one of the other classes needs to be. Earlier I gave the suggestion of crusaders filling the utility tank spot simply because the way I see it brawlers should be just that high damage tanks. Crusaders already both have elements of utility, pallies more than sks but both have more than bruisers. Move the crusaders to a full time utility/MA position (as of right now some of the best MA tanks I've seen are Pallies) and give brawlers better tanking ability but also give them the highest damage potential (and some tools to keep their hate under control). Whatever it comes down to there needs to be a reason to have more than 1-2 tnaks in a raid, there needs to be a reason to have at least one of each archtype and not just in tanks but in healers, scouts, and mages.

RootXArtemis

12-06-2009, 09:32 PM

<cite>Grumpy_Warrior_01 wrote:</cite><blockquote><cite>RootXArtemis wrote:</cite><blockquote>This would make fighters just equal to all other archetypes and on top of that let the individual fighters actually do what they're meant to - tank.</blockquote>All fighters fight. Part of fighting is tanking, part of fighting is protecting your allies, and part of fighting is doing respectable damage to the enemy. As long as players keep plucking the same string that all fighters must be tanks 24/7, you will continue to be disappointed when raid forces take only 2 or 3 to do just that: tank. All fighters need to get over the apparent emotional scarring that comes from standing on the back side of the dragon every now and then. It will get you into more raids, I promise.</blockquote>I never said anything about tanking 24/7 - I am talking about all classes needing to tank at some point, and yes I don't just mean 1 mob (aka Princes in KoS) but multiple mobs per expansion. This is what I'm trying to achieve.There is no reason why there should just be one person doing all the tanking. Having just one MT and one OT that are the same for all situations is part of the reason guilds only have 3 fighters.The problem is that fighters don't bring enough to the table to prefer 6 fighters over 2/3 fighters and 3 extra dps/utility instead. This is the first thing that needs to be adressed. However, this can't be done by giving fighters equal dps to dps classes nor by giving them an OP buff, which then is the only reason they are in a raid. They still need to retain their role as tanks (fighters are primarily damage takers). It's not like we should buff furies' dps to a point that when they don't heal their dps equals that of a wizard - they still need to be healing during a raid. Similarly, fighters should have enough utility to be given permanent raidspots, but part of their role should be tanking occasionally (obviously they can't all be tanking all the time).The bottom line is fighters are not primary damage dealers, not primary healers, they are primary damage takers and that should be their role. Healers heal in raids (some more than others, yet they still heal), dps'ers dps, so fighters should tank (some tanking more than others, yet all tanking to some degree). Currently nothing forces you to have either a warrior or crusader or brawler tank - it's just whoever is the expansion favorite.PS: Please don't tell me that any tank can tank TSO because yes I know that but you still only have one/two tanks (and tanking when your guild is geared to the point that fights are trivial is not an argument).PS: You spoke of fighters "protecting their allies" - I would love to see more of this but currently fighters have intercept, the guardian's stonesphere and what else? Adding buffs in this sense would be another way of giving fighters a more permanent role in raids.

Grumpy_Warrior_01

12-07-2009, 02:22 AM

<cite>RootXArtemis wrote:</cite><blockquote>There is no reason why there should just be one person doing all the tanking.There are GREAT reasons for having one consistent MT and one consistent OT. So much so in fact that many guilds do it this way. For the same reason, we certainly don't swap around the group 1 templar and defiler all the time just to let other healers "shine" in that spot. Everybody has their role and they stick to it, end of story. And it works.The bottom line is fighters are not primary damage dealers, not primary healers, they are primary damage takers and that should be their role. Healers heal in raids (some more than others, yet they still heal), dps'ers dps, so fighters should tank (some tanking more than others, yet all tanking to some degree). Currently nothing forces you to have either a warrior or crusader or brawler tank - it's just whoever is the expansion favorite.Fighters fight. They can do damage, take damage, hold the enemy's attention, and enhance the performance and durability of their allies in battle. Saying that all fighters' primary role is raid boss main tanking is the same as saying all scouts are top-end DPS just by virtue of being scouts. Talk to the bards about that one.PS: You spoke of fighters "protecting their allies" - I would love to see more of this but currently fighters have intercept, the guardian's stonesphere and what else? Adding buffs in this sense would be another way of giving fighters a more permanent role in raids.I have half a dozen or more buffs running all the time for improving self, ally, group, and raid during battle. All fighters get combat buffs.</blockquote>

Rahatmattata

12-07-2009, 02:02 PM

Yea, can't say I'm a fan of using x tank for n mob. I don't have a problem with some tanks being single target and some being aoe tanks either if they would actually balance it.

Costa

12-07-2009, 02:59 PM

If you want to have it so you have 1 of each arch type in raid then they need more fights like the sisters in SoH where they call and switch. Although it needs to be at a level where your brawlers are needed due to something they can do rather than how people do those mobs now with a scout tanking in a brawlers place.Seeing as there are 4 groups in raid then i tend to agree with some of the other posts that fighters need to be just that when they are not tanking and as such they all need utility for their group or raid that justifies them being there.Current content dictates to how the raids are set up with the number of fighters etc so the only way to overcome this is for content that requires a specific arch type to make it successfull. If that archtype is not there then who is at fault? The developers for making content that tries to encompas all or the guilds for not having that type of class?As far as heroic content goes then it should all be doable with any of the fighter classes although you will have some fighters that excell in certain areas than others as that is what makes each type individual.

Aull

12-07-2009, 03:33 PM

<cite>Pattywak@Kithicor wrote:</cite><blockquote><cite></cite><blockquote><cite>Aull wrote:</cite>SOE atm is doing a great job leaning some tanks towards MT and some towards OT. This way they don't have to share a role and can actually be a part of the raid full-time. SOE needs to step it up for the utility tank though like Monks had back in RoK....and yes, brawlers should be the more utility type tank. Utility should be in survivability for others they bring. All fighters need to bring some utility though, hence raid-wide buffs and group buffs, for the simple fact that keeping 3 fighters in a raid is actually worth it through all content instead of sitting a couple when they are not needed to just bring in extra DPS on the majority of the content.</blockquote>I wasn't around to see monks be utility so I can't comment about that but I do have something to say about this. If monks are utility then either bruisers need to be too or one of the other classes needs to be. Earlier I gave the suggestion of crusaders filling the utility tank spot simply because the way I see it brawlers should be just that high damage tanks. Crusaders already both have elements of utility, pallies more than sks but both have more than bruisers. Move the crusaders to a full time utility/MA position (as of right now some of the best MA tanks I've seen are Pallies) and give brawlers better tanking ability but also give them the highest damage potential (and some tools to keep their hate under control). Whatever it comes down to there needs to be a reason to have more than 1-2 tnaks in a raid, there needs to be a reason to have at least one of each archtype and not just in tanks but in healers, scouts, and mages.</blockquote>I didn't post that. Bruener did.

RootXArtemis

12-07-2009, 03:40 PM

<cite>Grumpy_Warrior_01 wrote:</cite><blockquote><cite>RootXArtemis wrote:</cite><blockquote>There is no reason why there should just be one person doing all the tanking.There are GREAT reasons for having one consistent MT and one consistent OT. So much so in fact that many guilds do it this way. For the same reason, we certainly don't swap around the group 1 templar and defiler all the time just to let other healers "shine" in that spot. Everybody has their role and they stick to it, end of story. And it works.The bottom line is fighters are not primary damage dealers, not primary healers, they are primary damage takers and that should be their role. Healers heal in raids (some more than others, yet they still heal), dps'ers dps, so fighters should tank (some tanking more than others, yet all tanking to some degree). Currently nothing forces you to have either a warrior or crusader or brawler tank - it's just whoever is the expansion favorite.Fighters fight. They can do damage, take damage, hold the enemy's attention, and enhance the performance and durability of their allies in battle. Saying that all fighters' primary role is raid boss main tanking is the same as saying all scouts are top-end DPS just by virtue of being scouts. Talk to the bards about that one.PS: You spoke of fighters "protecting their allies" - I would love to see more of this but currently fighters have intercept, the guardian's stonesphere and what else? Adding buffs in this sense would be another way of giving fighters a more permanent role in raids.I have half a dozen or more buffs running all the time for improving self, ally, group, and raid during battle. All fighters get combat buffs.</blockquote></blockquote>I'm afraid you did not thoroughly read through my argument. First off - I said healers heal in raids no matter what position, if you heal the dps group you're still healing. Furthermore your argument has nothing to do with what I'm speaking about. I am NOT saying that having one MT and one OT is incorrect in the current system. Obviously guilds are smart enough to optimize for the given system - I am saying that the circumstances need to change so that the optimization changes. What you're saying has absolutely nothing to do with this.Furthermore, there are differences in dps: e.g. in a primarily ranged fight wizards and rangers will outparse assassins and rogues etc, or with massive powerdrains (think autoattack) - whoever does the most dps is situational, even if there is a bias towards certain situations being prevalent (melee fights). Yes bards parse less than assassins, BUT they still dps. Fighters don't tank and their primary role is not dps'ing, even if it is part of their role - this is EXACTLY why currenlty you don't take more than 2/3 fighters, because the other 3/4 fighters would only dps and as that is not their primary role, raids prefer a primary DPS'er instead.You again speak about increasing durability of allies in battle etc etc, fighters currently barely do that. Sure one person gets to use your avoidance, guards might have a defense group buff, temporary mit buff and stonesphere, zerks might have berserk buff, but that's warriors and not fighters in general. Rather, in general, fighters have too little significance in terms of "protecting allies" or "enhancing their abilities." (Hence if you read my post, you would see that I say this would be an area to expand on to improve fighter utility and broaden their role).

RafaelSmith

12-07-2009, 04:08 PM

Fighters are tanks.......all of them. Its the primary and in many ways thier secondary roll as well.Ideally for evey fighter brought on a raid there has to be something for each of them to perform their primary role.The solution is to design raid content such that there is a need for multiple things to be tanked seperately. We have to get away with the defacto model of one tank to tank em all which plagues many MMOs including EQ2. Sure there are a few special encounters where multiple tanks are needed but in general raids today are the most optimal when they can be single tanked.The solution is not to kludge up the fighters so they can serve ghetto version of other roles like buffs, heals, DPS, etc.Nothing annoys me more than filling slots on raid with fighter #4 or #5 knowing good and well there is no need for them to be there. As a fighter myself...I am even more annoyed when I am that uneeded fighter. I have made it a point to not even attend raids where i will not be tanking anything.Hopefully the new balance dev for EQ2 will figure out a way to implement the small tweaks many fighter types need so they can all compete on equal footing for any tank jobs.Actually hope that "small changes" is the method SOE moves too instead of letting things brew over time then overreact with some massive revamp.

Rahatmattata

12-07-2009, 07:30 PM

<cite>Gaylon@Mistmoore wrote:</cite><blockquote>Hopefully the new balance dev for EQ2 will figure out a way to implement the small tweaks many fighter types need so they can all compete on equal footing for any tank jobs.</blockquote>I wouldn't be surprised if they do nothing. Either because there are more important things to work on, or because they are afraid of the mass rage quit from hordes of FotM shadowknights.

Aull

12-07-2009, 08:23 PM

I am sure that many of those fotm sk's were playing guards, zerks, and brawlers. If anything they would just switch back.

Lethe5683

12-07-2009, 09:54 PM

<cite>Bruener wrote:</cite><blockquote>SOE needs to step it up for the utility tank though like Monks had back in RoK....and yes, brawlers should be the more utility type tank. Utility should be in survivability for others they bring. All fighters need to bring some utility though, hence raid-wide buffs and group buffs, for the simple fact that keeping 3 fighters in a raid is actually worth it through all content instead of sitting a couple when they are not needed to just bring in extra DPS on the majority of the content.</blockquote>No way in hell should they do that. That would be even worse than being forced back into a DPS role.

BChizzle

12-08-2009, 04:23 AM

<cite>Lethe5683 wrote:</cite><blockquote>No way in hell should they do that. That would be even worse than being forced back into a DPS role.</blockquote>Leave it to an SK to try and pigeonhole brawlers.

Jemoo

12-08-2009, 05:19 AM

Sorry Aull and Bruener, musta deleted the wrote names when pairing it down <img src="/smilies/3b63d1616c5dfcf29f8a7a031aaa7cad.gif" border="0" alt="SMILEY" />

Aull

12-08-2009, 11:04 AM

Np Pattywak. I just didn't want people thinking I was Bruener. That would really hurt my reputation. J/K<img src="/eq2/images/smilies/283a16da79f3aa23fe1025c96295f04f.gif" border="0" />

Bruener

12-08-2009, 11:26 AM

<cite>Lethe5683 wrote:</cite><blockquote><cite>Bruener wrote:</cite><blockquote>SOE needs to step it up for the utility tank though like Monks had back in RoK....and yes, brawlers should be the more utility type tank. Utility should be in survivability for others they bring. All fighters need to bring some utility though, hence raid-wide buffs and group buffs, for the simple fact that keeping 3 fighters in a raid is actually worth it through all content instead of sitting a couple when they are not needed to just bring in extra DPS on the majority of the content.</blockquote>No way in hell should they do that. That would be even worse than being forced back into a DPS role.</blockquote>There is no pigeon-holing in that type of play-style. Sorry if you can't seem to comprehend that being a utility tank means being the fighter there helping out the survivabilty of the raid, being an emergency tank, buffing your allies, able to pick up and drag mobs to where they need to be. That is what Brawlers should be designed for. Very versatile and played right really just bring up the raid.Or, yeah they could actually make Brawlers like Monks were in EQ1. Monks were not tanks at all. They were once again a very versatile class that was fun to play. Nobody expected Monks to tank in EQ1. They were DPS with guess what.....UTILITY.There shoudl not be 6 different classes competing for 2 roles.

RafaelSmith

12-08-2009, 11:53 AM

<cite>Bruener wrote:</cite><blockquote>There shoudl not be 6 different classes competing for 2 roles.</blockquote>Too bad SOE didnt realize this before launch =P

Bruener

12-08-2009, 12:51 PM

<cite>Gaylon@Mistmoore wrote:</cite><blockquote><cite>Bruener wrote:</cite><blockquote>There shoudl not be 6 different classes competing for 2 roles.</blockquote>Too bad SOE didnt realize this before launch =P</blockquote>Except they did. Brawlers were supposed to be designed like the Monk from EQ1. Their whole basis. Because of SOEs archetype system they put them in the Fighter tree to keep it 6-6-6-6. No big deal until people started associating fighter = tank.If SOE actually designed the class better for their intended role people would be much happier and the Brawler classes would be much stronger. Instead some Brawlers want to be Utility, some Brawlers want to be DPS, and some Brawlers want to be tanks. Trying to make more people happy has watered down the class and will continue to be a problem. Instead if SOE focused on a vision for the Brawler class instead of always giving them a little in each area to make everybody happy the class would be much better off.And it makes much more sense to have that vision be a role outside of the 2 only tank role on raids. 6 classes in 3 roles is much better than 6 classes in 2 roles.

BChizzle

12-08-2009, 01:18 PM

<cite>Bruener wrote:</cite><blockquote>There is no pigeon-holing in that type of play-style. Sorry if you can't seem to comprehend that being a utility tank means being the fighter there helping out the survivabilty of the raid, being an emergency tank, buffing your allies, able to pick up and drag mobs to where they need to be. That is what Brawlers should be designed for. Very versatile and played right really just bring up the raid.Or, yeah they could actually make Brawlers like Monks were in EQ1. Monks were not tanks at all. They were once again a very versatile class that was fun to play. Nobody expected Monks to tank in EQ1. They were DPS with guess what.....UTILITY.There shoudl not be 6 different classes competing for 2 roles.</blockquote>They should return SK's to the spot they had before TSO, you guys weren't utility you weren't tanks you weren't anything really but you sure looked good standing outside raidzones.I mean seriously lets be real any time this topic comes up you conveniently forget that your class was nothing a year ago and if you weren't made into better tanks you'd still be nothing, stop trying to forcefeed your agenda to everyone it is clear that by making tanks better tanks people will play them more.

RafaelSmith

12-08-2009, 02:56 PM

<cite>Bruener wrote:</cite><blockquote><cite>Gaylon@Mistmoore wrote:</cite><blockquote><cite>Bruener wrote:</cite><blockquote>There shoudl not be 6 different classes competing for 2 roles.</blockquote>Too bad SOE didnt realize this before launch =P</blockquote>Except they did. Brawlers were supposed to be designed like the Monk from EQ1. Their whole basis. Because of SOEs archetype system they put them in the Fighter tree to keep it 6-6-6-6. No big deal until people started associating fighter = tank.If SOE actually designed the class better for their intended role people would be much happier and the Brawler classes would be much stronger. Instead some Brawlers want to be Utility, some Brawlers want to be DPS, and some Brawlers want to be tanks. Trying to make more people happy has watered down the class and will continue to be a problem. Instead if SOE focused on a vision for the Brawler class instead of always giving them a little in each area to make everybody happy the class would be much better off.And it makes much more sense to have that vision be a role outside of the 2 only tank role on raids. 6 classes in 3 roles is much better than 6 classes in 2 roles.</blockquote>Since day one I have believed that the Archetype system was flawed and balancing it properly impossible..........and 24 classes was way too many to try to fit into a game that at its core is dated where someone tanks, someone heals, everyone else does dmg.Fighter happens to be the most obvious example of how it just doesnt work. Look at the 4 plates.....the only way they were able to bring them in line (at least in terms of raiding) was too make them basically the same. There is less differences between he plates now than ever. We all use the same armor ending up with virtually identical tanking stats, and all tank with a sword and board(Tower shield).And yes both SOE and the players are to blame for the "[Removed for Content] do we do about Brawlers". I recall back around CU#13 where SOE devs came out and stated that Fighter = Tank. Big mistake. In game there is no segment of the playerbase that is more confused than Brawlers......ive met some that refuse to tank....and some that think they are Scouts/Mages and should be T1 DPS.

Bruener

12-08-2009, 03:19 PM

<cite>BChizzle wrote:</cite><blockquote><cite>Bruener wrote:</cite><blockquote>There is no pigeon-holing in that type of play-style. Sorry if you can't seem to comprehend that being a utility tank means being the fighter there helping out the survivabilty of the raid, being an emergency tank, buffing your allies, able to pick up and drag mobs to where they need to be. That is what Brawlers should be designed for. Very versatile and played right really just bring up the raid.Or, yeah they could actually make Brawlers like Monks were in EQ1. Monks were not tanks at all. They were once again a very versatile class that was fun to play. Nobody expected Monks to tank in EQ1. They were DPS with guess what.....UTILITY.There shoudl not be 6 different classes competing for 2 roles.</blockquote>They should return SK's to the spot they had before TSO, you guys weren't utility you weren't tanks you weren't anything really but you sure looked good standing outside raidzones.I mean seriously lets be real any time this topic comes up you conveniently forget that your class was nothing a year ago and if you weren't made into better tanks you'd still be nothing, stop trying to forcefeed your agenda to everyone it is clear that by making tanks better tanks people will play them more.</blockquote>The huge difference between SKs and Brawlers is everybody's perception on what SKs should be. That is on par with the counter-part plate tanks. SOE f'ed up big time especially in RoK with SKs and took way too long to make those adjustments. SKs were met to tank and be kings of hate just like EQ1 where SKs had a hard time even walking into a city. Now Brawlers on the other hand are descendants from the EQ1 Monk. They wear leather. And the player perception was to be like EQ1 monks. A very versatile class with good DPS.Yes, SKs were in the crapper a year ago....but SKs have always asked to be, and always expected to be TANKS. The evil counter-part to Paladin. Brawlers....well some want to be tanks, some want to be utility, some want to be DPS, some want to be all 3. The ones that actually expected to be playing a Monk type character from EQ1 gave up a long time ago because too many wants from other players watered down the class and have made it some of everything, but great at nothing.Instead of constantly trying to put the peg in the wrong shaped hole all the time SOE needs to revert back to what could have been great for Brawlers. An awesome utility fighter on a raid that when played right will be extremely appreciated.

Grumpy_Warrior_01

12-08-2009, 04:07 PM

<cite>Gaylon@Mistmoore wrote:</cite><blockquote>Since day one I have believed that the Archetype system was flawed and balancing it properly impossible..........and 24 classes was way too many to try to fit into a game that at its core is dated where someone tanks, someone heals, everyone else does dmg.</blockquote>I'm not sure the archetype system is flawed so much as the general understanding of what it implies. Some players simplistically equate fighter=tank or scout=dps, often deliberately to propagandize an agenda (such as the daily "all fighters are tanks" argument.) But you are going to get disappointed if you look no further than the archetype label to assign blanket roles. Priest means a lot more than just heals. Mages do a lot more than just nukes, with varying degrees of proficiency. Look at the wizard versus illusionist versus conjuror. Three totally diverse skill sets, and yet they are all of the Mage archetype.Sure, all fighters are tanks because all get taunts and the ability to take a hit. But when you look at the skill sets granted for soloing, grouping, small raids and large raids, not all fighters are going to be equally capable as tanks in all of those areas, nor should we want to be! Otherwise you would just have one generic blob for a fighter class. Fighters need to accept some weaknesses to go along with their unique strengths.

jrolla777

12-08-2009, 05:02 PM

RafaelSmith

12-08-2009, 05:06 PM

<cite>Grumpy_Warrior_01 wrote:</cite><blockquote> Otherwise you would just have one generic blob for a fighter class.</blockquote>Which describes exactly the evolution of the Fighter archetype since launch until now and for all we know into the next expansion.

RafaelSmith

12-08-2009, 05:11 PM

<cite>Mancy@Unrest wrote:</cite><blockquote><cite>Grumpy_Warrior_01 wrote:</cite><blockquote>I'm not sure the archetype system is flawed so much as the general understanding of what it implies. Some players simplistically equate fighter=tank or scout=dps, often deliberately to propagandize an agenda (such as the daily "all fighters are tanks" argument.) But you are going to get disappointed if you look no further than the archetype label to assign blanket roles. Priest means a lot more than just heals. Mages do a lot more than just nukes, with varying degrees of proficiency. Look at the wizard versus illusionist versus conjuror. Three totally diverse skill sets, and yet they are all of the Mage archetype.Sure, all fighters are tanks because all get taunts and the ability to take a hit. But when you look at the skill sets granted for soloing, grouping, small raids and large raids, not all fighters are going to be equally capable as tanks in all of those areas, nor should we want to be! Otherwise you would just have one generic blob for a fighter class. Fighters need to accept some weaknesses to go along with their unique strengths.</blockquote>But wizards, illys and conjs fulfill their main role very sufficently, dps. illys have more buffs for others, but they still do thier main job exceptionally, dps. Fighters' main job is to tank, before other "unique strengths". if a fighter class is underpowered to his brethern at his main role, then there is imbalance.</blockquote>But not all main roles stack. DPS stacks....healing stacks. Tanking does not. Once you have the very limited required "tanking" slots filled ....more fighters is waste. Assuming there is a slot there is always room for another DPS or healer or buffer.

Aull

12-08-2009, 05:43 PM

<cite>Grumpy_Warrior_01 wrote:</cite><blockquote>I'm not sure the archetype system is flawed so much as the general understanding of what it implies. Some players simplistically equate fighter=tank or scout=dps, often deliberately to propagandize an agenda (such as the daily "all fighters are tanks" argument.) But you are going to get disappointed if you look no further than the archetype label to assign blanket roles. Priest means a lot more than just heals. Mages do a lot more than just nukes, with varying degrees of proficiency. Look at the wizard versus illusionist versus conjuror. Three totally diverse skill sets, and yet they are all of the Mage archetype.Sure, all fighters are tanks because all get taunts and the ability to take a hit. But when you look at the skill sets granted for soloing, grouping, small raids and large raids, not all fighters are going to be equally capable as tanks in all of those areas, nor should we want to be! Otherwise you would just have one generic blob for a fighter class. Fighters need to accept some weaknesses to go along with their unique strengths.</blockquote>I like your post Grumpy.For me when it comes down to the deal I do not think all fighters should be able to tank the same raid mobs with equal ease. I wouldn't mind the fact that a monk might not be best fitted for the role of raid MT and that a guardian is more better suited for that area. I can live with that.I just think every fighter wants the spot light of best raid MT, but they do not want to loose anything they have that is special. I think that if a monk really wanted to become as great of a raid tank as a guardian then I would expect to loose something like the targetable heal, dps, feign death or something else. Can't expect to have all that and have great survival to boot. Something somewhere has to give.Besides if all tanks become like the feared guardian and hold the raid mt title then I would say get ready to loose your dps and be very dependent on others for aggro and finishing quests that other classes can solo with ease.

Rahatmattata

12-08-2009, 05:56 PM

<cite>Mancy@Unrest wrote:</cite><blockquote>But wizards, illys and conjs fulfill their main role very sufficently, dps. illys have more buffs for others, but they still do thier main job exceptionally, dps. Fighters' main job is to tank, before other "unique strengths". if a fighter class is underpowered to his brethern at his main role, then there is imbalance.</blockquote>Mages have dps sorcerer, hybrid summoner, and utility chanter. Don't kid yourself, enchanter dps is pretty OP for the utility they bring, while summoners are pretty [Removed for Content].Scouts have dps predator, hybrid rogue, and utility bard. Assassins and dirges seem to be the favorite scouts, while rangers are often considered gimper (maybe because they are harder to play, or only work well with really good gear... idk).Priests aren't so clear cut, but basically clerics (well templars anyway) are pure healers and known for their buffs (shield ally, sanctuary, stoneskin, etc.), shamans are known for debuffs that make the mob hit like a wuss and proc wards/heals when it attacks, and druids are known for their "utility"... ports... run speed.. evac... although druids could really be considered the hybrid of the archtype.So a similar template for fighters would be something like meat shield warriors, hybrid crusaders, utility brawlers. Where if you want a pure tank you get a guard for defense capabilities, or a zerker for for offensive. A crusader if you want a hybrid that can tank ok, heal group members, dps pretty decent, feign death, evac, better threat control (paladins have pretty much always be the king of aggro... shadowknights used to pretty much suck though)... etc. And brawlers if you want a bunch of nifty tricks with some limited tanking capability. Now, I'm sure a lot of people would QQ about this model, but for a long time... up until TSO this is basically how the fighter archtype was. With TSO SOE (Aerilik) has pretty much tried to turn crusaders into pure tanks like warriors, but let them keep all their hybrid capabilities... and pretty much gave brawlers the finger. I have a feeling the SOE big wigs didn't want their shadowknights to continue to blow donkey balls while warcraft was coming out with their ubah pwn deathknight, and paladins benefited just by being of the same archtype.

RafaelSmith

12-08-2009, 06:03 PM

<cite>Rahatmattata wrote:</cite><blockquote>up until TSO this is basically how the fighter archtype was. With TSO SOE (Aerilik) has pretty much tried to turn crusaders into pure tanks like warriors, but let them keep all their hybrid capabilities... and pretty much gave brawlers the finger. I have a feeling the SOE big wigs didn't want their shadowknights to continue to blow donkey balls while warcraft was coming out with their ubah pwn deathknight, and paladins benefited just by being of the same archtype.</blockquote>LOL pretty much sums things up as I see them <img src="/smilies/3b63d1616c5dfcf29f8a7a031aaa7cad.gif" border="0" alt="SMILEY" />

Bruener

12-08-2009, 06:49 PM

<cite>Mancy@Unrest wrote:</cite><blockquote>But wizards, illys and conjs fulfill their main role very sufficently, dps. illys have more buffs for others, but they still do thier main job exceptionally, dps. Fighters' main job is to tank, before other "unique strengths". if a fighter class is underpowered to his brethern at his main role, then there is imbalance.</blockquote>See your perception is wrong. Mages aren't designed to straight up DPS, they are designed to increase DPS. Sorcerors do this through the obvious method of direct DPS. That is why Sorcerors DPS the most. Chanters on the other hand do this through a combination of personal DPS and the DPS potential they buff others. The extra DPS a sorceror has is more than made up for by the buffing an illu does on top of their own DPS.Scouts operate the same way. Predators are pure DPS. Rogues have good personal DPS and more than make up for the gap that Predators have in the debuffs they bring to increase raid DPS. Bards have mediocre DPS but bring more DPS through buffs that again make up for the gap between Predators and Bards.Tanks should work the same way. You have the tank that is going to fit the MT role. Takes damage the best. You have the tanks that fit the OT role, survivability is less but their agro is much better for their intended role. Finally you have the utility fighter that can tank in a pinch but just like bards and chanters would bring to the table through buffs an increase to survivability. An example, imagine if Brawlers were the only ones that had an avoidance buff. Maybe an additional stoneskin to put on another player in a pinch. Group intercede/stoneskin ability. So, yes the Brawler can tank, just like Bards and Chanters can DPS. What they lack in personal tanking tools though they would more than make up for in what they bring to the raid for the additional survivability they would bring.This would make it worth it for that 3rd fighter spot, and you can bet that it will be a Brawler. One additional change that would need to be made is making it so that 2 tanks compete for MT, 2 for OT, and 2 for 3rd tank. Interesting that it could easily work in the archetype just like it does in the others with Warriors, Crusaders, Brawlers. Imo, the vision should be Bezerkers given the tools to perform like Guards. Crusaders are definitely given the tools already to be the OT spot. And Brawlers need those tools to close the gap.With a set up like this each fighter would know their place and could actually get the adjustments and future buffs to make sure they can perform that role the best. Round pegs in round holes.

SK_Lafree

12-08-2009, 07:05 PM

Noobie here so sorry if this is a dumb question but I've seen some ideas to spread out DSP, resistances, agro management/AoE and durrability but what about some debuff/buffs for fighters?I thought that brawlers were supposed to have a little more debuff than Crusaers or Warriors. Couldn't that be an element the devs could play with in addition to the others to help create some character for their fighter classes? Particulary with the rumor debuff is getting pulled from rogues and given to summoners.

Aull

12-08-2009, 08:12 PM

SK Lafreeze I think you have a great suggestion. However since the rogues already shine in this area it would be hard to give brawlers any debuffs without stealing from them.Currently I think bruisers have one offensive debuff that lowers the mobs chance of hitting its target and monks have a defensive debuff.In the beginning the brawlers should have been given the debuffs that the rogues have currently and the rogues being a bit more tankish.

Lethe5683

12-08-2009, 09:29 PM

Bruener stop posting this garbage. Go run along and play your OP SK or something. EQ1 has nothing to do with class balance in EQ2. They are two very different games and thank god for that.

Bruener

12-08-2009, 11:18 PM

<cite>Lethe5683 wrote:</cite><blockquote>Bruener stop posting this garbage. Go run along and play your OP SK or something. EQ1 has nothing to do with class balance in EQ2. They are two very different games and thank god for that.</blockquote>Yeah, sorry. Somebody actually posting something that makes sense hurts doesn't it? This game would not be here if it wasn't for EQ1. Brilliant.

BChizzle

12-09-2009, 12:17 AM

<cite>Bruener wrote:</cite><blockquote>Tanks should work the same way. You have the tank that is going to fit the MT role. Takes damage the best. You have the tanks that fit the OT role, survivability is less but their agro is much better for their intended role. Finally you have the utility fighter that can tank in a pinch but just like bards and chanters would bring to the table through buffs an increase to survivability. An example, imagine if SK were the only ones that had an avoidance buff. Maybe an additional stoneskin to put on another player in a pinch. Group intercede/stoneskin ability. So, yes the SK can tank, just like Bards and Chanters can DPS. What they lack in personal tanking tools though they would more than make up for in what they bring to the raid for the additional survivability they would bring.This would make it worth it for that 3rd fighter spot, and you can bet that it will be a SK. One additional change that would need to be made is making it so that 2 tanks compete for MT, 2 for OT, and 2 for 3rd tank. Interesting that it could easily work in the archetype just like it does in the others with Warriors, Crusaders, Brawlers. Imo, the vision should be Bezerkers given the tools to perform like Guards. Brawlers are definitely given the tools already to be the OT spot. And Crusaders need those tools to close the gap.With a set up like this each fighter would know their place and could actually get the adjustments and future buffs to make sure they can perform that role the best. Round pegs in round holes.</blockquote>Fixed it for you.

Lethe5683

12-09-2009, 06:55 AM

<cite>Bruener wrote:</cite><blockquote><cite>Lethe5683 wrote:</cite><blockquote>Bruener stop posting this garbage. Go run along and play your OP SK or something. EQ1 has nothing to do with class balance in EQ2. They are two very different games and thank god for that.</blockquote>Yeah, sorry. Somebody actually posting something that makes sense hurts doesn't it? This game would not be here if it wasn't for EQ1. Brilliant.</blockquote> Don't be ridiculous it doesn't matter if EQ1 was the predecessor of EQ2 that doesn't mean it is supposed to be the same. Not to mention you don't seem to have a clue as to what other people want in the classes they play so take your biased SK garbage and go elsewere.

Lethe5683

12-09-2009, 06:58 AM

<cite>Bruener wrote:</cite><blockquote>Instead of constantly trying to put the peg in the wrong shaped hole all the time SOE needs to revert back to what could have been great for Brawlers. An awesome worthless and boring utility fighter on a raid that when played right will be extremely appreciated will help SK's like myself become even more rediculously OP.</blockquote>

Lethe5683

12-09-2009, 07:04 AM

<cite>Bruener wrote:</cite><blockquote>There is no pigeon-holing in that type of play-style. Sorry if you can't seem to comprehend that being a utility tank means being the fighter there helping out the survivabilty of the raid SKs, being an emergency tank, buffing your allies SKs, able to pick up and drag mobs to where they need to be. That is what Brawlers should be designed for. Very versatile and played right really just bring up the raid SKs.</blockquote>

Bruener

12-09-2009, 11:28 AM

Wow, you guys are good at taking what somebody else says and crossing off a few words to fill in what you want. That is the weakest way to put forth an argument and really is quite sad that just because you can't think of anything good to say you have to resort to petty quoting.Sorry guys, the majority of the players playing this game think that Brawlers should be a type of utility tank. Most of the Brawlers when questioned will tell you they don't expect to be awesome tanks but to have great versatility, utility, DPS. The reason they expect that is because 4 other fighters are already competing for the 2 tanking spots.And Lethe I am sorry you can't wrap your little brain around how enjoyable it coud be to play a Brawler if they give them the tools they need. Its no different than what the OT does most of the time when they are not OT'ing. Brawlers, like Monks in EQ1 should become a form of CC/DPS with the ability to tank in emergency situations. Crap hits the fan and more times than not it would mean a good Brawler could save the situation. Controlling adds, giving survivability to the raid, and providing good DPS at the same time would mean a great toon to play....and would fit what most people that rolled a Brawler expect. Or, you could keep fighting for tanking tools while others fight for DPS and others fight for utility...and you can end up a watered-down class that is always complaining. I guess if that is what you enjoy good luck.

Jemoo

12-09-2009, 12:11 PM

I agree with most of what Bruener has said. Some brawlers are looking for tanking spots, but why compete with 4 other classes for the same thing when you could get something different and easier for the devs to balance (like dps and utility, they already have the dps and monks have the utility) and fill a different spot unique to your class. While I do think SoE needs to do something to make brawlers a better tank class for grouping I don't feel they should be raid MT. Leave MT to the warriors thats what they are good at. Give SKs and Pallies something they excel at such as OT/MA. They all should be able to tank groups but raiding is completely different. All classes need that role to play in raids and if you give brawlers and crusaders the MT role then what do warriors have? Give each fighter something they excel at OUTSIDE tanking. Raids don't need 3/4 tanks but they should need 3/4 fighters each for something different.

Aull

12-09-2009, 01:42 PM

I agree with Bruener's " you could keep fighting for tanking tools while others fight for DPS and others fight for utility...and you can end up a watered-down class that is always complaining".For me I would rather SOE buck up and place it on the forums as to what they are intending for a monk and for a bruiser and listen to some feedback but not all of it.If SOE states that both monk and bruiser will be seeing more increases to their tanking skills then so be it.If SOE states that both monk and bruiser will be more utility then so be it.If SOE states that both monk and bruiser will be more dps inclined then so be it.Just not all three areas for both.What ever way SOE moves will upset brawler players. Honestly I don't want my bruiser being another utility class. I want bruisers being what they have always been and that is more offensively inclined and less defensively inclined. Ten ton hammer and wikia described bruisers as being this.Anyway what I want a bruisers to be and what say Crabbok wants to see bruisers as will possibly be two different ideas. SOE really needs to be the one to set the brawlers each in their own given direction. Players will never be able to determine what they want.

Lethe5683

12-09-2009, 03:59 PM

<cite>Bruener wrote:</cite><blockquote>Wow, you guys are good at taking what somebody else says and crossing off a few words to fill in what you want. That is the weakest way to put forth an argument and really is quite sad that just because you can't think of anything good to say you have to resort to petty quoting.Sorry guys, the majority of the players playing this game think that Brawlers should be a type of utility tank. Most of the Brawlers when questioned will tell you they don't expect to be awesome tanks but to have great versatility, utility, DPS. The reason they expect that is because 4 other fighters are already competing for the 2 tanking spots.And Lethe I am sorry you can't wrap your little brain around how enjoyable it coud be to play a Brawler if they give them the tools they need. Its no different than what the OT does most of the time when they are not OT'ing. Brawlers, like Monks in EQ1 should become a form of CC/DPS with the ability to tank in emergency situations. Crap hits the fan and more times than not it would mean a good Brawler could save the situation. Controlling adds, giving survivability to the raid, and providing good DPS at the same time would mean a great toon to play....and would fit what most people that rolled a Brawler expect. Or, you could keep fighting for tanking tools while others fight for DPS and others fight for utility...and you can end up a watered-down class that is always complaining. I guess if that is what you enjoy good luck.</blockquote>Your one to talk about weak arguements when the best you can come up with is insulting anyone who doesn't agree with you . Since you are obviously not going to be civil neither will I. It doesn't matter whatsoever what the majority of people playing the game think brawlers should be since the majority of people playing the game are stupid people like you who strut around acting like they are the voice of the community and speak nothing but absolute truth. What does matter is what the majority of real players who play brawlers as a main think the class should be, and I can guarantee you that is not the same as what the majority of people think brawlers should be.

Grumpy_Warrior_01

12-09-2009, 04:34 PM

If I rolled a brawler today, trying to tank a 30-foot tall dragon by "float like a butterfly, sting like a bee" bobbing and weaving in preference over an iron-clad walking Sherman tank would not even cross my mind. I have never figured out why leather-clad street punks and toga-wrapped tranquility meditators would even contemplate that as part of their gig./shrug

RafaelSmith

12-09-2009, 04:52 PM

<cite>Grumpy_Warrior_01 wrote:</cite><blockquote>If I rolled a brawler today, trying to tank a 30-foot tall dragon by "float like a butterfly, sting like a bee" bobbing and weaving in preference over an iron-clad walking Sherman tank would not even cross my mind. I have never figured out why leather-clad street punks and toga-wrapped tranquility meditators would even contemplate that as part of their gig./shrug</blockquote>Since day one of EQ2 I have thought that Brawlers were never intended to be Main Tanks.By the same token.........I think the crazy avoidance numbers Warriors been allowed to reach are out of line.Oh and I dont think Crusaders should be allowed to use Tower Shield or Bows....../sigh

Aull

12-09-2009, 05:04 PM

Grumpy_Warrior_01

12-09-2009, 05:54 PM

<cite>Gaylon@Mistmoore wrote:</cite><blockquote>Since day one of EQ2 I have thought that Brawlers were never intended to be Main Tanks.By the same token.........I think the crazy avoidance numbers Warriors been allowed to reach are out of line.Oh and I dont think Crusaders should be allowed to use Tower Shield or Bows....../sigh</blockquote>The avoidance numbers are of course coming from those shields. Every now and then I run with players who have to have it pointed out to them that when your shield gets hit, you have avoided damage to your person. The better the shield, the higher the avoidance. Once a guardian drops his shield, which we generally are forced to do these days, any advantage evaporates.

BChizzle

12-09-2009, 06:19 PM

Brawlers are tanks period. If you try and makes brawlers into some kind of weakazzed versions of buffers why not just bring an extra bard/illy if you make them dps why not just bring an extra actual dps. Plain and simple Brawlers should be in raids to tank, and don't give my that omg how to you stand up to dragons in leather BS its fantasy it doesn't make sense you can blow fire out of your finger tips either. But I'll tell you this if I was to have to face a dragon irl I wouldn't want to be in plate I would want to be in something I could move super fast in.

Aull

12-09-2009, 07:06 PM

<cite>BChizzle wrote:</cite><blockquote>Brawlers are tanks period. If you try and makes brawlers into some kind of weakazzed versions of buffers why not just bring an extra bard/illy if you make them dps why not just bring an extra actual dps. Plain and simple Brawlers should be in raids to tank, and don't give my that omg how to you stand up to dragons in leather BS its fantasy it doesn't make sense you can blow fire out of your finger tips either. But I'll tell you this if I was to have to face a dragon irl I wouldn't want to be in plate I would want to be in something I could move super fast in.</blockquote>I agree with ya BChizz but many will argue if you make brawlers tanks (which they already are) then why not just bring a plate tank. <img src="/smilies/69934afc394145350659cd7add244ca9.gif" border="0" alt="SMILEY" />

Landiin

12-09-2009, 07:16 PM

<cite>BChizzle wrote:</cite><blockquote>Brawlers are tanks period. If you try and makes brawlers into some kind of weakazzed versions of buffers why not just bring an extra bard/illy if you make them dps why not just bring an extra actual dps. Plain and simple Brawlers should be in raids to tank, and don't give my that omg how to you stand up to dragons in leather BS its fantasy it doesn't make sense you can blow fire out of your finger tips either. But I'll tell you this if I was to have to face a dragon irl I wouldn't want to be in plate I would want to be in something I could move super fast in.</blockquote>Brawlers are instance tank not raid tanks silly rabbit <img src="/smilies/69934afc394145350659cd7add244ca9.gif" border="0" alt="SMILEY" />

BChizzle

12-09-2009, 07:20 PM

<cite>Toran@Oasis wrote:</cite><blockquote><cite>BChizzle wrote:</cite><blockquote>Brawlers are tanks period. If you try and makes brawlers into some kind of weakazzed versions of buffers why not just bring an extra bard/illy if you make them dps why not just bring an extra actual dps. Plain and simple Brawlers should be in raids to tank, and don't give my that omg how to you stand up to dragons in leather BS its fantasy it doesn't make sense you can blow fire out of your finger tips either. But I'll tell you this if I was to have to face a dragon irl I wouldn't want to be in plate I would want to be in something I could move super fast in.</blockquote>Brawlers are instance tank not raid tanks silly rabbit <img src="/eq2/images/smilies/69934afc394145350659cd7add244ca9.gif" border="0" /></blockquote>Funnzy since I have tanked everything in this game rather easily.

Lethe5683

12-09-2009, 09:57 PM

<cite>Grumpy_Warrior_01 wrote:</cite><blockquote>If I rolled a brawler today, trying to tank a 30-foot tall dragon by "float like a butterfly, sting like a bee" bobbing and weaving in preference over an iron-clad walking Sherman tank would not even cross my mind. I have never figured out why leather-clad street punks and toga-wrapped tranquility meditators would even contemplate that as part of their gig./shrug</blockquote>What you say makes absolutly no sense. You could dodge attacks from a dragon but to a dragon plate armor is little more than "tin foil" and you would be stomped into the ground. Don't try to bring reality into a fantasy game to help your arguements because more often than not it will just subvert your own arguement as shown above...

Lethe5683

12-09-2009, 09:59 PM

<cite>Aull wrote:</cite><blockquote><cite>BChizzle wrote:</cite><blockquote>Brawlers are tanks period. If you try and makes brawlers into some kind of weakazzed versions of buffers why not just bring an extra bard/illy if you make them dps why not just bring an extra actual dps. Plain and simple Brawlers should be in raids to tank, and don't give my that omg how to you stand up to dragons in leather BS its fantasy it doesn't make sense you can blow fire out of your finger tips either. But I'll tell you this if I was to have to face a dragon irl I wouldn't want to be in plate I would want to be in something I could move super fast in.</blockquote>I agree with ya BChizz but many will argue if you make brawlers tanks (which they already are) then why not just bring a plate tank. <img src="/eq2/images/smilies/69934afc394145350659cd7add244ca9.gif" border="0" /></blockquote>Brawlers are supposed to be tanks who can also DPS respectibly while tanking. But the fact that plate tanks have gotten brawler like DPS (except guards) while still having much bettewr survivability is what makes brawlers so inferior.

Rahatmattata

12-09-2009, 11:35 PM

Just give brawlers swashbuckler dps and a small (and I do mean small) bump of durability... like, give them the most HP of all fighters. Nerf plate tank dps and boost plate tank threat to compensate. The details of how to do that would be up to the game devs. Design new encounters with multiple mobs of varying strength and abilities, where having 3 tanks makes it much easier.Make brawlers the best tank for plowing trash for all I care. Not sure how to do that, and that's one reason I'm not a game developer for EQ2. I don't have to come up with the details, they do.There are many ways to balance classes. You can give a 10 dollar bill to one fighter & two 5 dollar bills to another fighter, resulting in equality. Or you can give a sweet shield and crappy sword to one fighter & a sweet sword and crappy shield to another fighter, resulting in balanced but not equal.I think you need either balance by fighter1 strong in x weak in y, fighter2 strong in y weak in x, fighter 3 average in x average in yorequality in that every fighter is completely equal in survivability, utility, aggro, dps, solo, pvp... but uses different tools to do this. I see this option as a massive headache to achieve, and no other archtype is balanced like this anyway.For fighters SOE seems to have a hybrid of the two examples resulting in balance in some areas, equality in other areas, and a lack of any balance in yet other areas. It's sort of like weaving three pieces of yarn together alternating different patterns. It looks really nice until you get to the end of the yarn. You end up with a knotted mess and some pieces of yarn are shorter/longer than other pieces. Just pick one pattern and stick with it unless you really know [Removed for Content] you're doing.IMO

Prestissimo

12-10-2009, 01:23 AM

Stop nerfing paladins. Stop ignoring brawlers. Make threat worth something, but not everything. Give tanks a reason to want to dps AND to taunt and give every tank a different way to be equal to each other in all scenarios with the exception of specific abilities or encounter genre or specific ways that make each fighter valuable to a group and raid in more than one scenario per expansion. Stop ignoring summoners and give them SOMETHING to make them better (not related but while you're at it might as well throw it in) and make troubadors less unfun while the wheels are rolling and something is getting done.I'd be happy after that personally. I simply want all tanks to be able to tank and to do it without being rediculously more difficult/easier than others. I do not support nerfs on any tank class, even the SK (although they did get excessive on the sk luvin in TSO). Most tanks are just fine as they are except that they are completely dps dependant, and the solution to that is simply by reducing non-dps tanks damage output by 50% and tack on the amount of taunt to each ability based on how much damage was removed. Merge taunt bonuses with melee bonuses, and holy cow the problem with taunts not doing anything will be solved.I simply want my paladin to function and to stop being nerfed for no effective reason and to not have to relearn my entire class when a developer gets a whim to "rebalance" them based on faulty assumptions. Why is that so much to ask? Paladins may have amends and holy ground which are in themselves very overkill, BUT compare that with EVERYTHING else they have and you'll see exactly why there is no merrit to nerfing those abilities.When "balancing" the paladins or when others cry about the OPed state of certain abilities don't also forget everything else that goes into a class. For the paladin, consider the following. Compare survivability toolsof a paladin to other tanks: none. Compare utility functions to other tanks; none. Compare class specific functions neglecting the previously mentioned amends and holy ground; none spare gimpy heals that aren't even worth mentioning since they do nothing for anyone else 99.9% of the time. Compare raw agro gain with the exception of the previously mentioned 2 abilities; way less than anyone else after you take away amends and the snap value of holy ground. Compare effective traits that make them highly valuable tanks when compared to others; none again sparing the previously mentioned abilities and gimpy heals that don't matter.Compare the RAW numbers that a class can put out, and then deduct from the total based on the average return from siphoning behaviors such as amends. Don't just assume that because in x condition with x setup a specific ability is overpowered so in all conditions with all setups it must be equally as overpowered and merrits a huge change because it just doesn't work like that. Just like for brawlers and their lack of survivability and aoe agro, warriors and their overdependance on dps and huge vulnerability to control effects/unideal fight/group conditions, and every other class in the game and their respective flaws. Balancing around situational "standards" ignores the individuality of the classes and if you're absolutely set on completely ignoring the individuality of classes, just merge them all into one and get it over with so we can all continue playing without being continously changed or so we can just quit and cut our losses while we're ahead.

BChizzle

12-10-2009, 03:24 AM

All fighters should tank around the same level, I think sk's in tso is a good measuring point to start at.

BChizzle

12-10-2009, 03:34 AM

<cite>Grumpy_Warrior_01 wrote:</cite><blockquote>The avoidance numbers are of course coming from those shields. Every now and then I run with players who have to have it pointed out to them that when your shield gets hit, you have avoided damage to your person. The better the shield, the higher the avoidance. Once a guardian drops his shield, which we generally are forced to do these days, any advantage evaporates.</blockquote>Try being a brawler with no shield. At least plates still have a shield option in offensive stance.

Lethe5683

12-10-2009, 04:40 AM

Brawlers don't need that much work. The thing that is most aggravating about it is that it is so ridiculously obvious and simple how to fix brawlers yet SoE still does NOTHING. Three simple changes would solve almost all of brawlers tanking issues. 1. Make strikethrough work only against shield block and parry. 2. Give brawlers at least 40% AoE auto attack. 3. Make minimum deflection chance not tied to stance. Offensive already costs a lot of mitigation and some contested avoidance; we shouldn't also loose our minimum deflection unless you want to make plate tanks unable to use a shield in offensive stance.

Aull

12-10-2009, 10:56 AM

I am all for brawlers seeing improvement but I don't think they need a massive overhaul either. With brawler single target dps having the potential to be very high I figure uping their survival would be nice but not only slightly. Fixing as mentioned the strikethrough and how brawlers are double attacked will be monumental.Giving bralwers better (not equal) aoe aggro is one of the top reasons I think most brawlers sufffer. I personally think uping the proc rating for crane twirl and giving it a slight boost in damage would be best. I wouldn't shun 40% aoe auto attack either.Like Lethe mentioned on the deflection tied to stance should be done away with.

BChizzle

12-10-2009, 12:18 PM

<cite>Aull wrote:</cite><blockquote>I am all for brawlers seeing improvement but I don't think they need a massive overhaul either. With brawler single target dps having the potential to be very high I figure uping their survival would be nice but not only slightly. Fixing as mentioned the strikethrough and how brawlers are double attacked will be monumental.Giving bralwers better (not equal) aoe aggro is one of the top reasons I think most brawlers sufffer. I personally think uping the proc rating for crane twirl and giving it a slight boost in damage would be best. I wouldn't shun 40% aoe auto attack either.Like Lethe mentioned on the deflection tied to stance should be done away with.</blockquote>Fix twirl, forget the ae auto attack tbh I like having something unique and if the fix is simply bringing twirl in line with auto attack damage I don't see why its a problem.

Siatfallen

12-10-2009, 01:02 PM

Lethe5683

12-10-2009, 01:30 PM

<cite>BChizzle wrote:</cite><blockquote><cite>Aull wrote:</cite><blockquote>I am all for brawlers seeing improvement but I don't think they need a massive overhaul either. With brawler single target dps having the potential to be very high I figure uping their survival would be nice but not only slightly. Fixing as mentioned the strikethrough and how brawlers are double attacked will be monumental.Giving bralwers better (not equal) aoe aggro is one of the top reasons I think most brawlers sufffer. I personally think uping the proc rating for crane twirl and giving it a slight boost in damage would be best. I wouldn't shun 40% aoe auto attack either.Like Lethe mentioned on the deflection tied to stance should be done away with.</blockquote>Fix twirl, forget the ae auto attack tbh I like having something unique and if the fix is simply bringing twirl in line with auto attack damage I don't see why its a problem.</blockquote>The problem with twirl is first it's damage won't scale automatically unless they specifically make it do so, upping it's damage will only fix the problem for awile. The other thing is the proc rate on crane twirl is so bad it's not even funny.<cite>Siatfallen wrote:</cite><blockquote>The problem with twirl is that proc damage is simply not scaling to level very well. So we can up the damage output of it now, and next time the level cap goes up we'll see the same problem again.That could probably be solved in many ways, but linking the damage output to autoattack damage just seems like the easiest way to go. That still makes it different from AE autoattack. Make this damage tie to the mainhand weapon, add in the effects of crane flock, and you may begin seeing something of an argument for using twohanded weapons for brawlers.Assuming of course that they actually design decent twohanded weapons for a change.</blockquote>What's a two handed weapon?

BChizzle

12-10-2009, 02:15 PM

<cite>Lethe5683 wrote:</cite><blockquote>The problem with twirl is first it's damage won't scale automatically unless they specifically make it do so, upping it's damage will only fix the problem for awile. The other thing is the proc rate on crane twirl is so bad it's not even funny.</blockquote>With it being affected by base dmg and crit chance there really isn't a reason it cant scale better to level, put it up to 40% double the dmg and done. If it procs off DA's/ae attacks/flurrys and CA's I don't really see an issue here, because it hits 8 targets I can live with it doing a bit less dmg then an ae auto attack but the divide should be much closer.

Lethe5683

12-10-2009, 04:47 PM

<cite>BChizzle wrote:</cite><blockquote><cite>Lethe5683 wrote:</cite><blockquote>The problem with twirl is first it's damage won't scale automatically unless they specifically make it do so, upping it's damage will only fix the problem for awile. The other thing is the proc rate on crane twirl is so bad it's not even funny.</blockquote>With it being affected by base dmg and crit chance there really isn't a reason it cant scale better to level, put it up to 40% double the dmg and done. If it procs off DA's/ae attacks/flurrys and CA's I don't really see an issue here, because it hits 8 targets I can live with it doing a bit less dmg then an ae auto attack but the divide should be much closer.</blockquote>To make it able to compete with the DPS AoE autoattack of the same % would do for a player with top of the line gear they would have to make it so powerfull to begin with that it would be totally overpowered for weaker players. Unless they find some reliable way to tie the proc directly to autoattack damage I don't think they will ever be able to make it work right.I agree that the proc dmg being doubled and increased to 40% would be a huge improvement but it still just won't compete with AoE autoattack except on single target fights or fights with 8+ mobs that last more than a few seconds.

Ambrin

12-10-2009, 05:38 PM

<cite>BChizzle wrote:</cite><blockquote><cite>Aull wrote:</cite><blockquote>I am all for brawlers seeing improvement but I don't think they need a massive overhaul either. With brawler single target dps having the potential to be very high I figure uping their survival would be nice but not only slightly. Fixing as mentioned the strikethrough and how brawlers are double attacked will be monumental.Giving bralwers better (not equal) aoe aggro is one of the top reasons I think most brawlers sufffer. I personally think uping the proc rating for crane twirl and giving it a slight boost in damage would be best. I wouldn't shun 40% aoe auto attack either.Like Lethe mentioned on the deflection tied to stance should be done away with.</blockquote>Fix twirl, forget the ae auto attack tbh I like having something unique and if the fix is simply bringing twirl in line with auto attack damage I don't see why its a problem.</blockquote>As much as I like the proc on Crane Twirl, to what level do you suggest the proc damage be balanced to? The level of a high end avatar killing brawler such as yourself who can easily auto attack for 4000+ damage a hit? Maybe a mid tier raider such as myself who's auto attacks are closer to 3000-3500 damage a hit? How about someone just starting to raid with their myth and a mix of T2/T3, maybe a piece of T4 doing 2500 damage a hit? What about someone running around in T1/T2 shard gear with only there epic, so ~1200 a hit? And finally, what about a soloer who just hit 80 and is in quested/treasured gear, or MC at the best doing around 700 per hit?* Note, these values are also accounting things like crit rates, which most people come close to capping once they start raiding (with buffs). Any damage values for a proc would have to account in the base CA and normal CA modifiers as well as crit rates that a person in that tier would have (assuming these stats were to affect Crane Twirl).If you balance the proc to the highest level of game play than it is completely over powered in the lower tiers, and if you balance it to the lower tiers it would be overly [Removed for Content] in the higher tiers. AE auto attack doesn't have this problem as it scales directly with gear in all levels of game play.What I would personally suggest for Crane Twirl would be something like this at 8/8 AA spent:* 32% AE auto attack (8*4).* 24% for the proc it has right now, but affected by melee stats instead of spell stats (8*3).This way we still remain largely unique among all classes when it comes to the "AE" AA lines while getting of roughly equal use (perhaps better or worse depending on gear).

BChizzle

12-10-2009, 06:11 PM

<cite>Ambrin@Nagafen wrote:</cite><blockquote><cite>BChizzle wrote:</cite><blockquote><cite>Aull wrote:</cite><blockquote>I am all for brawlers seeing improvement but I don't think they need a massive overhaul either. With brawler single target dps having the potential to be very high I figure uping their survival would be nice but not only slightly. Fixing as mentioned the strikethrough and how brawlers are double attacked will be monumental.Giving bralwers better (not equal) aoe aggro is one of the top reasons I think most brawlers sufffer. I personally think uping the proc rating for crane twirl and giving it a slight boost in damage would be best. I wouldn't shun 40% aoe auto attack either.Like Lethe mentioned on the deflection tied to stance should be done away with.</blockquote>Fix twirl, forget the ae auto attack tbh I like having something unique and if the fix is simply bringing twirl in line with auto attack damage I don't see why its a problem.</blockquote>As much as I like the proc on Crane Twirl, to what level do you suggest the proc damage be balanced to? The level of a high end avatar killing brawler such as yourself who can easily auto attack for 4000+ damage a hit? Maybe a mid tier raider such as myself who's auto attacks are closer to 3000-3500 damage a hit? How about someone just starting to raid with their myth and a mix of T2/T3, maybe a piece of T4 doing 2500 damage a hit? What about someone running around in T1/T2 shard gear with only there epic, so ~1200 a hit? And finally, what about a soloer who just hit 80 and is in quested/treasured gear, or MC at the best doing around 700 per hit?* Note, these values are also accounting things like crit rates, which most people come close to capping once they start raiding (with buffs). Any damage values for a proc would have to account in the base CA and normal CA modifiers as well as crit rates that a person in that tier would have (assuming these stats were to affect Crane Twirl).If you balance the proc to the highest level of game play than it is completely over powered in the lower tiers, and if you balance it to the lower tiers it would be overly [Removed for Content] in the higher tiers. AE auto attack doesn't have this problem as it scales directly with gear in all levels of game play.What I would personally suggest for Crane Twirl would be something like this at 8/8 AA spent:* 32% AE auto attack (8*4).* 24% for the proc it has right now, but affected by melee stats instead of spell stats (8*3).This way we still remain largely unique among all classes when it comes to the "AE" AA lines while getting of roughly equal use (perhaps better or worse depending on gear).</blockquote>You are forgetting it procs off of ca's, ae's and da's too also it doesnt matter if it procs off spell crits and base those stats are all getting merged.EDIT: Here is the potential of crane twirl now tell me raising the proc rate to 40% won't make it on par with ae auto attacks if not make it too OP. Don't forget we still get crane flock as well.<img src="http://i120.photobucket.com/albums/o176/mallent/lawlparse.jpg" width="1024" height="813" />

Lethe5683

12-10-2009, 06:59 PM

<cite>Ambrin@Nagafen wrote:</cite><blockquote>* 32% AE auto attack (8*4).* 24% for the proc it has right now, but affected by melee stats instead of spell stats (8*3).</blockquote>Both? That might actually be little bit OP.

BChizzle

12-10-2009, 07:14 PM

<cite>Lethe5683 wrote:</cite><blockquote><cite>Ambrin@Nagafen wrote:</cite><blockquote>* 32% AE auto attack (8*4).* 24% for the proc it has right now, but affected by melee stats instead of spell stats (8*3).</blockquote>Both? That might actually be little bit OP.</blockquote>The one thing too is crane twirl is a significant dps proc on single target mobs by making it an ae auto we effectively nerf our single target dps.

Lethe5683

12-11-2009, 12:08 AM

<cite>BChizzle wrote:</cite><blockquote><cite>Lethe5683 wrote:</cite><blockquote><cite>Ambrin@Nagafen wrote:</cite><blockquote>* 32% AE auto attack (8*4).* 24% for the proc it has right now, but affected by melee stats instead of spell stats (8*3).</blockquote>Both? That might actually be little bit OP.</blockquote>The one thing too is crane twirl is a significant dps proc on single target mobs by making it an ae auto we effectively nerf our single target dps.</blockquote>I guess so. To be honest I never knew that it proced of CAs.

BChizzle

12-11-2009, 12:54 AM

<cite>Lethe5683 wrote:</cite><blockquote><cite>BChizzle wrote:</cite><blockquote><cite>Lethe5683 wrote:</cite><blockquote><cite>Ambrin@Nagafen wrote:</cite><blockquote>* 32% AE auto attack (8*4).* 24% for the proc it has right now, but affected by melee stats instead of spell stats (8*3).</blockquote>Both? That might actually be little bit OP.</blockquote>The one thing too is crane twirl is a significant dps proc on single target mobs by making it an ae auto we effectively nerf our single target dps.</blockquote>I guess so. To be honest I never knew that it proced of CAs.</blockquote>Ya, it makes it so its ok it doesn't hit for 4k but the proc rate does need to come up.

ZerkerDwarf

12-24-2009, 09:04 AM

<cite>Visjeer@Nagafen wrote:</cite><blockquote>I actually had an idea similar to this a while ago, but it had more to do with the control effects various bosses did. The idea was you could make each archetype immune to a different type of control effect, so you would therefore want a certain archetype to tank a certain boss if a boss used one type of control effect a lot.An example of how this might work is:Brawlers -> Immune to knockbacks, knockdowns, throwbacks, roots and snares.Warriors -> Immune to stuns, stifles and dazes.Crusaders -> Immune to Fear, charm and mesmerize.* While brawlers do get a slight adventage in this breakdown in the number of this they would be immune to, but in my mind I associate knockback, knockdowns, and throwbacks as being pretty much the same thing. This way each archetype is immune to 3 different control effects.** This doesn't take into account PvP where the immunities might need to be revoked or toned back, for example: instead of immunity the effects would have their duration reduced by 50%.*** Crusaders already sort of have this as they can spec to be immune to fear. If this is implemented I would think it would be as a AA choice. The crusader AA that specifically makes them immune to fear would probably need to be modified so that it is still useful.I believe this would help the each archetype in raids as you could design raid zones and encounters with a specific archetype(s) in mind, making having one of each archetype in a tanking role a desirable raid setup.This does run into some issues with heroic zones. If one zone favoured a particular type of control effects the archetypes who aren't immune to it would be at a huge disadvantage. The developers would have to make sure they don't make a zone that is only effectively tankable by one archetype. I'd hope that in any given zone the amount of control effects would be balanced so that no one archetype has any kind of advantage.</blockquote>Great idea of distributing immunities across the fighter classes.The useless warrior WIS line could be replaced by a warrior immunity line, so to speak.

Lethe5683

12-25-2009, 01:38 AM

<cite>Visjeer@Nagafen wrote:</cite><blockquote>* While brawlers do get a slight adventage in this breakdown in the number of this they would be immune to, but in my mind I associate knockback, knockdowns, and throwbacks as being pretty much the same thing. This way each archetype is immune to 3 different control effects.</blockquote>Correct me if I'm wrong, but I belive that knockdown and knockback also apply stun so being immune to knockback but not stun would not change anything but the animation.

BChizzle

12-25-2009, 04:10 AM

<cite>Lethe5683 wrote:</cite><blockquote><cite>Visjeer@Nagafen wrote:</cite><blockquote>* While brawlers do get a slight adventage in this breakdown in the number of this they would be immune to, but in my mind I associate knockback, knockdowns, and throwbacks as being pretty much the same thing. This way each archetype is immune to 3 different control effects.</blockquote>Correct me if I'm wrong, but I belive that knockdown and knockback also apply stun so being immune to knockback but not stun would not change anything but the animation.</blockquote>Its completly unbalanced, Ill take daze stun stifle for 500 Alex. OMG go figure the guy posting was a warrior.

Ambrin

12-26-2009, 04:23 AM

<cite>BChizzle wrote:</cite><blockquote><cite>Lethe5683 wrote:</cite><blockquote><cite>Visjeer@Nagafen wrote:</cite><blockquote>* While brawlers do get a slight adventage in this breakdown in the number of this they would be immune to, but in my mind I associate knockback, knockdowns, and throwbacks as being pretty much the same thing. This way each archetype is immune to 3 different control effects.</blockquote>Correct me if I'm wrong, but I belive that knockdown and knockback also apply stun so being immune to knockback but not stun would not change anything but the animation.</blockquote>Its completly unbalanced, Ill take daze stun stifle for 500 Alex. OMG go figure the guy posting was a warrior.</blockquote>I'm not sure who you are addressing with that statement, but if it was me my only toons are my monk and my necro.Anyways, it was only a suggestion of how immunities could be broken down, not some hard and fast "the way I posted or not at all" kind of deal.Also, one more note, you could obviously design a fight where you pretty much need one, or all,or even a mix of immunities. Just because one archetype doesn't get what could be perceived as the "best" immunities does not at all mean that the other archetypes wouldn't be equally as needed. After all, that stifle or fear immunity would be pretty useless on a mob like this:* When damaged sends the player flying (throwback).* Extreme frontals that would one shot all non-tanks.* Positioned in a long hallway that makes it impossible for the DPS and the tank to position themselves against wall.Now you have a mob that can only effectively fought with a tank who is immune to throw backs (brawler), but not impossible for the other tanks to fight. It would just take longer as the DPS would be extremely slow (hit the mob once, have to run back across the room to get to the mob).You could also design another encounter with 3 mobs, and each designed to be tanked by a specific archetype. Add in other effects like requiring tank switches and other fun stuff and you could have an interesting fight that pretty much requires having a tank of each archetype in the tanking slot.