Guardians: Requesting Feedback

[Xelgad]

<p>Greetings Guardians!First off, allow me say that we understand that the class is being outshined at the moment, and we’re working on it. It's going to take more than just one change to get Guardians back to working as a strong class again. I'm not going into details yet, but we do have a mechanics change in the works that will at least help a bit to distinguish Guardians as a more defensive tank. Even with that, the class is currently lacking in other areas, including threat generation and utility.It's utility that we want to focus this thread on. We want to bring Guardian utility up to the level that the other fighters bring to a group or raid. We have three tentative changes that will be going to test soon:</p><ol><li>Got Your Back will become raidwide.</li><li>Cripple will become a maintainable debuff with a damage component.</li><li>Call of Shielding will also increase the health of the raid. The level 87 version at master will amount to around 1,000 hit points.</li></ol><p>We’re looking for feedback on these ideas, and we’re open to boosting Guardian utility even a bit further, especially in heroic content. I want to emphasize that we’re not trying to turn Guardians into plate-wearing Bards or anything of the sort. However, I do want to try to focus this thread on the utility aspect of the class.</p>

[Rhita]

<p>Definitely a good start. Got your back will be a decent ability now. Cripple still isn't that great of an ability and not worth getting once you have the myth/buff that makes us immune to riposte. Call of Shielding will actually be worth maintaining too. A few suggestions though, take away the 34 defense on call of shielding and add 2% parry with that hp, that way its got some worthwhile avoidance on it.</p><p>Another suggestion I had was change our plant ability thats pretty much useless in all content to where it roots the guardian and makes him immune to knockback for its duration. That would give guardians the edge in being the best MT spot but wouldnt make the class overpowered.</p><p>Last change I could think of would be with moderate and improved moderate, its a little overkill on the dehate. Maybe change our AA for our moderate in the guardian tree to offer something to the person you are placing this on. Like 1 crit bonus per lvl and maxes at lvl 5. Thanks for taking the time to look at our class.</p>

[Gungo]

<p><cite>Rhita@Najena wrote:</cite></p><blockquote><p>Last change I could think of would be with moderate and improved moderate, its a little overkill on the dehate. Maybe change our AA for our moderate in the guardian tree to offer something to the person you are placing this on. Like 1 crit bonus per lvl and maxes at lvl 5. Thanks for taking the time to look at our class.</p></blockquote><p>With the way crit bonus works on wards I would suggest potency instead of crit bonus.</p>

[Rhita]

<p>Either one, both would make us wanted more. If its crit bonus, my coercer gets it, if potency, then my defiler.</p>

[Sydares]

<p>I'm glad to see posts like this detailing plans and asking for further input - Guardians definitely need the help.</p>

[circusgirl]

<p>Personally, I would like to see the guardian avoidance lend replaced with a mitigation lend that works similarly.  Ideally this buff would allow a guardian to buff another fighter's (or group/raidmember's) mitigation, while simultaneously receiving an avoidance lend from a brawler.</p><p>As things stand now the avoidance lend that guardians have is almost never used in a raid.  They are always on the receiving end, and bring nothing to the raid by having an avoidance lend to give.  Being able to lend some mit to another fighter/groupmember would prove far more useful in both raids and heroic instancing.</p><p>Please note that I'm talking about a lend in the same sense that buffs like Tranquil Vision, shakeoff, etc. work, <strong>not</strong> one like pledge of armament.  An avoidance lend does not hurt the caster when used, like pledge does.</p>

[Rahatmattata]

<p>Recapture needs to be more useful. Compared to other tanks' level 80 spell, it's sickening. I really can't think of anything cool to add to it besides like giving all fighters a temp buff like flurry or something. TBH, I'd rather it be something that helps the guardian or non-fighters in some way, rather than helping other tanks hold aggro.</p><p>Maybe it would be OP, but the temp group mit buff could also add like 7% damage reduction and be.... raid-wide? Or tack on some damage reduction, either proc or static on our existing raid-wide buff. In any case, I think guard "utility" should be defensive/protective in nature.</p><p>It would be real nice if sentry watch worked with magic damage and dots (pretty sure it doesn't), unyielding will is a buff that stays up until it triggers or is canceled, and tower of stone casting time is reduced to normal combat art casting speed.</p><p>Thanks for posting. The last time a dev has acknowledged the guardian boards was before the launch of TSO afaik.</p>

[Rezikai]

<p><cite>Rhita@Najena wrote:</cite></p><blockquote><p>Definitely a good start. Got your back will be a decent ability now. Cripple still isn't that great of an ability and not worth getting once you have the myth/buff that makes us immune to riposte. Call of Shielding will actually be worth maintaining too. A few suggestions though, take away the 34 defense on call of shielding and add 2% parry with that hp, that way its got some worthwhile avoidance on it.</p><p><span style="color: #ff6600;">A nice idea, but the fact that all raid mobs pretty much ignore parry means it becomes a heroic mob buff to use and while hp is.. well, hp.</span></p><p>Another suggestion I had was change our plant ability thats pretty much useless in all content to where it roots the guardian and makes him immune to knockback for its duration. That would give guardians the edge in being the best MT spot but wouldnt make the class overpowered.</p><p><span style="color: #808000;">/agree... this is something that was nice up until t7 (EoF i believe) when they nerfed this to not work on raid mobs, before then it did... and was actually worth casting.</span></p><p>Last change I could think of would be with moderate and improved moderate, its a little overkill on the dehate. Maybe change our AA for our moderate in the guardian tree to offer something to the person you are placing this on. Like 1 crit bonus per lvl and maxes at lvl 5. Thanks for taking the time to look at our class.</p><p><span style="color: #808000;">O.o    =]</span></p></blockquote><p>As for the to +def it helps some for heroic issues but as said before raid issues its pretty much worthless as for the suggestion of turning it into a raid wide Mit buff it still wouldnt be desired as mitigation is obtained in so many other avenues for other classes with Adorns/AAs the HP tho wouldnt be terrible if it was the 1k hp idea imo.</p><p>As for the Cripple, making it a 5% damage reduction thats always up would bring it in line with other tank myths/spells, we had our own myth at 10% damage reduction before it also was nerfed..... and made me sad.</p>

[Yimway]

<p><cite>Xelgad wrote:</cite></p><blockquote><p>we do have a mechanics change in the works that will at least help a bit to distinguish Guardians as a more defensive tank. </p><ol><li>Got Your Back will become raidwide.</li><li>Cripple will become a maintainable debuff with a damage component.</li><li>Call of Shielding will also increase the health of the raid. The level 87 version at master will amount to around 1,000 hit points.</li></ol></blockquote><p>Not having an understanding of where mechanics changes are going puts us at a pretty hefty disadvantage when talking about utilitiy needs.  I think everyone will agree utility is the LEAST important aspect of fighter abilities.  The last [Removed for Content] thing I want a guard brought along for is utility.</p><p>That being said, yes our utility is way behind all other fighters.</p><p>1. Got your back -  Thing is the other fighters on the raid don't have survivability problems, even making this raid wide is not going to be so situationally beneficial it will not be valued.  I recommend dumping this entirely and replacing it with something else.  However if you want to stay in the same genre, have it protect all healers in the group.  I personally would rather see it as an Enhance: Battle Cry and change it to a raid wide mitigation increase.</p><p>2. Cripple - maintainable debuff is in the right dirrection, question is what kind of debuff.  I personally would like to see something like 5-10% reduction of base physical damage of target.  Lowering melee output and providing some defensive debuffing vs raidwide trauma.</p><p>3 Call of Shielding - Hp is fine, I know others would rather see a damage reduction component instead, but I can understand where that could be problematic.  It's tough for me to say this buff would be desirable or not, as clearly are getting by fine without it,.</p><p>The biggest problem with the utility changes you outline is it helps the class almost nill in grouping where it is absolutely the weakest and needs serious help.</p><p>As others have stated, Recapture is totally useless putside of raiding.  It should be adjusted as we described in beta 6 months ago, it should increase hate position of all fighters in raid, but it should also lower hate position of non-fighters in the guardian's group.  Including some raw threat on it for the guard would be good icing, as I know none of us want to manage aggro by positional snaps alone.</p><p>I would consider looking at Guardian Sphere and changing it to 50% chance to stoneskin instead of intercept damage on ally, or change it so that the guardian only takes 20% of the intended damage.  Currently, it is too easy for the ability to be a death sentence for the guard rather than a save for his group.</p><p>I understand your only looking at utility, but buffing utility without addressing hate generation raid wide isn't going to help us much.</p><p>I find my only problem holding aggro is off of other fighters.  The biggest problem I find is, I can't seem to get other fighters to stop hitting positional increases on my target.  I implore you to consider taking damage components off of fighter positional increasers so that players are less motivated to use them at innapropriate times.  Seperating dps components from positionals would allow me to actually hold aggro again.</p>

[Yimway]

<p>And are you even considering pvp utility with these changes, since not only are we the worst raid plate tank, worst heroic tank, we're undeniably the worst pvp tank as well.</p>

[steelbadger]

<p><cite>Xelgad wrote:</cite></p><blockquote><p>Greetings Guardians!First off, allow me say that we understand that the class is being outshined at the moment, and we’re working on it. It's going to take more than just one change to get Guardians back to working as a strong class again. I'm not going into details yet, but we do have a mechanics change in the works that will at least help a bit to distinguish Guardians as a more defensive tank. Even with that, the class is currently lacking in other areas, including threat generation and utility.It's utility that we want to focus this thread on. We want to bring Guardian utility up to the level that the other fighters bring to a group or raid. We have three tentative changes that will be going to test soon:</p><ol><li>Got Your Back will become raidwide.</li><li>Cripple will become a maintainable debuff with a damage component.</li><li>Call of Shielding will also increase the health of the raid. The level 87 version at master will amount to around 1,000 hit points.</li></ol><p>We’re looking for feedback on these ideas, and we’re open to boosting Guardian utility even a bit further, especially in heroic content. I want to emphasize that we’re not trying to turn Guardians into plate-wearing Bards or anything of the sort. However, I do want to try to focus this thread on the utility aspect of the class.</p></blockquote><p>These changes are fine, in and of themselves, but they won't make much difference to the overall desirability of Guardians in groups/raids.</p><p>As you rightly say you're not wanting to turn Guards into plate-wearing bards, but this means that Guardian utility will never be at a level where a raid wants to take one regardless of their other failings.  At the end of the day, in both heroic and epic content, the final arbiters in tank desirability are aggro generation capability and survivability.  Now a Guardian's forte is supposed to be survivability, but this quality isn't really seeked out.  Any tank class can now tank any mob with just 2 healers (Raid) or 1 healer (Heroic).  Once everyone is able to stay alive then any advantage one has over the other in terms of survivability is largely moot.  It's not possible to 'stay alive better'.</p><p>If you want to fix Guardians properly then it will require a reworking of:</p><p>1)  The class, to regain it's advantage to survivability.</p><p>2)  The mobs, to ensure that that survivability is actually useful.</p><p>3)  The gear, to recalibrate the cap on mitigation and maybe resists so that there's somewhere for Guards to go.  At the moment I can hit mit cap vs lvl 98 solo.  That should not be even remotely possible.</p><p>If you just want to waylay the whinage then greatly increase aggro generation (not DPS generation) in both AOE and single target.  That's fairly easy to do, just add some big-ol procs to some AA somewhere, add big time threat to assault (to give us something to compare with Holy Ground, Gibe, Sacrament that style of thing) and increase the basic threat generation of reinforcement to make it similar to Insight (but with the added bonus of the +1 hate position portion).</p>

[Wulfghar]

<p>I would have to agree with Steelbadger on this one.  I understand that Devs are looking at the bigger picture, rather than an expansion by expansion fix.  However, as it stands now any other plate(and some leather) fighters can tank all of the same content a Guardian can while bringing alot more dps-oriented utility to their raidforce.  The content itself isn't difficult enough because all of the raid encounters aren't hitting hard enough to create a demand for a "Survival/Defensive" oriented tank.  So the question most raid leaders face is: "Why should I bring a Guardian when I could bring a Zerk or SK and achieve the same effect in less time with more dps?"  1k HP on our raidwide buff?  Why is it needed when most healers that are geared enough and most dps/tank classes that are competent enough never die from raid ae's.  I do like Rhita's suggestion of the kickback immunity, but that is a fix that will only affect 1 player in the raid.  As a raid leader, I have to make the choice of what best improves the whole raid.  Right now, with this content, I can't think of a single reason to bring a Guardian along.  We have less hate generation, less dps, less utility for our own group and the whole raid, less aoe agro and all we have to show for it is an iota of survivability(which isn't even necessary).</p>

[metalhed]

<p>1k HP buff would be welcomed for raidwide, maybe add 5 crit bonus or 5 potency with it.</p><p>Aggro is the main problem with Guardians,Guardians will be better balanced just from that one fix alone.</p><p>I have an idea that would help all MT's no matter what class. Let's call it the "Primary Tank Ruleset"</p><p>1.First tank with aggro is considered the Primary Tank</p><p>2.When the Primary Tank dies, no other tank can be the Primary tank, so then the normal ruleset applies.</p><p>3.Mobs with memwipe/or require tank switches/offtanking would not use this ruleset.</p><p>4. Any tank using hate postions while the Primary Tank Ruleset is in effect would only increase the Primary Tanks hate positions.</p><p>     Example, DPS rips aggro from the Primary Tank, Off tank hits rescue, mob switches back to Primary Tank.</p><p>5. No other tank can get aggro till Primary Tank dies.</p><p>One of the biggest complaints for guardians, is not so much losing aggro from DPS , its the other tanks that are mainly the problem. No point in being named MT when you can't hold aggro from the OT that is just trying to be helpful and dps.</p><p>I think something like this would help all MT's, plus give more room for the other tanks to dps without fear of ripping aggro from the MT.</p>

[aislynn00]

<p><cite>Xelgad wrote:</cite></p><blockquote>It's utility that we want to focus this thread on. We want to bring Guardian utility up to the level that the other fighters bring to a group or raid. We have three tentative changes that will be going to test soon:1. Got Your Back will become raidwide.</blockquote><p>While I appreciate the sentiment, I'm afraid this change won't accomplish anything, for three reasons:</p><p>1) It only protects fighters.</p><p>2) It doesn't protect targets who are the direct target of the mob (i.e., the person with aggro).</p><p>3) It is an endline ability in a subtree that virtually no guardian is ever going to invest 20 points into, since doing so would entail reducing either personal survivability or personal DPS/hate generation by taking points out of the other guardian subtrees, which wouldn't make any sense whatsoever.</p><p>The most any guardian is currently going to invest into this tree is 5 into Enhance: Reinforcement, 3 into Enhance: Rescue (to get to Enhance: Reinforcement), and in some builds, 5 into Enhance: Sentry Watch. That amounts to 8 (the norm) - 13 (the absolute max) points.</p><p>If you really wanted to make this ability worth effectively wasting at the very least 7 AA points (aside from the cost of the ability itself), then here are some options for you:</p><p>1) Remove the class restriction, set the duration to 15 sec and the reuse time to 60 sec, and increase the range to 25 - 30m.</p><p>That is to say, Got Your Back would become a group AE protector somewhat weaker then, say, AA-enhanced Tortoise Shell. It still wouldn't affect the guardian if he was tanking, but it would have become a very worthwhile utility AA.</p><p>OR</p><p>2) Make Got Your Back affect every fighter raidewide, including the guardian himself, and allow it to do what no other AE protector is able to do: protect against targeted AE's--i.e., a MT'ing guardian could protect himself from an AE hit. Additionally, set the reuse time to 60 sec and increase the range to 50m.</p><blockquote>2. Cripple will become a maintainable debuff with a damage component.</blockquote><p>The problem with Cripple is that its sole purpose seems to give away one of our class advantages to other tanks, so they can better fill the MT role.  That is, needless to say, the exact opposite of what most raiding guardians are looking to achieve.</p><p>If you want to make Cripple worth it, render it a maintainable debuff that reduces the auto-attack modifier of the mob by 5% - 10%.  In such a form, it would actually help <em>any</em> MT, not just non-guardians.</p><p>Alternatively, make it a modest <em>maintainable</em> physical mitigation debuff, something that would actually boost raidwide DPS significantly without overpowering the guardian's personal DPS. I think that would go a long way towards making up for the currently inferior guardian DPS.</p><blockquote>3. Call of Shielding will also increase the health of the raid. The level 87 version at master will amount to around 1,000 hit points.</blockquote><p>Now, that sounds like a good idea, but let's face it: nobody is ever going to bring a guardian to a raid because of 1K extra HP, especially not considering the DPS and/or HPS-boosting raid-wide buffs of other fighters.</p><p>Aside from the HP, how about adding a 10% auto-attack modifier component and/or a 10% Accuracy bonus?</p><hr /><p>Finally, let me stress that no amount of utility will turn guardians into the first choice as raid MT's unless you return to us a significant non-situational survivability edge, and not just vs spike damage, and adjust mobs to actually require that level of survivability.  After all, if you leave mobs unchanged, why would you bring a guardian, given that shadow knights, berserkers, and paladins bring more DPS to the raid and are able to tank every single mob in the game?</p><p>At any rate, as far as survivability goes, we currently have no mitigation advantage whatsoever (any plate tank can easily reach the cap) while paladins have a 10% permanent damage reduction advantage plus substantial healing and a significantly higher block chance (due to AA's), just to mention one example.</p><p>Raising the mitigation cap to 18,000 - 20,000 vs 98th level mobs, adding a permanent 10% Damage Reduction component to our defensive stance, and making Unyielding Will (our death preventer) a permanent buff until triggered would go a long way towards returning some manner of survivability edge to guardians.</p>

[spudsmckenzie2]

<p>Hello Xelgad,</p><p>   Thank you for taking our suggestions..</p><p>1).  recapture needs some attention. i use it quite abit during raids and often it doesnt work. perhaps this ability could be boosted abit.</p><p>2). our death save could use a makeover. often in laggy zones it gets double clicked and thus cancelled. i would love to see a death save on a shorter timer also.</p><p>3). i know this is a little off topic but when pulling multiple mobs and reinforcement is down its often hard to maintain decent aggro especally during raids. i was thinking of some kind of aggro adjustment to our class that is inert or built in that would make our class more effective.</p><p> -thank you</p>

[Salarionn]

I understand that you want to work on our utility, but you suggested that making us preferred defensive tanks is the plan, but there is a problem with that really. That is what lead us down the dark alley we find our class now. We have received snap after snap while every other tank was given more raw DPS along with being able to live almost as well. The problem is every other tank class can live through every encounter in the game and bring much more DPS to the table. Making us better defensive tanks isnt going to help us much being almost every guild leader out there is going to allow for a extra wipe or two a week for the tanks that can bring the heat. I think its rather pointless to keep stacking us with defense when being more defensive then we are currently wont help for that reason. You wont find a Guard on most of the WW ranking guilds rosters. We are defensive to death as it is, making us more defensive sounds great, but in the real world of raiding it wont help us get in raids, let alone displace the other three classes that can do it all. Why take a dependent on healers 100%, 1/3-1/2 less DPS , only a brittle hair better surviving tank, when you can have one thats good at everything do it. How many of your SF encounters have DPS checks? I can think of three and I havnt even seen every encounter yet. Why bring in Mr. Defensive when you can have a choice of three different Mr. Everything? That was the goal to make Guards the defensive warrior, but the defensive Crusader (Pally) can still hang DPS wise with the offensive arch type of the warrior and crusaders. I know I an being redundant, but I just want to make sure ya understand that its DPS we lack. When you set up encounters that NEED a certain amount of DPS, no guild is going to be switching in and out tanks when you have a choice of three who can be in there for everything.

[Davngr1]

<p> posted this on another forum a few days ago, so ill just paste it here.</p><p>  few if any classes are brought on most encounters for survivability because the content does not hit "that hard" and dps "caps" seems to be what makes mob die, like before but more so now imo. the problem is that guardian is a defensive class you can't add 5% raid wide crit bonus or potency because that would not be in line with the class. i think they should take sentinel and make it a raid wide buff you receive at lvl 55. of course change it to a permanent buff but also change it to a percentage to avoid death and give hate to the guard. ie. sentinel all raid/group members have a 5%? maybe 10%? (might be op <img title="Smiley Tongue" src="http://eq2flames.com/images/smilies/smiley-tongue.gif" border="0" />) chance to have sentinel cast on them at death. * will heal target for 50% of health * will increase hate to caster by 5000k * will increase threat position to caster by 5 * this effect can only trigger once a minute * this effect can not be modified except by direct means. this would stay inline with guardian AND not only offer survivability but also offer DPS that is also needed. since when people die their dps seems to drop to zero <img title="Smiley Tongue" src="http://eq2flames.com/images/smilies/smiley-tongue.gif" border="0" /></p>

[Britty]

<p><cite>Xelgad wrote:</cite></p><blockquote><p>Greetings Guardians!First off, allow me say that we understand that the class is being outshined at the moment, and we’re working on it. It's going to take more than just one change to get Guardians back to working as a strong class again. I'm not going into details yet, but we do have a mechanics change in the works that will at least help a bit to distinguish Guardians as a more defensive tank. Even with that, the class is currently lacking in other areas, including threat generation and utility.It's utility that we want to focus this thread on. We want to bring Guardian utility up to the level that the other fighters bring to a group or raid. We have three tentative changes that will be going to test soon:</p><ol><li>Got Your Back will become raidwide.</li><li>Cripple will become a maintainable debuff with a damage component.</li><li>Call of Shielding will also increase the health of the raid. The level 87 version at master will amount to around 1,000 hit points.</li></ol><p>We’re looking for feedback on these ideas, and we’re open to boosting Guardian utility even a bit further, especially in heroic content. I want to emphasize that we’re not trying to turn Guardians into plate-wearing Bards or anything of the sort. However, I do want to try to focus this thread on the utility aspect of the class.</p></blockquote><p>These adjustements will make absolutely no difference to the desirability of a Guardian. If there is indeed by the dev team a focus on Guardians and their deficiencies then these items kind of make me scratch my head somewhat.</p><p>You need to read the Guardian threads somewhat to see where the class is really hurting and needs attention pretty much right away.</p>

[Xethren]

<p><cite>steelbadger wrote:</cite></p><blockquote><p><cite>Xelgad wrote:</cite></p><blockquote><p>Greetings Guardians!First off, allow me say that we understand that the class is being outshined at the moment, and we’re working on it. It's going to take more than just one change to get Guardians back to working as a strong class again. I'm not going into details yet, but we do have a mechanics change in the works that will at least help a bit to distinguish Guardians as a more defensive tank. Even with that, the class is currently lacking in other areas, including threat generation and utility.It's utility that we want to focus this thread on. We want to bring Guardian utility up to the level that the other fighters bring to a group or raid. We have three tentative changes that will be going to test soon:</p><ol><li>Got Your Back will become raidwide.</li><li>Cripple will become a maintainable debuff with a damage component.</li><li>Call of Shielding will also increase the health of the raid. The level 87 version at master will amount to around 1,000 hit points.</li></ol><p>We’re looking for feedback on these ideas, and we’re open to boosting Guardian utility even a bit further, especially in heroic content. I want to emphasize that we’re not trying to turn Guardians into plate-wearing Bards or anything of the sort. However, I do want to try to focus this thread on the utility aspect of the class.</p></blockquote><p>These changes are fine, in and of themselves, but they won't make much difference to the overall desirability of Guardians in groups/raids.</p><p>As you rightly say you're not wanting to turn Guards into plate-wearing bards, but this means that Guardian utility will never be at a level where a raid wants to take one regardless of their other failings.  At the end of the day, in both heroic and epic content, the final arbiters in tank desirability are aggro generation capability and survivability.  Now a Guardian's forte is supposed to be survivability, but this quality isn't really seeked out.  Any tank class can now tank any mob with just 2 healers (Raid) or 1 healer (Heroic).  Once everyone is able to stay alive then any advantage one has over the other in terms of survivability is largely moot.  It's not possible to 'stay alive better'.</p><p>If you want to fix Guardians properly then it will require a reworking of:</p><p>1)  The class, to regain it's advantage to survivability.</p><p>2)  The mobs, to ensure that that survivability is actually useful.</p><p>3)  The gear, to recalibrate the cap on mitigation and maybe resists so that there's somewhere for Guards to go.  At the moment I can hit mit cap vs lvl 98 solo.  That should not be even remotely possible.</p><p>If you just want to waylay the whinage then greatly increase aggro generation (not DPS generation) in both AOE and single target.  That's fairly easy to do, just add some big-ol procs to some AA somewhere, add big time threat to assault (to give us something to compare with Holy Ground, Gibe, Sacrament that style of thing) and increase the basic threat generation of reinforcement to make it similar to Insight (but with the added bonus of the +1 hate position portion).</p></blockquote><p>This. Guardians are in desparate need of hate changes that make it easier for them to be able to hold mobs on them. Also these proposed changes by Xel do absolutely nothing for the solo or heroic guard. Our tiny edge in survivability is pointless, and the Guard has next to nothing going for them being the lowest DPS tank.</p><p>Reworking the class's utility should be behind fixing their hate-gen and 'why bring a guard when any other tank does it better/faster' issues.</p>

[Macross_JR]

<p><cite>Xelgad wrote:</cite></p><blockquote><p>Greetings Guardians!First off, allow me say that we understand that the class is being outshined at the moment, and we’re working on it. It's going to take more than just one change to get Guardians back to working as a strong class again. I'm not going into details yet, but we do have a mechanics change in the works that will at least help a bit to distinguish Guardians as a more defensive tank. Even with that, the class is currently lacking in other areas, including threat generation and utility.It's utility that we want to focus this thread on. We want to bring Guardian utility up to the level that the other fighters bring to a group or raid. We have three tentative changes that will be going to test soon:</p><ol><li>Got Your Back will become raidwide.(<span style="color: #ff0000;">Pointless as at most there might be 3 fighters on a raid at all)</span></li><li>Cripple will become a maintainable debuff with a damage component.<span style="color: #ff0000;">(With out knowing what kind of maintained debuff this is its really hard to comment on it)</span></li><li>Call of Shielding will also increase the health of the raid. The level 87 version at master will amount to around 1,000 hit points.<span style="color: #ff0000;">(As others have stated 1k hp won't garner enough of a change for this to be considered usefull)</span></li></ol><p>We’re looking for feedback on these ideas, and we’re open to boosting Guardian utility even a bit further, especially in heroic content. I want to emphasize that we’re not trying to turn Guardians into plate-wearing Bards or anything of the sort. However, I do want to try to focus this thread on the utility aspect of the class.</p></blockquote><p>If you want to change some of our utility make Battle Cry be an unlimited AoE threat over time spell(i.e. Grave Sac).  You can change the recast to adjust for it, but doing that would go a long way to help.  As others have stated Recapture needs to be changed, we were the only fighter that got a level 80 ability that helped other fighters hold agro when they don't need help in holding agro.  Another thing would be to change Sentinel Strike to a buff that adds hate to each successful hit instead of just a taunt with damage.  Those are all I can think of right now.</p>

[Ristan]

<p><cite>Salarionn wrote:</cite></p><blockquote>I understand that you want to work on our utility, but you suggested that making us preferred defensive tanks is the plan, but there is a problem with that really. That is what lead us down the dark alley we find our class now. We have received snap after snap while every other tank was given more raw DPS along with being able to live almost as well. The problem is every other tank class can live through every encounter in the game and bring much more DPS to the table. Making us better defensive tanks isnt going to help us much being almost every guild leader out there is going to allow for a extra wipe or two a week for the tanks that can bring the heat. I think its rather pointless to keep stacking us with defense when being more defensive then we are currently wont help for that reason. You wont find a Guard on most of the WW ranking guilds rosters. We are defensive to death as it is, making us more defensive sounds great, but in the real world of raiding it wont help us get in raids, let alone displace the other three classes that can do it all. Why take a dependent on healers 100%, 1/3-1/2 less DPS , only a brittle hair better surviving tank, when you can have one thats good at everything do it. How many of your SF encounters have DPS checks? I can think of three and I havnt even seen every encounter yet. Why bring in Mr. Defensive when you can have a choice of three different Mr. Everything? That was the goal to make Guards the defensive warrior, but the defensive Crusader (Pally) can still hang DPS wise with the offensive arch type of the warrior and crusaders. I know I an being redundant, but I just want to make sure ya understand that its DPS we lack. When you set up encounters that NEED a certain amount of DPS, no guild is going to be switching in and out tanks when you have a choice of three who can be in there for everything. </blockquote><p>This.</p><p>As a raid leader, My MT is a pally, my OT is a zerker., My 3rd tank is a brawler...the guard goes 4th, and is only there really to pick up the mob if the first 3 tanks die, sometimes he doesn't go if we need dps.  The guard can't reach half the numbers that any of my other tanks can, and can't hold the mob as well either especially if there are multiple mobs.</p><p>I play a Guard, it's my alt but it's 90 and in raid gear, with expert/masters.  It was my main for awhile.  DPS/Hate generation is very frustrating on that toon.</p><p>A few things that I think would help:</p><p>1. Give us a blue aoe that increases threat, you can attach it to one of our exsisting attacks.  Doesn't have to be a "taunt" just a slight threat increase to our short range blue aoe to help us grab mobs that are not linked.</p><p>2. Recapture needs alot of work.  My thoughts, make it a temp buff you can cast on another tank (single target) that works like reinforcement.  It would give us something in a raid if all of our snaps are down, or if the OT is having problems holding a mob we can snap it on him while we MT or vice versa.</p><p>3. I liked the previous posters idea about got your back as becoming a group aoe block, so that when your healers have to eat the aoe because your still in there, you can protect them if theres alot of damage being put out.</p><p>4. Since repost/parry doesn't work in raids well, I would like to see cripple rewored, but I'm not sure if a debuff and damage component would be any way of improving it.  a Mitigation or damage decrease would be better.</p><p>5. I like the idea that call of sheilding would give a good hp boost, but it's not enough.  Defense also means about 0 on a raid.  It would be nice to have a HP boost + a mitigation increase or even a damage ward proc that has a % to go off on each person in the raid sorta like the ward procs you see on gear, only raid wide, and at a 10% chance to proc.  Alternativly, add a % to threat to it.  1k hps + 5% hate transfer from the raid to the caster.</p><p>6. increase the DPS output of the guardian.  A defensive tank is a good idea, but not in a game where dps > than all.</p>

[Shareana]

<p>I can understand players would like some love for their classes, but let's keep this post to the Guardians please <img src="/smilies/3b63d1616c5dfcf29f8a7a031aaa7cad.gif" border="0" alt="SMILEY" /></p>

[Emerix]

<p>In reference to another post: I do not think Guardians need a boost for groups. I have no issue tanking anything heroic and my gear is totally outdated (T8 raid stuff).</p><p> Now as for raids: I like the idea with the raidwide health buff. To make it really interesting you could make it % based instead of a solid 1k - or attach a general damage reduction (5% might be already too strong) that'd make us much more viable as offtanks, too.</p><p>A utility thing that might as well solve our thread problem would be improved moderate being raidwide OR it being a hate transfer instead of a hate gain increase/decrease ( see trak shield ) We would NOT need to do any more damage but instead we'd just hold aggro by threat.</p><p>Anyhow: whatever change happens should be entirely defensively IMO. Crit buffs etc are marvelous indeed but don't quite fit our class.</p>

[soltaker83]

<p>1. If the raidwide buff stays extremely defensively based we're just going to continue to be sat for other tanks as the much defense is not needed.  I would like to see something raid wide similar to the warlock mythical, raidwide proc for dmg and either hate postion or just an amount of hate reduction for non-fighters.  Would help raidwide dps which would give us something to bring to raid that would be helpful on dps fights, and help with raid wide hate management.</p><p>2.  Add some sort of buff in addition to avoidance/dmg intercept to moderate or sustain, crit bonus or potency.  Would also be nice if sustain had a death intervention attached if target died w/ say a 3 min recast.</p><p>Not so utility oriented but...</p><p>3. Don't think many people would be swayed into using Got Your Back or Cripple unless major major changes are made, think something that would improve the usefulness of a line we already have is turning the 9 double attack in the guardian tree to either % flurry or melee auto attack multiplier.</p><p>4. Our self buff that increases our stamina is completely pointless at this time.  Would like to see an improvement here, either a self buff for shield effectiveness since we're way behind the point crusaders can reach, or a X times per min non-modifiable stone skin proc to help with survivability even while dual wielding so we can stay alive and produce decent dps.</p>

[Landiin]

<p><cite>Xelgad wrote:</cite></p><blockquote><p>Greetings Guardians!First off, allow me say that we understand that the class is being outshined at the moment, and we’re working on it. It's going to take more than just one change to get Guardians back to working as a strong class again. I'm not going into details yet, but we do have a mechanics change in the works that will at least help a bit to distinguish Guardians as a more defensive tank. Even with that, the class is currently lacking in other areas, including threat generation and utility.It's utility that we want to focus this thread on. We want to bring Guardian utility up to the level that the other fighters bring to a group or raid. We have three tentative changes that will be going to test soon:</p><ol><li>Got Your Back will become raidwide.</li><li>Cripple will become a maintainable debuff with a damage component.</li><li>Call of Shielding will also increase the health of the raid. The level 87 version at master will amount to around 1,000 hit points.</li></ol><p>We’re looking for feedback on these ideas, and we’re open to boosting Guardian utility even a bit further, especially in heroic content. I want to emphasize that we’re not trying to turn Guardians into plate-wearing Bards or anything of the sort. However, I do want to try to focus this thread on the utility aspect of the class.</p></blockquote><p>1. Still pretty much usless, Change it from fighter only or change it where if the guard is the focus it will still block the AE. Because if you not tanking why else do you need a tank to stay in over your DPS? Oh thats right SK are DPS we must protect them, my bad.</p><p>2. /boggle! Who thought this was a bright idea?</p><p>3. Like others has said 1k hp? I mean really? The only time I see that being wanted is if, well I don't. </p><p>I am just amazed you guys decided to address our utilities 1st. When that isn't where we are that broke ATM. The only reason I can see you addressing our utilities 1st is because you have big changes coming to the other fighters soon. Where they will be nerf down to our lvl of DPS and thread generation. I do hope that is the case because bringing us up to their level only gives god mode to another tank.</p>

[ranga]

<p><cite>Atan@Unrest wrote:</cite></p><blockquote><p><cite>Xelgad wrote:</cite></p><blockquote><p>we do have a mechanics change in the works that will at least help a bit to distinguish Guardians as a more defensive tank.</p><ol><li>Got Your Back will become raidwide.</li><li>Cripple will become a maintainable debuff with a damage component.</li><li>Call of Shielding will also increase the health of the raid. The level 87 version at master will amount to around 1,000 hit points.</li></ol></blockquote><p>Not having an understanding of where mechanics changes are going puts us at a pretty hefty disadvantage when talking about utilitiy needs.  I think everyone will agree utility is the LEAST important aspect of fighter abilities.  The last [Removed for Content] thing I want a guard brought along for is utility.</p><p>That being said, yes our utility is way behind all other fighters.</p><p>1. Got your back -  Thing is the other fighters on the raid don't have survivability problems, even making this raid wide is not going to be so situationally beneficial it will not be valued.  I recommend dumping this entirely and replacing it with something else.  However if you want to stay in the same genre, have it protect all healers in the group.  I personally would rather see it as an Enhance: Battle Cry and change it to a raid wide mitigation increase.</p><p>2. Cripple - maintainable debuff is in the right dirrection, question is what kind of debuff.  I personally would like to see something like 5-10% reduction of base physical damage of target.  Lowering melee output and providing some defensive debuffing vs raidwide trauma.</p><p>3 Call of Shielding - Hp is fine, I know others would rather see a damage reduction component instead, but I can understand where that could be problematic.  It's tough for me to say this buff would be desirable or not, as clearly are getting by fine without it,.</p><p>The biggest problem with the utility changes you outline is it helps the class almost nill in grouping where it is absolutely the weakest and needs serious help.</p><p>As others have stated, Recapture is totally useless putside of raiding.  It should be adjusted as we described in beta 6 months ago, it should increase hate position of all fighters in raid, but it should also lower hate position of non-fighters in the guardian's group.  Including some raw threat on it for the guard would be good icing, as I know none of us want to manage aggro by positional snaps alone.</p><p>I would consider looking at Guardian Sphere and changing it to 50% chance to stoneskin instead of intercept damage on ally, or change it so that the guardian only takes 20% of the intended damage.  Currently, it is too easy for the ability to be a death sentence for the guard rather than a save for his group.</p><p>I understand your only looking at utility, but buffing utility without addressing hate generation raid wide isn't going to help us much.</p><p>I find my only problem holding aggro is off of other fighters.  The biggest problem I find is, I can't seem to get other fighters to stop hitting positional increases on my target.  I implore you to consider taking damage components off of fighter positional increasers so that players are less motivated to use them at innapropriate times.  Seperating dps components from positionals would allow me to actually hold aggro again.</p></blockquote><p>What Atan said +25 and ...</p><p>Why interfere with Call of Shielding at all? Why not just increase the Health component of Battle Tactics by 1k? You are just going to complicate it further by duplicating bonuses across buffs.</p><p>To make Cripple do what it says on the can i.e cripple it should be a phys dmg debuff and speed debuff (plus any dmg you wish to add)</p><p>Guardian Sphere can be suicide against AoE mobs. Either reduce the intercept dmg or increase the stoneskin proc chance. (Would be nice if you did both lol)</p><p>Make Got Your Back groupwide and exclude fighters. I don't care if another fighter gets a whack - if they cant take it they need to gear up or get their healers sorted. I am there to keep aggro and soak up the dmg so others can do their job. I don't want to be babying other fighters over my MT group. TBH if they die because they take aggro then they deserve it for not being able to count to 100 lol.</p><p>Lastly, thanks for taking the time to look at this but as others have said, a good trawl through the other threads on what is wrong with the class would be a very good starting point.</p>

[Loendar]

<p><cite>Aviola@Antonia Bayle wrote:</cite></p><blockquote><p>In reference to another post: I do not think Guardians need a boost for groups. I have no issue tanking anything heroic and my gear is totally outdated (T8 raid stuff).</p><p> Now as for raids: I like the idea with the raidwide health buff. To make it really interesting you could make it % based instead of a solid 1k - or attach a general damage reduction (5% might be already too strong) that'd make us much more viable as offtanks, too.</p><p>A utility thing that might as well solve our thread problem would be improved moderate being raidwide OR it being a hate transfer instead of a hate gain increase/decrease ( see trak shield ) We would NOT need to do any more damage but instead we'd just hold aggro by threat.</p><p>Anyhow: whatever change happens should be entirely defensively IMO. Crit buffs etc are marvelous indeed but don't quite fit our class.</p></blockquote><p>I respectfully disagree.  I'm not raid equipped on my lvl 90 guardian at all - just a mix of legendary from current tier instances - and holding aggro on the SF instance group encounters is a royal pain w/ a good DPS'r.  We need work on all tiers of content, not just raiding.</p><p>I don't raid currently on my Guardian but I surely feel a lot of pain (and listen to a lot of griping) that I'm not up to par with similarly equipped other tank classes.  AOE is our Achilles heel at all levels of content and unless/until that is addressed we will continue to be second-class tanks.</p>

[Hirofortis]

<p>Here is an idea for recapture. Make it a maintained buff that can be placed on another tank.  If the guardian looses agro it sends the mob to the chosen tank for 15 seconds.  This way it is not russian roulet as to who it goes to and it would actually make it a useful buff.</p><p>As far as agro is concerned, l have played a SK and I have a guardian that I have raid tanked and group tanked with and agro is not even close to the same.  I do not believe the sk is out of line where it is at. It is a solid tank and does it's job well.  Guardians though need a boost on being able to control agro.  This boils down to the whole stupid idea of group and single target tanks.  The problem is that zerkers, Shadownights, and Pallys all are excellent at controlling groups.  So please get rid of that idea and give the guards some agro control.  This needs to be in the form of our of encounter agro.  Because that is really where the issue comes from.</p>

[Wasuna]

<p>First, thank you for the post. it is greatly appreciated. I will point out to others that Xegald noted that Guardians are lacking in other areas also but they wanted to adress Utility first. While I can appreciate that, I feel that addressing them seperate can lead to inconsistant resuslts but we can but suggest and follow how SoE will handle this.</p><p>My comments:</p><p>1. Got your back - Serious Raids bring 3 fighters. One should most times be the direct target of the AoE and the description of the AA means your protecting OTHER fighters not diretcly targeted. So, your going to upen this ability to allow Guardians to help guard ONE other person in the raid who isn't even tanking? I fail to see how this would be even remotely desired or helpful. I guarantee you I will keep the spec I have now which DOES NOT include that ability.</p><p>2. Cripple - OK. No way I can comment on this until I know what the debuff is. A direct reduction of damage. A potency reduction of the mob.. etc. somthing like that would kind of be helpful. A reduction of the mobs defense by 5 is not going to help.</p><p>3. Call of Shielding - Current raids get along without this 1000 HP so it will never be a requirement. My Troubador raids will a very low end raid force and even they don't need the extra 1000 HP. Resists and stragety is much more important. Why bring a guardian and give everybody 1000 HP when you can bring a DPS and increase the total DPS of the raid by 5-10% and everything dies 5-10% faster? That's the game you have created...</p><p>I'll take anything I can get but I think your way off base on what will make a Guardian desirable. Please remmember that you all designed a game/expansion where <span style="text-decoration: underline;">DPS > EVERYTHING</span>. We didn't make that choice, it was given to us in terms exptations from tanks holding agro while doing massive DPS and all of these nifty blue stats that let everybody cap just about everything.</p><p>As you make your changes please remmember where Guardians are:</p><p>1. Lowest TPS BY FAR.</p><p>2. Lowest DPS BY FAR.</p><p>3. Lowest Utility (eh.. allfighters have pretty weak utility but we are fighters after all)</p><p>4. Basically equal survivability.</p><p>All of this needs to be BALANCED and utlity is really the weakest things for all fighetrs to balance first. I do not want to hear about Guardians soling conservatory or Library. I want a balanced, reasonable fighter group.</p>

[Wasuna]

<p><cite>Aviola@Antonia Bayle wrote:</cite></p><blockquote><p>In reference to another post: I do not think Guardians need a boost for groups. I have no issue tanking anything heroic and my gear is totally outdated (T8 raid stuff).</p><p> Now as for raids: I like the idea with the raidwide health buff. To make it really interesting you could make it % based instead of a solid 1k - or attach a general damage reduction (5% might be already too strong) that'd make us much more viable as offtanks, too.</p><p>A utility thing that might as well solve our thread problem would be improved moderate being raidwide OR it being a hate transfer instead of a hate gain increase/decrease ( see trak shield ) We would NOT need to do any more damage but instead we'd just hold aggro by threat.</p><p>Anyhow: whatever change happens should be entirely defensively IMO. Crit buffs etc are marvelous indeed but don't quite fit our class.</p></blockquote><p>I'm Legendary/fabled geared all level 90 full masters and 250 AA's. I lose agro ALL the time in groups. I try and pick groups I can handle but those are the 40-50K DPS groups and most of that is usually my Assassin wife or Swashbuckler friend that transfer hate to me. I still lose agro to them. When I get those, 70-80K DPS groups by accident (Enchanters that do 30K DPS and don't cast power regen and crap like that) It's just an agro fest with the healer going nuts. Nothing i can do but cycle snaps and hope the mob dies faster than the Enchanter.</p>

[vinere]

<p>Recaputer - Highly useful on liek 3 mobs total.. totally worthless on the rest.. no clue what to do</p><p>Guardian Sphere - I only use this when i can be assured no one will be in range for me to intercept damage on, since getting hit with 6 x 30k ae's isnt the win.</p><p>And my last, and most needed fix, is making Unyielding will an UNTIL CANCLED BUFF.  You can leave it with the long recast, but having to GUESS when to use it is highly anoying.  For a lot of guilds the harder fights take 8-10+ min, and unyeilding only lasts 3-4 min.  So you ahve to guess if you think are going to die early in the fight, mid fight, or at the end of the fight.  And if you use it early, it wont be back up before the fight is over due to the long recast.  If you goal is to increase our surviveability this would be a great fix.</p><p>Also i forgot the name, but the endline in the war tree that increases our attributes when we drop under 50% health needs to be fixed.  I like the SF aa that increase your mitigation, but i think this AA needs reworked.  First it should allow the buff to last for 1 min when triggered, and just make it so it can only trigger once every 3 min.  Then make the SF aa add a strait damnage reductoin of 1% per rank so 8% total</p><p>Also i would really like the effect on our TSO BP's back.  We need a red adorn that adds teh 5% damage reductoin back to our bp's, since in the long run on most mobs, the 4% mitigation adorn is wasted anyway.</p>

[LordPazuzu]

<p><cite>Xelgad wrote:</cite></p><blockquote><ol><li>Got Your Back will become raidwide. <span style="color: #ff0000;">T</span><span style="color: #ff0000;">hen i</span><span style="color: #ff0000;">t would protect the one or two other fighters on the raid or the zero other fighters in the group... still kinda worthless.</span></li><li>Cripple will become a maintainable debuff with a damage component. <span style="color: #ff0000;">Meh.</span></li><li>Call of Shielding will also increase the health of the raid. The level 87 version at master will amount to around 1,000 hit points.  <span style="color: #ff0000;">Considering how much the mobs can hit for, not that great either at this point but I'll take it.</span></li></ol></blockquote><p>None of these changes are all that great or desirable.  Guardian utility is not the issue.  The primary Guardian issues have been and remain to be lower DPS and threat generation, especially AOE threat generation.</p><p>For a raidwide ability, how about a raidwide Sentry Watch or Moderate.</p>

[Iacon]

<p>There are a number possiblities for improvement of Guardian utility, and I think it would be much more beneficial if some of our utility combat arts were looked at also.</p><p><strong>Plant</strong></p><p><em>What it does:</em> Blue AOE root + Attack Speed debuff, also debuffs caster</p><p><em>What's wrong with it: </em>Debuffing yourself own offensive capabilities and mobility is not preferable to say the least. Rooting mobs is very rarely useful (if you have agro they'll usually be where you want them anyway).</p><p><em>My Suggestion:</em> Make it a buff that make Guardians immune the Knockback and Profession based teleportation spells (like Rift). Other tanks can get either temporary or permanent immunity to various status effects and I think this would be in line with those. Knockback effects are fairly prevailant at all levels of the game. There is nothing more annoying then having a dragon or some other mob kick you out of your position which in turn makes everyone else have to readjust.</p><p><strong>Guardian Sphere</strong></p><p><em>What it does</em>: Groupwide intercept + Stoneskin trigger chance temp buff</p><p><em>What's wrong with it</em>: It's a death trap. Who honestly thought intercepting the entire group's damage was a good idea?</p><p><em>My Suggestion</em>: Groupwide Stone trigger chance with higher levels of the spell proccing more consistantly more times. Guaranteed not to cause spontaneous death.</p><p><strong>Hunker Down</strong></p><p><em>What it does</em>: temporary self Mitigation buff + root proc chance + self debuff</p><p><em>What's wrong with it</em>: Snaring and debuffing your own attack speed is bad. Rooting mobs isn't that useful.</p><p><em>My suggestion</em>: Temporary self mitigation buff + Mutagenic Burst style AOE proc on incoming damage. This would help with hate management in AOE fights.</p>

[Yimway]

<p><cite>Meaghan@Lucan DLere wrote:</cite></p><blockquote><p>None of these changes are all that great or desirable.  Guardian utility is not the issue.  The primary Guardian issues have been and remain to be lower DPS and threat generation, especially AOE threat generation.</p></blockquote><p>Don't forget no real survivability differential vs other fighters, not that the content actually demands more survivability that has already been over-rewarded to *all* fighters.</p>

[Onorem]

<p>Thank you for acknowledging that there are issues to look at.</p><p>Please consider posting a notice about this somewhere outside the tucked behind an unexpanded Class Discussion forum heading.</p><p>I've levelled my guardian...through soloing, thanks for the additional stonebrunt quests by the way, they are necessary for classes that have little to no place in instances...but had given up following along the class forums quite a while ago. I only knew about this thread because a guildmate pointed it out.</p><p>1. Got Your Back was worthless before. Raidwide worthless is still worthless.</p><p>2. What's the proposed debuff? No point in commenting without anything remotely specific.</p><p>3. 1000 hp raidwide is nice...but not a reason to bring a class that brings nothing else.</p><p>Utility is a problem, but not "the problem." If you're limited to focusing on one thing at a time, please consider closing this thread and starting a new one that might help the class.</p>

[Wasuna]

<p>I'd have to agree with multiple posts here. The three prime things I'd like to see providing additional utility are:</p><p>1. Guardian Sphere - The one guardian group buff that is NEVER used in a group and used ALL THE TIME when solo. The whole concept of this buff is just wrong. Remove the stone skin and make is so that the Guardian only gets 10-20% of the damage (mitigated to our stats, we are the one getting hit by the way) from any intercept check that hits. This would NOT be used while MTing but it could help a group a huge amount. I'd almost hate to see this happen becasue I use this ability all the time when soloing faction or something.</p><p>2. Recapture - This is just a stupid spell. Do you even play the game? I don't have a second fighetr in a group more than 5% of the time. And, since I'm a Guardian with terrible DPS I'm always the tank since the other guy can do better in a DPS role and help the group more. So, you give me a spell to help another fighter keep agro? Really? Heck, it would be more useful if it reduced other fighters in agro level but that would only helps 5% of the time. And, if I'm bring other fighters into a group (usually a brawler) then I have sucky dps choices already and I just moderate them.</p><p>3. Unyielding will. Dunno if this is a utility item but it would sure help if it had a longer duration. Until Canceled would wonderful but I can't see that being added.</p>

[Salarionn]

<cite>Wasuna wrote:</cite><blockquote><p>>3. Unyielding will. Dunno if this is a utility item but it would sure help if it had a longer duration. Until Canceled would wonderful but I can't see that being added.</p><p> </p></blockquote> I find this to be the biggest tease skill we have since when you are really in need of it, you cant hit it and have it instantly be usable its takes a few seconds for it to actually be up and ready. Whats the point of a awesome DI when you cant have it rdy when casted? When you're red and you know your about to drop, you hit it and pray the healers get at least one more good reactive/ward on you so it has time to actually be proc'd. Why make it flip through the rainbow or colors before it turns red and usable? This should be a insta cast, insta use... not wait a couple seconds and pray thing. Furthermore, even when I do manage to get it up and usable I have still died because it doesnt work 100% of the time.

[steveatk]

<p><cite>Xelgad wrote:</cite></p><blockquote><p>It's utility that we want to focus this thread on. We want to bring Guardian utility up to the level that the other fighters bring to a group or raid. We have three tentative changes that will be going to test soon:</p><ol><li>Got Your Back will become raidwide.</li><li>Cripple will become a maintainable debuff with a damage component.</li><li>Call of Shielding will also increase the health of the raid. The level 87 version at master will amount to around 1,000 hit points.</li></ol></blockquote><p>It's good to see that you recognise that there are issues and I hope your proposed solutions to the other issues that we have is forthcoming soon, especially with regards to agro.</p><p>Obviously the utility needs to be defensive in nature, that's a given</p><p>Guardian Sphere. The first thing to do is let us protect our group/raid not by intercepting and taking the damage (<strong>because those skills KILL us and then everyone else dies anyway</strong>) but by giving stone skin procs. If stoneskins also have a hate component towards the Guardian then that's even better.</p><p>Nobody will spec into Got Your Back. You will have to do a LOT more to the skill than give us the ability to protect 2 other fighters in a raid and nobody in a group. You will also need to make the choices in that tree more attractive because we still won't take it even if it does become worthwhile and the rest of the tree remains unchanged - even then we would have to lose significant defensive or agro choices to take it so it would need to be very special indeed.</p><p>What is the debuff on Cripple that you propose?</p><p>You would need to add more health than that to Call of Shielding or add mitigation/stone skin proc to it alongside that 1,000 health to make it worthwhile and reinforce the fact that we are protectors of others.</p><p>Recapture needs to be scrapped and re-done. Why would I ever want to help other tanks take agro when none of them struggle with it? <strong>What use is this skill in a group situation?</strong> I maintain that it needs to be a large true AOE taunt as an attention grabber much like gibe, grave sacrament and holy ground.</p>

[Landiin]

Xelgad thanks for acknowledge that you guys are working on the class and know it is badly broken. The thing is, we need to see the bigger plan in order to give good informed feedback. So with out knowing the entire plan we just balance these changes for the way it is now and well they are very lack luster for the way things are now, Sorry to say. However we do thank you for looking at our class.

[lollipop]

<p><cite>Xelgad wrote:</cite></p><blockquote><p>Greetings Guardians!First off, allow me say that we understand that the class is being outshined at the moment, and we’re working on it. It's going to take more than just one change to get Guardians back to working as a strong class again. I'm not going into details yet, but we do have a mechanics change in the works that will at least help a bit to distinguish Guardians as a more defensive tank. Even with that, the class is currently lacking in other areas, including threat generation and utility.It's utility that we want to focus this thread on. We want to bring Guardian utility up to the level that the other fighters bring to a group or raid. We have three tentative changes that will be going to test soon:</p><ol><li>Got Your Back will become raidwide.</li><li>Cripple will become a maintainable debuff with a damage component.</li><li>Call of Shielding will also increase the health of the raid. The level 87 version at master will amount to around 1,000 hit points.</li></ol><p>We’re looking for feedback on these ideas, and we’re open to boosting Guardian utility even a bit further, especially in heroic content. I want to emphasize that we’re not trying to turn Guardians into plate-wearing Bards or anything of the sort. However, I do want to try to focus this thread on the utility aspect of the class.</p></blockquote><p>Another <span>mechanics change. [Removed for Content] do you all have to change </span><span>mechanics every xpac. or should I say every new dev, [Removed for Content]. Stop trying to re-invent the game all the time. Fix the crap that needs to be fixed and tweak skills.</span></p>

[Rahatmattata]

<p>It's all well and good to tell Xelgad and other people why their ideas suck and won't work, but unless you are providing better ideas, your post is really just clutter to be sifted through to get to the ideas... including this one, so I'm gonna keep it short.</p><p>On second thought... I'm just gonna throw this out there. Some of these are probably OP, or maybe useless... but I'll leave that up to the game devs to decide.</p><p>Dragoon Reflexes -> Remove Stifle.</p><p>Got Your Back -> Group aoe prevent. Maybe put a condition on it such as must be standing behind the guardian or near or something.</p><p>Recapture -> PBAoE increases threat to all fighters (not position) and increase flurry chance of all fighters by oh... idk... 5%?</p><p>Battle Cry -> the lower each group members' HP is, the more damage reduction they get from Battle Cry. Something like for every 10% HP they lose, they get 1.5% damage reduction.</p><p>Defensive Minded -> Either avoidance, casting haste/reuse, or both components become group-wide</p><p><em><strong></strong></em></p><p><em><strong>Repeated from previous post</strong></em></p><p>Sentry Watch -> Again... should prevent death from all types of damage (except maybe falling damage or drowning <img src="/eq2/images/smilies/908627bbe5e9f6a080977db8c365caff.gif" border="0" />)</p><p>Unyielding Will -> Buff stays on until canceled.</p><p>Tower of Stone -> Casting time reduced to 0.5 seconds.</p>

[Onorem]

<p><cite>Rahatmattata wrote:</cite></p><blockquote><p>It's all well and good to tell Xelgad and other people why their ideas suck and won't work, but unless you are providing better ideas, your post is really just clutter to be sifted through to get to the ideas... including this one, so I'm gonna keep it short.</p></blockquote><p>I don't have all the answers, nor do I claim to. Not being able to provide a solution is not a reason against explaining why the proposed solution isn't likely to be effective.</p>

[Rahatmattata]

<p>Alright, but this is our chance to have direct input into how we think guardians should work... so we should not waste the opportunity, and give it a decent shot at coming up with ideas to make guards viable.</p>

[NakuniBu]

<p>I know lots of guardians want to be the end all be all "main tank", but I don't really think thats a realistic goal without alienating all other fighters, so the real problem can only be dps, or lack there of.  So looking at it from the fact that we're suppose to be a single target tank, why can't we do the most or near the most single target dps?</p><p>a flurry of 5-10% would probably be the "easiest" fix, since it doesn't affect antyhing aoe related.</p><p>Would love the idea of just changing guardian sphere to be a group wide stone skin proc (3-5% trigger maybe?)</p><p>Making a raidwide of 1k hp is going to be laughed at pretty much by anyone raiding hard modes, like its been stated before if your not bringing dps your not really bringing anything.  How about adding a %3-5 increase in procs, to go along with it.</p><p>Also why is our myth damage reduction, of all the 3 fighter myths that reduce damage, the only one thats a proc instead of just a constant?  Switching this to a 5%+ ALL dmg reduction permanently on would do a lot to help us stay on track with what a paladin brings.</p>

[Netty]

<p>Like some of the ideas. But dont really think guards need a huge boost in dps. UT/hate is the way to go and some more dps. Guards are a leader and should be experts on fighting skill/def. Cant really remeber the names on some buffs since i havent played my guard since tso. Here are some ideas anyway. 5% hit chance on combat skill buff. Sphere need to be fixed since it will kill you more than its saves the group so lower the damage you take from you group members alot. Dont remove it since i really think that would be to OP but lower it. Plant. Well i dont understand why this one got changed in the first place... It should be KB immune its not OP at all imo... since you get rooted yourself and KB can easy be avoided by tanking up on a wall. add some threat on 100% when the guardian takes damage and plant is up. This will help guards alot in aoe cont and ST cont. Raid wide buff. Since def doesent work on raids it makes no sens to have this buff. Even in group cont this buff is useless since the mob should hit the guard not your group members. Change it to something els. raid wide health and with AA add 5% hit chance or something like that. Got your back should be a group aoe block.. make it have higher reuse speed or what ever to not be to OP. Since most of the AA:s over you have to place points in this buff really need to be something better than protect other fighters or none would ever spec in it anyway. Guard myth got destroyed in rok after being the best weapon of all fighters. I mean the proc alone was changed at first from 10% damage reduction to 5% since the guard got so much unconntested avoidance from it anyway. If you want it to stay as a proc change it back to 10% damage reduction guards are def tanks after all. I really think guards should get some kinda of damage bonus when using a shield this is where the so called defensiv tank lack the most. Not sure how tho. Recapture. Make it increase the guards threat aswell when using it that way you will make sure your OT will get the mob if you die mob memwipe or something like that. As it is now with the low hate gain of the guardian he wont be tanking at all when using it. cripple reduce the mobs damge out put. Not sure what your idea was but this is mine anyway. </p>

[Gungo]

<p>I think its fairly safe to say all guardians are pretty unanimous on the following abilites being improved</p><p>1) Guardian Sphere2) Recapture3) Unyielding will4) Plant</p><p><span style="color: #ff0000;">What alot of posters have said is these abilites should be changed as follows to improve utility and guardians Main tank role. </span></p><p><span style="color: #ff0000;"></span></p><p style="font-family: verdana, arial, helvetica, sans-serif;"><span style="color: #000000;"><span style="color: #ff0000;">1. Guardian Sphere - Remove the stone skin and make it a group 20% damage reduction buff. It will support the guardians defense role, Main tank role, and group survivability. </span></span></p><p style="font-family: verdana, arial, helvetica, sans-serif;"><span style="color: #000000;"><span style="color: #ff0000;">2. Recapture - Keep the raid wise positional increase for all fighters. This helps in tank swaps. Add in a group positional decrease to make it useful in groups. Maybe get creative and put a short duration reactive hate proc on the guardian so he could recapture hate if he so desires or build hate with another target during tank switches. </span></span></p><p style="font-family: verdana, arial, helvetica, sans-serif;"><span style="color: #000000;"><span style="color: #ff0000;">3. Unyielding will- Until Canceled. If 2 of the most powerful fighters (zerkers, shadowknights) have an until canceled death prevent (actually MULTIPLE triggers), every fighter needs at least 1 until canceled trigger, especially the class that is suppose to be the most defensive of the lot. </span></span></p><p style="font-family: verdana, arial, helvetica, sans-serif;"><span style="color: #000000;"><span style="color: #ff0000;">4) Plant- Knockback immunity will help. Especially since plant is not a permanent ability. If that is not an option remove the root.</span></span></p><p style="font-family: verdana, arial, helvetica, sans-serif;"><span style="color: #000000;"><span style="color: #ff0000;"> </span></span></p>

[Rahatmattata]

<p>...</p>

[steveatk]

<p>I'd rather keep Guardian Sphere as a group stone skin but remove the part where the Guardian intercepts the damage and kills himself</p><p>Would also rather see Recapture as an AOE agro grabber for the heroic level guardians</p><p>Agree on the other 2</p>

[Elvondil]

<p>My mistake</p>

[Emlar_from_Halas]

<p><cite>Gungo wrote:</cite></p><blockquote><p>I think its fairly safe to say all guardians are pretty unanimous on the following abilites being improved</p><p>1) Guardian Sphere2) Recapture3) Unyielding will4) Plant</p><p><span style="color: #ff0000;">What alot of posters have said is these abilites should be changed as follows to improve utility and guardians Main tank role. </span></p><p style="font-family: verdana, arial, helvetica, sans-serif;"><span style="color: #000000;"><span style="color: #ff0000;">1. Guardian Sphere - Remove the stone skin and make it a group 20% damage reduction buff. It will support the guardians defense role, Main tank role, and group survivability. </span></span></p><p style="font-family: verdana, arial, helvetica, sans-serif;"><span style="color: #000000;"><span style="color: #ff0000;">2. Recapture - Keep the raid wise positional increase for all fighters. This helps in tank swaps. Add in a group positional decrease to make it useful in groups. Maybe get creative and put a short duration reactive hate proc on the guardian so he could recapture hate if he so desires or build hate with another target during tank switches. </span></span></p><p style="font-family: verdana, arial, helvetica, sans-serif;"><span style="color: #000000;"><span style="color: #ff0000;">3. Unyielding will- Until Canceled. If 2 of the most powerful fighters (zerkers, shadowknights) have an until canceled death prevent (actually MULTIPLE triggers), every fighter needs at least 1 until canceled trigger, especially the class that is suppose to be the most defensive of the lot. </span></span></p><p style="font-family: verdana, arial, helvetica, sans-serif;"><span style="color: #000000;"><span style="color: #ff0000;">4) Plant- Knockback immunity will help. Especially since plant is not a permanent ability. If that is not an option remove the root.</span></span></p></blockquote><p>We are indeed, still, I don't jump to your conclusions.</p><p>I Love the stone skin proc of Guardian Sphere and don't want to lose it. I've been used to it for years now, even if using Guardian Sphere is pretty challenging in raids. Therefore, change "got your back" into a Guardian Sphere" modifier that removes 75% of dmg intercepted by Guardian. Less powerful than anti-AE, but quite usefull.</p><p>Recapture is fine with me. I'm using it both on Rathgar and Toxx, and I love this CA. Though I agree it's useless in groups.</p><p>Unyielding Will became a must for guardians with the new SoF AA. Changing it to "Until Canceled" would be even better, but I can live without it.</p><p>Add 3K threat to Plant V.</p><p>Modify Belly smash to work also on rooted mobs and increase duration to 15 secs. This would provide a substantial dps increase to melee classes both in raids and groups.</p>

[dr4gonUK]

<p><cite>Xelgad wrote:</cite></p><blockquote><ol><li>Got Your Back will become raidwide.</li><li>Cripple will become a maintainable debuff with a damage component.</li><li>Call of Shielding will also increase the health of the raid. The level 87 version at master will amount to around 1,000 hit points.</li></ol></blockquote><p>1. Is this not setting a new precedent( i dont think there's another class that has raidwide aoe block)? Its a worthless aa as it stands. Raidwide makes this useful.</p><p>2. Is this a nerf or an upgrade?</p><p>3. Like it.</p>

[MurFalad]

<p><cite>Xelgad wrote:</cite></p><blockquote><p>It's utility that we want to focus this thread on. We want to bring Guardian utility up to the level that the other fighters bring to a group or raid. We have three tentative changes that will be going to test soon:</p><ol><li>Got Your Back will become raidwide.</li><li>Cripple will become a maintainable debuff with a damage component.</li><li>Call of Shielding will also increase the health of the raid. The level 87 version at master will amount to around 1,000 hit points.</li></ol><p>We’re looking for feedback on these ideas, and we’re open to boosting Guardian utility even a bit further, especially in heroic content. I want to emphasize that we’re not trying to turn Guardians into plate-wearing Bards or anything of the sort. However, I do want to try to focus this thread on the utility aspect of the class.</p></blockquote><p>Well my feedback on these three ideas is here, although I rarely raid so I'm more interested in the group effects</p><p>1) Got your back, I have specc'd this, but only out of curiosity, sometimes if I'm in a group with an extra fighter I use it ypically battlegrounds.  Perhaps make this work differently in non-raid zones, something like a taunt that we can apply to a party member to gain aggro on all the mobs on them would be useful.</p><p>2) It sounds ok, but since the mythical gets rid of the need for riposte the whole talent looks useless, personally I think the mythical buffs being so powerful forever here is a mistake, but that's a different issue.</p><p>3) That sounds useful and quite powerful, but if the raid can survive with a beserker or SK then they get more DPS, for the amount to be so good that it makes a Guardian attractive I think it would also make the Guardian OP, it is a useful buff though.</p><p>For me the problems I see with Guardians are partly the class and partly the content.  On the class I think one big problem is our very low threat generation.  Our taunts just don't seem to have scaled with the DPS this expansion having gone up about 20% only, Sentinel strike especially is stuck back at level 80.</p><p>The other problem with the class is AOE tanking, where we rely very heavily on reactive procs that rely on us having aggro to start with, so as soon as we lose aggro on a mob we have no tools to get it back, especially with the speed of combat and the difficulty to target in EQ2 this is a problem.  This compares to crusader tanks that actively build up threat.</p><p>At the same time a lot more of the challenge of group content now in SF is in AOE tanking and gaining and holding aggro on multiple mobs, so between the guardians poor AOE aggro generation and the preference for an AOE tank for group content the guardian is in a bad spot.  Personally I'd like to see less AOE tanking and more crowd control and tactics (e.g. have mobs that give an avoidance debuff that stacks with the number we tank in melee range).</p><p>But since its probably unlikely to change the content something drastic for the tanking would be needed, I wonder if changing shout to effect either the whole group or the top 5 mobs already aggro'd to the Guardian?  As often I have the problem where 2-3 encounters are aggro'd to me, but they are just single mob encounters.  I'm not really a fan of AOE tanking though and would not want the solution to just turn Guardians into another flavour of crusader.</p><p>Lastly I would definitely like to see the flavour of the guardians very much put as the shield of the group such as</p><p>Guardian Sphere - A group stoneskin or a heavily mitigated absorb.</p><p>Unyielding will - instant cast, its enough of a decision for guardians to make to use it at the right time.</p><p>Plant - Adding a knockback protection would be very useful</p><p>I've got your back - Make it get aggro on all mobs currently aggro'd to target group member along with the AOE prevention so it has two functions that work at the same time.</p><p>Recapture - Not sure really, its a raid only spell which is maybe nice there but useless elsewhere else, maybe just delete it and make the existing spells more powerful?  I think we have too many abilities as it is, although perhaps changing it to something interesting with the shield instead though would be better.</p>

[Soul_Dreamer]

<p><cite>Emlar@Storms wrote:</cite></p><blockquote><p><cite>Gungo wrote:</cite></p><blockquote><p>I think its fairly safe to say all guardians are pretty unanimous on the following abilites being improved</p><p>1) Guardian Sphere2) Recapture3) Unyielding will4) Plant</p><p><span style="color: #ff0000;">What alot of posters have said is these abilites should be changed as follows to improve utility and guardians Main tank role. </span></p><p style="font-family: verdana, arial, helvetica, sans-serif;"><span style="color: #000000;"><span style="color: #ff0000;">1. Guardian Sphere - Remove the stone skin and make it a group 20% damage reduction buff. It will support the guardians defense role, Main tank role, and group survivability. </span></span></p><p style="font-family: verdana, arial, helvetica, sans-serif;"><span style="color: #000000;"><span style="color: #ff0000;">2. Recapture - Keep the raid wise positional increase for all fighters. This helps in tank swaps. Add in a group positional decrease to make it useful in groups. Maybe get creative and put a short duration reactive hate proc on the guardian so he could recapture hate if he so desires or build hate with another target during tank switches. </span></span></p><p style="font-family: verdana, arial, helvetica, sans-serif;"><span style="color: #000000;"><span style="color: #ff0000;">3. Unyielding will- Until Canceled. If 2 of the most powerful fighters (zerkers, shadowknights) have an until canceled death prevent (actually MULTIPLE triggers), every fighter needs at least 1 until canceled trigger, especially the class that is suppose to be the most defensive of the lot. </span></span></p><p style="font-family: verdana, arial, helvetica, sans-serif;"><span style="color: #000000;"><span style="color: #ff0000;">4) Plant- Knockback immunity will help. Especially since plant is not a permanent ability. If that is not an option remove the root.</span></span></p></blockquote><p>We are indeed, still, I don't jump to your conclusions.</p><p>I Love the stone skin proc of Guardian Sphere and don't want to lose it. I've been used to it for years now, even if using Guardian Sphere is pretty challenging in raids. Therefore, change "got your back" into a Guardian Sphere" modifier that removes 75% of dmg intercepted by Guardian. Less powerful than anti-AE, but quite usefull.</p><p><span style="color: #3366ff;">Sorry I don't want to fix a broken CA by using AA abilities, fix the CA and give something useful to Got your back, group AOE Avoid is perfect and fits with the Guardian. A Guardians healer should be able to live through AOE's/Avoid AOE's that they couldn't with another tank.</span></p><p>Recapture is fine with me. I'm using it both on Rathgar and Toxx, and I love this CA. Though I agree it's useless in groups.</p><p><span style="color: #3366ff;">As you said, useless in groups, add hate to tanks and the Guardian, deagro to group/raid members (non tank).</span></p><p>Unyielding Will became a must for guardians with the new SoF AA. Changing it to "Until Canceled" would be even better, but I can live without it.</p><p><span style="color: #3366ff;">There is no reason this shouldn't be done when other tanks have always on deaths prevents and as previously stated MULTIPLE Triggers.</span></p><p>Add 3K threat to Plant V.</p><p><span style="color: #3366ff;">KB Immunity on it please, remove the part that debuffs the Guardian and also a Mutagenic burst style proc AOE on damage.</span></p><p>Modify Belly smash to work also on rooted mobs and increase duration to 15 secs. This would provide a substantial dps increase to melee classes both in raids and groups.</p><p><span style="color: #3366ff;">No, brigands are already complaining they are useless or next to it in raids since mobs are so heavily debuffed to this type of mitigation debuff. If you want it changed make it decrease incomming damage on an attack by 10% and then make it always useable.</span></p></blockquote><p>1. Got your back - group wide and all classes, proposed change will do nothing. </p><p>2. Cripple - Add hate to every CA in the line, not just debuffs, the CA needs to reduce a mobs crit bonus/potency by 10% for 10 seconds after EVERY CA effected by the aa's in the line.</p><p>3. Call of shielding - 1000 hp and a 10% chance to deathsave anyone in the raid, remove the defense if defense is going to stay as useles as it is now.</p><p>There are literally 100's of ideas on these forums posted by 10's of Guardians over the past 2 years suggesting beneficial changes/fixes. The Guardian class needs fixing with hate/dps and fixing soon, you can already see just how few Guardians there are compared to other tank classes across all playstyles be it Solo/Group/PvP and now even raid.</p><p>Utility really isn't the way to go though, Guardians need HATE and DPS. Someone said earlier they don't think Guardians should have more hate or DPS especially or AOE hate.. why not? Every other tank class has been encroaching on Guardian survivability and being given Guardian survivability style tools for 3 expansions now and had to pay nothing in their DPS or Hate for it or been given even more DPS/Hate while being given these tools. </p><p>As I said above, a group/raid with a Guardian in it should be more stable than one without, this is the utility a Guardian should bring. At the same time they need the DPS and Hate to hold a mob in ALL situations just like every other tank can..</p><p>Unless these "Mechanics" changes are going to bring other tanks survivability down it's a pointless change since the small gain in survivability a Guardian offers just isn't needed anywhere in game currently.</p>

[Yimway]

<p><cite>Gungo wrote:</cite></p><blockquote><p>I think its fairly safe to say all guardians are pretty unanimous on the following abilites being improved</p><p>1) Guardian Sphere2) Recapture3) Unyielding will4) Plant</p></blockquote><p>TBH, don't really care about unyielding will.  Death save's belong to healers imo, tanks have no business with complete heals.  Remove them from all tanks and the game will be healthier.</p>

[Rahatmattata]

<p><cite>Soul_Dreamer wrote:</cite></p><blockquote><p>2. Cripple - Add hate to every CA in the line, not just debuffs, the CA needs to reduce a mobs crit bonus/potency by 10% for 10 seconds after EVERY CA effected by the aa's in the line.</p></blockquote><p>This is useless except in pvp and TSO/SF raiding. And is knockback really that big of a deal? It's not like we're casting spells that keep getting interrupted.</p>

[Xelgad]

<p>Thank you all for the feedback so far!Just to address one general point, we're trying to take a more subtle approach in adjusting this class. Instead of making one or two drastic changes, we're going for maybe a dozen smaller fixes and upgrades that result in a more balanced and better working Guardian. These fixes and upgrades will go beyond just utility. In that sense, it's good to hear that these changes won't immediately make Guardians desirable for every raid, since we certainly don't want utility to be the driving force that gets Guardians into raids. Furthermore, please remember that “Got Your Back” and “Cripple” are still Echoes of Faydwer Advancements and need to be balanced as such. The fact that some of you like the “Got Your Back” change while others still prefer other options is a sign that the proposed change is in the realm of balance.To clarify, the current plan for the Cripple debuff is a 75% reduction to target's riposte damage. While we're aware that Guardians are immune to riposte damage at end game, we still see a situational use for the debuff in cases where it's dangerous or impossible for scouts and healers to position behind the target. The added damage component is not insignificant and has a very low chance to miss. More feedback on this would be welcomed.While some of your other suggestions may make it in game, we especially like the idea to upgrade Guardian Sphere, since it could be a great way to provide some defensive utility that would be useful in heroic content. The tentative plan is to change Guardian Sphere into a group buff that grants all non-fighters a 50% (at master) chance to stoneskin. The Guardian will have a 25% (at master) chance to stoneskin him or herself. The casting time has been reduced to 0.5 seconds, the radius has been increased to 35 meters, the duration maxes out at 20 seconds and there is no limit on the number of stoneskins that can trigger during the duration.</p>

[Rhita]

<p>I love that Guardian Sphere upgrade, sounds very useful and would give the guard a good edge for a defensive MT grp. The Cripple line still doesnt sound too great. Last expansion when i would duel wield to dp dps, i think riposte would be like 70dps zonewide damage to me, thats not gonna kill a scout. An AoE auto attack would kill a scout.</p><p>That alone won't make us wanted but its a start.</p><p>Still would like to see plant upgraded to something more useful. Not sure if you have an idea for that but as I mentioned, Its an ability that last 10seconds, up to 13 seconds with AAs. Making it root the guardian and making him immune to knockback would not overpower the class but would be another edge for the MT spot. Crusaders get immune to fear, so they cant complain that we get a temp buff for KBs</p>

[Macross_JR]

<p><cite>Xelgad wrote:</cite></p><blockquote><p>Thank you all for the feedback so far!Just to address one general point, we're trying to take a more subtle approach in adjusting this class. Instead of making one or two drastic changes, we're going for maybe a dozen smaller fixes and upgrades that result in a more balanced and better working Guardian. These fixes and upgrades will go beyond just utility. In that sense, it's good to hear that these changes won't immediately make Guardians desirable for every raid, since we certainly don't want utility to be the driving force that gets Guardians into raids. Furthermore, please remember that “Got Your Back” and “Cripple” are still Echoes of Faydwer Advancements and need to be balanced as such. The fact that some of you like the “Got Your Back” change while others still prefer other options is a sign that the proposed change is in the realm of balance.To clarify, the current plan for the Cripple debuff is a 75% reduction to target's riposte damage. While we're aware that Guardians are immune to riposte damage at end game, we still see a situational use for the debuff in cases where it's dangerous or impossible for scouts and healers to position behind the target. The added damage component is not insignificant and has a very low chance to miss. More feedback on this would be welcomed.While some of your other suggestions may make it in game, we especially like the idea to upgrade Guardian Sphere, since it could be a great way to provide some defensive utility that would be useful in heroic content. The tentative plan is to change Guardian Sphere into a group buff that grants all non-fighters a 50% (at master) chance to stoneskin. The Guardian will have a 25% (at master) chance to stoneskin him or herself. The casting time has been reduced to 0.5 seconds, the radius has been increased to 35 meters, the duration maxes out at 20 seconds and there is no limit on the number of stoneskins that can trigger during the duration.</p></blockquote><p>I'm sorry, but Got Your Back is a crap change period.  Also, the reasoning for not changing it to something else doesn't fly.  The debuff for Cripple is a joke as riposte damage from anything other then raid mobs is a joke.  The only thing is people might, and I stress MIGHT, take a Guardian for Cripple so he can be in the short bus group to help the raid while he does crap to really help.  At the moment that debuff is not needed and honestly the scouts and healers don't take that much damage from riposte over just plain frontal attacks.  I will say, the change to Guardians Sphere is cool, but in all honestly until you come forth with exactly the full plan anything else you do is meh.  Guardians need help in threat the most and here you are wanting to change utility.  Fix what is wrong the most first then work on the minor things.</p>

[Ardors]

<p><span style="font-family: Verdana; color: #ffffff; font-size: 9pt;">It's refreshing to see the Guardian class will receive some much needed attention soon...not too early for sure.</span></p><p><span style="font-family: Verdana; color: #ffffff; font-size: 9pt;">Making smaller changes is a better approach I agree, and here's what I think need to be keep in perspective when changing things;</span></p><p><span style="font-family: Verdana; color: #ffffff; font-size: 9pt;">For raids, two overall changes need to happen to make a "a more balance and better Guardian" as you put it. First off, we simply cannot generate only half the dps of other fighters, while using a shield, without a serious change to threat generation. I don’t mind keeping a lower dps if we are given other tools to compete in TPS. And secondly, if we are to keep our lower DPS, then our more defensive nature need to mean something...as it stand now, were all equal in that department... </span></p><p><span style="font-family: Verdana; color: #ffffff; font-size: 9pt;">Also, please revisit the AE tank vs single target tank idea... It's been flawed from day one....this has been mentioned countless times here on these forums... AE tanks tools are working on single targets...not vice versa... </span></p><p><span style="font-family: Verdana; color: #000000; font-size: 9pt;"><p style="margin: 0in 0in 0pt;"><span style="font-size: small;"><span style="font-family: Times New Roman;"><span style="font-family: Verdana; color: #ffffff; font-size: 9pt;">The diminishing return curve and stats cap is crippling the guarding imo, what good are my tools to short term increase my defence when I am already at cap without them…</span></span></span></p><p style="margin: 0in 0in 0pt;"><span style="font-size: small;"></span></p><p style="margin: 0in 0in 0pt;"><span style="font-size: small;"><span style="font-family: Times New Roman;"><span style="font-family: Verdana; font-size: 9pt;"><span style="font-family: Verdana; color: #ffffff; font-size: 9pt;">Many ideas on what could be changed has been mentioned already, so I wont be redundant and repeat the same stuff, but I hope Xelgad, you keep what I just wrote in perspective when making changes…anything else you change will make the non raid Guard more desirable, and that’s great, but for the raid guards, what I mentioned is paramount.</span></span></span></span></p><p style="margin: 0in 0in 0pt;"><span style="font-size: small;"></span></p><font face="Verdana" color="#000000"><p style="margin: 0in 0in 0pt;"><span style="font-size: small;"><span style="font-family: Times New Roman;"><p><p style="margin: 0in 0in 0pt;"><span style="font-family: Verdana; font-size: 9pt;"><span style="font-family: Verdana; color: #ffffff; font-size: 9pt;">Good luck and Thanks!</span></span></p></p></span><span style="font-size: small;"><font face="Verdana" color="#000000"><font size="3"><font size="3"><p style="margin: 0in 0in 0pt;"> </p></font></font></font></span><font face="Verdana" color="#000000"><font size="3"><p style="margin: 0in 0in 0pt;"> </p></font></font></span><p style="margin: 0in 0in 0pt;"> </p></p></font></span><p style="margin: 0in 0in 0pt;"><p style="margin: 0in 0in 0pt;"> </p></p></p>

[Soul_Dreamer]

<p><cite>Xelgad wrote:</cite></p><blockquote><p>Thank you all for the feedback so far!Just to address one general point, we're trying to take a more subtle approach in adjusting this class. Instead of making one or two drastic changes, we're going for maybe a dozen smaller fixes and upgrades that result in a more balanced and better working Guardian. These fixes and upgrades will go beyond just utility. In that sense, it's good to hear that these changes won't immediately make Guardians desirable for every raid, since we certainly don't want utility to be the driving force that gets Guardians into raids. Furthermore, please remember that “Got Your Back” and “Cripple” are still Echoes of Faydwer Advancements and need to be balanced as such. The fact that some of you like the “Got Your Back” change while others still prefer other options is a sign that the proposed change is in the realm of balance.</p><p><span style="color: #3366ff;">This will be to situational to use, I can only think of 1 or 2 fights it could be usefull to protect other fighters in a raid from AOE's it will also do nothing for group content still, I won't be giving up vital DPS AA's to get this.</span>To clarify, the current plan for the Cripple debuff is a 75% reduction to target's riposte damage. While we're aware that Guardians are immune to riposte damage at end game, we still see a situational use for the debuff in cases where it's dangerous or impossible for scouts and healers to position behind the target. The added damage component is not insignificant and has a very low chance to miss. More feedback on this would be welcomed.</p><p><span style="color: #3366ff;">Frontal AOE auto attacks kill people, NOT riposte damage, this AA is still worthless. I've grouped and raided on Warlock(Original, DoF, KoS)/Brigand(KoS, EoF)/Guardian(RoK > Present) and never, not once has a riposte killed me. The tiny gain from the debuff enhancements and this debuff simply aren't worth wasting points on. </span></p><p><span style="color: #3366ff;">As an example SK's get:</span><span style="color: #3366ff; font-size: 10.8333px;">Hateful respite (Absorb damage and deal damage)Reaver (2% Heal on every spell) Pools of blood (I seem to remeber it being about 1.8k unconsius HP)</span></p><p><span style="color: #3366ff;">Guardians:Got your back - AOE avoid for all FIGHTERS in the group/raid.Double attack - 9% Double attack.Cripple - ...........................Block - 1 Block.</span></p><p><span style="color: #3366ff;">How is 75% reduction a mobs riposte damage balanced to any of the SK buffs ESPECIALLY when the tank with the ability is 100% immune to riposte damage. And it's not end game it's ALL level 90 Guardians, everyone now has access to the Mythical buff. Then take into acccount the lacklustre other AA end lines.... Some change on cripple is really need but anything is more usefull than this. Just save the time and don't change it if this is the case because NO ONE will use it.</span></p><p><span style="color: #3366ff;">Guardians are in dire need of hate/dps/utility if you're looking to change these old abilities they are ideal places to put some of these things. </span></p><p>While some of your other suggestions may make it in game, we especially like the idea to upgrade Guardian Sphere, since it could be a great way to provide some defensive utility that would be useful in heroic content. The tentative plan is to change Guardian Sphere into a group buff that grants all non-fighters a 50% (at master) chance to stoneskin. The Guardian will have a 25% (at master) chance to stoneskin him or herself. The casting time has been reduced to 0.5 seconds, the radius has been increased to 35 meters, the duration maxes out at 20 seconds and there is no limit on the number of stoneskins that can trigger during the duration.</p><p><span style="color: #3366ff;">Perfect change and much needed, mobs I need this ability on I can't use it since I'll die.</span></p></blockquote>

[Ransum]

<p>first the gaurdian class is the only tank that can not heal themselves in combat, our mit should be far superior to th rest of the tanks along with our avoidance.. give us some in combat heals</p>

[Theren]

Got Your Back --- Blocks AoE's on the guardian, even when direct. i could dig that. i also like atan's idea about plant making guards immune to kb's one thing i've always felt is that aggro should always be the tanks main job. that said i think Improved Moderation could be changed to a group wide hate siphon. My 2copper Ry

[Soul_Dreamer]

<p>Been thinking some more about Cripple. I still think it's an ideal place to put a little hate and a useful buff/debuff if any changes are being made to it.</p><p>Sooo..</p><p>Add hate to all abilities in the line, a set amount per point which goes up with level.</p><p>Cripple itself.DebuffsAuto attack reduction (probably the most beneficial to all play styles and benefits the tank tanking if the Guardian isn't).Crit bonus reduction.Potency reduction.BuffsDamage reduction.Group Damage reduction - Probably my favorite and the one I can see being most usefull to groups/raids.~Stoneskin after every attack from the CA's in the tree.</p><p>Also I prefer the style of the ability currently where the it is in effect when teh abilities in the tree are used, it gives us more control of when it's up and when it's not. 5 Abilities, say 10 seconds duration per ability?</p><p>One thing that really needs to be addressed is that ALL other plate fighters have equal or near equal survivability to a Guardian so the benefits a Guardian has other than Survivability needs to be relatively equal to the benefits other tanks have be it via DPS/Hate/Utility.</p><p>What sort of time frame are we looking at for the complete changes, 1 month/2 months, finished at next expansion? Taking small steps is all well and good but these changes are needed soon. We where told almost 2 years ago we'd get small tweaks to hate and DPS as needed, when TSO launched, this is the first time any of those promises have materialised.</p>

[Davngr1]

<p><cite>Xelgad wrote:</cite></p><blockquote><p>Thank you all for the feedback so far!Just to address one general point, we're trying to take a more subtle approach in adjusting this class. Instead of making one or two drastic changes, we're going for maybe a dozen smaller fixes and upgrades that result in a more balanced and better working Guardian. These fixes and upgrades will go beyond just utility. In that sense, it's good to hear that these changes won't immediately make Guardians desirable for every raid, since we certainly don't want utility to be the driving force that gets Guardians into raids. Furthermore, please remember that “Got Your Back” and “Cripple” are still Echoes of Faydwer Advancements and need to be balanced as such. The fact that some of you like the “Got Your Back” change while others still prefer other options is a sign that the proposed change is in the realm of balance.To clarify, the current plan for the Cripple debuff is a 75% reduction to target's riposte damage. While we're aware that Guardians are immune to riposte damage at end game, we still see a situational use for the debuff in cases where it's dangerous or impossible for scouts and healers to position behind the target. The added damage component is not insignificant and has a very low chance to miss. More feedback on this would be welcomed.While some of your other suggestions may make it in game, we especially like the idea to upgrade Guardian Sphere, since it could be a great way to provide some defensive utility that would be useful in heroic content. The tentative plan is to change Guardian Sphere into a group buff that grants all non-fighters a 50% (at master) chance to stoneskin. The Guardian will have a 25% (at master) chance to stoneskin him or herself. The casting time has been reduced to 0.5 seconds, the radius has been increased to 35 meters, the duration maxes out at 20 seconds and there is no limit on the number of stoneskins that can trigger during the duration.</p></blockquote><p>great idea for sphere.</p><p>  but unless cripple is upgraded to reduce "barrage" frontal attack damage it will and does nothing for survivability of "non tank" classes in front of the mob.</p>

[Vlahkmaak]

<p>Guardian thoughts:  Give me more auto attack damage/dps for threat - ALOT more than the crusader ability grants.  Continue to allow other plate tanks to shine in the AOE areas.  Im ok with that.  We all need a job to do but currently aoe threat + AoE DPS > single target threat + dps for faster killing which people enjoy more. </p><p><strong>1.) Recapture:</strong></p><p>IF target is Epic leave as is.</p><p>IF target is solo/heroc forces target to target caster for X seconds (sort of an encounter version of cry of the warrior)</p><p>IF target is PVP target encounter is prevented from using positional (+/-) hate abilities or taunts for 15 seconds.  Tramua curable.</p><p>If Target is SK the SK immediately Harm Touches themselves.</p><p><strong>2.) Cripple</strong> add a -% crit effect to it makeing the mob crit less hard, will stack with the ranger skill.</p><p>For each cripple ability active the guardian gets a "splurt" type hate gain OR just a flat out + threat component to any cripple ability based on # of AA in each individual skill (or in the entire tree?)</p><p>OR</p><p>DPS Solution  <span style="text-decoration: underline;">For each AA point in cripple the guardian recieves a base autto attack multiplier for increased auto attk damage/DPS that should roughly be double the crusader ability.</span></p><p>If target is a scout the scout is immediately snared for 200% and forced to moonwalk.</p><p><strong>3.) Hold the Line</strong> will proc 500 trauma damage on every parry, block, and 100 trauma damage upon getting hit.  OR 1.8x per minute it will grant the guardian a chance to become immune to knockdowns  for 30 seconds.  Essentially a mutegenic burst type trauma ability.</p><p>PVP: If target is a crusader target will loose 1 level per proc <img src="/eq2/images/smilies/908627bbe5e9f6a080977db8c365caff.gif" border="0" /></p><p><strong>4.) Battle Hardening</strong> added to both the warrior and guardian tree in TSO abilities.</p><p><strong>5.) Tactical Wisdom</strong> Allows the guardian to break cap on incoming physical damage.</p><p>PVP Raises the guardians mitigation to 80%.</p><p><strong>6.) Guardians Will</strong> grants a 1.8% chance to proc a modern Claymore Version of reflect if shield equiped in secondary.</p><p>If PVP - All crusaders in the immediate vicinity (Ie logged into the game anywhere) soil themsleves and rust their armor causing 1d6 points of armor damage costing more than 2x the normal repair cost. <img src="/eq2/images/smilies/908627bbe5e9f6a080977db8c365caff.gif" border="0" /></p><p><strong>7.) Rallying Cry</strong> adds an additional +5 Potency to the grp in addition to current functioning.  All rezzes are + X more effective raidwide. </p><p><strong>8.) Stance: Armored</strong>: Effect added - Rock Iron Nerves.  Reduces all incoming damge by 10%.</p><p><strong>9.) Assualt and Dragoon Spin</strong>: Blue Hate added.  Dragoon Spin Blue Hate based on # of AA in the skill.  If Lay Waste is taken then direct hate is added. Hate proc would be maybe 2x what the CA hits for.</p><p><strong>10.) Bind Wound</strong> - useable in combat.</p><p><strong>11.) Iron Will</strong>: Remove STA and add to defensive stance.  Change to a 500 hp regenerating ward.</p><p><strong>12.) Executionaers Fury</strong>: 1% chance to Flurry per AA point spent up to 10%.</p><p><strong>13.) Got your back</strong>: Worthless.  You would have to make this a no brainer to get me to reduce my DPS, Cripple points, or stalwarting points to even consider wasting any more points than bare minimum in this line.</p><p><strong>14.) Unyielding Will</strong>: Permanent buff till it fires off once the 5 aa in enhanced version are spent OR make it so it cannot be cancelled once clicked by double clicking due to lag. </p><p><strong>15.) Concusion:</strong> +5 sec stifle component.</p><p><strong>16.) Battle Cry:</strong> +5 Potency while active.</p><p>17.) Get rid of guardain class and replace us with Bheastlohrds.</p><p>Have to go - will call for more stars and the moon later.</p>

[YummiOger]

<p>As far as the overall Guardian Condition, I agree with Atan and Soul_Dreamer. Listen to them IMO.</p><p>Guardians do not need any game changing reworks or updates. Just small  bumps in some key areas. Not all abilities are useful to every class. im sure many classes have abilities that have very limited usefulness. im ok with haveing some limited usefulness abilities if the overall picture is OK.</p><p>With that being said. Got Your Back (100% useless), Recapture(Usless in solo/group play), and Cripple (100% usless) fall under the bar. and need to be looked at.</p><p>Warrior STR Line end ability has been broken/unuseable for a long time. plz fix.</p><p>Mythical Buff, Guardian Sphere, Raid Buff, and TPS are in desperate need of re-visiting and could offer substantial increases in gameplay satisfaction.</p>

[Soul_Dreamer]

<p>Xelgad,</p><p><span style="white-space: pre;"> </span>There are some Guardians who are unable to post on EQ2 forums but who also have views on this. Link to thread where this thread is being discussed below. </p><p><a href="http://www.eq2flames.com/guardians/66634-xelgad-requests-feedback-guardians.html"> Clicky</a></p><p>Warrior STR end line ability has never been usefull and should be changed as  the Enchanter (power below 30%) ability was ages ago, reduce the benefits and have it always on.</p>

[rwiz]

<p>・Got your back - If it become raidwide, maybe useless if it is still fighters only...</p><p>I hope this : Block next AE for 1 triger (raidwide), 15sec , if you cast CA this spell is canceled,</p><p>・Cripple - I hope this : adding 10% crit damage reduction  for cripple line.</p><p>・Plant - Please make it can effect to Epic mobs, I don't use this spell for long time.</p><p>・Iron will - How worth this spell ? I hope + HP spell...not STA</p><p>・Intercept - I don't use this spell because when I use this , I sometimes die.</p><p>I hope this : Block next damage for 1 triger (for raid member), 15sec , if you cast CA this spell is canceled,</p><p>・Sentinel - I don't use this spell because when I use this , I sometimes die.</p><p>I think transfer damage spell need more love...</p>

[aislynn00]

<p><cite>Xelgad wrote:</cite></p><blockquote><p>Thank you all for the feedback so far!Just to address one general point, we're trying to take a more subtle approach in adjusting this class. Instead of making one or two drastic changes, we're going for maybe a dozen smaller fixes and upgrades that result in a more balanced and better working Guardian.</p></blockquote><p>That sounds like an interesting idea, at least if that "mechanics change" it is supposed to be coupled with involves changing the mitigation curve, so only guardians would be able to push close to the cap vs 98th level raid bosses. </p><p>A nerf, whether indirectly (e.g., the mitigation curve) or directly, of the survivability of non-guardian fighters is simply needed; otherwise, why bother with the added survivability and utility of a guardian?  You already get completely superior DPS and utility with a different tank class, plus equivalent (berserker and SK) or better (paladin) survivability--more than enough to do every single raid encounter currently in the game.</p><blockquote><p>Furthermore, please remember that “Got Your Back” and “Cripple” are still Echoes of Faydwer Advancements and need to be balanced as such.</p></blockquote><p>I'm not sure I understand what you mean by that. </p><p>One of the paladin EoF advancements permanently adds 35% Block Chance.  One of the berserker EoF AA's affords the berserker another death save.  Someone else already listed the rock-solid shadowknight EoF endline AA's, so I won't bother repeating them.</p><p>My point being, you can't imply that EoF endline abilities <em>have</em> to be relatively weak without be simultaneously arguing that aforementioned decidedly powerful SK, berserker, and paladin EoF AA's have to be nerfed.</p><blockquote><p>The fact that some of you like the “Got Your Back” change while others still prefer other options is a sign that the proposed change is in the realm of balance.</p></blockquote><p>A group-wide AE blocker without class restrictions with 60 sec reuse would be balanced.  Heck, even a group-only, healer-only AE blocker with 30 - 45 sec reuse would be useful.</p><p>On the other hand, anything that only protects fighters, raidwide or otherwise, is simply junk, especially given the required AA investment: Off-tanks are usually way beyond 14m if actually doing any off-tanking, so they won't be hit hard by any AE's no matter what, and the AE blocker in its current form doesn't do anything to help the one fighter who could actually use it: the MT.</p><blockquote><p>To clarify, the current plan for the Cripple debuff is a 75% reduction to target's riposte damage. While we're aware that Guardians are immune to riposte damage at end game, we still see a situational use for the debuff in cases where it's dangerous or impossible for scouts and healers to position behind the target.</p><p>The added damage component is not insignificant and has a very low chance to miss. More feedback on this would be welcomed.</p></blockquote><p>When can't a scout at the very least flank (and thus avoid ripostes) a raid boss?  Even Roehn Theer doesn't pose a problem in that regard.</p><p>Besides, are you aware how ripostes actually work these days? </p><p>Back in KoS, a riposte was an actual extra auto-attack that occasionally triggered off a successful parry.  Mobs that riposted alot, such as Vilucidae in Lyceum of Abhorrence, were actually able to kill raid tanks because of their ripostes.</p><p>At some point after KoS, however, the underlying riposte mechanics changed dramatically, leaving us where we are today: raid bosses that auto-attack for 12K+ damage riposte for perhaps 1200 damage, a tiny fraction of the damage of an actual auto-attack, rendering ripostes--and thus, riposte immunity as well as riposte damage reduction--a complete joke.</p><p>At any rate, you have to keep in mind that you aren't just handing guardians this ability for free.  You are asking us to move points from either our survivability-boosting subtree (obviously not going to happen; we would have to give up Unyielding Will reuse reduction/heal increase, Guardian Sphere reuse reduction, ToS reuse reduction, and the Block endline) or our DPS subtree, which would cost us tremendous DPS and hate generation plus block our only feasible path to Reinforcement reuse reduction.</p><p>And for what?  Enhancement of our debuffs, which currently aren't doing much, if anything at all. </p><p>Let's see:</p><p> o Casting skill debuff?  Nope, you never, ever resist raid boss AE's or nukes.  Pointless AA number one.</p><p> o Combat skill debuff?  Nope, raid bosses never, ever miss an attack.  Pointless AA number two.</p><p> o DPS Modifier debuff?  I hope this one does <em>something</em>, but between a defiler, a mystic, a dirge, multiple other fighter classes, and who knows what other classes all debuffing DPS Modifier, I somehow figure raid bosses are already hitting the DPS Modifier debuff cap.  Pointless AA number three.</p><p> o Duration increase of our Defense/Parry skill debuff.  Aside from being a nice, hard-hitting attack that itself doesn't miss, does it do anything?  I don't know.  The debuff component certainly doesn't do enough to prevent me from missing or being parried or blocked while it is running, so an AA to increase the duration by a few seconds isn't exactly the coolest thing since sliced bread.  Pointless AA number four.</p><p>In other words, whatever "not insignificant" damage component you are adding to the effectively meaningless maintainable riposte debuff would have to singlehandedly make up for the loss of 20 points moved out of the DPS tree and/or Enhance: Rescue and Enhance: Reinforcement.</p><p>I really, truly don't see that happening.</p><p>Please forget about the whole riposte notion and instead make Cripple a maintainable Potency debuff (still with lots of hate and damage), change our DPS Modifier debuff to an Auto-Attack Modifier debuff, change our casting skill debuff to a significant power drain or a dispel (i.e., buff remover), and finally, change our combat skill debuff to an AE Auto-Attack Chance debuff.</p><blockquote><p>While some of your other suggestions may make it in game, we especially like the idea to upgrade Guardian Sphere, since it could be a great way to provide some defensive utility that would be useful in heroic content. The tentative plan is to change Guardian Sphere into a group buff that grants all non-fighters a 50% (at master) chance to stoneskin. The Guardian will have a 25% (at master) chance to stoneskin him or herself. The casting time has been reduced to 0.5 seconds, the radius has been increased to 35 meters, the duration maxes out at 20 seconds and there is no limit on the number of stoneskins that can trigger during the duration.</p></blockquote><p>What can I say? It sounds like a great idea.</p><p>Here's another two:</p><p>1) Change Plant to a toggleable, <em>permanent</em> buff with two effects: Roots Caster and Prevents Knockback.</p><p>2) Add Immunity to Charm, Mez, and/or Disarm to our mythical/Epic Repercussions buff proc.</p>

[Yimway]

<p><cite>Xelgad wrote:</cite></p><blockquote><p>Just to address one general point, we're trying to take a more subtle approach in adjusting this class. Instead of making one or two drastic changes, we're going for maybe a dozen smaller fixes and upgrades that result in a more balanced and better working Guardian. These fixes and upgrades will go beyond just utility. In that sense, it's good to hear that these changes won't immediately make Guardians desirable for every raid, since we certainly don't want utility to be the driving force that gets Guardians into raids. Furthermore, please remember that “Got Your Back” and “Cripple” are still Echoes of Faydwer Advancements and need to be balanced as such. The fact that some of you like the “Got Your Back” change while others still prefer other options is a sign that the proposed change is in the realm of balance.To clarify, the current plan for the Cripple debuff is a 75% reduction to target's riposte damage. While we're aware that Guardians are immune to riposte damage at end game, we still see a situational use for the debuff in cases where it's dangerous or impossible for scouts and healers to position behind the target. The added damage component is not insignificant and has a very low chance to miss. More feedback on this would be welcomed.</p></blockquote><p>These two statements only serve to demonstrate exactly how far out of touch you are with actually playing the class.</p><p>I can certainly understand why you don't post more.</p><p>No guard is going to take and stick with got your back or cripple leaving them as you suggest.  Since mythical's are now defacto for any class in which someone plays as thier main, cripple as you well know is completely useless.</p><p>Got your back, would be so rarely situationally useful, that it would only maybe, in a drugged up halucination fantasy be placed on a mirror spec for a few select fights.</p><p>Other fighters don't need help surviving aoe abilities.  I mean yay, someone could stay in on a few mobs and avoid a curse penalty if a guard wasted a ton of aa into an ability that would be mildly useful on just a handful of raid scripts (but not remotely needed).  But in all seriousness, how do you envision a guard giving up aa needed for hate generation to get got your back?  Have you really looked at what is above it on the line they'd be putting aa into?</p><p>I understand in scope, these are EoF abilities as you say, but looking at SK 'eof' abilities, I still find them very lacking.</p><p>You should also consider changes to the slaughtering endline ability as 9% DA is hardly very relevant in today's game either.  The only truely relevant endline ability we have currently is block (and even then I'm forced to tank without a shield 95% of the time due to the wonderful status quot game mechanics), and with your proposed changes, for anyone who really understands the class, it remains the only relevant endline in the guardian tree.</p>

[Rahatmattata]

<p><cite>Xelgad wrote:</cite></p><blockquote><p>More feedback on this would be welcomed.</p></blockquote><p>Go ahead and change it if you want... but no guard is going to drop the stalwarting and slaughtering lines for Got Your Back and Cripple, so honestly you're wasting your time with that. Now if you made Cripple so that it disarms mobs/players for 10 seconds... now you're talkin.</p><p>The Stone Sphere change is alright... but a lot more needs to be done to make the guardian relevant in today's game. For starters, put the warrior tree double attack AA back to 60% with 10AA. This wouldn't do much for raid equipped guards, as they already have a ton of double attack, and would greatly help the guard in entry level gear trying to gear up. As the guardian gets better gear and more double attack, the 60% becomes less useful since you can't double attack more than 100% of the time anyway. And yea, I know this would buff zerkers too, but there was no good reason to nerf that AA line and it should be restored.</p><p>Also, the mythical epic weapon should be buffed so that it's not terrible. 10% permanent damage reduction would be a start.</p>

[Rahatmattata]

<p><cite>Vlahkmaak@Venekor wrote:</cite></p><blockquote><strong>1.) Recapture:</strong><p>If Target is SK the SK immediately Harm Touches themselves.</p><p><strong>2.) Cripple</strong></p>If target is a scout the scout is immediatle snared for 200% and forced to moon.<p><strong>3.) Hold the Line</strong> will proc 500 trauma damage on every parry, block, and 100 trauma damage upon getting hit.  OR 1.8x per minute it will grant the guardian a chance to become immune to knockdowns  for 30 seconds.  Essentially a mutegenic burst type trauma ability.</p><p>PVP: If target is a crusader target will loose 1 level per proc <img src="/eq2/images/smilies/908627bbe5e9f6a080977db8c365caff.gif" border="0" /></p><strong>6.) Guardians Wil</strong> <p>If PVP - All crusaders in the immediate vicinity (Ie logged into the game anywhere) soil themsleves and rust their armor causing 1d6 points of armor damage costing more than 2x the normal repair cost. <img src="/eq2/images/smilies/908627bbe5e9f6a080977db8c365caff.gif" border="0" /></p></blockquote><p>Make it so.</p>

[Iacon]

<p>In my opinion, the whole Crippling line should be scrapped for a Taunting line. The whole line is terrible and even if you make the endline marginally better no one is ever going to use it, because you have to waste too many points. Here's my idea for a reworked line that people might actually use:</p><p><strong>Enhance Goading Gesture: </strong>17% additional chance to proc the secondary effect per point, 5 points put it on a different timer than Provoke.</p><p><strong>Enhance Provoke:</strong> Decrease resistability 5% and increase threat 10% per point.</p><p><strong>Enhance Shout:</strong> Decrease resistability 5% and increase threat 10% per point.</p><p><strong>Enhance Taunting Blow: </strong>move this AA out of the Slaughtering line and replace it with increased damage on another CA.</p><p><strong>Enhance Recapture</strong>: Decrease Hate position of all nonfighters with target encounter.</p><p><strong>End Line - "Inflamatory Comments":</strong> Add Heat damage to Provoke and Shout.</p>

[Vlahkmaak]

<p><cite>rwiz wrote:</cite></p><blockquote><p>・Got your back - If it become raidwide, maybe useless if it is still fighters only...</p><p>I hope this : Block next AE for 1 triger (raidwide), 15sec , if you cast CA this spell is canceled,</p><p>・Cripple - I hope this : adding 10% crit damage reduction  for cripple line.</p><p>・Plant - Please make it can effect to Epic mobs, I don't use this spell for long time.</p><p>・Iron will - How worth this spell ? I hope + HP spell...not STA</p><p><strong><span style="text-decoration: underline;">・Intercept - I don't use this spell because when I use this , I sometimes die.</span></strong></p><p>I hope this : Block next damage for 1 triger (for raid member), 15sec , if you cast CA this spell is canceled,</p><p>・Sentinel - I don't use this spell because when I use this , I sometimes die.</p><p>I think transfer damage spell need more love...</p></blockquote><p>When you need to use this ability on another tank (or individual) cast ToS first then cast this ability - free stone skins to your target.</p>

[OzNeK]

<p>Main trouble of Guardian is no any good, i mean rly good things for group or for raid or for themselvs. No rly cool antispike abilities like adrenaline or mass deadsaves of SK(dunno correct name on eng), no prevents of magical damage(this type of damage is main killer and damage dealer in SF raids) physical damage now is not so high but magical damage is rly strong, but guardian have nothing to prevent it.</p><p>Guardian have no usefull bufs, Sk have great buffs, Pala have cool buffs too, Berserker have rly nice buffs and great survival abillites. But guard have only useless baffs and no deadsaves, no working rly working antispikes.</p><p>For example, when guard tanking Evil Roen theer he needs 3 healer, when berserker tank same mob, he needs only 2.</p><p>So guardian = monk, this class is dead for raids but i hope u will make him better =)</p>

[daceb]

<p><span ><p>personally I think my guardian is ok as is, 250 AA and good group set up and I do just fine, I may not be able to room pull or dps like other tanks but I don't care about all that, only suggestions I can make is improve taunt range as sometimes when I am a foot away from mob and rooted nothing I throw at the mob will get the agro back including rescue I have to move in closer to get the agro, and secondly the thing which I feel will improve me no end and cause me a lot less stress is to fix tab targeting, too often I am fighting a mob and another walks in and I try to tab to it and it either tabs to something not even in range and on screen or just [Removed for Content] right refuses to change target no matter how many times I press it, and am unable to mouse over to mob as my screen is loaded up with particle effects(even on balanced), so please, pretty please with sugar on top, fix tab targeting<img src="/eq2/images/smilies/283a16da79f3aa23fe1025c96295f04f.gif" border="0" /></p></span></p>

[Emlar_from_Halas]

<p><cite>Xelgad wrote:</cite></p><blockquote><p>Thank you all for the feedback so far!Just to address one general point, we're trying to take a more subtle approach in adjusting this class. Instead of making one or two drastic changes, we're going for maybe a dozen smaller fixes and upgrades that result in a more balanced and better working Guardian. These fixes and upgrades will go beyond just utility. In that sense, it's good to hear that these changes won't immediately make Guardians desirable for every raid, since we certainly don't want utility to be the driving force that gets Guardians into raids. Furthermore, please remember that “Got Your Back” and “Cripple” are still Echoes of Faydwer Advancements and need to be balanced as such. The fact that some of you like the “Got Your Back” change while others still prefer other options is a sign that the proposed change is in the realm of balance.</p><p><span style="color: #3366ff;">Change GYB to group members AE avoidance and you get my vote.</span></p><p>To clarify, the current plan for the Cripple debuff is a 75% reduction to target's riposte damage. While we're aware that Guardians are immune to riposte damage at end game, we still see a situational use for the debuff in cases where it's dangerous or impossible for scouts and healers to position behind the target. The added damage component is not insignificant and has a very low chance to miss. More feedback on this would be welcomed.<span style="color: #3366ff;">Numbers provided from last run against Toxx: She riposted only 6 times, always against me. I missed one return and the other 5 made 7K dammage (yeah !) </span><img src="/eq2/images/smilies/8a80c6485cd926be453217d59a84a888.gif" border="0" /><span style="color: #3366ff;">.Against Rohen Theer, I haven't seen any riposte for the last 2 downs.As many already said, Riposte became a non event after it got revamped.</span></p><p>While some of your other suggestions may make it in game, we especially like the idea to upgrade Guardian Sphere, since it could be a great way to provide some defensive utility that would be useful in heroic content. The tentative plan is to change Guardian Sphere into a group buff that grants all non-fighters a 50% (at master) chance to stoneskin. The Guardian will have a 25% (at master) chance to stoneskin him or herself. The casting time has been reduced to 0.5 seconds, the radius has been increased to 35 meters, the duration maxes out at 20 seconds and there is no limit on the number of stoneskins that can trigger during the duration.</p><p><span style="color: #3366ff;">You got my vote on this one</span></p></blockquote><p>I'm very much in favor of a suggestion made by Frogweiser on EQ2F. We are all forced to DW in order to generate enough aggro. But, we all agree that this lowers our survivability a lot (just as an example, I blocked 157 out of 321 slashes from last RT). He proposed "something that grants a HUGE amount of agro for tanking with a shield to suffice the major dps cut we have."Like a shield stance where our auto attack dps would generate 40% more aggro for example.</p>

[Salarionn]

<cite>Netty wrote:</cite><blockquote><p>Like some of the ideas. But dont really think guards need a huge boost in dps. UT/hate is the way to go and some more dps. </p></blockquote> I am sorry, but as you said later in this post you quit playing your Guard. You didnt stop playing it because you couldnt survive the encounters, you quit because the other tanks could survive everything as well and bring so much more DPS to the raids. I dont know if you switched to another tank class yourself or just let somebody have the MT spot, but I am almost 100% certain that you or the raid leader let this happen because the other three options can live as well and bring so much more DPS. We are not going to get back into raids in large numbers unless the DPS gap is closed. I am not asking to be equal to the offensive tanks, but when you have SKs that are doing 70-80k parses (WW ranking guilds) or 35-40k (good guild) why bother putting in the Guardian at 35k (WW ranking guilds) or 20K (good guilds) ? Something major broken when you have such a HUGE gap in what we can parse as tanks. No tanks should be able to double anothers DPS weather you are an "offensive" tank or not. I can see a 5K difference, but its really silly at this point. No raid leader worth a spit is going to give up that much DPS just to have a Guard in the raid. < EDIT: These numbers are being generated on single target mobs and AE fights alike. They can do massive damage regardless of how many mobs are in front of them.

[Rhita]

<p>I must say i fully agree with the dps gap needing to shrink a bit. While I have not been replaced, i know those who have and all to other tanks cuz they can parse higher and survive just the same. Its true about got your back, while its a nice change and might help in certain situations. Its not gonna ultimately make us all switch to it. As for changing the warrior sta tree back to 60 dbl attack. Its not needed, as said before we are already the class with the highest DA in AAs. I only have 4 points in this and sit at 140 DA in raid. So its not needed. Cripple line still needs some thought, Maybe some things to add would be weapon bonus for guards maybe zerks too to make us more in line with crusaders. As well as some shield block so we can have more survivability.</p><p>Off Topic:</p><p>A change that would be nice for all classes would be to allow us to spend our points where we want in trees and for example, 22 are needed per line in the RoK tree. Make it where only 22 is needed and 4 is not needed to advance to the next one in the line.</p>

[Salarionn]

<cite>Rhita@Najena wrote:</cite><blockquote><p>I must say i fully agree with the dps gap needing to shrink a bit. While I have not been replaced, i know those who have and all to other tanks cuz they can parse higher and survive just the same. Its true about got your back, while its a nice change and might help in certain situations. Its not gonna ultimately make us all switch to it. As for changing the warrior sta tree back to 60 dbl attack. Its not needed, as said before we are already the class with the highest DA in AAs. I only have 4 points in this and sit at 140 DA in raid. So its not needed. Cripple line still needs some thought, Maybe some things to add would be weapon bonus for guards maybe zerks too to make us more in line with crusaders. As well as some shield block so we can have more survivability.</p><p> </p><p> </p><p>Off Topic:</p><p>A change that would be nice for all classes would be to allow us to spend our points where we want in trees and for example, 22 are needed per line in the RoK tree. Make it where only 22 is needed and 4 is not needed to advance to the next one in the line.</p></blockquote> Yes Shinta, I am lucky in that regard as well. I am not in a WW ranking guild anymore, but that was my choice. I have offers to go and hang out with a few of them, but I am chilling with my friends in a casual guild at least until the summer is over. I am speaking for the guys who have been replaced for the DPS reasons and the Guards who havnt carved out some sort of a name for themselves in the game. The guys who want to start raiding, but have no real chance as things stand now.

[Rhita]

<p><cite>Salarionn wrote:</cite></p><blockquote><cite>Rhita@Najena wrote:</cite><blockquote><p>I must say i fully agree with the dps gap needing to shrink a bit. While I have not been replaced, i know those who have and all to other tanks cuz they can parse higher and survive just the same. Its true about got your back, while its a nice change and might help in certain situations. Its not gonna ultimately make us all switch to it. As for changing the warrior sta tree back to 60 dbl attack. Its not needed, as said before we are already the class with the highest DA in AAs. I only have 4 points in this and sit at 140 DA in raid. So its not needed. Cripple line still needs some thought, Maybe some things to add would be weapon bonus for guards maybe zerks too to make us more in line with crusaders. As well as some shield block so we can have more survivability.</p><p>Off Topic:</p><p>A change that would be nice for all classes would be to allow us to spend our points where we want in trees and for example, 22 are needed per line in the RoK tree. Make it where only 22 is needed and 4 is not needed to advance to the next one in the line.</p></blockquote> Yes Shinta, I am lucky in that regard as well. I am not in a WW ranking guild anymore, but that was my choice. I have offers to go and hang out with a few of them, but I am chilling with my friends in a casual guild at least until the summer is over. I am speaking for the guys who have been replaced for the DPS reasons and the Guards who havnt carved out some sort of a name for themselves in the game. The guys who want to start raiding, but have no real chance as things stand now.</blockquote><p>lol its Rhita, not Shinta lol.</p>

[Rhita]

<p>Just had a thought for our ability Recapture. Since its possibly the worst possible lvl 80 spell in game, what if it were changed to 24 hate positions and something like a 30k threat taunt. Then it would truly be recapture but for the guardian. Could extend the recast to like 5 minutes or longer. Then it would be useful if we died or something and we could recapture the mob when were ready.</p>

[steelbadger]

<p><cite>Xelgad wrote:</cite></p><blockquote><p>Thank you all for the feedback so far!Just to address one general point, we're trying to take a more subtle approach in adjusting this class. Instead of making one or two drastic changes, we're going for maybe a dozen smaller fixes and upgrades that result in a more balanced and better working Guardian. These fixes and upgrades will go beyond just utility. In that sense, it's good to hear that these changes won't immediately make Guardians desirable for every raid, since we certainly don't want utility to be the driving force that gets Guardians into raids. Furthermore, please remember that “Got Your Back” and “Cripple” are still Echoes of Faydwer Advancements and need to be balanced as such. The fact that some of you like the “Got Your Back” change while others still prefer other options is a sign that the proposed change is in the realm of balance.To clarify, the current plan for the Cripple debuff is a 75% reduction to target's riposte damage. While we're aware that Guardians are immune to riposte damage at end game, we still see a situational use for the debuff in cases where it's dangerous or impossible for scouts and healers to position behind the target. The added damage component is not insignificant and has a very low chance to miss. More feedback on this would be welcomed.While some of your other suggestions may make it in game, we especially like the idea to upgrade Guardian Sphere, since it could be a great way to provide some defensive utility that would be useful in heroic content. The tentative plan is to change Guardian Sphere into a group buff that grants all non-fighters a 50% (at master) chance to stoneskin. The Guardian will have a 25% (at master) chance to stoneskin him or herself. The casting time has been reduced to 0.5 seconds, the radius has been increased to 35 meters, the duration maxes out at 20 seconds and there is no limit on the number of stoneskins that can trigger during the duration.</p></blockquote><p>There are mixed responses concerning your proposed changes to Got Your Back and Cripple because some people accept that any change, any acknowledgement of the need for change in Guardian abilities is good while others realise that, because these are AA abilities, a small boost wont change the strength of the class at all.</p><p>The new proposed Got Your Back would be of no use to heroic tanks and of extremely limited use to raid tanks.  An ability that aids the survivability of the people who need it <em>least</em> (Non tanking tanks) is not going to get used and so while this is a boost to the ability it is not a boost to Guardians as no-one in their right mind is likely to take it with or without the boost.</p><p>Cripple is similar.  Riposte is pathetic, once upon a time Riposte was a defining characteristic for some raids mobs, nowadays?  Less so.  Riposte damage is pretty much negligible and if someone is in front of a mob they will not be killed by ripostes.  They will be killed by the frontal portion of their AOE or simply by AoE auto-attack.  Riposte has been replaced by Flurry and AoE auto-attack in mob design.  New, shinier mechanics.  This ability would still be bypassed for the extra DPS from the slaughtering line unless, that is, the damage component on Cripple grants more DPS than all the AAs in Slaughtering combined.  Our debuffs simply aren't good enough to bother buffing.  10% effectiveness added to 0 effectiveness is still zero.</p><p>I'd support all of the Crippling AAs being changed to Taunt enhancement AAs.  But they'd need to be fairly big bonuses to make them attractive when compared against Slaughtering.</p><p>I don't understand why Got Your Back even exists.  Other tanks have their own survivability tools to stay alive, I don't see why any tank should need my help with it, particularly something as common as AoEs.  If a tank cannot survive an AoE, well, it's probably best they stay dead, they're a liability and I can't save them every time.  The same kinda applies to Recapture really.  Why does the poorest tank in terms of aggro generation have a way of helping other tanks?  It makes no sense, if anyone will need help capturing aggro it's the Guardian, but they get to waste their time buffing people who don't need buffing.</p><p>And remember; if you wish to increase Guardian attractiveness by buffing their survivability to give them back an advantage in this region then mob design needs to make the decision to field a Guard a viable one.  Mobs simply don't hit hard enough to encorage the DPS vs Survivability trade-off.</p>

[Khurghan]

<p>As Guardian Sphere: Like this change.</p><p>Other stuff -</p><ul><li>Dragoon's Reflexes :</li></ul><p>Please make this ability immune to strikethrough. Also consider lets us use CAs (not just taunts) to bring this in-line with other tanks similar abilities, it would also mean people *might* consider actually taking the AAs to make it last for longer because atm they are pointless.</p><ul><li>Got Your Back :</li></ul><p>Two sides to this really it has a very short reuse time so. If its a raid-wide AE avoid (non-direct) for tanks it might need a larger radius) - if as some people want were to block AEs that are direct it can't be raid-wide (for tanks) and be on such a short reuse timer.</p><ul><li>Crippling Line :</li></ul><p>This whole line sucks even if cripple was a maintained with a dot - what guard is gonna take it?</p><ul><li>Unyielding Will :</li></ul><p>Having to 2nd guess if we are gonna fall over sucks - bring it in line with other tanks buffs and make it maintained.</p><ul><li>Iron Will :</li></ul><p>This ability is a joke with stat caps on STA as they are, it would be better to make it a straight HP buff.</p><ul><li>Recapture :</li></ul><p>Hmm it had it's uses (AoJ) but its still pretty sucky - the dev's have said they won't allow any tank to have a +23 hate position ability because that would mean they would not be able to use 23 hate position drop mobs anymore.</p><ul><li>Call of shielding :</li></ul><p>As people have pointed out making this more defensive will not really help that much - maybe change it and add some accuracy, strikethough and weapon damage bonus (not necessarily all of those).</p><p>As there is a big problem in us and jim-jam tanks. If they make raid bosses hit so hard (mitigation) that you need a super-defensive tank to be able to stay alive then a jim-jam tank is gonna get one-shotted. Only way they could balace that would be to bring back The Reparm f**k - and I can't see a lot of people liking that.</p><p>Keeping along the defensive lines would be nice if we have some percantage shielding VS spells - most of the time now its AEs we have to worry about not getting hit. Maybe consider changing some of our abilties to help us resist non-melee stuff this would help give us some much needed survivability (at least to bring us in line with paladins). And before anyone tries the role-play card go and read-up on barbarians in 1st edition ADnD (not sure about later editions as past my time).</p>

[MurFalad]

<p>Looking at the ideas and there are two seperate problems being talked about, one is general gameplay that seems wrong (too much need to AOE, AOE attacks being far too powerful compared to single target attacks, thoughtless mechanics like unyeilding will that give a deathsave sometime in the future automatically without any need to really time anything).</p><p>The other problem that I think the thread is supposed to fix seems a fundemental one to me, all tanks now have equal survivability, that's a fact since all tanks can survive the content thrown at them, as the tank being alive or dead is a binary result no more survivability will help the guardian unless you nerf the other tanks (returning the design to pre-RoK), which was changed for a good reason.</p><p>As that's a fact then the other two things that the guardian must do is generate threat and generate DPS, no one is going to take a tank along to a raid who generates say 70k of threat via taunts if they can take a tank that generates 70k of threat via DPS.  The simple solution is to make the guardian DPS equal to other tanks, even though I think that sucks for game design as we have high survivability (like the other tanks), so we then become the uber classes compared to others in PVP especially breaking BGs.</p><p>Personally I think our threat needs to be increased, our DPS is probably fine, but then other classes need a lot of their DPS swapped for just threat to balance things, that then makes the class work in PVP and PVE at the same time (the more survivability we get the less DPS we can do).</p><p>Then there is the last problem, why bother taking a tank who does the same DPS to a single target when another class can match or exceed this and also do much more AOE.  I think here we need a role, something we excel at to make up for this and I think this discussion is working on it, personally I think the AOE power needs to be toned down (I suggest damage spread amoungst mobs) to balance it out though or otherwise fundementally people will always want the AOE tank over the more group protective tank.</p><p>The group stone shield sounds good, the more I think about the cripple debuff the more though I think its utterly useless, and I'm betting its the least most taken endline ability for a [Removed for Content] good reason, basically the whole line is poor and the differences they make to already weak effects do not get people excited about using them.n  Right now I don't notice my survivability jump if I get a RUIN applied to a mob, it probably does jump but by an unnoticable value, so 10% extra of that isn't going to be much.</p><p>Please give us instead more class flavour, change it into a mostly shield line with debuff fillers and make the end line ability something cool and fun like a spell reflect, that would make using it something to look forward to and to work on getting right in every encounter.</p>

[Rahatmattata]

<p><cite>Rhita@Najena wrote:</cite></p><blockquote><p>I must say i fully agree with the dps gap needing to shrink a bit. While I have not been replaced, i know those who have and all to other tanks cuz they can parse higher and survive just the same. Its true about got your back, while its a nice change and might help in certain situations. Its not gonna ultimately make us all switch to it. As for changing the warrior sta tree back to 60 dbl attack. Its not needed, as said before we are already the class with the highest DA in AAs. I only have 4 points in this and sit at 140 DA in raid. So its not needed. Cripple line still needs some thought, Maybe some things to add would be weapon bonus for guards maybe zerks too to make us more in line with crusaders. As well as some shield block so we can have more survivability.</p></blockquote><p>That's because you are getting at least 72% from your raid gear and 19% from AAs... sitting at 91% self buffed, at least. You must not have read my post. As I said, restoring the warrior double attack to 60% helps level 15-89 warriors tank, and warriors with entry-level legendary (or even treasured/crafted/etc) gear, which is what Xelgad is focusing on. You are right, it would do nothing for raid tanks with some of the best gear in the game. As your gear gets better, and the buffs from people around you get better, the DA line becomes less effective so as to not be overpowered. Basically you start freeing up AAs by getting better gear.</p><p>If you want to talk about something that's not needed, let's talk about 10 seconds of KB immunity. Standing in a corner = immune to KB.</p>

[meltedman]

<p>Howdy,</p><p>Thanks for taking the time and opening the door to the headache that is our class (And our complaints).</p><p>It's understood Guardian's are defensive tanks with (very(painfully))low dps. However, if we're going to be min-maxing our class let's see some of the maxing. We need threat(for tanking) and some powerful group saves.</p><p>I rolled my first toon as a Guard in part because of the description on character create page. "anchor of any group of adventurers".."Protection for their allies".."Combining durable armor with an impressive array of defense skills".</p><p>I would like to see my defense skills actually impress.</p><p>A buff to Guardian Sphere that doesn't kill me is much appreciated and starts the ball rolling for balance in my group.</p><p>Intercept cause 25% extra incoming damage to your group. That's not saving your allies that's a team debuff.</p><p>Hold the Line: Grant it a chance(40%?) to AE threat engaged mobs. This does not affect our dps and would help considerably in heroic content.</p><p>Reversal: Provide a chance(20-25%) to trigger on Shield Bash.</p><p>Iron Will: Give an identical WIS boost. Spells hurt.</p><p>Call of Shielding: Give this a buff when you're in different stances. If I'm not taking the hits that require Defensive stance I would like to provide a helping hand to my allies.</p><p>Recapture: Give this poor lvl 80 spell some heroic content some love. Adding a detaunt for non fighters would add to both raid and heroic utility. (without adding to the caster's threat)</p><p>Unyielding Will got a lot of love in SF. I would suggest tweaking it to remove penalty for not dying. Not a revamp but a little addition.</p><p>Cripple: Don't kid yourself this is still a laughable AA waste. </p><p>Got Your Back is not helpful fighter only. Again..the class description says protection for their Allies(plural). Not just the guys who already can take hits.</p><p>I would like to see the buffs change slightly with my stance to better suit whatever my role is in group/raid.</p>

[Rahatmattata]

<p><cite>Khurghan wrote:</cite></p><blockquote><ul><li>Iron Will :</li></ul><p>This ability is a joke with stat caps on STA as they are, it would be better to make it a straight HP buff.</p></blockquote><p>I forgot about that one. That is one spell I refuse to spend money upgrading passed adept 1.</p><p>Got Your Back must be a group-wide AoE blocker, or it will never be used.</p><p>Cripple must be something else entirely, or it will never be used.</p><p>Guards must be doing shadowknight/zerker/paladin level of DPS or they are still inferior, or guards need more survivability and mobs have to be revamped to hit harder, or other plate tanks' defense has to be nerfed. Either way, I don't care anymore. But if none of this happens, guards will remain an out-dated redundant class.</p>

[bishoph]

<p><cite>Xelgad wrote:</cite></p><blockquote><p>Greetings Guardians!First off, allow me say that we understand that the class is being outshined at the moment, and we’re working on it. It's going to take more than just one change to get Guardians back to working as a strong class again. I'm not going into details yet, but we do have a mechanics change in the works that will at least help a bit to distinguish Guardians as a more defensive tank. Even with that, the class is currently lacking in other areas, including threat generation and utility.It's utility that we want to focus this thread on. We want to bring Guardian utility up to the level that the other fighters bring to a group or raid. We have three tentative changes that will be going to test soon:</p><ol><li>Got Your Back will become raidwide.</li><li>Cripple will become a maintainable debuff with a damage component.</li><li>Call of Shielding will also increase the health of the raid. The level 87 version at master will amount to around 1,000 hit points.</li></ol><p>We’re looking for feedback on these ideas, and we’re open to boosting Guardian utility even a bit further, especially in heroic content. I want to emphasize that we’re not trying to turn Guardians into plate-wearing Bards or anything of the sort. However, I do want to try to focus this thread on the utility aspect of the class.</p></blockquote><p>Changing the end lines, is good, but you need to change the lines them self, so people will use them.  Most of the talents in these two lines, are not needed or wanted. The Guardian lines, have been taken the same way since RoK, this should point to some of the issues in the lines not being as powerful as needed.   some examples, would be...Enhance Moderation - Remove, the lowering hate gain on it, and make it add a threat transfer.Enhance Sentry Watch - Remove the reuse speed, and lower the damage the Guardian takes, by a lot.  As many have said, you hit this and an AE goes off (or your in a group with people who are morons and take frontal's) you are dead.  Dead tank = dead group most of the time.The debuff improvements in the Cripple line, really are not that important right now.  With the people I group with, witch are not t9 raid geared, no fight lasts more than 30 seconds for trash.  On bosses, they are still not all that worth while, since even with out a prefect group, they do not add much that will effect the fight.  In raids, if in a OT or DPS role they do not add in much survivability to the group or MT. Maybe add in longer duration on the ability's in the line.  Then change Cripple to -  Increases effectiveness of all ability's in the line by X%, Adds a small hate gains to each ability in the line, and adds an Interrupt to all the ability's in the line.  This might get the utility you are looking for.  An AE block is really not needed, much at this point of the game.  In groups, you never have a second fighter, unless you are just off messing around.  In raids, you can set up a group, to have three or four of them for the MT.  Something like Grave Sac, would be nice for Guardians, since its rank in the 30's can out AE hate gain a lvl 90 guardian.Changes to these lines, can bring in the Utility that you are looking for.</p>

[Khurghan]

<p><cite>meltedman wrote:</cite></p><blockquote><p>Iron Will: Give an identical WIS boost. Spells hurt.</p></blockquote><p>We need shielding not increases in our resists.</p>

[meltedman]

<p><cite>Khurghan wrote:</cite></p><blockquote><p><cite>meltedman wrote:</cite></p><blockquote><p>Iron Will: Give an identical WIS boost. Spells hurt.</p></blockquote><p>We need shielding not increases in our resists.</p></blockquote><p>Fair enough. I was trying to think of anything to add to Iron Will.</p>

[Twizty]

<p>For me personally, I dont care that much about incresing our dps, thats not what we are about. Survivability and hate generation is what we should be about. I know a lot of guards dual weild in offensive stance just to kick out the dps required to maintain the threat position on the mob(s). This is a workaround and sacrifices the survivability of the guard.</p><p>Maybe a change to the stances would be an idea, such as in offensive stance the ca's kick out the dps as usual plus a potency or ca bonus due to the stance, (this would be great for heroic content which is where guards are so often overlooked in favour of crusaders due to the huge dps they can kick out). Defensive stance should obviously increase our survivability as it does but how about threat output on all ca's while in defensive stance. Also, why not increase threat generation when hunkered. As we all know, if we go full defensive our already meagre dps goes through the floor, and at the moment dps is threat.</p><p>Changing our utility is a good start and hopefully the start of some better changes for us. Speaking personally, I would be happy to sacrifice some dps in favour of a threat generation bonus, especially in raids. I dont have too much trouble holding aggro at the moment, but as my guild members get better geared and start kicking out more dps, I'm going to have problems.</p><p>None of my suggestions so far will ever make guards desirable as MT's in raid over other tanks, so I'll watch with interest the proposed changes to our utility. Hopefully something good will come our way so people actually want us to tank group content as well as raid content again.</p>

[stargazer5678]

<p>Completely agree that Utility shouldn't be the highest priority but will play along.</p><p>I propose:</p><p><span style="color: #ff6600;"><strong>Recapture</strong> </span>- Increase hate position of Guardian by 3 and other fighters by 1.</p><p><span style="color: #3366ff;">Explanation</span>: this way it becomes a decent snap utility useful in groups and raids. It will give more benefit to the guardian while helping other tanks too.</p><p><span style="color: #ff6600;"><strong>Hateful Assault</strong></span> - Decreases hate position of all non-fighter group memebers by 1 if shield equiped in secondary. Recast 1 min.</p><p><span style="color: #3366ff;">Explanation</span>: that CA is useless in it's current form. Very little damage and hate. Change it to be AoE snap but limit to be only used with a shield (make it tower if you must).</p><p><span style="color: #ff6600;"><strong>Lay waste</strong></span> - Boosts all attributes (Sta, Agi, Int, Wis, Str) of group members by 10% for 10seconds. Doesn't share time with Assault.</p><p><span style="color: #3366ff;">Explanation</span>: nice CA but improve it a bit by giving an offensive temp buff to the whole group (I know other classes will not like this but I don't care) and give it it's own timer. Why share it with our ONLY blue AoE (not counting dragoon).</p>

[EverDog]

<p>Hello there.</p><p>It is nice to see GRD class is going to be revamped.</p><p>Thanks to Xelgad and devs, first of all.</p><p>In my opinion, what GRD should get at first is "ability to prevent his death", which should be much better than Heart Exploding thing as GRD has for now.</p><p>Unlike SK's Bloodletter, GRD has to predict when intense damages in 2 sec will come to him to use that ability effectivly.</p><p>Or that Heart Exploding thing is almost nothing.</p><p>So here my suggestion.</p><p>1, Make "unyielding will" permanent buff as blood letter is.</p><p>2, Reduce the reuse timer of "unyielding will" , maybe 5min or 7.5min.</p><p>3, Add 1 more trigger count on "unyielding will" (total 2)</p><p>1k more HP raid buff sounds nice to me.but it is not critical.</p><p>Cripple debuff with damage ? better than nothing. Still GRD should be Main Tank with best survivability in the game rather than Sub Tank having good debuff.</p><p>Got your back? I say I never get your back anyway.</p>

[snowli]

<p>I don't play a guardian, never have, but I regularly heal main tanks, including a guardian.</p><p>The main issue as a healer I see for tanks is I prefer to heal a SK by far because bloodletter lets a spike in dps, lag, bad evades, control effects like charms, ports whatever be survived 1 or 2 times. Next best to heal is a paladin because of that stun them but let them survive ability. Both are massively superior it seems because they are up until they go off, the other tank abilities appear to be based on them having some kind of precognition to be able to activate an ability before the [Removed for Content] hits the fan, which almost never works. Most raiding situations where a tank dies it happens much faster than they can activate a short term death prevent.</p><p>In short: <strong>SK's have 3 life bars, guardians have 1 - who would you rather heal?</strong></p>

[etch666]

<p>Playing a guardian feels like playing an outdated tank class that seems to have been left behind this xpac.</p><p>The following CA's have been my biggest gripe when tanking with a guard, I don't think its too unreasonable to ask for:</p><p>IRON WILL - This buff needs a rethink, something more useful than the very useless stamina it has atm, besides Guards already get a HP buff.</p><p>PLANT - I never use this spell hardly, its more trouble than its worth tbh - its a blue ae already so why not just have it as a blue dmg/threat ae that will go towards balancing the ae hate issue of this class.</p><p>TAUNTING ASSAULT: This is a nice ae threat ca, sadly the cast time is too long and could do with shortening to match assaults cast time (1 sec).</p><p>GUARDIAN SPHERE: This spell is currently not worth the risk of clicking - how about scrap the stoneskin and intercede effect and just make it a short duration flat dmg reduction % for the whole group, something useful to click to mitigate incoming ae's - this is fine utility in itself.</p><p>RECAPTURE: Rly not sure what to make of this taunt, it can be useful on memwiping mobs when more than 1 tank is on the mob - however it can be resisted. If this spell is to stay the same at least make it unresistable, since its a very situational spell anyway.</p><p>Aside from the ae threat issue, if you are looking for utility then thinking about effects that protect the group/raid in someway will give the guard class a very nice niche in raids, and make them somewhat desired again. However a simple + 1000hp to a raid buff is not going far enough, but its a step in the right direction.</p>

[aislynn00]

<p><cite>meltedman wrote:</cite></p><blockquote><p><cite>Khurghan wrote:</cite></p><blockquote><p><cite>meltedman wrote:</cite></p><blockquote><p>Iron Will: Give an identical WIS boost. Spells hurt.</p></blockquote><p>We need shielding not increases in our resists.</p></blockquote><p>Fair enough. I was trying to think of anything to add to Iron Will.</p></blockquote><p>How about raw HP instead of Stamina, which you are able to easily cap without the buff?  How about 3% <em>uncontested</em> Parry?  How about 25% chance to resist any Charm or Mez effects?  Seems in keeping with the name of the buff.</p>

[Khurghan]

<p>I kind of like the idea of plant giving us immunity to knock-up and knock-back, the alternative would be AE mob bugged pathing/Mob in wall immunity which would be much harder to implement.</p>

[Lucianclaw]

Some ideas, not sure if their original but at least folks can sound out and improve or kill them...so posting Reinforcement - have it proc 100% autoattack AE, and maybe some accuracy that way Guardians can assure aggro at start of fight. We might not be able to keep it, but at least we can get our initial lock more effectively. Have the AE autoattack AA 2 spells - one that gives us the max 40% AE autoattack or toggle to the other spell which would give guardians increased damage to a single target (not sure how that would be possible). That way guardian can do greater autoattack damage to a single target

[Disma]

<p>he main difference I see between guardians and other fighters at the moment is an ability to heal.</p><p>Zerkers get an ability that heals them when hit now for only 15 triggers but it still heals for quite a bit plus they have 2 death saves and can aoe dps really well.</p><p>Crusaders can get pretty high on a heal parse damage parse and can take dmg like a guardian so why take a warrior?</p><p>Crusaders can spec for divine aura and take no damage and aura of the crusader which is another ability that allows them to take no damage.</p><p>SKs have the advantage of not even having to cast a heal, while they damage a mob they heal automatically plus they have bloodletter which gives them 2 death saves apllies have 1 but it is on a 1 min reuse i believe and can be cast in combat.</p><p>Guardians get stoneskin procs and I like the fix of tower of stone to not intercept damage unless it is 10% of hitpoints and I like last man standing that absorbs 7 attacks and reduces damage by 85%, but this is still not equal to all the healing and death saves of other tanks. Guardians may have a small advantage in survivability, but have little utility, and their dps is in the floor so why not take a tank who can heal themself, dps like a t1-t2 dps and can take damage too?</p><p>The changes proposed are not enough we need some kind of equalizer that makes us desirable for heroic and raid content. If a crusader or zerker isnt the main tank they can dps and off tank. I can tell ya from experience guardians are terrible off tanks. Maybe a utility role is what this class should play now. Buffing the MT and the MT group to keep them alive because at t9 there is no need for guardians unless you are already the MT for your raid force and there is no reason to take a second guardian, but as i said other tanks can at least offer some dps. Maybe get rid of all those useless aas and turn them into buffs for the raid and the MT. I know this will change the way the class is played but now they arent even desirable on a raid at least this way they would have some function.</p><p>My take on tanks</p><p>I think all tanks should have aa specs they can use to give mit and avoidance and help the MT keep agro (like an aa that mitigates the dmg taken by the MT to the entire raid or to just the fighters in the raid) as well like a hate feed from thier taunts. I understand its kind of late in the game to be changing things that much, but at least it would be worth taking more than one fighter on a raid.  The way i see it brawlers should buff the MTs or raids avoidance and crusaders could buff mit vs magic and warriors buff vs physical for the MT or the entire raid make them all have some utility. The damage from mobs could be spread to other tanks as well boosting the MTs survivability. Crusaders could intercept magic damage and warriors could intercept some physical damage while brawlers could do both or something else. This is just my idea to help all tanks to be more wanted in raids and this way they dont get left behind and onle 2 tanks go on a raid as usual.</p><p>Sorry for the wall of text.</p>

[Ballads]

<p>With the change to Got your Back, I foresee raids with 2 guardians, a few healers, and the rest SK's. The benefits of being perma AE Immune would far out weigh what other classes could provide when you consider how OP Sk dps is.</p>

[Soul_Dreamer]

<p><cite>Ballads wrote:</cite></p><blockquote><p>With the change to Got your Back, I foresee raids with 2 guardians, a few healers, and the rest SK's. The benefits of being perma AE Immune would far out weigh what other classes could provide when you consider how OP Sk dps is.</p></blockquote><p>What change? Fighter AOE immunity raid wide? Honestly, get a clue or get better at reading.. The proposed chage would be 2 Guardians able to keep all TANKS in the raid AOE immune for 30 seconds of every minute. How often do your tanks die to AOEs?...... Now think again, AOE avoid for those 2/3 fighters is OP?</p><p>Guardians have always sacrificed everything for survivability, solo ability, group tanking, everything, the only thing we ever did well was MT raids. Other fighters whined about this and demanded survivability so they could also MT raids. The biggest mistake made in fighter balance was caving in to these requests without removing abilities or buffing the Guardian. IF all other fighters get everything we sacrificed so much for, Guardians shouldn't have to make sacrifices any longer.</p><p>Leave out the "Small steps" or "<span style="font-size: 11.6667px;">taking a more subtle approach", Guardians need the DPS and Hate that other fighters can generate while offering similar utility they can and keeping our current survivability which is on par with other fighters. NOTHING else will fix the class. Exactly where did SK's/Zerk's/Pallies have to make sacrifices for their new survivability tools? </span></p><p>Guardians are the only class using the old balancing mechanics of tanks, ie.. you have to loose something to gain something, now no one else does, we shouldn't.</p><p>All those who believe Guardians shouldn't do the DPS/Hate of other tanks need to get with the times and realise that either:A. They're wrong.B. All those other tanks shouldn't have the survivability of the Guardian while do everything else they can.</p><p>The below needs to happen..</p><p>Utilty -</p><p>Massive group damage reduction, AOE avoids/stoneskins/damage reductions. A Guardians group/raid should be able to survive more than a group/raid without a Guardian in it. The second you gave all tanks Guardian like survivability there was no "Defensive tank", just 1 tank not able to do the same job as the other 3. Tanks don't need more survivability, simply because no content needs it, the "Defensive tanks" need to be able to make their groups live longer as well as themselves. The offensive tanks need to increase the groups damage (as is currently the case). This is the ONLY way to now keep defensive/offensive tanks.</p><p>AOE/ST Tanks -</p><p>Get rid of this plan if it's even the case, with current content and assuming the content pattern continues Guardians are at the huge disadvantage of being the only ST tank in a world of AOE content. AOE abilities work ST as well as AOE, ST abilities do NOT work on AOE targets.</p><p>Hate/DPS (one and the same currently) - </p><p>On par with every other plate tank in game, while being able to keep the survivability they can. Guardians shouldn't have to duel weild and be full offensive to not even come close to the Hate potential of other plate tanks, especially when other plate tanks can keep their survivability gains when they go more offensive.</p><p><span style="font-size: 11.6667px;">Some examples of survivability gains wile DPSing/Max hating...</span></p><p>SK - 3 full heals on death (Red adorn/Bugged VP Set), abilities that reduce inc damage and increase DPS, Max DPS with a shield.Zerk - 50% damage reduction, 50% of the time, 100% AOE auto attack, Death save queued and ready.Pally - Damage reduction and heals, Max DPS with a shield, Heals/Wards.Guardian - ..............Fill in the bank....... most of our abilities require a shield and we can't use one while DPSing.</p><p>Oh and lastly.. Knights Stance is far far more OP than the buckler line ever was, no AA to improve 2 handers and make them viable... no Crusaders where given the ability to max their DPS (Hate) while having a shield equipped. In the same expansion you took away buckler line and gave this to Crusaders, honestly, I don't think the old dev had a clue what balance was, please put Guardians back into balance with the other tanks!</p>

[Soul_Dreamer]

<p><cite>Dismall@Nagafen wrote:</cite></p><blockquote><p>The changes proposed are not enough we need some kind of equalizer that makes us desirable for heroic and raid content. If a crusader or zerker isnt the main tank they can dps and off tank. I can tell ya from experience guardians are terrible off tanks. Maybe a utility role is what this class should play now. Buffing the MT and the MT group to keep them alive because at t9 there is no need for guardians unless you are already the MT for your raid force and there is no reason to take a second guardian, but as i said other tanks can at least offer some dps. Maybe get rid of all those useless aas and turn them into buffs for the raid and the MT. I know this will change the way the class is played but now they arent even desirable on a raid at least this way they would have some function.</p></blockquote><p>If within 2 expansions Guardians turn from a Viable/Main choice as MT to a tank that buffs the MT you'll finally see most of the last of the Guardian leave game or re roll.</p><p>To fix Guardians it's very simple, they need to be able to perform the role the other tanks can as well as they can. which is simply.. ALL ROLES! MT/Group Tank/OT/Solo/PvP Tank.</p><p>Ask any SK/Pally/Zerk and they'll tell you tanks are the most balanced they have ever been, in reality you have 3 god mode tanks who are versatile, can fill any role and fun to play, and 1 tank left by the wayside in all but 1 area.</p>

[circusgirl]

<p><cite>Soul_Dreamer wrote:</cite></p><blockquote><p><cite>Dismall@Nagafen wrote:</cite></p><blockquote><p>The changes proposed are not enough we need some kind of equalizer that makes us desirable for heroic and raid content. If a crusader or zerker isnt the main tank they can dps and off tank. I can tell ya from experience guardians are terrible off tanks. Maybe a utility role is what this class should play now. Buffing the MT and the MT group to keep them alive because at t9 there is no need for guardians unless you are already the MT for your raid force and there is no reason to take a second guardian, but as i said other tanks can at least offer some dps. Maybe get rid of all those useless aas and turn them into buffs for the raid and the MT. I know this will change the way the class is played but now they arent even desirable on a raid at least this way they would have some function.</p></blockquote><p>If within 2 expansions Guardians turn from a Viable/Main choice as MT to a tank that buffs the MT you'll finally see most of the last of the Guardian leave game or re roll.</p><p>To fix Guardians it's very simple, they need to be able to perform the role the other tanks can as well as they can. which is simply.. ALL ROLES! MT/Group Tank/OT/Solo/PvP Tank.</p><p>Ask any SK/Pally/Zerk and they'll tell you tanks are the most balanced they have ever been, in reality you have 3 god mode tanks who are versatile, can fill any role and fun to play, and 1 tank left by the wayside in all but 1 area.</p></blockquote><p>Ahem.  There are 6 tank classes, not four.  </p>

[Yimway]

<p><cite>Dismall@Nagafen wrote:</cite></p><blockquote><p>he main difference I see between guardians and other fighters at the moment is an ability to heal.</p><p>Zerkers get an ability that heals them when hit now for only 15 triggers but it still heals for quite a bit plus they have 2 death saves and can aoe dps really well.</p><p>Crusaders can get pretty high on a heal parse damage parse and can take dmg like a guardian so why take a warrior?</p><p>Crusaders can spec for divine aura and take no damage and aura of the crusader which is another ability that allows them to take no damage.</p><p>SKs have the advantage of not even having to cast a heal, while they damage a mob they heal automatically plus they have bloodletter which gives them 2 death saves apllies have 1 but it is on a 1 min reuse i believe and can be cast in combat.</p></blockquote><p>While true, the answer isn't making guardians the same, the answer across the archtype is to bring tank self healing down to a reasonable level.  In its current form it breaks heroic, solo, and pvp tanking completely, and it impacts raid tanking.</p><p>The idea of just making all tanks that way is just conceeding failure in building a reasonable tank archtype.</p>

[EverDog]

<p><cite>snowline wrote:</cite></p><blockquote><p>The main issue as a healer I see for tanks is I prefer to heal a SK by far because bloodletter lets a spike in dps, lag, bad evades, control effects like charms, ports whatever be survived 1 or 2 times. Next best to heal is a paladin because of that stun them but let them survive ability. Both are massively superior it seems because they are up until they go off, the other tank abilities appear to be based on them having some kind of precognition to be able to activate an ability before the [Removed for Content] hits the fan, which almost never works. Most raiding situations where a tank dies it happens much faster than they can activate a short term death prevent.</p><p>In short: <strong>SK's have 3 life bars, guardians have 1 - who would you rather heal?</strong></p></blockquote><p>This is exactly what i wanted to say above. ( i know my English sucks)</p><p>Without Bloodletter,  myabe SKs die 1.1 times more than Guardians do as Raid MT.</p><p>With Bloodletter, SKs survive better than Guardians in most situations.</p><p>This is the biggest issue of Guardians for now.</p><p>In other words, while SKs ALWAYS do much more DPS and TPS than Guardians do,</p><p>It is just SITUATIONAL if Guradians survive better or SKs survive better.</p><p>It matters so much when Guardians are supposed to be best Raid MT class.</p>

[Salarionn]

They make us survive better then other tanks its not going to change the landscape of raiding. The other tanks are ABLE to survive the content, any guild/raid leaders will be more then happy to die a little more having a tank that can double a Guardians parse. You would have to be a complete [Removed for Content] as a guild/raid leader when there are DPS check mobs, AE encounter to use a 20-25k Guard over a 40-50K SK. That my friends is the bottom line. I dont know how many of you guy who are OK with our DPS actually raid high end or even raid at all, but that was what the class was made to do, RAID TANK. They made every other tank able to do that job and added the NEED for heavy DPS in their raid content. The guilds out there are about one thing..... D P S..... that is it..... DAMAGE PER SECOND.... from EVERY CLASS including the tanks. This isnt T5 where you just need some fat guy to stand up and take a beating for a few minutes and let the others do their thing. The CONTENT DEMANDS DPS! We have crapola for DPS and until that changes we wont have a place in raids period. No added threat, survivability or utility is going to change the facts of the raiding world, in EQ2 its all about the DPS. EDIT: I am starting to wonder how many of you guys posting here actually raid current HM content.

[Jeal]

<p><cite>Soul_Dreamer wrote:</cite></p><blockquote><p>Oh and lastly.. Knights Stance is far far more OP than the buckler line ever was, no AA to improve 2 handers and make them viable... no Crusaders where given the ability to max their DPS (Hate) while having a shield equipped. In the same expansion you took away buckler line and gave this to Crusaders, honestly, I don't think the old dev had a clue what balance was, please put Guardians back into balance with the other tanks!</p></blockquote><p>Just wanted to point out that crusaders get 1.3 base mod to crit bonus while warriors/brawlers get 1.5.  Thats 30 bonus versus 50 for the other 4 classes. The Knights Stance aa (when maxed) adds 25 bonus to ONLY our mainhand and ONLY while shield equipped.  So we get 55 bonus on mh and 30 bonus on spells and cas vs 50 bonus on everything to start with, if I didn't make it clear enough already :/.  This ability was to bring us UP to par and is not the problem.</p>

[spankmaker]

<p>Well, first off I think you should realize people that choose a guardian most likely do so because they don't want to play a bard  or any other class for that matter if you want to sell this game  to people why not give them what they expect  I mean would you be happy from a  consumer point of view  to purchace this game  make the closest thing to a warrior class there is and then  find out that its  actually the worst warrior  in the whole game? </p><p>  The  guardian class should be the  the best  at holding a mob taking damage and protecting his group or raid party  thats what you state in your class descriptions but this isn't true why do you choose to say that as the game is now that should be the monks description  I think that if you want to draw more players in to the game you could start  by being honest.</p><p>If I wanted to  play a bard or a shaman I could make one  or  are they the new guardian ?</p>

[Jeal]

<p>the guard is still the most defensive tank in the game... the people screaming SK bloodletter makes them better are insane.. or talking about heroic content that a swashbuckler could tank.  I could list off a ton of examples why but.. i doubt any of you would pay much attention in this thread :/</p>

[Rhita]

<p>How many guilds even run with guards? Thats right, barely any. you are what? a pally MT? So dont come in here and ruin our fix. You know this class is under the rest and we are finally getting some much needed love.</p>

[Soul_Dreamer]

<p><cite>Jeal@Unrest wrote:</cite></p><blockquote><p>the guard is still the most defensive tank in the game... the people screaming SK bloodletter makes them better are insane.. or talking about heroic content that a swashbuckler could tank.  I could list off a ton of examples why but.. i doubt any of you would pay much attention in this thread :/</p></blockquote><p>The defense of a Guardian isn't needed in current content, you're even agreeing but somehow using it as an argument against us. You're saying Guardians are the most defensive tank but swashies are able to tank all heroic content.</p><p>Guardians may still be the most defensive tank in raid content also, but it's not by enough and we give up to much compared to the other tanks for it. I'll repeat, all current content can be tanked by any tank, it's what other tanks bring to the table as well as their almost Guardian like survivability. I<span style="font-size: 11.6667px;">t's not only bloodletter that makes SK's a bettter choice as MT, it's the whole package, why bring a tank with slightly higher survivability but that offers nothing else, when you can bring a tank that has all the survivability you need and offers masses of DPS and can't loose agro?</span></p><p>Ohh and Knights stance was introduced before the crit bonus changes of this expansion, how exactly was it introduced to bring Crusaders up to par? It's not the fact this ability improves your DPS, it's the fact that it improves it while you have a shield equipped to the extent that no other build is needed for DPSing. This is exactly the same problem so many argued against the Stamina line for warriors and the Guardian mythical, both have since been nerfed. If it increased the DPS mod of 2 handers then there wouldn't be a problem since you'd be giving up all your uncontested avoid while DPSing with a 2 hander.</p>

[Jeal]

<p><cite>Rhita@Najena wrote:</cite></p><blockquote><p>How many guilds even run with guards? Thats right, barely any. you are what? a pally MT? So dont come in here and ruin our fix. You know this class is under the rest and we are finally getting some much needed love.</p></blockquote><p>not trying to ruin your fix.. i agree that you guys should probably have some help in SOME areas.. but when i hear every other guard say SKs are somehow better at taking damage than them.. it makes me sad.. because they're just plain wrong :/</p>

[Jeal]

<p><cite>Soul_Dreamer wrote:</cite></p><blockquote><p>Ohh and Knights stance was introduced before the crit bonus changes of this expansion, how exactly was it introduced to bring Crusaders up to par? It's not the fact this ability improves your DPS, it's the fact that it improves it while you have a shield equipped to the extent that no other build is needed for DPSing. This is exactly the same problem so many argued against the Stamina line for warriors and the Guardian mythical, both have since been nerfed. If it increased the DPS mod of 2 handers then there wouldn't be a problem since you'd be giving up all your uncontested avoid while DPSing with a 2 hander.</p></blockquote><p>you must of forgot about the part where i said... YOU HAVE 20 MORE CRIT BONUS THAN WE DO 100% OF THE TIME</p><p>oh yeah .. you guys can dual wield.. while our absolute best option is sword and board till they teach someone at SOE how to make a 2h that isn't completely worthless</p><p>2 swords.. 20 more crit bonus and us getting 25 to ONLY our mh is somehow.. a problem here?... i take real exception to that</p>

[Rhita]

<p>While we may get that extra bonus and the ability to duel wield. My highest parse on my guard is currently 38k, my guilds SK has hit i believe 78k? even while sword and board, they more than double my duel wield and extra crit bonus. That is a serious problem considering the lvl of survivability difference of being DW to sword and board. Yes its true that I can survive better when fully defensive and at max, but my parse goes to crap down to 15k ish. While an sk fully defensive can still hit upwards 30k+. I dont care to be on equal parse with a cursader, your a hybrid and meant for dps. But I want a serious edge in some way thats useful with some dps to boot. I dont mind being 10k behind crusaders. But at least I am wanted.</p>

[steelbadger]

<p><cite>Jeal@Unrest wrote:</cite></p><blockquote><p>you must of forgot about the part where i said... YOU HAVE 20 MORE CRIT BONUS THAN WE DO 100% OF THE TIME</p><p>oh yeah .. you guys can dual wield.. while our absolute best option is sword and board till they teach someone at SOE how to make a 2h that isn't completely worthless</p><p>2 swords.. 20 more crit bonus and us getting 25 to ONLY our mh is somehow.. a problem here?... i take real exception to that</p></blockquote><p>The point is moot.  You can do more dps than a DW Guard while you single wield and so evidently the crit bonus disadvantage and inability to DW is far from crippling your class.</p><p>And the problem is that you can do your best DPS while using a shield.  That's the primary problem we Guards have with Crusaders; not that you can do more DPS than us, but that you can do more dps than us at the same time as being more survivable.</p><p>Now are you going to do the decent thing and stop trying to derail this thread with your trolling or are you so petty as to actually actively work to stop a clearly underperforming class from getting the attention it deserves?</p><p>This thread was never about nerfing Crusaders.  People have been using your class as a yard-stick for what Guards are incapable of, and thus what makes them undesirable.  But you just can't leave it to rest, you can't possibly let anyone suggest that Paladins are (shock horror) <em>better</em> than Guards.  Because <em>that</em> might lead to (shock horror) Paladins getting a nerf.</p><p>You're not getting a nerf, and we're currently not asking for a nerf.  We're asking to be brought up to the level of Crusaders and to describe that we necessarily have to describe the areas in which we are inferior to Crusaders.  Now, please leave us to our thread, unless you have something constructive to add concerning what might aid Guards.</p>

[Soul_Dreamer]

<p><cite>Jeal@Unrest wrote:</cite></p><blockquote><p><cite>Soul_Dreamer wrote:</cite></p><blockquote><p>Ohh and Knights stance was introduced before the crit bonus changes of this expansion, how exactly was it introduced to bring Crusaders up to par? It's not the fact this ability improves your DPS, it's the fact that it improves it while you have a shield equipped to the extent that no other build is needed for DPSing. This is exactly the same problem so many argued against the Stamina line for warriors and the Guardian mythical, both have since been nerfed. If it increased the DPS mod of 2 handers then there wouldn't be a problem since you'd be giving up all your uncontested avoid while DPSing with a 2 hander.</p></blockquote><p>you must of forgot about the part where i said... YOU HAVE 20 MORE CRIT BONUS THAN WE DO 100% OF THE TIME</p><p>oh yeah .. you guys can dual wield.. while our absolute best option is sword and board till they teach someone at SOE how to make a 2h that isn't completely worthless</p><p>2 swords.. 20 more crit bonus and us getting 25 to ONLY our mh is somehow.. a problem here?... i take real exception to that</p></blockquote><p>The problem is as stated, you're gaining max DPS while having a shield which is exactly what most crusaders argued against with the buckler line. It was also the other way around, Warriors where given more Melee bonuses to keep US in line with Crusaders, not crusaders given this ability to keep you in line with warriors.</p><p>It's also NOT crit bonus you're receiving from Knights Stance, the ability essentially increases the damage rating of a weapon by 25%. </p><p><span style="font-size: 11.6667px;">Below image is Harisplitter with and without Knights stance, same gear and buffs. LEft = with, right = without, and wouldn't you know.. 25% increase to th base values with knights stance than without it. What knights stance is doing is giving you almost the damage of a 2 hander when you have a shield and 1 hander. </span></p><p>This is actually more than 25% Crit bonus to the weapons damage. Assume 45% Crit bonus from gear etc.</p><p>Knights stance as +25% Crit bonus = 2410 (max damage) * 1.7 (Crit multiplier) = 4097Knights Stance as a 25% increase to damage rating = 3036 (New Max damage) * 1.45 (crit multiplier) = 4402.</p><p>This goes up the higher crit bonus you have.</p><p><img src="http://i9.photobucket.com/albums/a77/veevers/SKWeapon.png" /></p><p>Can we get back on track and Guardian abilities/feedback rather than having the thread hijacked by Crusaders defending an ability that causes some of the imbalance between warriors and Crusaders?</p><p>Below are abilities that I think could be improved/changed to improve and balance the Guardian class, not all are expected it/s just every ability that has issues/range for improvement.</p><p>AA Lines</p><p>KOS - </p><p>Strength end line is and always has been worthless, a tank simply can't maintain under 50% HP to have this buff up. Reduce the amounts on the buffs and make it always on, or stop it dispelling when we go over 50% so that if we spike we gain the buff and it sticks helping us to not spike again.</p><p>Agility - </p><p>Dragoons needs changing so we can do something with it up, no similar 8sec+ Damage avoid prevents you from gaining hate while having it up, infact some abilities actually increase DPS/Hate while being used.</p><p>Stamina - </p><p>The health component on the stamina line end ability could do with adding as a ward that keeps on being added to as we use CA's until it is used up then starts again adding up.</p><p>Wisdom - </p><p>At level 90 I gain 50 Mit per point in unshakeable, this used to be useful before the mit curve was introduced, please amend to damage reduction.</p><p>Int line - </p><p>The staple for all warriors, all I know have this line.</p><p>Guardian lines.</p><p>Stability - </p><p>Enhance intercept - Reuse reduction is fine, also reduce the damage the Guardian takes though.</p><p>Enhance Sentinal - Increase the potency of player it's placed on, 1% Per rank instead of ading resists.</p><p>Enhance Moderate - 2% Agro siphon instead of added hate reduction, with this on a player and with group moderate the player the ability is on is waaay beyond cap in hate reduction.</p><p>Enhance Sentry watch - Allso needs the duration increasing, 6 seconds per AA will take it up to 1 min duration. The ability itself needs the damage reduced that the Guardian takes.</p><p>Got your back - Group AOE avoid, same duration, we're meant to protect, allow us to actually protect our group.</p><p>Slaughtering - </p><p>Slaughtering - Change from double attack to Crit bonus/Potency.</p><p>Crippleing - </p><p>Enhance Ruin - Ability is a DoT, reduce the duration of the DoT component and add the following to the CA. 200 hate per point to the initial hit and 50 hate per point spent to the DoT portion. Total of 2000 hate added to the CA.</p><p>Enhance Sever - Ability is a DoT, reduce the duration of the DoT component and add the following to the CA. 160 hate per point to the initial hit and 40 hate per point spent to the DoT portion. Total of 2000 hate added to the CA.</p><p>Enhance Concussion - DD 400 hate per point for a total of 2000.</p><p>Enhance Retaliate - DD 1 min reuse, 1000 hate per point to a total of 5000 hate.</p><p>Enhance Decimate - DD 1 min recast, 1000 hate per point to a total of 5000 hate.</p><p>This gives a Total of -</p><p>28000 hate per min or 466 hate per second (Without crits) </p><p>Estimate of 1.7 Multiplier (crits + bonus) will give 792 hate per second. </p><p>Estimate of 2.0 multiplier (crits + bonus) will give 932 hate per second.</p><p>Cripple - Group damage reduction of 10%/Reduction in mobs Auto attack multiplier</p><p>for 10 seconds after every cripple ability that lands.</p><p>Shadows - </p><p>Guardian line.</p><p>Hateful Assault - Also reduces the cast time.</p><p>Abilities - </p><p>Assault - Remove max targets/increase Max targets, it's our only AOE if none chosen through AA, even then it's only 1 of 2.</p><p>Call of Shielding - Need something else adding as well, the defense isn't even useful to the tank tanking if the mob is epic, or cons orange. 1000HP and a buff for a 10% chance to deathsave (on successful deathsave immunity to the death save for 1 min).</p><p>Call to arms - Also add something extra to the group, this is our only offensive group buff so needs to add somethin usefull as well as the skills it currently does without AA in the ability. On a successful CA/Spell target gains a 300 point ward for 10 seconds and also gains a small damage proc on every CA/Spell cast for 10 seconds, nothing major, maybe 100 slashing damage?</p><p>Guardian Sphere - Do what  you've proposed <img src="/eq2/images/smilies/3b63d1616c5dfcf29f8a7a031aaa7cad.gif" border="0" /></p><p>Hunker down - Remove the slow.</p><p>Iron will - Currently a stamina buff.. I have 1500 stamina self buffed, in a raid I've seen it over 2000, 90 stamina does nothing usefull at all even to low geared Guardians thiw ill only be a handful of HP. If you want to keep it defensive add a regenning ward or soemthing usefull. I'd prefer another offensive buff though since we only have 1 discounting offensive stance. Maybe: On a successful Melee attack can cast Iron Will - Increases Flurry of the Guardian by 5% and adds 500 hate to every CA for 10 seconds.  2 times a min proc rate.</p><p>Plant - Root + KB removal, remove the debuff to ourselves and add in a recurring hate effect for 500 hate per second. Gives us another ability to help hold AOE mobs.</p><p>Recapture - Includ the Guardian so this ability is useful in all but solo play. Also add in a group hate position reduction. </p><p>Sentry watch - Reduce the damage the Guardian take, this will kill if used to save a group member on a melee AOE which is one place it should be usefull.</p><p>Tower of stone - Add hate per block, Block abilities have been given out to all fighters, make ours something that sets it apart.</p><p>Unyielding will - 5 Min base recast. Always on and triggered when needed.</p><p>Wrath of Vel'Arek - 10% damage reduction like it had before please.  Also add an AOE splurt type effect for every taunt so if we chain taunts they get more powerful each taunt and effect every target currently engaged. The Guardian ability is out of date compared to other tanks and is situatioanl at best, useless at worst. It's also the only mythical  buff that can be gotten by every class through items (others have this effect on them) Give us osmehting unique and usefull. This isn't just for raiding anymore but needs to help Heroic Guardians.</p><p>ALL COMBAT ARTS - Bring the damage up/Lower recasts so we do relatively equal DPS to other fighters! </p><p>There is no survivability gap, there should be little to no DPS/Utility gaps, until this is addressed Guardians will remain at the back of the short buss.</p>

[Jeal]

<p>was not trolling and not trying to derail any thread.. thats what you guys are doing.. i even quoted the most important point... like TEN TIMES that knights stance is not overpowered by any stretch of the imagination.. i'm defending MY class and listing why it should be defended over that aa not attacking yours.  perhaps i didn' tmake it clear when i quoted exactly the statement i had a problem with before my initial argument... good job stringing it along into something that has nothing to do with what i was talking about.</p><p>i also stated in that same post that i feel that guards are the best defensive tank and mentioned nothing else about them other than the facts related directly to the knights stance aa... please stop playing the word game and pay attention to what was actually said.</p><p>no we are not gaining max dps with a sword and board.. we are simply not being introduced to proper 2handers.  which then could be considered max dps.  please stick to your class :/</p>

[Soul_Dreamer]

<p><cite>Jeal@Unrest wrote:</cite></p><blockquote><p>was not trolling and not trying to derail any thread.. thats what you guys are doing.. i even quoted the most important point... like TEN TIMES that knights stance is not overpowered by any stretch of the imagination.. i'm defending MY class and listing why it should be defended over that aa not attacking yours.  perhaps i didn' tmake it clear when i quoted exactly the statement i had a problem with before my initial argument... good job stringing it along into something that has nothing to do with what i was talking about.</p><p>i also stated in that same post that i feel that guards are the best defensive tank and mentioned nothing else about them other than the facts related directly to the knights stance aa... please stop playing the word game and pay attention to what was actually said.</p><p>no we are not gaining max dps with a sword and board.. we are simply not being introduced to proper 2handers.  which then could be considered max dps.  please stick to your class :/</p></blockquote><p>You don't even understand the ability you're defending, how you think it works isn't how it works, the ability turns your 1 hander into the DR of almost a 2 hander whilst having a shield equipped. </p><p>I wouldn't be bothered if if increased the DR of 2 handers so 2 handers where actually a viable option for Crusaders to DPS with, but it doesn't. It allows you to do the maximum (or close to it) dps your class can do while keeping the 30% uncontested avoidance your shield provides. </p><p>This is the last reply I'm going to give you since you obviously don't understand the ability you're defending and how it effects tank balance.</p>

[Jeal]

<p>no i just said bonus.. but thats ok..</p><p>regardless 20 crit bonus on your mainhand and all your cas > 25 weapon bonus.. which works more akin to str modifying the damage as you've painstakingly pointed out...</p><p>once again.. knights stance is not the issue here.. as i've tried to point out  it irritates me when a class blames another class's ability for why they think they suck is all... and you simply ignored that as if i were directly attacking you... its really.. :/</p>

[Macross_JR]

<p><cite>Jeal@Unrest wrote:</cite></p><blockquote><p>was not trolling and not trying to derail any thread.. thats what you guys are doing.. i even quoted the most important point... like TEN TIMES that knights stance is not overpowered by any stretch of the imagination.. i'm defending MY class and listing why it should be defended over that aa not attacking yours.  perhaps i didn' tmake it clear when i quoted exactly the statement i had a problem with before my initial argument... good job stringing it along into something that has nothing to do with what i was talking about.</p><p>i also stated in that same post that i feel that guards are the best defensive tank and mentioned nothing else about them other than the facts related directly to the knights stance aa... please stop playing the word game and pay attention to what was actually said.</p><p>no we are not gaining max dps with a sword and board.. we are simply not being introduced to proper 2handers.  which then could be considered max dps.  please stick to your class :/</p></blockquote><p>Jeal, you ask us to stick to our class, how about you stick to your class boards and let us guardians talk about ways we want to be improved.  The thing is, guardians need help in dps and agro.  Those are the key differences between guardians and other plate tanks at the moment.  And you stating that guardians are the most defensive tanks is really moot.  Our survivability is clearly not even needed due to the fact that the other plate tanks are able to live just fine killing the HM mobs in this expansion.  Again, our being the most defensive doesn't mean squat because it's not needed, so why make us even more defensive if our current defense is not needed?</p><p>I personally think that our Crippling line should get changed to add threat to every one of the ca's in that tree and for the end ability to add threat to all ca's.  I'll let SoE decide on numbers for how much, but that right there will help with our agro issue.  But we still need to either do around the same dps as the other plate tanks or they need to make it so the other tanks aren't able to tank everything in the game.  So, I'll let you decide how you feel about that.</p>

[Soul_Dreamer]

<p><cite>Jeal@Unrest wrote:</cite></p><blockquote><p>no i just said bonus.. but thats ok..</p><p>regardless 20 crit bonus on your mainhand and all your cas > 25 weapon bonus.. which works more akin to str modifying the damage as you've painstakingly pointed out...</p><p>once again.. knights stance is not the issue here.. as i've tried to point out  it irritates me when a class blames another class's ability for why they think they suck is all... and you simply ignored that as if i were directly attacking you... its really.. :/</p></blockquote><p>So you think it's fine that every 1 hander in game does at least 25% more damage when a Crusader uses it than when any other class uses it?</p><p>You've even agreed that your max DPS is WITH your shield equipped! "<span style="font-family: verdana, arial, helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 11.6667px; color: #d2c5a9;">oh yeah .. you guys can dual wield.. while our absolute best option is sword and board till they teach someone at SOE how to make a 2h that isn't completely worthless</span><span style="font-size: 11.6667px;">"</span></p><p>If this AA was changed to effect 2 handers they would be more than a viable option for DPSing, but you obviously don't want that because you know just how good this ability is.</p><p><span style="font-size: 11.6667px;">But OK, I'll play along, lets keep Knighst Stance as it is. </span></p><p>Can Warriors please have 30% Uncontested avoid added to their offhand weapon when duel weilding along with a reduction in the offhand weapons effectiveness of 30%, it's about the same as Knights Stance and that's fine apparently. Then Give Brawlers something similar also, why not everyone else has it now.....</p><p>Brawlers are the only class that should keep their uncontested avoid when in DPS mode, IF any class.</p>

[circusgirl]

<p><cite>Soul_Dreamer wrote:</cite></p><blockquote><p><cite>Jeal@Unrest wrote:</cite></p><blockquote><p>no i just said bonus.. but thats ok..</p><p>regardless 20 crit bonus on your mainhand and all your cas > 25 weapon bonus.. which works more akin to str modifying the damage as you've painstakingly pointed out...</p><p>once again.. knights stance is not the issue here.. as i've tried to point out  it irritates me when a class blames another class's ability for why they think they suck is all... and you simply ignored that as if i were directly attacking you... its really.. :/</p></blockquote><p>So you think it's fine that every 1 hander in game does at least 25% more damage when a Crusader uses it than when any other class uses it?</p><p>You've even agreed that your max DPS is WITH your shield equipped! "<span style="font-family: verdana, arial, helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 11.6667px; color: #d2c5a9;">oh yeah .. you guys can dual wield.. while our absolute best option is sword and board till they teach someone at SOE how to make a 2h that isn't completely worthless</span><span style="font-size: 11.6667px;">"</span></p><p>If this AA was changed to effect 2 handers they would be more than a viable option for DPSing, but you obviously don't want that because you know just how good this ability is.</p><p><span style="font-size: 11.6667px;">But OK, I'll play along, lets keep Knighst Stance as it is. </span></p><p>Can Warriors please have 30% Uncontested avoid added to their offhand weapon when duel weilding along with a reduction in the offhand weapons effectiveness of 30%, it's about the same as Knights Stance and that's fine apparently. Then Give Brawlers something similar also, why not everyone else has it now.....</p><p>Brawlers are the only class that should keep their uncontested avoid when in DPS mode, IF any class.</p></blockquote><p>And, ironically, we're the only class that doesn't.  Brawlers lose 81.5% of our uncontested avoidance by going offensive, since our avoidance is tied to our defensive stance.  A crusader loses none of their avoidance by going offensive, and neither does a warrior (though they do lose it if they dual weild).  </p><p>Personally, I'm of the opinion that the block on plate tanks' shields should only be uncontested if they're in defensive stance, which is how it works for brawlers.</p>

[Soul_Dreamer]

<p>I'd prefer to have Brawlers with uncontested avoid at all times than loose shield block when in offensive stance on tanks. That way tanks will loose their block chance when they go into 2 Hander/Duel weild but keep it if they need just the little bit more hate when using a shield in offensive stance.Typing too much to stances is a bad idea and limiting, as Brawlers currently know.</p><p>Back on topic though.. </p><p>Would be nice to get more ideas on Guardians though, or can someone collate all the good ideas from every other Guardian thread and post them on this one so Xelgad can see them all in 1 place?</p><p>Xelgad:</p><p>While it's wonderful news we're getting some attention I think it needs to be the right attention, you've posted initial change ideas and we can reply to them and give opinions but to give proper views we need to know the whole picture of where you want Guardians to be once the changes are complete.</p><p>It would be wonderful if a productive discussion could happen between yourself and some of the better Guardians that are left to thrash out areas where we need improvement and areas you're not able to touch for balance reasons. While this forum is a place this can happen, every time we post a comparison between ourselves and other tanks, other tanks are going to post defending/trolling posts in the thread pulling it away from the topic at hand.</p><p>If there is any chance you can organise a Skype/Vent chat with a couple of Guardians for 30 mins or so I believe it would be very productive. US players will probably be best due to time zones, I know this almost definately won't happen but I think this 30 mins would be more productive than this thread going on for a week or so.</p>

[BChizzle]

<p><cite>Xelgad wrote:</cite></p><blockquote><p>I'm not going into details yet, but we do have a mechanics change in the works that will at least help a bit to distinguish Guardians as a more defensive tank.</p></blockquote><p>Hi Xelgad, any truth to the rumours that the mechanics change will be to remove strikethrough on mob auto attacks?  If so I think that would be an excellent idea, quite simply strikethrough except for very specific scenario's shouldn't exist in this game.</p>

[etch666]

<p>Wouldn't getting rid of strikethrough, also get rid of brawlers avoidance tanking advantage over plate tanks?</p>

[Soul_Dreamer]

<p>More than likely a change to the mitigation curve, or Warrior Temp mit buffs are going to be damage reduction buffs. </p>

[Pervis]

<p><cite>Soul_Dreamer wrote:</cite></p><blockquote><p><cite>Ballads wrote:</cite></p><blockquote><p>With the change to Got your Back, I foresee raids with 2 guardians, a few healers, and the rest SK's. The benefits of being perma AE Immune would far out weigh what other classes could provide when you consider how OP Sk dps is.</p></blockquote><p>What change? Fighter AOE immunity raid wide? Honestly, get a clue or get better at reading.. The proposed chage would be 2 Guardians able to keep all TANKS in the raid AOE immune for 30 seconds of every minute. How often do your tanks die to AOEs?...... Now think again, AOE avoid for those 2/3 fighters is OP?</p></blockquote><p>Imagine this scenario.</p><p>2 guardians, 16 SKs, 6 paladins.</p><p>Entire raid is AE immune 100% of the time, the paladins are able to provide enough heals to which ever SK is voted MT, on top of the SKs own abilities, the SKs are able to dish out as much DPS as the average raid. The only thing missing is a few thousand mitigation and HP from healer buffs, and power regen.</p><p>This would be possible not because the guardian ability would be ovepowered, but because other tank classes are stupidly overpowered. I don't often call for outright nerfs to any class, but no thread with a develop discussing guardian viability should exist without discussions as to what they are going to do to nerf crusaders. A nerf to crusaders will do more to get guardians back MTing raids than anything discussed in this thread so far.</p><p>That is, of course, unless they plan on increasing all guardian CA hate and damage by 500%, and giving them in combat self heals.</p>

[BChizzle]

<p><cite>etch666 wrote:</cite></p><blockquote><p>Wouldn't getting rid of strikethrough, also get rid of brawlers avoidance tanking advantage over plate tanks?</p></blockquote><p>It would make the advantage smaller, but the advantage is hardly important.</p>

[Vlahkmaak]

<p><cite>Jeal@Unrest wrote:</cite></p><blockquote><p>no i just said bonus.. but thats ok..</p><p>regardless 20 crit bonus on your mainhand and all your cas > 25 weapon bonus.. which works more akin to str modifying the damage as you've painstakingly pointed out...</p><p>once again.. knights stance is not the issue here.. as i've tried to point out  it irritates me when a class blames another class's ability for why they think they suck is all... and you simply ignored that as if i were directly attacking you... its really.. :/</p></blockquote><p>I have both a 90 pally and a 90 guard.  The auto attack damage of my pally compared to my guardian far surpasses the damge done by the guardian while maintaining the Shield.  In addition on my crusader I get better innate shield block options through AA.  I am not interested in having my pally nerfed but the extra DR hits ALOT harder thus generating more aggro through DPS which my guardian lacks.  Increased DR to a guardian will go along way towards our SINGLE TARGET dps/ hate generation.</p><p>On my pally Holy ground is up constantly less than 1 min timer with AA-s it works better than reinforcemnet as it is a 1 hate increaser and added damage and threat whereas reinforcement is up 1min 30 secs.  Caveliers Cry is also freaking awesome for AOE aggro. </p><p>The game has turned into a DPS race and all tanks that are equaly geared, on the same general level of progression, and with the same MT buffs are all equally defensible now but not equally capable of pullting out DPS.  I'm not one of these guards thinking if only I ahd bloodletter... thats just a silly thought.  I want = DPS since you all now have = survivability.  The main reason I ran the pally up was to see if other plate tanks do I = survivability. </p><p>My baby SK can do things my guard at the same level NEVER could.  Reaver is like having a boxed warden in tow for solo room clearing.  My pally in far less gear than my guard is truelly amazing in pve content.  My guard can tank the instances and even room pull like a crusader but I loose survivability with the dual wield option which is needed to maintain consistent aggro on many different encounters at once.</p><p>Neither myself not 99% of the guards in this forum are seeking to nerf crusaders - we want the equal DPS of the = survivability you gained.  Once that is accomplished and everyone is roughly balanced any of the 4 plate tanks equally geared/skilled should push equal numbers.</p><p><strong>The Utility of the Proposed Got your Back will work to further hurt guardians.</strong>  We will be given a skill that will make other fighters (not ourselves) immune to AOE damage.  Therefore this skill would relegate the guardian to the 4th grp as our function is now to give that SK, Pally, or Zerk another AOE immunity while we TOS ourselves and intercede them for further free stone skins.  Luckily I have a niche and continue to raid but a lot of guardians wanting to raid cannot or bring nothing but lowered dps to the table in both PVE and PVP.</p>

[Rahatmattata]

<p><cite>Salarionn wrote:</cite></p><blockquote> They make us survive better then other tanks its not going to change the landscape of raiding. The other tanks are ABLE to survive the content, any guild/raid leaders will be more then happy to die a little more having a tank that can double a Guardians parse. You would have to be a complete [Removed for Content] as a guild/raid leader when there are DPS check mobs, AE encounter to use a 20-25k Guard over a 40-50K SK. That my friends is the bottom line. I dont know how many of you guy who are OK with our DPS actually raid high end or even raid at all, but that was what the class was made to do, RAID TANK. They made every other tank able to do that job and added the NEED for heavy DPS in their raid content. The guilds out there are about one thing..... D P S..... that is it..... DAMAGE PER SECOND.... from EVERY CLASS including the tanks. This isnt T5 where you just need some fat guy to stand up and take a beating for a few minutes and let the others do their thing. The CONTENT DEMANDS DPS! We have crapola for DPS and until that changes we wont have a place in raids period. No added threat, survivability or utility is going to change the facts of the raiding world, in EQ2 its all about the DPS. EDIT: I am starting to wonder how many of you guys posting here actually raid current HM content.</blockquote><p>Your assumption that guards were designed to be the main tank for raid content is wrong. Guards were designed to be the most defensive tank in the game. In fact, Xelgad even said he's looking for ways to imporve guards in heroic content... which is level 1 - 90. Nowhere did he say, "hey guys I need some ideas to make guards better in level 90 epic content."</p><p>Also, I was wondering how long the thread would last before crusaders and brawlers chimed in with their 2c and derailed this into another fighter balance thread. Because, we don't have enough fighter balance argument threads yet.</p>

[Yimway]

<p><cite>Jeal@Unrest wrote:</cite></p><blockquote><p>you must of forgot about the part where i said... YOU HAVE 20 MORE CRIT BONUS THAN WE DO 100% OF THE TIME</p><p>oh yeah .. you guys can dual wield.. while our absolute best option is sword and board till they teach someone at SOE how to make a 2h that isn't completely worthless</p><p>2 swords.. 20 more crit bonus and us getting 25 to ONLY our mh is somehow.. a problem here?... i take real exception to that</p></blockquote><p>The only problem is the net parse differential between guards and crusaders.</p><p>1.3, 1.5, don't matter at all, it is only the final results and potential.</p><p>In the end, Knights stance would be better designed if it only applied to 2h weapons.</p><p>While you claim your intent is not to derail the thread, thats exactly what it is doing. It's an entirely supurfilous discussion that doesn't belong in this thread.  Take it to general fighter discussion.</p>

[Brildean]

<p>so will be got your back be for all players or fighter only.. if its fighter only its still useless. it should be protects all nearby allies as long as they arn't fighters. Cause quite frankley if your a fighter ae's should be the last of your worries. as your have the hps to take them head on.</p>

[Salarionn]

<cite>Jeal@Unrest wrote:</cite><blockquote><p>was not trolling and not trying to derail any thread.. thats what you guys are doing.. i even quoted the most important point... like TEN TIMES that knights stance is not overpowered by any stretch of the imagination.. i'm defending MY class and listing why it should be defended over that aa not attacking yours.  perhaps i didn' tmake it clear when i quoted exactly the statement i had a problem with before my initial argument... good job stringing it along into something that has nothing to do with what i was talking about.</p><p>i also stated in that same post that i feel that guards are the best defensive tank and mentioned nothing else about them other than the facts related directly to the knights stance aa... please stop playing the word game and pay attention to what was actually said.</p><p>no we are not gaining max dps with a sword and board.. we are simply not being introduced to proper 2handers.  which then could be considered max dps.  please stick to your class :/</p></blockquote> You are a clever man, but we all know you are here only to make sure you class doesnt get a nerf with your comments here. We dont want you nerfed at all. Your class (PALLY) can out DPS ours with a sword and shield even when we are duel wielding. Do you argue that fact sir? I dont mean you out DPS us by a smidge as the "defensive crusader", you out DPS us by a fair margin while we give up everything and become scouts who wear plate armor, and still fall well short of your "defensive crusaders" DPS with a sword and shield. Can you disagree or argue these facts sir? EDIT: Additionally, are you saying that with a proper 2hd weapon in your hands you will be at max DPS? I find it odd that you would come here and make comments when you are already beating us by a nice chunk with your sword and board. We know there are some really nice 2hd weapons in the game that havnt actually been discovered yet because the mob hasnt died. How much more DPS with a proper 2hd will you be doing? Would you be upset with SOE (since we cant even compete with you as is) to make our DW DPS as high as yours with a 2hd? Would you be upset if we competed with your DPS sword and board? I mean we are BOTH the " defensive models". One should not be able to out shine the other to the degree they are currently. Do you argue that your class can tank everything in the game very easily? Can you say you have trouble tanking ANY encounter in the game sir? I will thank you if you dont come in here trying to pretend to want to help when you are only here to make sure your class isnt touched. We are not fools as much as you would like to us to be. When there is a rat in the house we can see its droppings. I will call you out for the cheese chaser that you are currently being. SEE ABOVE

[Feldorm]

<p>Great to hear about the changes and also to see the defensive orientation.</p><p>I love the guardian sphere change is it will actually help make us more desirable as tanks (in all content) and it is currently almost useless.</p><p>I don't really feel the other changes will increase our desirability in relation to other tanks which is what is the key point for me (although perhaps they will help in part of a larger package like you suggest).</p><p>I might be echoing what others say but here are some points I have about the class:</p><p>Iron will is effectively useless at lvl 90. Why not change this to a plain hp buff (say 1k at 90 master), as it would surely be reasonable for a guardian to have an hp advantage over the less defensive tanks (not talking about group buffs).</p><p>Unyielding will is kinda rubbish and very buggy (not firing, can root you to the spot in bg, etc). I think a reasonable change would be for it not to kill you and change the aa to a 2nd charge. Perhaps reduce the recast too. It is currently awful in comparison to bloodletter (which has up to 3 charges and fast recast). It doesn't need to be as good as bloodletter but a small improvement would be nice.</p><p>I think sentinel's strike should be changed to 30s duration so it fits into our cast rotation. If necessary damage can be reduced proportionately but threat should probably be increased to help our single target aggro against other tanks/dps. A large amount of guardians feel single target threat should be a priority.</p><p>I think we should have more combat arts that can be cast while stunned/stifled (some useful ones would be single target taunt, tower of stone, assault, guardian sphere, sentry watch). Or give us a buff for immunity to sun/stifle (add to defensive minded?). This might give us something else over other tanks.</p><p>Cry of the warrior could really do with being unresistable as its just down to luck at the moment.</p><p>Sentry watch never seems to work for whatever reason and is very situational at best. Perhaps you could give it infinite charges and change it to "50% chance to reduce threat priority and threat of all non-fighter allies in current group when hit by melee attack." Maybe reduce the recast too. This might help us in a group/bg perspective instead of giving us tons of ae aggro abiltiies and turning us into a zerker.</p><p>Some more changes from a group/bg perspective are needed. Tbh guardians arent meant to dps well or increase everyone's dps by tons so I disasgree with suggestions of adding in potency/crit bonus to our buffs. It seems zerkers have gone down the heal route and guardians are going down the stoneskin/prevention route. Following this trend I really feel guardians need some kind of % damage reduction against all damage (say 10% of each hit and capped at 150 damage), whether via perma buff or aa. This will help bring us inline (somewhat) to other tanks healing abilities in groups/bg whilst not making us overpowered in raids because of the small reduction. Also it will not be as useful as say heals which you can save for when you need, but will reduce our chances of entering the "oh crap" type of situation.</p>

[Davngr1]

<p>IF you don't play a guard, there is NO REASON to be posting here.</p> <p>  anywho..</p> <p>  i got to thinking and if this has been said i apologize for duplicating the statement..</p> <p>   IMO the guard myth POST nerf is a joke, you can literally kill a blue con epic mob and obtain the same benefits via gear.</p> <p>   i know people always like to say that myth's are 3 expansions old and to go back and fix them is wasteful but how can ANYONE really say that they are 3 expansions old?   when in fact myth's are brand new to the non raiding player this expansion in sense.    more and more people will getting myth buffs now that it no longer requires a raid and the fact IS that the guard effect is lacking.</p> <p>   can we add something that's actually worth while to it?</p> <p>   kb immunity?</p> <p>   hate generation?</p> <p>  make sentinel and maintaind buff and remove the damage intercept?</p> <p>  add 20 crit bonus when in def stance with shield? </p> <p>  it's clear thta myths aren't a 3 expansion old item they are in fact current and good luck raiding in the current expansion with out that myth buff, so why is the guard myth buff so bland?</p> <p> also would like to add that more survivability for the group is awesome but the fact is that EVERY tank needs to be able to live against a mob.  so IF you make guard survivability useful you will in fact screw over the rest of the tanks.</p><p>  what needs to happen is that guard needs to receive some "single target dominance" in both agro and dps because right now the offensive tanks own single and ae. </p>

[bishoph]

<p>A few changes that might help.</p><p>Wis line </p><p> - Belly Smash - take the knock down requirement off.</p><p>- Unshackable - Change to group mit buff, that is worth while.</p><p>Maybe swap these two.  Unshackleable, needs to be upped, to make the line better.  The end talent is good, but you have two items in the line that are not worth spending points in.  Stance Mastery could help up the Guards DPS, by a little bit.  Though not enough to put them in line with the other plate tanks.</p><p>Guardian Tree-</p><p>Guardian Sphere - Change the lower CD time to Lower damage taken.</p><p>Moderate - Add in a Hate trans to the AA, as many have said.</p><p>Cripple (the end line) ups the Guardians DPS or Hate gain for each Debuff that is up.  Maybe even give the group, half the DPS gain for physical damage. </p><p>TSO</p><p>Added Consitition - Change this from add life, to Advoidance for the group or Mit.</p><p>Strategic Assault - Effects Taunting Assault as well.</p><p>Sentinel Stirke - Up the reuse, and make it an AE.</p><p>I made a Guardian to tank, not to DPS.  A lot of the issues I see in tanking, is that we are to dependant on other classes to do our job.  You have to have a Chanter, bard, and a HT to effectily do your job.  No other game is really like this.  The tanks have the tools and skills they need to do the job.  Then again with all the in combat rezing in this game, no one has accountablitly, for pulling agro.  If I die, someone will rez me and I get a do over.  Most of the boss type mobs, its just pile on more and more damage until it is dead.  There is little reason to have Defensive and offensive tanks in the game, everything seams to be built around do the most damage you can. </p><p>Balance is an illision, it can never happen.  The best bet to get it close is to do the following...</p><p>Offense + Defense + Util = 10</p><p>do that for every class.  There are a lot of classes that have over 5 in DPS and Util, that makes this game hard to balance and run smooth.</p>

[WarmMachine]

<p>Guardian's utilities need a lot of changes to make the worth while.<span style="color: #000000;">  </span>The first three listed changes are pretty much worthless.  <span style="color: #0000ff;">1. got your back will become raid wide.</span> (it's short range basically means that guards have to stay in and eat the ae so the other tank does not)  I can not think of a fight right now that this would be very helpful on.  Yes another person doesn't get his for a few k damage, it is not as good as blade dance or tortis shell.</p> <p><span style="color: #339966;"><span style="color: #0000ff;">2.Cripple will become a maintainable debuff with a damage component</span>.</span>  Another worthless change, did labs tonight with a zerker main tanking and the zone wide repost damage was 15 dps, and the highest repost was under 5k damage.  So while it sounds good, the reality is this debuff will do next to nothing.</p> <p><span style="color: #0000ff;">3. Call of Shielding will also increase the health of the raid.  The 87 version at master will amount to around 1,000 hit points.</span>  While the current form is worthless the proposed upgrade is still far below the other tanks raid wide buff.  One thing that would be worth while is a raid wide ward regenerating ward.  The 87 version at master would adsorb roughly 1000 points of damage that regenerated every 60 seconds or so.  I think this would me more in line with the guardian, guarding the raid.</p> <p><span style="color: #339966;"><span style="color: #0000ff;">4. The tentative plan is to change Guardian Sphere into a group buff that grants all non-fighters a 50% (at master) chance to stoneskin. The Guardian will have a 25% (at master) chance to stoneskin him or herself. The casting time has been reduced to 0.5 seconds, the radius has been increased to 35 meters, the duration maxes out at 20 seconds and there is no limit on the number of stoneskins that can trigger during the duration.</span> </span>This change is great, makes the utility useful with out making it over powered.</p> <p>Get rid of the idea that the guardian is a single target tank.  There is not a heroic or raid instance in SF that does not have group encounter mobs.  The idea that guardians should not be good at holding agro on encounter mobs came about long ago because guardians were the best tank in the game for taking damage and were giving this as a weakness.  At one point guardians were the only tank that could use a tower shield, but that was change to where all plate tanks can use any shield.  Since then all other tanks have been beefed up to where they can tank any single target just as well as a guardian.  However the guardians AE dps has not been increased on par with the defensive increases to the other tanks.   Most poeple who rolled a guardian did so to be the main tank, now any tank class can fill this roll.  While the other tank classes were improved so they could fill the main tank roll, guardians lack of AE threat was never fixed; guardians utilities were never brought up to par instead they became dated and useless as game mechanics changed.</p> <p>Other Changes I would like to see implemented.</p> <p>-First of all I will just say up guards dps about 50%, that is the fastest and easist way to "fix" guardians.  While the general feeling among guardians seems to be, we are fine with low dps as long as we trade low dps for better survivability and utilities.  The "edge" we gain in survivability is taking 2% more damage (looking at labs zone wide for when I tank on my guard vs. when my guilds zerker tanks, he has 1 piece of t2 gear that I have t1 otherwise armor is the same) however on the zone wide parse guardian's put out at least 10k less dps on single target and 30k less on group encounters.  Most might not like this suggestion, but look back at how many class changes and mechanics changes have gone poorly, this is the best bet being done correctly and will make guardians a viable pick for groups, raids and pvp.</p> <p>-Sentinel is worthless, it is basically intercede with a chance to proc. Running this on raids basically means you take double the damage for aes with the result being killing yourself.  In groups it can have the same effect, although this is less common.  With the aa line you can add 2-10% to all resist with this spell.  This spell could be change several ways, make it a proc to make the person immune to control spells (stifle, root, stun, ect) or just a simple damage reduction spell, or keep it in line with the AA and make the spell a buff to all resist with the AA upping the amount of resists.</p> <p>-Plant it has been addressed in several other posts with the general idea making you immune to kick back spells, I agree.</p> <p>-Sentry Watch it has been addressed in several other posts, remove the damage to the guardian from this, make it a raid wide 1 trigger death save with the current hate gain, duration and recast. This will make it useful in raids, groups and pvp.</p> <p>-Death Saves, guardians don't have one. Guardians have a death delay but not a save. Change this to a delay to a save though AA, then it will be useful. Several people have argued to make it a permanent buff like the crusaders, if unyeilding will was made to a permanent buff the recast time would need to be raised.</p> <p>-Lay Waste, take it off the same timer as Assault. This will give guardians one more ability upping their dps a small amount.</p> <p>-Change the defensive stance, Armored, to add more of an edge.  First thing that needs to be done is change the +defense to +block, to make it useful (maybe make this change to all tanks) and keep the +parry the same.    Since guardians are defensive tanks, their defensive stance should be better than any other tanks, right now it is pretty much the same as all other tanks. The only difference between the guardian and the zerker defensive stance 5% more effectiveness to worn armor.  witch sounds like a good bit but lets look at the numbers, T2 bp have 692 mitigation on them, witch means a zerker would get 795 mitigation in defensive and a guard would get 830.  This is the big bad defensive advantage we have over other classes but you hit the mitigation cap quickly in this expansion making the difference meaningless.  An easy fix would be to add a small amount, around 5% damage reduction to the defensive stance.</p> <p>-Change the Mythical Buff to re-add the permanent 5% damage reduction, palies have a permanent 10% on their mythical plus 10% of damage is returned as healing, so this should not be overpowered.</p> <p>-Change the melee auto attack from AA back to 60 from 40, this will not only help guardians, but zerker's who do not have their mythical.</p> <p>-Several AA lines are in need of being reworked or changed.  Most have been mentioned in other posts, but I would like to see the Crippling line reworked into something that provided hate increase, like AA to increase the trigger % on hold the line, or instead of upping the minor debuffs have the AA add a hate component to the spells.  SF and TSO AA lines are ok, mainly the EoF guard and the KS warrior trees that are dated with all the game changes since they were implemented.</p> <p>-Hunker down, increases the mitigation of the guardian while lowering attack speed and snaring the caster, it also grants melee attacks a 10% chance to root the target.  This is worthless on raids since epics are immune to root, most raid tanks are past the mitigation cap witch effectively turns this spell into a self debuff on raids.  In groups it snares you so if a mob is outside of melee range it will take you longer to adjust if somebody pulls agro.   I like the underling idea behind the spell of trading dps for survivability.  If the mitigation were to change this to a 10% damage reduction and change root to threat this would be a wonderful temp buff, that you trade dps for survivability.</p> <p>Over all I would like to see the guardian raise back up as the best defensive tank trading their dps for survivability.  I don't see this ever happening because the other tanks would complain that only guards can tank certain mobs because of their high survivability.  So I will settle for them bumping up our dps on par with the other tanks. The other option I see is them turning us into bards who have a taunt button.</p>

[Wulfghar]

<p><cite>WarmMachine wrote:</cite></p><blockquote><p>Guardian's utilities need a lot of changes to make the worth while.<span style="color: #000000;">  </span>The first three listed changes are pretty much worthless.  <span style="color: #0000ff;">1. got your back will become raid wide.</span> (it's short range basically means that guards have to stay in and eat the ae so the other tank does not)  I can not think of a fight right now that this would be very helpful on.  Yes another person doesn't get his for a few k damage, it is not as good as blade dance or tortis shell.<span style="color: #ff0000;"> - Completely agree with this assessment.  The fact that in order to achieve this ability we would have to sacrifice either dps or survival from our existing "cut-n-paste" spec, it should be changed to something that might actually be viable.  Perhaps an ability to proc a ward on group members AE each time the Guardian is struck. 5% chance would sound about right.  Otherwise its pointless.</span></p> <p><span style="color: #339966;"><span style="color: #0000ff;">2.Cripple will become a maintainable debuff with a damage component</span>.</span>  Another worthless change, did labs tonight with a zerker main tanking and the zone wide repost damage was 15 dps, and the highest repost was under 5k damage.  So while it sounds good, the reality is this debuff will do next to nothing.  <span style="color: #ff0000;">- Considering the only fight that I know of where dps(a.k.a. the only people who have to worry about riposte damage) are consistently in front of a mob is Roehn Theer, this is also pointless waste of AA.  However, if you were to make this a maintainable debuff against ae auto attack OR crit bonus/potency with a damage component, now we're talkin.</span></p> <p><span style="color: #0000ff;">3. Call of Shielding will also increase the health of the raid.  The 87 version at master will amount to around 1,000 hit points.</span>  While the current form is worthless the proposed upgrade is still far below the other tanks raid wide buff.  One thing that would be worth while is a raid wide ward regenerating ward.  The 87 version at master would adsorb roughly 1000 points of damage that regenerated every 60 seconds or so.  I think this would me more in line with the guardian, guarding the raid. <span style="color: #ff0000;">- I really don't see the need to add more HP when most dps who die from AoE do so with a wider margin than 1k.  A regenerating ward for the whole raid would be nice, also a static damage reduction raidwide would also be good if you are trying to stick with the "defensive" idea (even though its completely outdated and sub-par).  Personally, I would like to see a raidwide buff that provides a bonus to both starter guilds who suffer survivability issues as well as top-end guilds who are looking to min-max their dps.</span></p> <p><span style="color: #339966;"><span style="color: #0000ff;">4. The tentative plan is to change Guardian Sphere into a group buff that grants all non-fighters a 50% (at master) chance to stoneskin. The Guardian will have a 25% (at master) chance to stoneskin him or herself. The casting time has been reduced to 0.5 seconds, the radius has been increased to 35 meters, the duration maxes out at 20 seconds and there is no limit on the number of stoneskins that can trigger during the duration.</span> </span>This change is great, makes the utility useful with out making it over powered.<span style="color: #ff0000;"> - Completely agree with this change, awesome idea and well received imho.</span></p> <p>Get rid of the idea that the guardian is a single target tank.  There is not a heroic or raid instance in SF that does not have group encounter mobs.  The idea that guardians should not be good at holding agro on encounter mobs came about long ago because guardians were the best tank in the game for taking damage and were giving this as a weakness.  At one point guardians were the only tank that could use a tower shield, but that was change to where all plate tanks can use any shield.  Since then all other tanks have been beefed up to where they can tank any single target just as well as a guardian.  However the guardians AE dps has not been increased on par with the defensive increases to the other tanks.   Most poeple who rolled a guardian did so to be the main tank, now any tank class can fill this roll.  While the other tank classes were improved so they could fill the main tank roll, guardians lack of AE threat was never fixed; guardians utilities were never brought up to par instead they became dated and useless as game mechanics changed.<span style="color: #ff0000;"> - 10/10, spot on.  Couldn't have said it any better.</span></p> <p>Other Changes I would like to see implemented.</p> <p>-First of all I will just say up guards dps about 50%, that is the fastest and easist way to "fix" guardians.  While the general feeling among guardians seems to be, we are fine with low dps as long as we trade low dps for better survivability and utilities.  The "edge" we gain in survivability is taking 2% more damage (looking at labs zone wide for when I tank on my guard vs. when my guilds zerker tanks, he has 1 piece of t2 gear that I have t1 otherwise armor is the same) however on the zone wide parse guardian's put out at least 10k less dps on single target and 30k less on group encounters.  Most might not like this suggestion, but look back at how many class changes and mechanics changes have gone poorly, this is the best bet being done correctly and will make guardians a viable pick for groups, raids and pvp. <span style="color: #ff0000;">- If SoE is trying to keep us shackled to the outdated concept of "Mr. Defensive", I would agree with this suggestion as long as we were sword and board.  It keeps us from sacrificing survivability just to try and play catchup to Crusaders.</span></p> <p>-Sentinel is worthless, it is basically intercede with a chance to proc. Running this on raids basically means you take double the damage for aes with the result being killing yourself.  In groups it can have the same effect, although this is less common.  With the aa line you can add 2-10% to all resist with this spell.  This spell could be change several ways, make it a proc to make the person immune to control spells (stifle, root, stun, ect) or just a simple damage reduction spell, or keep it in line with the AA and make the spell a buff to all resist with the AA upping the amount of resists.<span style="color: #ff0000;"> - Love the immunity idea, would be awesome to place on a MT healer.</span></p> <p>-Plant it has been addressed in several other posts with the general idea making you immune to kick back spells, I agree. <span style="color: #ff0000;">- Also love this idea.  Nothing much else to say.</span></p> <p>-Sentry Watch it has been addressed in several other posts, remove the damage to the guardian from this, make it a raid wide 1 trigger death save with the current hate gain, duration and recast. This will make it useful in raids, groups and pvp.<span style="color: #ff0000;"> - I honestly hardly ever use this ability, but the change you propose seems about right.  It would have to be radius based upon activation, so only those say within 10 meters would be subject to its protection(i.e. a scout who gets rooted or stunned inside a mob's aoe kill zone).</span></p> <p>-Death Saves, guardians don't have one. Guardians have a death delay but not a save. Change this to a delay to a save though AA, then it will be useful. Several people have argued to make it a permanent buff like the crusaders, if unyeilding will was made to a permanent buff the recast time would need to be raised.<span style="color: #ff0000;"> - With the AA's I have into my Unyielding Will, it is a save.  However, it is finicky at best and requires precognition to anticipate the time of your death.  Personally, I say have it up until canceled, cannot be cast in combat(just like Bloodletter), provide 1 trigger reliably and share a similar recast timer as Bloodletter.  Shadowknights have potentially 4 full health bars(3 Bloodletter procs with TSO set gear bonus) to ride out bad detrimentals, lag spikes, or other unpredictable events.  Giving Guardians one death save that we can count on being there when it hits the fan doesn't seem like that much to ask.  However, as stated previously, it would be nice not to have to wait so long to recast it either.</span></p> <p>-Lay Waste, take it off the same timer as Assault. This will give guardians one more ability upping their dps a small amount. <span style="color: #ff0000;">- This would be nice just from a dps standpoint, but not exactly a must-have in my book.</span></p> <p>-Change the defensive stance, Armored, to add more of an edge.  First thing that needs to be done is change the +defense to +block, to make it useful (maybe make this change to all tanks) and keep the +parry the same.    Since guardians are defensive tanks, their defensive stance should be better than any other tanks, right now it is pretty much the same as all other tanks. The only difference between the guardian and the zerker defensive stance 5% more effectiveness to worn armor.  witch sounds like a good bit but lets look at the numbers, T2 bp have 692 mitigation on them, witch means a zerker would get 795 mitigation in defensive and a guard would get 830.  This is the big bad defensive advantage we have over other classes but you hit the mitigation cap quickly in this expansion making the difference meaningless.  An easy fix would be to add a small amount, around 5% damage reduction to the defensive stance. <span style="color: #ff0000;">- Well said.  Berserker offensive stance gives them a damage proc chance on attack, and rightly so seeing as how they are the "Offensive" breed of Warrior.  I don't think its too much to ask for our defensive stance to stand out of the crowd if we are to continue touting the "Defensive" role.  Remove the mitigation difference as most tanks who raid are able to cap mit anyways and replace it with Block chance(why not, considering the Monk class has it as well) and either a static damage reduction or perhaps a chance to proc a stoneskin.</span></p> <p>-Change the Mythical Buff to re-add the permanent 5% damage reduction, palies have a permanent 10% on their mythical plus 10% of damage is returned as healing, so this should not be overpowered. <span style="color: #ff0000;">- Its been said enough ways by enough people that there really isn't anything else I can add.</span></p> <p>-Change the melee auto attack from AA back to 60 from 40, this will not only help guardians, but zerker's who do not have their mythical.<span style="color: #ff0000;"> - Agree.</span></p> <p>-Several AA lines are in need of being reworked or changed.  Most have been mentioned in other posts, but I would like to see the Crippling line reworked into something that provided hate increase, like AA to increase the trigger % on hold the line, or instead of upping the minor debuffs have the AA add a hate component to the spells.  SF and TSO AA lines are ok, mainly the EoF guard and the KS warrior trees that are dated with all the game changes since they were implemented.<span style="color: #ff0000;"> - To be honest, not sure what to think of this idea as the other changes that you've suggested (increase in dps and auto attack damage) would be sufficient combined with our existing abilities to generate hate.  However, as a standalone suggestion, perhaps.</span></p> <p>-Hunker down, increases the mitigation of the guardian while lowering attack speed and snaring the caster, it also grants melee attacks a 10% chance to root the target.  This is worthless on raids since epics are immune to root, most raid tanks are past the mitigation cap witch effectively turns this spell into a self debuff on raids.  In groups it snares you so if a mob is outside of melee range it will take you longer to adjust if somebody pulls agro.   I like the underling idea behind the spell of trading dps for survivability.  If the mitigation were to change this to a 10% damage reduction and change root to threat this would be a wonderful temp buff, that you trade dps for survivability.<span style="color: #ff0000;"> - Love this idea tbh.</span></p> <p>Over all I would like to see the guardian raise back up as the best defensive tank trading their dps for survivability.  I don't see this ever happening because the other tanks would complain that only guards can tank certain mobs because of their high survivability.  So I will settle for them bumping up our dps on par with the other tanks. The other option I see is them turning us into bards who have a taunt button.<span style="color: #ff0000;"> - As it has been said before, I don't believe any of us are complaining about what other tanks have and asking it to be taken away.  All we, as a class, are asking for is to be brought in line with the other fighters.  Considering they have gained abilities and gear that make them rivals for survivability, all we are asking for is to have the ability to rival them for utility and/or dps, even if SK's and Paly's still top the fighter parse.  I know the old saying, "Beggars can't be choosers.", but I don't want changes to our class that are going to only make us appealing as a tank choice to scrub starter guilds who die constantly and need all the survival they can get in order to clear through easy-mode encounters.  I would very much like to see Guardians as a whole taken seriously when trying for spots in guilds who are in the top 10 ranking.</span></p></blockquote>

[Soul_Dreamer]

<p>The changes to survivability while making life a little easier won't do anything to help our position since there is no call for extra survivability on current content.</p><p><span style="font-size: 11.6667px;">The days of the "Defensive/Offensive" Tanks are over and ended the second other tanks where given abilities to allow them to absorb damage dished out by mobs in the same way a Guardian can. The offensive/defensive tanks now should be defined on what they do for the groups survival since the tanks survival is basically equal. A Raid/Group with a Gaurdian in it needs to be able to live through more than one without a Guardian in it, in the same way a Group/Raid with an SK in it is able to do more DPS. This currently isn't the case and a Guardian offers nothing but survivability.. which all tanks now have in abundance.</span></p><p><span style="font-size: 11.6667px;">Broken/Useless abilities need fixing so they are directly useful to the Guardian/The Guardians group and not there to help the already over powered tanks perform their roles even better, AOE avoid for other tanks, hate for other tanks? Honestly if this is where the Guardian is going please confirm it now so I can Cancel my account. After fixing these abilities the DPS/Hate of the Guardian needs to be brought in line with the other plate tanks, increase the CA damage of our abilities, reduce the recast of the 1 min reuse abilities we have and Guardians are fixed.</span></p><p>I've already posted a full list of ALL abilities that have space for improvement or simply do not work with todays mechanics/content. </p><p>People who say this is asking too much are living in the past or trying to keep their class above and beyond what a capable Guardian is able to achieve. When all tanks can tank all content the yard stick for balance is DPS/Hate/Utility, presently Guardians fall short in all 3 categories, this needs to be changed!</p><p><span style="font-size: 11.6667px;">Simply put, if the gap in survivability/incomming damage is 5% so should the gap in DPS/Hate/Utility amount to about 5%. These things are hard to measure but currently all tanks take similar damage and the other tanks are lightyears ahead of Guardians in all other areas.</span></p>

[Shareana]

<p>Let's keep it on track please?  There is no need to call for nerfs or to be insulting other posters and classes.</p>

[Rahatmattata]

<p><cite>Xelgad wrote:</cite></p><blockquote><p>It's utility that we want to focus this thread on. We want to bring Guardian utility up to the level that the other fighters bring to a group or raid...</p><p>We’re looking for feedback on these ideas, and we’re open to boosting Guardian utility even a bit further, especially in heroic content...</p><p>However, I do want to try to focus this thread on the utility aspect of the class...</p></blockquote><p>This thread is not about balancing/nerfing other tanks tbh. I admit I have posted other things besides suggestions for guard utility here, but honestly goto the general fighter discussion, or just about any thread on the guard board and you can find extensive conversations about fighter balance and nerfing/buffing other tanks and content.</p><p>I hate posting and contributing to the spam so...</p><p>Block -> allow the guard to cast it on himself or any ally in the group/raid.</p>

[Undorett]

<p>Wow, I am glad to see Guardians are being looked at.  I wish I had more time to post right now.  One thing about Got Your Back, it would be really nice to have it just block for a different archtype, not fighters.  This would then have it be useful in both heroic and epic encounters.  Maybe Got Your Back just blocks all the healers in the raid or something.</p><p>Some good utility posts on all of these pages from other guardians.  I hope you take the time to read them all <img src="/eq2/images/smilies/3b63d1616c5dfcf29f8a7a031aaa7cad.gif" border="0" /></p><p>I hope the next round of changes we discuss are our abysmal DPS and threat generation when compared to other fighters.</p>

[Wasuna]

<p><cite>Xelgad wrote:</cite></p><blockquote><p>Thank you all for the feedback so far!Just to address one general point, we're trying to take a more subtle approach in adjusting this class. Instead of making one or two drastic changes, we're going for maybe a dozen smaller fixes and upgrades that result in a more balanced and better working Guardian. These fixes and upgrades will go beyond just utility. In that sense, it's good to hear that these changes won't immediately make Guardians desirable for every raid, since we certainly don't want utility to be the driving force that gets Guardians into raids. Furthermore, please remember that “Got Your Back” and “Cripple” are still Echoes of Faydwer Advancements and need to be balanced as such. The fact that some of you like the “Got Your Back” change while others still prefer other options is a sign that the proposed change is in the realm of balance.To clarify, the current plan for the Cripple debuff is a 75% reduction to target's riposte damage. While we're aware that Guardians are immune to riposte damage at end game, we still see a situational use for the debuff in cases where it's dangerous or impossible for scouts and healers to position behind the target. The added damage component is not insignificant and has a very low chance to miss. More feedback on this would be welcomed.While some of your other suggestions may make it in game, we especially like the idea to upgrade Guardian Sphere, since it could be a great way to provide some defensive utility that would be useful in heroic content. The tentative plan is to change Guardian Sphere into a group buff that grants all non-fighters a 50% (at master) chance to stoneskin. The Guardian will have a 25% (at master) chance to stoneskin him or herself. The casting time has been reduced to 0.5 seconds, the radius has been increased to 35 meters, the duration maxes out at 20 seconds and there is no limit on the number of stoneskins that can trigger during the duration.</p></blockquote><p>1. AA's that No Guardian use need to be changed anyway. Leaving them where they are for so long just means nobody was pay attention and the person that developed them was not looking at how the game works.</p><p>2. 75% reduction of ripsote damage. The last dragon in the Prismatic quest used to Ripsote and kill the tank with just one ripsote so the tank just stood there and taunted. That is not the case now. Whoever looked at this needs to look again. How is this going to help a Legendary geard Guardian? No raids want my Guardian due to your game design so this is a VERY important question.</p><p>3. Who liked the changes to Got Your back? Nobody is going to throw 22 points into that tree.</p><p>4. I love the change to Guardian Sphere. Though you didn't mention the intercept portion of the ability. Even with the suggested changes it still will NOT be used in raids if it still intercepts. The tank is suppose to stay alive. If the tank dies then usually it's a whipe so the tank even considering using an intercept ability is stupid.</p><p>I'm a Legendary geared Guardian. The changes you make need to make it so people don't drop group as soon as they see the tank is a Guardian without any comments. I will be considering that as I look at your comments. I'm a Good tank and your game design should NOT be penalizing me.</p>

[Soul_Dreamer]

<p><p>OK, instead of offering solutions to the entire problem I'll go with the buffs stated..</p><p>1.) Got your Back - No one will take this even in this changed form, 2 choices to make this useful really.</p><p>a.) Group wide AOE avoid for the 15 sec duration and the minute recast.</p><p>b.) Have it as a buff that can be placed on any player in the raid and be 100% AOE Avoid unless target is direct.</p><p>2. Cripple - If this remains as a riposte damage reduction no one will take it. Go and stand in front of a mob as a scout while a tank is tanking it, any high level heroic or epic. If the mob has any chance to AOE auto attack at all that will kill you way before any riposte will. As other have stated Riposte accounts for such tiny amount of damage.  The ability needs to provide enough utility to be balanced with the other 2 staple lines (Slaughtering and Stalwarting) to be useful and pursuade Guardians to drop points from other places in order to get it. This doesn't mean it has to be over powered, but it does mean it has to be a useful ability.</p><p>a.) Turn crippling into a hate line by adding hate to all efffected CA's and maybe reducing the DoT's durations. Make the end ability something that limited the the damage the mob does to the Gaurdian/Group/Raid and make it enough to be noticable and beneficial. The line is about crippleing adding hate and reducing it's damage kinda suites the name and is very much neded.</p><p>b.) Add meaningful effects to the AA's instead of just increasing the debuff amounts, the % ages don't need to be anything large, all up to 5% or so. They will all help any tank that is tanking and including everyone in PVP/Groups/Solo/Raids.</p><p> eg:</p><p>Ruin: </p><p>Increases offensive skill reduction by x% (Remove or Leave)</p><p>ADD:crit bonus reduction by y%</p><p>Sever:damage per second reduction by x% (Remove or Leave)</p><p>ADD:auto attack reduction of y%</p><p>Concussion:Increases casting skill reduction by x%(Remove or Leave)</p><p>ADD: potency reduction by y%</p><p>Retaliate:Increases Duration by x seconds (Remove or Leave)</p><p>ADD<img src="/smilies/283a16da79f3aa23fe1025c96295f04f.gif" border="0" alt="SMILEY" />ecreases recast by x seconds (capped at 10 seconds reduction to bring the base down to 50seconds?).</p><p>Decimate:Increases Duration by x seconds (Remove or Leave)</p><p>ADD<img src="/smilies/283a16da79f3aa23fe1025c96295f04f.gif" border="0" alt="SMILEY" />ecreases recast by x seconds(capped at 10 seconds reduction to bring the base down to 50seconds?).</p><p> Make the end ability a nice large attack to provide more hate, or an always on buff that adds hate to each of the above CA's.</p><p>3. Call of Shielding.</p><p>30 odd Defense and 1000hp doesn't really balance with the majority of other fighters raid wide buffs. Can we please drop the defense, and add a proc chance to deathsave people in the raid of 10% on a death and only able to proc once every 4 mins per character? 1000hp and a chance for people to live if they die.</p></p>

[Rhita]

<p><cite>Wasuna wrote:</cite></p><blockquote><p><cite>Xelgad wrote:</cite></p><blockquote><p>Thank you all for the feedback so far!Just to address one general point, we're trying to take a more subtle approach in adjusting this class. Instead of making one or two drastic changes, we're going for maybe a dozen smaller fixes and upgrades that result in a more balanced and better working Guardian. These fixes and upgrades will go beyond just utility. In that sense, it's good to hear that these changes won't immediately make Guardians desirable for every raid, since we certainly don't want utility to be the driving force that gets Guardians into raids. Furthermore, please remember that “Got Your Back” and “Cripple” are still Echoes of Faydwer Advancements and need to be balanced as such. The fact that some of you like the “Got Your Back” change while others still prefer other options is a sign that the proposed change is in the realm of balance.To clarify, the current plan for the Cripple debuff is a 75% reduction to target's riposte damage. While we're aware that Guardians are immune to riposte damage at end game, we still see a situational use for the debuff in cases where it's dangerous or impossible for scouts and healers to position behind the target. The added damage component is not insignificant and has a very low chance to miss. More feedback on this would be welcomed.While some of your other suggestions may make it in game, we especially like the idea to upgrade Guardian Sphere, since it could be a great way to provide some defensive utility that would be useful in heroic content. The tentative plan is to change Guardian Sphere into a group buff that grants all non-fighters a 50% (at master) chance to stoneskin. The Guardian will have a 25% (at master) chance to stoneskin him or herself. The casting time has been reduced to 0.5 seconds, the radius has been increased to 35 meters, the duration maxes out at 20 seconds and there is no limit on the number of stoneskins that can trigger during the duration.</p></blockquote><p>1. AA's that No Guardian use need to be changed anyway. Leaving them where they are for so long just means nobody was pay attention and the person that developed them was not looking at how the game works.</p><p>2. 75% reduction of ripsote damage. The last dragon in the Prismatic quest used to Ripsote and kill the tank with just one ripsote so the tank just stood there and taunted. That is not the case now. Whoever looked at this needs to look again. How is this going to help a Legendary geard Guardian? No raids want my Guardian due to your game design so this is a VERY important question.</p><p>3. Who liked the changes to Got Your back? Nobody is going to throw 22 points into that tree.</p><p>4. I love the change to Guardian Sphere. Though you didn't mention the intercept portion of the ability. Even with the suggested changes it still will NOT be used in raids if it still intercepts. The tank is suppose to stay alive. If the tank dies then usually it's a whipe so the tank even considering using an intercept ability is stupid.</p><p>I'm a Legendary geared Guardian. The changes you make need to make it so people don't drop group as soon as they see the tank is a Guardian without any comments. I will be considering that as I look at your comments. I'm a Good tank and your game design should NOT be penalizing me.</p></blockquote><p>There is no intercept portion.</p>

[Wasuna]

<p><cite>Rhita@Najena wrote:</cite></p><blockquote><p>There is no intercept portion.</p></blockquote><p>Eh? No intercept on Guardian Sphere? Maybe you need to read the ability again. Unless you mean they are gonna take it out of the ability</p>

[Macross_JR]

<p><cite>Wasuna wrote:</cite></p><blockquote><p><cite>Rhita@Najena wrote:</cite></p><blockquote><p>There is no intercept portion.</p></blockquote><p>Eh? No intercept on Guardian Sphere? Maybe you need to read the ability again. Unless you mean they are gonna take it out of the ability</p></blockquote><p>According to what Xelgad posted he didn't post that it would intercept any damage at all.  Now it could be that the intercept part isn't changing so he didn't post about it, or they are removing the intercept part.</p>

[Wasuna]

<p>Yeah, my comment was that he didn't say anything at all about the intercept. If intercept is incldued then it's still a situational ability at the very best.</p><p>The Intercept concept was actually pretty cool back at level 60 when your healers were actually squishy. Of course getting hit for 1/3 your health for an intercepted blow was pretty bad then also. I stopped using it after a while. I was hard headed and wanted to keep using a class defining ability but it just never turned out good for the group.</p><p>Now, I only use sentinal when I'm duoing with my wife who is an Assassin. She rips agro off me left and right and that helps us stay up for the fights. Guardian and Assassin duoing means it's a race to death.</p>

[Rhita]

<p><cite>Wasuna wrote:</cite></p><blockquote><p><cite>Rhita@Najena wrote:</cite></p><blockquote><p>There is no intercept portion.</p></blockquote><p>Eh? No intercept on Guardian Sphere? Maybe you need to read the ability again. Unless you mean they are gonna take it out of the ability</p></blockquote><p>Kinda dumb to jump to the conclusion that i dont know what im talking about. But as it was said, Xelgad didnt mention any intercept on it.</p>

[Xelgad]

<p>To clarify, the intercept portion has been removed from Guardian Sphere. We have many more changes on the way.  Here are some of them, but this list is still not complete. Stability Tree:</p><ul><li>Enhance: Intercept now gives 2% damage reduction per point in addition to the reuse reduction.</li><li>Enhance: Moderate now grants 1 crit bonus per point instead of additional hate gain reduction.</li><li>Enhance: Rescue has been moved to another tree and replaced with Enhance: Call of Shielding, which increases the effectiveness of that buff by 5% per point.</li><li>Enhance: Reinforcement has been moved to another tree and replaced with Enhance: Call to Arms, which increases the effectiveness of that buff by 7% per point.</li></ul><p> The "Crippling" tree has been replaced with a new tree titled "Aggression."  This new tree is intended to provide extra threat generation, especially in cases where the Guardian doesn't have full hate buffs.  Aggression Tree:</p><ul><li>Enhance: Provoke, which grants 7% potency to the taunt with each point.</li><li>Enhance: Shout, which reduces the reuse of the ability by 0.4 seconds per point and improves the resistability by 2% per point.</li><li>Enhance: Hatred, which offers 2% hate mod per point.</li><li>Enhance: Rescue, which is the same as it was in the Stability tree.</li><li>Enhance: Reinforcement, which is the same as it was in the Stability tree.</li><li>Shoulder the Burden, which is a 10% hate siphon that can be placed on any group member. </li></ul><p> Other AA changes:</p><ul><li>"Double Attack" in the Guardian tree has been replaced with 3% chance to flurry and has been renamed to "Flurry."</li><li>"Bind Wound" in the Warrior tree is now a 100% heal (still out of combat).</li><li>Enhance: Plant now increases the duration of the ability by only 0.4 seconds per point (see below).</li><li>"Aggressive Nature" now increases the threat generated by Hold the Line by 5% per point instead of adding a threat proc on blocks (see below).</li></ul><p> Class ability changes:</p><ul><li>Recapture now lowers the threat position of non-fighters in the Guardian's group to the target encounter. While that effect is only groupwide, the raidwide effect that increases the threat position of other fighters is still present. The reuse on this ability has been increased to 45 seconds.</li><li>Iron Will now grants a reduction to snare effects on the Guardian in addition to the Stamina buff.</li><li>Plant has been redesigned. It is now a blue AE target lock with a small threat component. The base duration of the target lock is 6 seconds with the level 90 master. The base casting time remains at 1 second, and the recast is still 60 seconds.</li><li>Hold the Line now has the "Aggressive Nature" effect automatically built into the ability. It's as if you spent the 5 AA points in the Shadows tree without actually having to spend the points.  "Aggressive Defense," a Berserker ability, recieved the same change.</li></ul><p>Keep the feedback coming! The discussion has obviously shifted beyond just utility, and we're looking for feedback on all of these changes.  Any other suggestions for the class are welcomed as well, but understand that we are focusing mostly on more general changes rather than class or AA ability changes to solve the survivability problem.</p>

[Macross_JR]

<p>The new Plant is still no Holy Ground/Grave Sac or the zerker equivalent. Honestly I still don't like the new Aggression Tree. They moved the 2 items we always took out of the left tree and moved it to a new tree, that honestly I don't think is all that great. People really don't take the +hate in the STR tree for warriors already, what makes them think we want another spot to gain more hate that is easily capped. And yay for a siphon that if I remember no one wanted(at least me, I didn't want a pally type ability). What is the real point of the change of Bind Wound? Does nothing for us in combat. I kind of like the Aggressive Nature and Hold the Line change, that sounds more like the way the Guardian should work. Still nothing to help with them fixing the issues between dps and survivability that is still present. Why bring a defensive tank that can hold agro when an offensive tank has the same survivability and more dps. That is what they need to fix.</p>

[Jeal]

<p>edit: nevermind <img src="/smilies/3b63d1616c5dfcf29f8a7a031aaa7cad.gif" border="0" alt="SMILEY" /></p>

[Rahatmattata]

<p>Basically, I like that guards will have 3 viable EoF lines. Moderate is becoming a weird buff - it decreases hate, increases crit bonus (with AA), and is also an avoidance buff... alrighty... I'd probably put this on a healer most of the time.</p><p>The aggression line looks good. It should help guards on the heroic level without a perfect group, and be a pain for other players in PvP. Much better than the useless cripple line for sure.</p><p>Changing the double attack to flurry is a good move IMO. Bind wound... meh... I don't think anyone really cared if that was changed, although it will be useful for soloing and in PvP if you can get out of combat.</p><p>Recapture change sounds good. Should help non-raiding guards. Iron Will buff helps in PvP or training through trash yay. Would it hurt to throw root resist on there too?</p><p>Plant sounds awesome as long as the resist rate isn't terrible like Cry of the Warrior. Cry of the Warrior should be harder to resist by the way. It should also last for the entire duration unless it says "x duration on epics" or a mob is dispelling it. This applies to Plant also.</p><p>Aggressive Nature is cool.</p><p>These seem like good changes, and will help non-raiding guardians for sure... but again, most of this is just hate, where other fighters have the same threat coming from dps. If guards are to have lower dps, they need something else to make them desirable to play. High survivability has always been what guards were about. Guardians should once again have a distinct defensive edge (not in just 4% of the game's content), and future mobs should hit harder to make a guardian more desirable. What we have is the same sort of problem in RoK where the content (90% single target encounters) made some classes seem weak.</p><p>I know this would effect all fighters but, any chance of making the aggression skill boost threat from taunts/CAs similar to the way strength scales damage?</p>

[Soul_Dreamer]

<p><cite>Xelgad wrote:</cite></p><blockquote><p>To clarify, the intercept portion has been removed from Guardian Sphere. We have many more changes on the way.  Here are some of them, but this list is still not complete. Stability Tree:</p><ul><li>Enhance: Intercept now gives 2% damage reduction per point in addition to the reuse reduction.</li></ul><span style="white-space:pre"> </span><span style="color: #3366ff;">Reduction for the Guardian or for the target or both?</span><ul><li>Enhance: Moderate now grants 1 crit bonus per point instead of additional hate gain reduction.</li></ul><span style="white-space:pre"> </span><span style="color: #3366ff;">I'm not sure which would be best, potency or crit bonus, I've heard Crit bonus isn't working correctly for Shaman wards. Either way a nice change and means we give something to the group.</span><ul><li>Enhance: Rescue has been moved to another tree and replaced with Enhance: Call of Shielding, which increases the effectiveness of that buff by 5% per point.</li></ul><span style="white-space:pre"> </span><span style="color: #3366ff;">The "Defense" portion of this buff is still worthless though is my only complaint, any mob where you want to raise your avoidance to increase survivability that little bit more on, defense and parry are close to worthless. This part of the buff even if useful would still only benefit the fighter tanking. Is there any chance of the defence portion being changed to something useful for everyone? Something to help the whole raid survive would be my first idea.</span><ul><li>Enhance: Reinforcement has been moved to another tree and replaced with Enhance: Call to Arms, which increases the effectiveness of that buff by 7% per point. </li></ul><p><span style="white-space:pre"> </span><span style="color: #3366ff;">Hmm, not really very usefull unless it also effects the buffs added via the red adorn and the other AA for it, I'd suggest changing the buff this enhances since we already have an AA that enhances this ability. Maybe Enhance Sentinal: Add a chance to intercept magical attacks as well and greatly reduce the amount of damage intercepted down to about 10%, if a 10k AOE hits the target has a chance to only receive 50% say and I only intercept 20%. This ability also needs the amount intercepted lowered, I can't use this ability on some fighters since it has a chance to kill me <img src="/smilies/3b63d1616c5dfcf29f8a7a031aaa7cad.gif" border="0" alt="SMILEY" /></span></p><p><span style="white-space: pre;"> </span><span style="color: #3366ff;">All the Guardian abilities that have a chance to kill us need that part removing really or drastically reducing, other fighters when they buff the groups DPS don't have their DPS lowered as a result, why when we increase the groups survivability do we pay a survivability penalty ourselves?</span></p><p>The "Crippling" tree has been replaced with a new tree titled "Aggression."  This new tree is intended to provide extra threat generation, especially in cases where the Guardian doesn't have full hate buffs.  Aggression Tree:</p><ul><li>Enhance: Provoke, which grants 7% potency to the taunt with each point.</li></ul><span style="color: #3366ff;"><span style="white-space: pre;"> </span><img src="/eq2/images/smilies/e8a506dc4ad763aca51bec4ca7dc8560.gif" border="0" /></span><ul><li>Enhance: Shout, which reduces the reuse of the ability by 0.4 seconds per point and improves the resistability by 2% per point.</li></ul><span style="white-space: pre;"> </span><span style="color: #3366ff;">Not a fan, not a fan at all really, can it not do as the above AA and add potency, this reduces the recast to 8  seconds, (~7 with int line). It would be a lot more player friendly if it was increased by ~20% (5x4%) rather than have it's reuse lowered so we have to mash it every time it's up to get the benefit of the AA. We don't want to be taunt bots so can the same benefit be added but in potency?</span><ul><li>Enhance: Hatred, which offers 2% hate mod per point.</li></ul><span style="white-space: pre;"><span style="color: #3366ff;"> I can't see myself using it but some will so good change.</span></span><ul><li>Enhance: Rescue, which is the same as it was in the Stability tree.</li><li>Enhance: Reinforcement, which is the same as it was in the Stability tree.</li></ul><span style="white-space: pre;"> </span><span style="color: #3366ff;">Not entirely sure why these have been moved but I'm sure I'll cope. </span><ul><li>Shoulder the Burden, which is a 10% hate siphon that can be placed on any group member. </li></ul><span style="color: #3366ff;"><span style="white-space: pre;"> </span>Useful in groups, not so much in a raid unless you're in a 3 healer group, I suppose then siphoning off the dirge could be useful. Good change.</span><p> Other AA changes:</p><ul><li>"Double Attack" in the Guardian tree has been replaced with 3% chance to flurry and has been renamed to "Flurry."</li></ul><span style="white-space: pre;"><span style="color: #3366ff;"> </span></span><img src="/eq2/images/smilies/e8a506dc4ad763aca51bec4ca7dc8560.gif" border="0" /> <span style="color: #3366ff;">but more please <img src="/smilies/3b63d1616c5dfcf29f8a7a031aaa7cad.gif" border="0" alt="SMILEY" /></span><ul><li>"Bind Wound" in the Warrior tree is now a 100% heal (still out of combat).</li></ul><span style="white-space: pre;"><span style="color: #3366ff;"> Huh, no clue why this change happened.</span></span><ul><li>Enhance: Plant now increases the duration of the ability by only 0.4 seconds per point (see below).</li><li>"Aggressive Nature" now increases the threat generated by Hold the Line by 5% per point instead of adding a threat proc on blocks (see below).</li></ul><p> <span style="white-space: pre;"><span style="color: #3366ff;"> See below.</span></span></p><p><span style="white-space: pre;"></span>Class ability changes:</p><ul><li>Recapture now lowers the threat position of non-fighters in the Guardian's group to the target encounter. While that effect is only groupwide, the raidwide effect that increases the threat position of other fighters is still present. The reuse on this ability has been increased to 45 seconds.</li></ul><span style="white-space: pre;"><span style="color: #3366ff;"> Shame about the 50% increase in reuse when the ability should really have worked this way from start. </span></span><span style="color: #3366ff;">Any chance of leaving it at 30 seconds?</span><ul><li>Iron Will now grants a reduction to snare effects on the Guardian in addition to the Stamina buff.</li></ul><span style="color: #3366ff;"><span style="white-space: pre;"> </span>Except very low levels the stamina buff doesn't actually do anything, even heroic legendary geared Guardians are very close or over the stamina cap at level 90. We only have one offensive buff not counting offensive stance, can this be changed to : procs 500 mental damage and then 500 hate to every CA for the next 10 seconds. 2 times a min proc rate. A tiny DPS increase and a hate increase.</span><ul><li>Plant has been redesigned. It is now a blue AE target lock with a small threat component. The base duration of the target lock is 6 seconds with the level 90 master. The base casting time remains at 1 second, and the recast is still 60 seconds.</li></ul><span style="white-space: pre;"><span style="color: #3366ff;"> Only problem being soo many mobs are immune to target locks, a large AOE hate and DPS tool would be preferable and remove the target lock.</span></span><ul><li>Hold the Line now has the "Aggressive Nature" effect automatically built into the ability. It's as if you spent the 5 AA points in the Shadows tree without actually having to spend the points.  "Aggressive Defense," a Berserker ability, recieved the same change.</li></ul><span style="white-space: pre;"><span style="color: #3366ff;"> Just buffed Zerkers in an area they really don't need buffing (hate) as well but for a pure Guardian perspective is a nice change.</span></span><p>Keep the feedback coming! The discussion has obviously shifted beyond just utility, and we're looking for feedback on all of these changes.  Any other suggestions for the class are welcomed as well, but understand that we are focusing mostly on more general changes rather than class or AA ability changes to solve the survivability problem.</p></blockquote><p><span style="color: #3366ff;">The main issues I have here are:</span></p><p><span style="color: #3366ff;">A.) While there are hate changes to increase hate, I don't think they go far enough, not enough to balace hate across the fighters. *</span></p><p><span style="color: #3366ff;">B.) No DPS changes, the game is all about DPS now and nothing in the above changes where we stand with the other fighters, which is often more than  50% less in the same setting. **Think of it this way... Some mobs have DPS checks, not enough DPS in the raid/group and the mob doesn't die, it's that simple. SK/Zerk/Pally bring very very respectable DPS and can take hits as much as is required. Guardian bring next to no DPS and there is no call for our extra survivability. For this to be balanced, the Guardian needs to be survivable enough that a healer or other class can be dropped and another DPS added to balance it out. The raids DPS needs to stay the same, 1 tank lives easier so you can bring the extra DPS, another tank needs more healing but DPS's so you don't need the extra DPS...</span></p><p><span style="color: #3366ff;">*To effectively tank, all fighters need to be being hit, all the survivability in the world means nothing if the fighter doesn't have the mob on him in the first place. DPS have been driven time and time again in the direction of not having to manage their hate, they really, really hate it when a Guardian pops in group and they are forced to or die.</span></p><p><span style="color: #3366ff;">** The only way I can effectively see this working is if in the mechanics changes you're eluding to, other plate fighters loose survivability, to an extent that survivability to Hate/Utility is balanced. Currently it's not, and not in a big way, if the mechanics change doesn't fix this issue then Guardians need more DPS to compete.</span></p>

[Rahatmattata]

<p><cite>Soul_Dreamer wrote:</cite></p><blockquote><span style="color: #3366ff;">Reduction for the Guardian or for the target or both?</span></blockquote><blockquote><em>Pretty sure it's damage reduction for the guy you are intercepting.</em></blockquote><blockquote><blockquote><span style="color: #3366ff;">The "Defense" portion of this buff is still worthless though is my only complaint, any mob where you want to raise your avoidance to increase survivability that little bit more on, defense and parry are close to worthless. This part of the buff even if useful would still only benefit the fighter tanking. Is there any chance of the defence portion being changed to something useful for everyone? Something to help the whole raid survive would be my first idea.</span></blockquote><blockquote><em>This was my first reaction also, but then my perspective changed a bit. Two things... defense is useful in heroic/solo/pvp content, and helps classes with low avoidance when/if they get aggro, or aggro a loose mob. Also, this has been moved to the got your back tree, so if you don't like it, you aren't missing out on much. It seems to me like Xelgad is focusing on buffing non-raiding guards in heroic content... and to a lesser extent in raid content. Some people are just looking at the game from a level 90/250 raiding perspective and aren't considering the fact that there are 89 other levels in the game and the vast majority of guardians do not raid, so there will probably be <span style="text-decoration: underline;"><strong>some</strong></span> buffs aimed to boost non-raid guards while having little effect on level 90/250 guards with raid gear and ideal setups.</em></blockquote></blockquote>

[Prestissimo]

<p>It's a step in the right direction, but bringing guards back into the same range is only half of the equation.</p><p>Survivability and hate are the 2 only concerns a tank has. Holding hate by DPSing is way more efficient than holding hate through taunting could ever pray to remotely come close to being, so therefore, survivability and dps are the only 2 concerns a tank has unless you're going to change this or make threat worth more than just some extra gravy on the side. All tanks can take hits and have the tools to do so in different manners, so cap survivability in full defensive is not a real major concern, just what seperates more survivable from less survivable tanks. This means that it's really down to a question of how much is the minimum survivability needed, and how much dps can a fighter do without losing too much survivability to still live through the fight. As long as the fighter doesn't die, they can sacrifice more survivability to get more dps and more dps means they hold better hate, and the better they hold hate while killing faster and the less survivability they lose doing so, the better of a tank they are.</p><p><span style="text-decoration: underline;"><strong>THAT</strong></span> progression right there with enphasis on the last sentence is where every single problem in fighter balance is stemming from. It's nothing to do with what fighter tanks with what style, it's nothing to do with what fighter has the best death save, it's nothing to do with what fighter does the most raw dps, it's nothing to do with what fighter is the best at taking the hits because these are all things that seperate one fighter from another in terms of flavor and style. It's purely that dps evolved into the end all method of generating hate, and since all tanks can take hits well enough even if it's at differing levels of defensiveness, it's nothing more than a pure question of who can keep the best survivability without losing the most dps.</p><p>In order to balance fighters, there needs to be a clear difference between dps gained hate and threat gained hate. DPS kills things faster and generates hate where as threat only generates hate and contributes nothing else. Logically threat needs to have a higher impact point for point, otherwise (as it already has multiple times in the past and still is) threat will become totally worthless other than if it naturally will come as an added bonus on top of damage being dealt. Replacing threat with dps makes things die faster AND is more able to be boosted than threat and as long as both generate the same exact amount of hate, the method that kills things faster will be the end all method of choice.</p><p>Until threat generates more hate than damage, and until there are fights where you absolutely must have a defensive tank OR need the additional hate obtainable by a higher level recieved by threat, the offensive tanks will be the tank of choice period. THAT is the main thing that needs to be addressed otherwise you could make the guardian fart platinum on every intercept and it wont make them any more desireable as main tanks if the core of the problem is not fixed.</p><p>---------</p><p>That being said, tanks need to be able to solo because raiding and min/maxing is not the only thing in the game; it's just a major component that needs to be kept in mind so that people don't abuse potential. All 6 tanks need to be able to go into tank mode, and into a mode where they can bring some pain so that they can effectively solo, provide additional dps but not the same as dedicated dps for example on trash in raids (probably the same dps as utility classes bring), and honestly, give all fighters a toggleable ability or something that gives the choice of boosting dps at the cost of decreasing threat, and a way to boost threat at the cost of decreasing dps. That could be worked into the stances for all I care, but seriously the stances as they stand currently are garbage through and through and the inability to adjust hate/dps based on need is just solidifying the fact that the classes with the highest raw damage output will be the best choice for tanking. BTW, with the consolidation of stats, self heals, regens, life taps, etc are getting boosted equally by the same stats that boost damage which means more dps also equals more survivability. Big problem for balancing, and again some type of scaling effect would be a great candidate for defensive/offensive stances to help balance.</p>

[Undorett]

<p><div><p><cite>Xelgad wrote:</cite></p><blockquote><ul><li>Enhance: Hatred, which offers 2% hate mod per point.  <span style="color: #00ff00;">I would prefer to see an AA that either gives us more active hate generation (maybe an additional taunt, ideally a blue taunt), or if the previous is not possible, ,then have it add a hate proc to our weapon say 10% for each point spent - we already have a +hate mod in our warrior tree.</span></li></ul><ul><li>"Aggressive Nature" now increases the threat generated by Hold the Line by 5% per point instead of adding a threat proc on blocks (see below).  <span style="color: #00ff00;">If the proc above happens, then this would be pointless, but if not, I would like to see if 5pts were spent, it would add the hold the line taunt proc to our weapon as well</span></li></ul><ul><li>Plant has been redesigned. It is now a blue AE target lock with a small threat component. The base duration of the target lock is 6 seconds with the level 90 master. The base casting time remains at 1 second, and the recast is still 60 seconds. <span style="color: #00ff00;">With how many target lock immunities are in the game, and guardians now having 2 skills that many mobs are immune to, it would be nice to get a <span style="text-decoration: underline;">large </span>threat component with the lock.</span></li></ul></blockquote></div></p><p>I love that the class is getting some much needed attention.  Great changes so far, but there is still more work that needs to be done.  Threat is no where near as effective as DPS, and guards are at a big disadvantage DPS wise compared to other fighters.  Others have mentioned this throughout the thread great suggestions on how to boost guardian DPS.  I would love to see some of it make its way into the update.  </p><p>Again, thanks for working on our class.</p>

[Rahatmattata]

<p><cite>ReverendPaqo wrote:</cite></p><blockquote><p>Until threat generates more hate than damage, and until there are fights where you absolutely must have a defensive tank OR need the additional hate obtainable by a higher level recieved by threat, the offensive tanks will be the tank of choice period. THAT is the main thing that needs to be addressed otherwise you could make the guardian fart platinum on every intercept and it wont make them any more desireable as main tanks if the core of the problem is not fixed.</p></blockquote><p>Even still... how much aggro do you really need? You only need enough hate to hold aggro... anything more is useless. If an offensive tank can do 50k DPS and generate a total* of 60k TPS and hold aggro just fine... what is the benefit of you doing 30k DPS and a total* of 95k TPS? None.</p><p>I've changed my mind about some things over the last few days, and I'd like to see guards have a distinct defensive edge again. I realize it will trivialize/is not needed for current content, but future content can be made to be more difficult, or guards could just pull more mobs (if they can hold them).</p><p>*total including dps + threat for final TPS</p>

[aislynn00]

<p><cite>Xelgad wrote:</cite></p><blockquote><p>To clarify, the intercept portion has been removed from Guardian Sphere. We have many more changes on the way.  Here are some of them, but this list is still not complete. Stability Tree:</p><ul><li>Enhance: Intercept now gives 2% damage reduction per point in addition to the reuse reduction.</li></ul></blockquote><p>What this ability is missing to make it interesting is a range increaser.</p><p>Keep the reuse time reduction, for all I care, but increase the range by 100%.  Most of the time when I want to use Intercept, the target is out of my range.  Tanking a fairly large mob like Waansu, I can't even Intercede on someone in the MT group standing right on the opposite side of the dragon, which often turns Intercede into a waste of an ability.</p><blockquote><ul><li>Enhance: Moderate now grants 1 crit bonus per point instead of additional hate gain reduction.</li></ul></blockquote><p>I can now buff <em>one single person</em> in my group (who isn't me) by 5 Crit Bonus in return for 5 AA points?</p><p>That is a complete joke.  It is lightyears away from making it worth any point investment whatsoever.</p><p>Did you know Defilers, at a price of 5 AA, are able to add 5 Crit Bonus to their entire group, themselves included, which amounts to a total of 30 Crit Bonus?</p><p>Even better, are you aware that Paladins add 5 Heal Potency and that Shadowknights add 5 Spell Potency to the <em>entire raid</em> without having to pay any AA points for it?  That's a total of, respectively, <em>120 Heal Potency</em> and<em> 120 Spell Damage Potency</em>.</p><p>How about adding 4 Crit Bonus per point invested in Enhance: Moderate for a max of 20.  A rather humble buff, I'd say, compared to what other classes are bringing to the table.</p><blockquote><ul><li>Enhance: Rescue has been moved to another tree and replaced with Enhance: Call of Shielding, which increases the effectiveness of that buff by 5% per point.</li></ul></blockquote><p>Call of Shielding is still useless, given that raid bosses completely ignore Defense.  That is to say, they never miss.  Please check any parse vs mobs like Xilaxis, Waansu, Toxxulia, Perah'Celsis, et al.  None of them miss.  Ever.</p><p>If the 25% bonus applies to the new 1000 HP component as well, adding another 250 HP, then it is a decent enough AA ability, but Call of Shielding itself is still utterly inferior compared to pretty much any other fighter raidwide buff.</p><p>Please replace the Defense component with something worthwhile, preferably something that adds DPS to the raid (e.g., 5 Crit Bonus), but if that isn't in the stars, then at least add something that improves survivability measurably vs raid mobs (e.g., 5 Crit Mit).</p><blockquote><ul><li>Enhance: Reinforcement has been moved to another tree and replaced with Enhance: Call to Arms, which increases the effectiveness of that buff by 7% per point.</li></ul></blockquote><p>Call to Arms is already inferior to the shadowknight and paladin equivalent buff; the additional combat skill points would just bring us up to par, only we would have to pay AA to get to where we should already be.</p><p>In addition to the combat skill improvement, add 1% Accuracy per AA, so 5 AA points would result in 5% Accuracy, and we would have arrived at an AA ability that I and other raiding guardians would actually want.</p><blockquote><p>The "Crippling" tree has been replaced with a new tree titled "Aggression."  This new tree is intended to provide extra threat generation, especially in cases where the Guardian doesn't have full hate buffs.</p></blockquote><p>I'm afraid you are missing several rather important points here. Above all, you have to understand that you aren't <em>giving</em> us new abilities.  You are asking us to <em>give up</em> existing abilities in order to invest in this new tree of yours.</p><p>Clearly, the tree that this one would be competing against is the Slaughtering tree, and quite frankly, a guardian would have to be completely clueless to think that he would get more hate generation out of his AA by shifting them from Slaughtering to Aggression.</p><p>Let me elaborate:</p><p>The group taunt change is so weak, it hurts to just look at it. 0.4 second reuse reduction per AA of an ability with borderline irrelevant hate per second? Is this supposed to help vs encounter hate generation?  If so, I'm sorry to say it fails utterly.</p><p>Try adding 20% more hate per AA, for a total of 100% more hate for 5 AA.</p><p>The Hate Modifier ability has simply got to go.</p><p>Even a non-raiding guardian can get a few marks and buy a fabled belt with 15% hate modifier from a vendor in Moonfield (or any number of other items with similar procs or bonuses).  Add to that 10% Hate Modifier from the Warrior Hate Modifier AA ability.  Now add a few crafted Hate Modifier adornments--Voila! You are capped.  Of course, once you get one of the countless dirges out there, or a coercer, in the group, you'll be sitting way beyond the 50% cap and feel pretty stupid.</p><p>Instead of 2% Hate Modifier per AA, how about raising the Hate Modifier <em>cap</em> by 4% per point for a total of 20% for 5 AA, so it would be possible to reach 70% Hate Modifier with buffs and gear?</p><p>And finally, a baby version of Amends ability?  Please.  We are not paladins.</p><p>Even if we did want a personal hate transferral buff, there is a 50% cap on Hate Transferral.  With a coercer and either an assassin or a swashbuckler--the standard raid setup--we are already capped. In a group entirely without hate transferrers, you're also capped the moment you click on the Stormbringer Bulwark of the Unstoppable buff (i.e., the Trakanon shield from tier 8 that permanently transfers 10% hate from everyone in your group).</p><p>Instead, how about giving us a maintainable buff that allows us to proc 2500 hate and 2500 slashing damage 5 times a minute?</p><p>Powerful? Obviously, but then, it takes powerful boosts to bring us closer to the rest of the fighters in terms of DPS and hate generation, and these changes by themselves still aren't even close to cutting it.</p><blockquote>Other AA changes:<ul><li>"Double Attack" in the Guardian tree has been replaced with 3% chance to flurry and has been renamed to "Flurry."</li></ul></blockquote><p>Pretty lacklustre compared to the crusader AA Knight's Stance, which for a mere 5 AA adds a whopping 25% Auto-Attack Modifier (unlike Flurry, this also applies to double attacks) while wearing a shield.</p><p>I would suggest that you change the ability to add 10% Flurry and 10% Strikethrough.</p><blockquote><ul><li>"Bind Wound" in the Warrior tree is now a 100% heal (still out of combat).</li></ul></blockquote><p>Now you just have to reduce the reuse time to 10 seconds, so it can actually be used after every fight, same as paladins are able to do with their heals.  </p><p>It isn't as though this can be abused, given that it is out-of-combat-only.</p><blockquote><ul><li>"Aggressive Nature" now increases the threat generated by Hold the Line by 5% per point instead of adding a threat proc on blocks (see below).</li></ul></blockquote><p>Combined with the other Hold the Line change, this is a pretty decent improvement.  You should, however, include parries, so we get the same hate when we parry.</p><blockquote><p> Class ability changes:</p><ul><li>Recapture now lowers the threat position of non-fighters in the Guardian's group to the target encounter. While that effect is only groupwide, the raidwide effect that increases the threat position of other fighters is still present. The reuse on this ability has been increased to 45 seconds.</li></ul></blockquote><p>Quote frankly, I'd rather that the ability remain unchanged if the price of any change is longer reuse time. Recapture has its uses when tank switches are required and/or hate wipes are involved (e.g., Toxxulia).</p><blockquote><ul><li>Iron Will now grants a reduction to snare effects on the Guardian in addition to the Stamina buff.</li></ul></blockquote><p>Snares aren't exactly a big problem in raid fights, especially not on the MT, who remains stationary under most circumstances.</p><p>Please change this to something actually useful, such as a 25% chance to resist target loss, charm, disarm, or mez, and turn the Stamina bonus into a plain HP bonus, so it actually does something--every single guardian in legendary gear at 90th has got to be capped in Stamina at this point.</p><blockquote><ul><li>Plant has been redesigned. It is now a blue AE target lock with a small threat component. The base duration of the target lock is 6 seconds with the level 90 master. The base casting time remains at 1 second, and the recast is still 60 seconds.</li></ul></blockquote><p>Unless 1) this ability has 25m range, and 2) affects every mob in existence, including raid mobs, who almost all seem to be immune to target force effects, this is complete rubbish.  I'd rather keep Plant as it is--at least it adds some small measure of survivability in groups where debuff caps can't be easily reached.</p><p>If you really wanted to make Plant truly useful, turn it into a togglable/maintainable root + knockback immunity buff, or keep it as it is, but change the debuffed stat to Auto-Attack Modifier and make the root unbreakable again with full duration vs raid mobs, just the way it used to be back in KoS and EoF.</p>

[aislynn00]

<p>If the proposed changes stand, I am sorely disappointed. </p><p>There is nothing whatsoever in the proposed changes which noticeably improves guardian DPS, nor do I see any significant survivability upgrades that would put us well ahead of the other tanks, especially paladins, who are currently the toughest fighters in the game, courtesy of their mythical 10% Damage Reduction + 10% auto-heal buff.</p><p>Either change mechanics and/or mobs, so guardians are the only fighters able to tank the hardest raid mobs, or boost our overall DPS (including raid- and group-wide buffs) to the same levels as crusaders and berserkers. </p><p>Otherwise, this well-meaning attempt to restore some manner of class balance amongst tanks cannot but fail.</p>

[Landiin]

<p>The only thing really lacking IMO is our sword and board DPS issues and serlf healing like crusaders or something to balance that out. We need an AA change to give us a butt load of DPS while using a shield like crusaders. Like others have said with the DPS checks in the game the tank with the most DPS will be the prefered DPS. Now if you are planning on knocking crusaders down to our level with a shield then that works to. Yes some of these changes are lack luster but some are [Removed for Content] good. As much as I would like every change to be as good as the best on I don't expect it. Keep on tweaking <img src="/eq2/images/smilies/3b63d1616c5dfcf29f8a7a031aaa7cad.gif" border="0" /></p>

[Loendar]

<p>We are still getting blown away on AE dmg/taunt and DPS overall.  By way of example - I ran through Library with my Guard tanking and it took roughly 30 minutes to get to the end with me bypassing anything that didn't need pulling.  I then went through the same zone with a comparably geared (and player skilled) SK and we were done in 10-15 minutes without a critter left alive in the zone.</p><p>The disparity is simply too large to ignore.  We need DPS and AE power on par with the other tanks or we should all start praying for a 'Class Change' potion to appear on the Station store so we can swap to SK's as well.</p><p>Edit: Also, why in the world does our 'death save' continue to kill us while not even granting anything approaching full health?  Our death save (without dumping AA into it) is more like a death put-offer and not a very good one at that.  Please change the way it works (and let us leave it up like Bloodletter) so we have reason to use it.</p>

[Gungo]

<p>If you have no intention of fixing Bulwark of the unstoppable (the trakanon shield plate tanks still use for hate transfer)Then you might as well make "Shoulder the Burden" into the same exact buff a 10% hate transfer on EACH member of a group. </p><p>People also seem to forget the above list was not the complete list of changes for guards. The Stone sphere change was a huge bump in survivability. You cant just massively increase survivability and hate and then request the same dps as every other tank. That simply is not balanced. </p>

[Landiin]

<p>I sort of agree Gongo but ATM any increase in survivability is useless because ATM no more is needed when a DPS tank can survive just as well we will use them instead of a defensive low dps tank.</p><p>I agree about our death save. When it was created yea the penalty was justified. Now it is not, guardians at this point should have their DS on par with SK's.</p>

[Holyduke1234]

<p><cite>Soul_Dreamer wrote:</cite></p><blockquote><p><cite>Xelgad wrote:</cite></p><blockquote><p><span style="color: #003366;"><strong>My comments in Blue bold</strong></span></p><p>To clarify, the intercept portion has been removed from Guardian Sphere. We have many more changes on the way.  Here are some of them, but this list is still not complete. Stability Tree:</p><ul><li>Enhance: Intercept now gives 2% damage reduction per point in addition to the reuse reduction.</li></ul><p><span style="color: #3366ff;">Reduction for the Guardian or for the target or both?</span></p><p><span style="color: #000080;"><strong><span style="color: #003366;">Considering at master the target takes 0% of the damage and the guardian takes 100%, this would mean after 5 points I will take 90% damage? Not all that earth shattering. Does this damage I am taking for my target even get mitigated? Make it 4% or even 5% each point and it might be worth investing some points in.</span></strong> </span></p><ul><li>Enhance: Moderate now grants 1 crit bonus per point instead of additional hate gain reduction.</li></ul><p><span style="color: #3366ff;">I'm not sure which would be best, potency or crit bonus, I've heard Crit bonus isn't working correctly for Shaman wards. Either way a nice change and means we give something to the group.</span></p><p><span style="color: #003300;"><strong><span style="color: #003366;">OMG please dont take this away; the additional hate gain reduction. If I have 2 or 3 heavy hitting DPS'ers in my group without being able to reduce their hate I'm going to lose agro all the time. If you want, add the extra 1% crit bonus, but please dont remove this! Scouts doing 60k get reduced to 45K. Giving me an extra 5% crit bonus is NOT going to give me that much more hate. Again the guardians main issue is DPS. Because of this we cannot hold agro without a perfect group setup. Dirge or Coecer or going dual weild or all 3. This is the one and only ability that we have that helps alot with groups.</span></strong></span></p><ul><li>Enhance: Rescue has been moved to another tree and replaced with Enhance: Call of Shielding, which increases the effectiveness of that buff by 5% per point.</li></ul><p><span style="color: #3366ff;">The "Defense" portion of this buff is still worthless though is my only complaint, any mob where you want to raise your avoidance to increase survivability that little bit more on, defense and parry are close to worthless. This part of the buff even if useful would still only benefit the fighter tanking. Is there any chance of the defence portion being changed to something useful for everyone? Something to help the whole raid survive would be my first idea.</span></p><p><strong><span style="color: #003366;">Agree with Xelgad 100%. Please something besides increases Defense of raid by a few extra points. What about a small stone skin proc for the raid. I am a guardian. A protector. .5% raid stone skin proc?  2.5% with 5 points dumped in it?</span></strong></p><ul><li>Enhance: Reinforcement has been moved to another tree and replaced with Enhance: Call to Arms, which increases the effectiveness of that buff by 7% per point. </li></ul><p><span style="color: #3366ff;">Hmm, not really very usefull unless it also effects the buffs added via the red adorn and the other AA for it, I'd suggest changing the buff this enhances since we already have an AA that enhances this ability. Maybe Enhance Sentinal: Add a chance to intercept magical attacks as well and greatly reduce the amount of damage intercepted down to about 10%, if a 10k AOE hits the target has a chance to only receive 50% say and I only intercept 20%. This ability also needs the amount intercepted lowered, I can't use this ability on some fighters since it has a chance to kill me <img src="/eq2/images/smilies/3b63d1616c5dfcf29f8a7a031aaa7cad.gif" border="0" /></span></p><p><span style="color: #3366ff;">All the Guardian abilities that have a chance to kill us need that part removing really or drastically reducing, other fighters when they buff the groups DPS don't have their DPS lowered as a result, why when we increase the groups survivability do we pay a survivability penalty ourselves?</span></p><p><strong><span style="color: #003366;">Ok its an upgrade. 7% I will assume will also include the ability modifier of group (118.6 Mastered/maxed) and increase curshing, piercing, slashing and ranged of group members by 33.6. So after 5 points it would be 160.11 and 45.3 crushing, etc. Well thanks for an extra 50 points damage for the group and the extra 12 crushing, etc. As long as everyone is not maxed this will help everyone.... a little. </span></strong></p><p><strong><span style="color: #003366;">This reminds me of the SK ability Essence Siphon. Recast 25 seconds last 30 seconds. What does it do? Increases INT and STR of group by 77, increase ability modifier by 140, inflicts 2,500 damage and decrease the same things on the mob.</span></strong></p><p><strong><span style="color: #003366;">Also agree with what Xelgad is saying on the abilities that kill the guardian.</span></strong></p><p>The "Crippling" tree has been replaced with a new tree titled "Aggression."  This new tree is intended to provide extra threat generation, especially in cases where the Guardian doesn't have full hate buffs.  Aggression Tree:</p><ul><li>Enhance: Provoke, which grants 7% potency to the taunt with each point.</li></ul><span style="color: #3366ff;"><img src="/eq2/images/smilies/e8a506dc4ad763aca51bec4ca7dc8560.gif" border="0" /> <span style="color: #003366;"><strong><-- big thumbs up!!</strong></span></span><ul><li>Enhance: Shout, which reduces the reuse of the ability by 0.4 seconds per point and improves the resistability by 2% per point.</li></ul><p><span style="color: #3366ff;">Not a fan, not a fan at all really, can it not do as the above AA and add potency, this reduces the recast to 8  seconds, (~7 with int line). It would be a lot more player friendly if it was increased by ~20% (5x4%) rather than have it's reuse lowered so we have to mash it every time it's up to get the benefit of the AA. We don't want to be taunt bots so can the same benefit be added but in potency?</span></p><p><span style="color: #003366;"><strong>I dont mind this. It will help with agro on a group. So I am going to give it a thumbs up. Anything that will help with group encounters is welcomed. Having it "taunt harder" would be better so we are not mashing this button, Xelgad has a good point.</strong></span></p><ul><li>Enhance: Hatred, which offers 2% hate mod per point.</li></ul><p><span style="white-space: pre;"><span style="color: #3366ff;">I can't see myself using it but some will so good change.</span></span></p><p><span style="white-space: pre;"><span style="color: #003366;"><strong>More hate = better guardian</strong></span></span></p><ul><li>Enhance: Rescue, which is the same as it was in the Stability tree.</li><li>Enhance: Reinforcement, which is the same as it was in the Stability tree.</li></ul><p><span style="color: #3366ff;">Not entirely sure why these have been moved but I'm sure I'll cope. </span></p><p><span style="color: #003366;"><strong>Ok</strong></span></p><ul><li>Shoulder the Burden, which is a 10% hate siphon that can be placed on any group member. </li></ul><p><span style="color: #3366ff;">Useful in groups, not so much in a raid unless you're in a 3 healer group, I suppose then siphoning off the dirge could be useful. Good change.</span></p><p><span style="color: #3366ff;"><strong><span style="color: #003366;">again...</span><span style="white-space: pre;"><span style="color: #003366;">More hate = better guardian. Watch out pally's we are coming after you!</span></span></strong></span></p><p> Other AA changes:</p><ul><li>"Double Attack" in the Guardian tree has been replaced with 3% chance to flurry and has been renamed to "Flurry."</li></ul><p><img src="/eq2/images/smilies/e8a506dc4ad763aca51bec4ca7dc8560.gif" border="0" /> <span style="color: #3366ff;">but more please <img src="/eq2/images/smilies/3b63d1616c5dfcf29f8a7a031aaa7cad.gif" border="0" /></span></p><p><span style="color: #003366;"><strong>With 5 points that would be 15% flurry. THANK YOU!!!</strong></span></p><ul><li>"Bind Wound" in the Warrior tree is now a 100% heal (still out of combat).</li></ul><p><span style="white-space: pre;"><span style="color: #3366ff;">Huh, no clue why this change happened.</span></span></p><p><strong><span style="color: #003366;">Sounds good. BG mainly, get that health back fast before the next fight.</span></strong></p><ul><li>Enhance: Plant now increases the duration of the ability by only 0.4 seconds per point (see below).</li></ul><p><span style="color: #003366;"><strong>OK so we can lock all targets on us for 6 seconds. and it has a small hate proc? I hope after the 6 seconds we can hold onto them. At least this will give us something we can use. </strong></span></p><p><strong><span style="color: #003366;">All tanks get Rescue, and can get Sneering Assault, and Cry of the Warrior.</span></strong></p><p><span style="color: #003366;"><strong>Looking at our brother Berserker they get Insolence and Jeering Inslaught. Jeering is a rescue AoE that they can use every 45 seconds.... 45 seconds! 3 hate proc and damage proc. Same for Insolence Damage proc and hate. </strong></span></p><p><strong><span style="color: #003366;">SK's have Grav Sacrament. </span></strong><strong><span style="color: #003366;">Does 3,200 - 4,700 Disease damage AoE PLUS 1,500 - 2,200 Disease AoE every 4 seconds. PLUS increases threat by 2 AoE, PLUS Increases threat AoE by 7,800 - 9,100 instantly and by 7,500 - 9,100 every 4 seconds lasting 20 seconds. recast is 2 minutes 45 seconds. AND they get Death march recast every 2 minutes 15 seconds. </span></strong></p><p><span style="color: #003366;"><strong>We get Reinforcement last 15 seconds (more with points) and increase hate everytime we hit plus 1,600 threat, recast every 1 minute 45 seconds. Plus now we will be able to "lock them" for 6 seconds. Personally SK, Pally's and Zerkers have more ago tools then we do. If this is the only bone we can get I will glady take it but its a very small bone.</strong></span></p><p><strong><span style="color: #003366;">Do you see the same theme? All other tanks are getting Damage procs. While we get a little hate proc. OK, like I said. Thank you sir, I will take anything you are willing to give us but you are offering very little.</span></strong></p><ul><li>"Aggressive Nature" now increases the threat generated by Hold the Line by 5% per point instead of adding a threat proc on blocks (see below).</li></ul><p> <span style="white-space: pre;"><span style="color: #3366ff;"> See below.</span></span></p><strong><span style="color: #003366;">I like this one. If I am getting hit, I will generate more hate, but I need to try my hardest to do everything I can so I dont get hit. Talk about a catch 22! </span></strong></blockquote><blockquote><p>Class ability changes:</p><ul><li>Recapture now lowers the threat position of non-fighters in the Guardian's group to the target encounter. While that effect is only groupwide, the raidwide effect that increases the threat position of other fighters is still present. The reuse on this ability has been increased to 45 seconds.</li></ul><p><span style="white-space: pre;"><span style="color: #3366ff;">Shame about the 50% increase in reuse when the ability should really have worked this way from start. </span></span><span style="color: #3366ff;">Any chance of leaving it at 30 seconds?</span></p><p><span style="color: #003366;"><strong>Well good move. This will be like a reverse rescue of sorts. Lower everyone else and raise my position. 45 seconds is ok. I use recapture alot if I need to send a mob to another tank. or switching on fights like sara green heart. Could we have 40 seconds reuse if not 30?</strong></span></p><ul><li>Iron Will now grants a reduction to snare effects on the Guardian in addition to the Stamina buff.</li></ul><p><span style="color: #3366ff;">Except very low levels the stamina buff doesn't actually do anything, even heroic legendary geared Guardians are very close or over the stamina cap at level 90. We only have one offensive buff not counting offensive stance, can this be changed to : procs 500 mental damage and then 500 hate to every CA for the next 10 seconds. 2 times a min proc rate. A tiny DPS increase and a hate increase.</span></p><p><span style="color: #003366;"><strong>I feel like Oliver. Getting a bowl of watery soup while all the rich kids are eating steak. "Please sir may I have some more?"I guess someone had to get stuck with the STA group and raid wide buff.. or wait thats a SK that also increases spell damage by 4.38% and potency (with AA) by 1.3% group and raid wide. </strong></span></p><p><span style="color: #003366;"><strong>We are talking about the guardians self STA buff that gives us 80ish STA. So looks like we are getting a chance of not being snared? ** looks at his mythical/epic buff says chance to proc 1.8 per minute a 10 second immunity to Stun, Stifle, root, Fear and Daze. Well what do you know, snare is not there. </strong></span></p><p><strong><span style="color: #003366;">Could I suggest we get something called Aura of the Guardian? A spell/combat art that we can cast that would dispel hostile root, daze, etc and then give us 20 seconds of immunity to these effects. Let us recast that every 50 seconds?.... oh wait, Pallys and SK's already have those, my bad. Thank you for the reduction of snare effects.</span></strong></p><ul><li>Plant has been redesigned. It is now a blue AE target lock with a small threat component. The base duration of the target lock is 6 seconds with the level 90 master. The base casting time remains at 1 second, and the recast is still 60 seconds.</li></ul><span style="white-space: pre;"><span style="color: #3366ff;">Only problem being soo many mobs are immune to target locks, a large AOE hate and DPS tool would be preferable and remove the target lock.</span></span><ul><li>Hold the Line now has the "Aggressive Nature" effect automatically built into the ability. It's as if you spent the 5 AA points in the Shadows tree without actually having to spend the points.  "Aggressive Defense," a Berserker ability, recieved the same change.</li></ul><span style="white-space: pre;"><span style="color: #3366ff;">Just buffed Zerkers in an area they really don't need buffing (hate) as well but for a pure Guardian perspective is a nice change.</span></span><p>Keep the feedback coming! The discussion has obviously shifted beyond just utility, and we're looking for feedback on all of these changes.  Any other suggestions for the class are welcomed as well, but understand that we are focusing mostly on more general changes rather than class or AA ability changes to solve the survivability problem.</p></blockquote><p><span style="color: #3366ff;">The main issues I have here are:</span></p><p><span style="color: #3366ff;">A.) While there are hate changes to increase hate, I don't think they go far enough, not enough to balace hate across the fighters. *</span></p><p><span style="color: #003366;"><strong>/Agree</strong></span></p><p><span style="color: #3366ff;">B.) No DPS changes, the game is all about DPS now and nothing in the above changes where we stand with the other fighters, which is often more than  50% less in the same setting. **</span></p><p><span style="color: #3366ff;"><span style="color: #003366;"><strong>/Agree</strong></span>Think of it this way... Some mobs have DPS checks, not enough DPS in the raid/group and the mob doesn't die, it's that simple. SK/Zerk/Pally bring very very respectable DPS and can take hits as much as is required. Guardian bring next to no DPS and there is no call for our extra survivability. </span></p><p><span style="color: #3366ff;"><span style="color: #003366;"><strong>/Agree</strong></span>For this to be balanced, the Guardian needs to be survivable enough that a healer or other class can be dropped and another DPS added to balance it out. The raids DPS needs to stay the same, 1 tank lives easier so you can bring the extra DPS, another tank needs more healing but DPS's so you don't need the extra DPS...</span></p><p><span style="color: #003366;"><strong> /Agree</strong></span></p><p><span style="color: #3366ff;">*To effectively tank, all fighters need to be being hit, all the survivability in the world means nothing if the fighter doesn't have the mob on him in the first place. DPS have been driven time and time again in the direction of not having to manage their hate, they really, really hate it when a Guardian pops in group and they are forced to or die.</span></p><p><strong><span style="color: #003366;"> /Agree</span></strong></p><p><span style="color: #3366ff;">** The only way I can effectively see this working is if in the mechanics changes you're eluding to, other plate fighters loose survivability, to an extent that survivability to Hate/Utility is balanced. Currently it's not, and not in a big way, if the mechanics change doesn't fix this issue then Guardians need more DPS to compete.</span></p><span style="color: #003366;"><strong>/Agree</strong></span><p><span style="color: #003366;"><strong>My comments.</strong></span></p><p><span style="color: #003366;"><strong>Make me a guardian that is wanted. I want to be the rock of a group or raid. Tough-as-nails and able to take a beating. My two jobs are staying alive and holding ago. If that needs to be done by hate and not DPS I am fine with that. We each have a role to play in this game. Mine was being the end all "take a beating tank" that can survive where other tanks cannot. This is no longer the case which is why we are here now talking about guardians.</strong></span></p><p><span style="color: #003366;"><strong>If you need ideas look at the other tanks and compare what they have to what a guardian has. You will see a big difference in what they bring to groups and raids. Give us some utility that sets us apart. </strong></span></p><p><span style="color: #003366;"><strong>Raid stone skin </strong></span></p><p><span style="color: #003366;"><strong>Raid ward against physical damage.. something that Protects our raid and/or group. </strong></span></p><p><span style="color: #003366;"><strong>Even a group AoE blocker so our healers dont have to joust out. 3 person AoE blocker short range?</strong></span></p><p><strong><span style="color: #003366;">Have an AA that turns our taunts into damage also. So for every 100 point taunt or threat we do 1 point of slashing damage. Spend 5 points and get 5 slashing damage per 100?</span></strong></p><p><strong><span style="color: #003366;">As far as what you have posted the flurry is the best... but we lose double attack. It seems everything you offer us you take something away. Or what you are offering is a very small upgrade.</span></strong></p><p><strong><span style="color: #003366;">Still this guardian is happy for what you are doing. *Picks up his bowl*, please sir, can I have some more?</span></strong></p></blockquote>

[Rhita]

<p><cite>Holyduke1234 wrote:</cite></p><blockquote><p><cite>Soul_Dreamer wrote:</cite></p><blockquote><p><cite>Xelgad wrote:</cite></p><blockquote><ul><li>Enhance: Moderate now grants 1 crit bonus per point instead of additional hate gain reduction.</li></ul><p><span style="color: #3366ff;">I'm not sure which would be best, potency or crit bonus, I've heard Crit bonus isn't working correctly for Shaman wards. Either way a nice change and means we give something to the group.</span></p><p><span style="color: #003300;"><strong><span style="font-size: small; color: #ff0000;">OMG please dont take this away; the additional hate gain reduction. If I have 2 or 3 heavy hitting DPS'ers in my group without being able to reduce their hate I'm going to lose agro all the time. If you want, add the extra 1% crit bonus, but please dont remove this! Scouts doing 60k get reduced to 45K. Giving me an extra 5% crit bonus is NOT going to give me that much more hate. Again the guardians main issue is DPS. Because of this we cannot hold agro without a perfect group setup. Dirge or Coecer or going dual weild or all 3. This is the one and only ability that we have that helps alot with groups.</span></strong></span></p></blockquote></blockquote></blockquote><p>Dude, get improved moderate and then with just regular moderate, they are at the dehate cap. The crit bonus is needed. The extra -10% hate is lame and always has been.</p>

[spudsmckenzie2]

<p>just a thought but when im tanking on my guardian i often just cringe on using taunting assault cause its slow casting and often dont help much. perhaps cutting the recast time in half and drop the casting speed to 1 sec and any mob hit by it has a 20% chance to go up 1 hate position on guard hate.</p><p> also, perhaps some abilities that protect us from aoe's like sk's get that would be nice also....seems like i die to hellish flames from wasnu more then i should....thank you</p>

[steveatk]

<p>It doesn't do anywhere near enough for agro holding but there are some nice changes in there for the heroic Guardians especially. I like the new "Shoulder the Burden" end line AA however I think it should be 10% from every group member just like the Trak shield. The new "Hatred" AA in the Aggression tree should proc hate on CA's in my opinion. We don't need any more +hate mod as Heroic guards can cap it with the existing AA and gear whilst raid guards cap it with Dirge and Coercer. A hate proc would be much more useful for all levels of play.Also the self STA buff really needs changing. It doesn't gve me anything because I'm over cap on STA so it needs to be plain old Health instead.</p>

[aislynn00]

<p><cite>Gungo wrote:</cite></p><blockquote><p>People also seem to forget the above list was not the complete list of changes for guards. The Stone sphere change was a huge bump in survivability. You cant just massively increase survivability and hate and then request the same dps as every other tank. That simply is not balanced. </p></blockquote><p>1) The Guardian Sphere change is a situational bump in survivability for an instance group, or in raids, when the proverbial excrement hits the fan and adds are loose.  That said, however, it isn't anything like an AE blocker or a damage reducer.</p><p>Perhaps you don't know how it works, so I'll elaborate:</p><p>Whenever you take damage and GS is running, GS has a chance of proc'ing a stoneskin on you.  Do note: This stoneskin does <em>nothing</em> to help against the damage that actually <em>caused</em> it to proc.  If you were hit by an AE, the AE still deals its normal damage; you just have a stoneskin sitting on you for 10 seconds after the AE hit. </p><p>Now, if a <em>second</em> AE hits before those 10 seconds are up, it will be blocked by said stoneskin.  Great!  However, if you don't take damage during those 10 seconds, too bad; the stoneskin didn't do jack.</p><p>In other words, unless your group members are taking damage more frequently than every 10 seconds, which isn't the case even vs mobs with a lot of AE's, such as Waansu, GS doesn't improve group survivability at all.  Every other AE, on the average, will just proc a stoneskin, which will then sit unused and expire.</p><p>In order for GS to help the group as intended on raids, the duration of the stoneskins should be extended to at least 20 sec, or GS should just afford 50% Damage Reduction to every non-fighter in the group and 25% Damage Reduction to the guardian himself for the duration.</p><p>2) As for the guardian himself, the GS change isn't bad, but it really isn't much to write home about.  It only means he is able to use the ability in a few situations he wouldn't otherwise have been able to. </p><p>Personally, I have been using it on raids for years without issues.  It only has a 10m range, so vs any enemy with a large-ish hit box, even the dirge right on the opposite side of the mob, is out of range.  In encounters where I otherwise wouldn't be able to use it (i.e., mobs with a small hit box), I just ask the MT group scouts to move back a bit when they see my Guardian Sphere macro.</p><p>The problem with the ability, though, is that it is unreliable, and even in its new guise, remains situational. </p><p>On one hand, it doesn't improve guardian baseline survivability: When GS isn't up, I won't be taking less damage, so you aren't going to pick a guardian to tank a tough mob because of this ability. </p><p>On the other hand, even when GS is running, I don't actually know for certain that I'm going to stop or reduce incoming damage for a while (i.e., sometimes you get only one or two procs over the course of the entire duration), so it isn't really good to use in response to damage spikes.</p><p>I would much rather have a temporary 25% Damage Reduction buff (like a half-strength Adrenaline) with the current reuse of GS or a maintainable 5% - 10% Damage Reduction buff--one could be used more reliably vs damage spikes while the other would increase baseline survivability, which I think guardians need: aside from still lacking a maintainable death preventer (I still haven't given up hope that Unyielding Will will become a maintainable buff), we have enough damage spike compensation abilities in Block, ToS, and Last Man Standing.</p><p>3) In order for any amount of survivability to mean anything, it has to be needed.  You show me mobs that require a guardian tank, then I'll stop asking for more DPS.</p>

[Soul_Dreamer]

<p><span style="font-size: 11.6667px;">Holydude1234...</span></p><p><span style="font-size: 11.6667px;">1. ) The change to double attack will only be 3%, you can only put 1 point into the end ability of the AA trees.</span></p><p>2. ) I'm not Xelgad <img src="/eq2/images/smilies/3b63d1616c5dfcf29f8a7a031aaa7cad.gif" border="0" /></p><p>---------------------------------------------</p><p>Hmm..</p><p>I've thought some more about Guardian sphere.. on the initial cast can you make it put up the stoneskin on the group? The ability will then work to protect against immediate damage if you get it off before a mob reaches a group member and it will also protect against an immediate AOE. It's not exactly a large change, but provides the utility it should in a predictable manner, rather than just casting and hoping the group take damage to proc it before they are protected. </p><p>Can't remember who said it but I really like the idea for Enhance:Hatred, instead of base hate, why not add small amounts of hate to each CA. The hate mod is all well and good but we have it already in another place and it won't be useful to everyone, a proc of 300-500 hate on every CA will however help everyone. Say our average CA hit is 3000, 10% hate on top is 300, just adding the 300 hate to all CA's works out about the same does it not? </p><p>I firmly agree with what a lot of people are saying about DPS but I believe we can't really give educated feedback on the DPS state until we know what this mechanics change is, if the change makes it so Guardians are once again needed for their extra survivability especially against Hard mode mobs, or harder heroic instances for the more legendary player then I think it would be ok to leave DPS for it. I'd vote to make some of the amendments proposed in feedback to these changes for hate gain and we'll have to wait and see on the DPS front. If (and is likely to be the case) any tank can still tank any content after the mechanics change, then our DPS needs to be improved.</p>

[Pervis]

<p><cite>Holyduke1234 wrote:</cite></p><blockquote><span style="color: #003366;"><strong>With 5 points that would be 15% flurry. THANK YOU!!!</strong></span></blockquote><p>I am not sure if they plan on changing this, but as of right now you can only get one rank in Double Attack.</p><p>Since Flurry is just replacing Double Attack, unless they say otherwise, it should be assumed that only one rank of Flurry is avalible, thus only 3%.</p>

[Wulfghar]

<p><cite>Holyduke1234 wrote:</cite></p><blockquote><p><cite>Soul_Dreamer wrote:</cite></p><blockquote><p><cite>Xelgad wrote:</cite></p><blockquote><ul><li>Enhance: Moderate now grants 1 crit bonus per point instead of additional hate gain reduction.</li></ul><p><span style="color: #3366ff;">I'm not sure which would be best, potency or crit bonus, I've heard Crit bonus isn't working correctly for Shaman wards. Either way a nice change and means we give something to the group.</span></p><p><span style="color: #003300;"><strong><span style="color: #003366;">OMG please dont take this away; the additional hate gain reduction. If I have 2 or 3 heavy hitting DPS'ers in my group without being able to reduce their hate I'm going to lose agro all the time. If you want, add the extra 1% crit bonus, but please dont remove this! Scouts doing 60k get reduced to 45K. Giving me an extra 5% crit bonus is NOT going to give me that much more hate. Again the guardians main issue is DPS. Because of this we cannot hold agro without a perfect group setup. Dirge or Coecer or going dual weild or all 3. This is the one and only ability that we have that helps alot with groups.</span><span style="color: #003366;"><span style="color: #ff0000;"> - As was posted previously, Group Moderate ftw if you have that much trouble.</span></span></strong></span></p><ul><li>Enhance: Call to Arms, which increases the effectiveness of that buff by 7% per point. </li></ul><p><span style="color: #3366ff;">Hmm, not really very usefull unless it also effects the buffs added via the red adorn and the other AA for it, I'd suggest changing the buff this enhances since we already have an AA that enhances this ability. Maybe Enhance Sentinal: Add a chance to intercept magical attacks as well and greatly reduce the amount of damage intercepted down to about 10%, if a 10k AOE hits the target has a chance to only receive 50% say and I only intercept 20%. This ability also needs the amount intercepted lowered, I can't use this ability on some fighters since it has a chance to kill me <img src="/eq2/images/smilies/3b63d1616c5dfcf29f8a7a031aaa7cad.gif" border="0" /></span></p><p><span style="color: #3366ff;">All the Guardian abilities that have a chance to kill us need that part removing really or drastically reducing, other fighters when they buff the groups DPS don't have their DPS lowered as a result, why when we increase the groups survivability do we pay a survivability penalty ourselves?</span></p><p><strong><span style="color: #003366;">Ok its an upgrade. 7% I will assume will also include the ability modifier of group (118.6 Mastered/maxed) and increase curshing, piercing, slashing and ranged of group members by 33.6. So after 5 points it would be 160.11 and 45.3 crushing, etc. Well thanks for an extra 50 points damage for the group and the extra 12 crushing, etc. As long as everyone is not maxed this will help everyone.... a little. </span><span style="color: #003366;"><span style="color: #ff0000;">- A little clarification is needed, but I doubt the 7% increase will apply to the ability modifier portion due to its origin being from an AA line.</span></span></strong></p><p><strong><span style="color: #003366;">This reminds me of the SK ability Essence Siphon. Recast 25 seconds last 30 seconds. What does it do? Increases INT and STR of group by 77, increase ability modifier by 140, inflicts 2,500 damage and decrease the same things on the mob.</span></strong></p><p><strong><span style="color: #003366;">Also agree with what Xelgad is saying on the abilities that kill the guardian.</span></strong></p><p>The "Crippling" tree has been replaced with a new tree titled "Aggression."  This new tree is intended to provide extra threat generation, especially in cases where the Guardian doesn't have full hate buffs.  Aggression Tree:</p><ul><li>Enhance: Provoke, which grants 7% potency to the taunt with each point.</li></ul><span style="color: #3366ff;"><img src="/eq2/images/smilies/e8a506dc4ad763aca51bec4ca7dc8560.gif" border="0" /> <span style="color: #003366;"><strong><-- big thumbs up!!<span style="color: #ff0000;"> - Not worth spending 5 points on.</span></strong></span></span><ul><li>Enhance: Hatred, which offers 2% hate mod per point.</li></ul><p><span style="white-space: pre;"><span style="color: #3366ff;">I can't see myself using it but some will so good change.</span></span></p><p><span style="white-space: pre;"><span style="color: #003366;"><strong>More hate = better guardian<span style="color: #ff0000;"> - Obviously you don't know how hate mod works, or perhaps you skimmed over the dozens of posts pointing it out. Hate mod caps at 50%, which is easily attainable via gear/adorns, or good ol' dirge/coercer buffs.</span></strong></span></span></p><ul><li>Shoulder the Burden, which is a 10% hate siphon that can be placed on any group member. </li></ul><p><span style="color: #3366ff;">Useful in groups, not so much in a raid unless you're in a 3 healer group, I suppose then siphoning off the dirge could be useful. Good change.</span></p><p><span style="color: #3366ff;"><strong><span style="color: #003366;">again...</span><span style="white-space: pre;"><span style="color: #003366;">More hate = better guardian. Watch out pally's we are coming after you! </span><span style="color: #003366;"><span style="color: #ff0000;">- Your enthusiasm is as fake as our need for more hate mod or hate siphon/transfer.</span></span></span></strong></span></p><p> Other AA changes:</p><ul><li>"Double Attack" in the Guardian tree has been replaced with 3% chance to flurry and has been renamed to "Flurry."</li></ul><p><img src="/eq2/images/smilies/e8a506dc4ad763aca51bec4ca7dc8560.gif" border="0" /> <span style="color: #3366ff;">but more please <img src="/eq2/images/smilies/3b63d1616c5dfcf29f8a7a031aaa7cad.gif" border="0" /></span></p><p><span style="color: #003366;"><strong>With 5 points that would be 15% flurry. THANK YOU!!!<span style="color: #ff0000;"> - ....You do realize that "Double Attack" is an ability which only allows 1 point, seeing as its an endline?  So, theoretically "Flurry" would also only allow 1 point for a maximum of 3%, which is nice to look at, but nowhere enough.</span></strong></span></p><ul><li>Enhance: Plant now increases the duration of the ability by only 0.4 seconds per point (see below).</li></ul><p><span style="color: #003366;"><strong>OK so we can lock all targets on us for 6 seconds. and it has a small hate proc? I hope after the 6 seconds we can hold onto them. At least this will give us something we can use. </strong></span></p><p><strong><span style="color: #003366;">All tanks get Rescue, and can get Sneering Assault, and Cry of the Warrior.</span></strong></p><p><span style="color: #003366;"><strong>Looking at our brother Berserker they get Insolence and Jeering Inslaught. Jeering is a rescue AoE that they can use every 45 seconds.... 45 seconds! 3 hate proc and damage proc. Same for Insolence Damage proc and hate. </strong></span></p><p><strong><span style="color: #003366;">SK's have Grav Sacrament. </span></strong><strong><span style="color: #003366;">Does 3,200 - 4,700 Disease damage AoE PLUS 1,500 - 2,200 Disease AoE every 4 seconds. PLUS increases threat by 2 AoE, PLUS Increases threat AoE by 7,800 - 9,100 instantly and by 7,500 - 9,100 every 4 seconds lasting 20 seconds. recast is 2 minutes 45 seconds. AND they get Death march recast every 2 minutes 15 seconds. </span></strong></p><p><span style="color: #003366;"><strong>We get Reinforcement last 15 seconds (more with points) and increase hate everytime we hit plus 1,600 threat, recast every 1 minute 45 seconds. Plus now we will be able to "lock them" for 6 seconds. Personally SK, Pally's and Zerkers have more ago tools then we do. If this is the only bone we can get I will glady take it but its a very small bone.</strong></span></p><p><strong><span style="color: #003366;">Do you see the same theme? All other tanks are getting Damage procs. While we get a little hate proc. OK, like I said. Thank you sir, I will take anything you are willing to give us but you are offering very little.</span><span style="color: #003366;"><span style="color: #ff0000;"> - This may help with heroic content or battlegrounds, but has almost no use whatsoever in epic content.  Personally I agree with previous posters that it should be one of 2 things: a.) A toggleable buff that provides immunity to kickback/etc, or b.) A blue background AE with either threat or positional hate up front and over time.</span></span></strong></p><ul><li>"Aggressive Nature" now increases the threat generated by Hold the Line by 5% per point instead of adding a threat proc on blocks (see below).</li></ul><p> <span style="white-space: pre;"><span style="color: #3366ff;"> See below.</span></span></p><strong><span style="color: #003366;">I like this one. If I am getting hit, I will generate more hate, but I need to try my hardest to do everything I can so I dont get hit. Talk about a catch 22! </span><span style="color: #003366;"><span style="color: #ff0000;">- For the first time, you really hit the nail on the head.  Tanking is about living as long as you can and holding agro the best you can(TPS).  Part of survival is negating incoming damage via stoneskins and block, which reduces the effectiveness of this ability.  With the change to Sphere, this will be even more so.</span></span></strong></blockquote><blockquote><p>Class ability changes:</p><ul><li>Recapture now lowers the threat position of non-fighters in the Guardian's group to the target encounter. While that effect is only groupwide, the raidwide effect that increases the threat position of other fighters is still present. The reuse on this ability has been increased to 45 seconds.</li></ul><p><span style="white-space: pre;"><span style="color: #3366ff;">Shame about the 50% increase in reuse when the ability should really have worked this way from start. </span></span><span style="color: #3366ff;">Any chance of leaving it at 30 seconds?</span></p><p><span style="color: #003366;"><strong>Well good move. This will be like a reverse rescue of sorts. Lower everyone else and raise my position. 45 seconds is ok. I use recapture alot if I need to send a mob to another tank. or switching on fights like sara green heart. Could we have 40 seconds reuse if not 30?<span style="color: #ff0000;"> - Personally I say leave it as it was originally if this is the proposed change.  If we can get a fix to our DPS problem, we won't need to lower the threat position of our group, now will we?</span></strong></span></p><ul><li>Iron Will now grants a reduction to snare effects on the Guardian in addition to the Stamina buff.</li></ul><p><span style="color: #3366ff;">Except very low levels the stamina buff doesn't actually do anything, even heroic legendary geared Guardians are very close or over the stamina cap at level 90. We only have one offensive buff not counting offensive stance, can this be changed to : procs 500 mental damage and then 500 hate to every CA for the next 10 seconds. 2 times a min proc rate. A tiny DPS increase and a hate increase.</span></p><p><span style="color: #003366;"><strong>I feel like Oliver. Getting a bowl of watery soup while all the rich kids are eating steak. "Please sir may I have some more?"I guess someone had to get stuck with the STA group and raid wide buff.. or wait thats a SK that also increases spell damage by 4.38% and potency (with AA) by 1.3% group and raid wide. </strong></span></p><p><span style="color: #003366;"><strong>We are talking about the guardians self STA buff that gives us 80ish STA. So looks like we are getting a chance of not being snared? ** looks at his mythical/epic buff says chance to proc 1.8 per minute a 10 second immunity to Stun, Stifle, root, Fear and Daze. Well what do you know, snare is not there. </strong></span></p><p><strong><span style="color: #003366;">Could I suggest we get something called Aura of the Guardian? A spell/combat art that we can cast that would dispel hostile root, daze, etc and then give us 20 seconds of immunity to these effects. Let us recast that every 50 seconds?.... oh wait, Pallys and SK's already have those, my bad. Thank you for the reduction of snare effects. </span><span style="color: #003366;"><span style="color: #ff0000;">- Well said.  SK's get an addition to their group buff that adds 10% casting speed and reuse, we get...[Removed for Content]?  Ability modifier and accuracy?  Accuracy by itself is nice, but couple it with something more beefy than AM.  For the STA buff, make it % based increase to your HP pool.  3% at Expert level and 5% at Master level.</span></span></strong></p></blockquote><p><span style="color: #3366ff;">The main issues I have here are:</span></p><p><span style="color: #3366ff;">A.) While there are hate changes to increase hate, I don't think they go far enough, not enough to balace hate across the fighters. *</span></p><p><span style="color: #003366;"><strong>/Agree </strong></span></p><p><span style="color: #ff0000;">- While I do agree that changes aren't going far enough(or in the right direction), I believe that we need more work like the addition of flurry, rather than increases to taunt size or hate mod/xfer.</span></p><p><span style="color: #3366ff;">B.) No DPS changes, the game is all about DPS now and nothing in the above changes where we stand with the other fighters, which is often more than  50% less in the same setting. **</span></p><p><span style="color: #3366ff;"><span style="color: #003366;"><strong>/Agree</strong></span></span></p><p><span style="color: #3366ff;"><span style="color: #003366;"><strong></strong></span><span style="color: #ff0000;">- I also completely agree, and will continue to agree until changes are made to remedy this situation.  Perhaps it might help if one of the Devs in charge of making these changes actually played a Guardian in current content.  Perhaps after they feel the sting of getting your ego handed to you by an SK with an evil grin and a chuckle, they might start thinking along the right lines.</span>Think of it this way... Some mobs have DPS checks, not enough DPS in the raid/group and the mob doesn't die, it's that simple. SK/Zerk/Pally bring very very respectable DPS and can take hits as much as is required. Guardian bring next to no DPS and there is no call for our extra survivability. </span></p><p><span style="color: #3366ff;"><span style="color: #003366;"><strong>/Agree</strong></span></span></p><p><span style="color: #3366ff;"><span style="color: #ff0000;">- Ditto.  Moar DoTs! (DD's would work too, <img src="/eq2/images/smilies/908627bbe5e9f6a080977db8c365caff.gif" border="0" />)</span>** The only way I can effectively see this working is if in the mechanics changes you're eluding to, other plate fighters loose survivability, to an extent that survivability to Hate/Utility is balanced. Currently it's not, and not in a big way, if the mechanics change doesn't fix this issue then Guardians need more DPS to compete.</span></p><p><strong>/Agree</strong></p><p><span style="color: #ff0000;">- I would think changing the mechanics of an entire expansion's content would be a tad bit more involved than reworking an outdated class to allow for more DPS.  Reworking existing content = Guardians in the same boat next year.  Reworking the Guardian class = Guardians taken seriously from now on.</span></p><p><span style="color: #003366;"><strong>My comments.</strong></span></p><p><span style="color: #003366;"><strong>Make me a guardian that is wanted. I want to be the rock of a group or raid. Tough-as-nails and able to take a beating. My two jobs are staying alive and holding ago. If that needs to be done by hate and not DPS I am fine with that. We each have a role to play in this game. Mine was being the end all "take a beating tank" that can survive where other tanks cannot. This is no longer the case which is why we are here now talking about guardians.</strong></span></p><p><span style="color: #003366;"><strong>If you need ideas look at the other tanks and compare what they have to what a guardian has. You will see a big difference in what they bring to groups and raids. Give us some utility that sets us apart. </strong></span></p><p><span style="color: #003366;"><strong>Raid stone skin </strong></span></p><p><span style="color: #003366;"><strong>Raid ward against physical damage.. something that Protects our raid and/or group. </strong></span></p><p><span style="color: #003366;"><strong>Even a group AoE blocker so our healers dont have to joust out. 3 person AoE blocker short range?</strong></span></p><p><strong><span style="color: #003366;">Have an AA that turns our taunts into damage also. So for every 100 point taunt or threat we do 1 point of slashing damage. Spend 5 points and get 5 slashing damage per 100?</span></strong></p><p><strong><span style="color: #003366;">As far as what you have posted the flurry is the best... but we lose double attack. It seems everything you offer us you take something away. Or what you are offering is a very small upgrade.</span></strong></p><p><strong><span style="color: #003366;">Still this guardian is happy for what you are doing. *Picks up his bowl*, please sir, can I have some more?</span></strong></p></blockquote></blockquote>

[steelbadger]

<p><cite>Xelgad wrote:</cite></p><blockquote><p>Stability Tree:</p><ul><li>Enhance: Intercept now gives 2% damage reduction per point in addition to the reuse reduction.</li><li>Enhance: Moderate now grants 1 crit bonus per point instead of additional hate gain reduction.</li><li>Enhance: Rescue has been moved to another tree and replaced with Enhance: Call of Shielding, which increases the effectiveness of that buff by 5% per point.</li><li>Enhance: Reinforcement has been moved to another tree and replaced with Enhance: Call to Arms, which increases the effectiveness of that buff by 7% per point. </li></ul></blockquote><p>While fairly standard little bonuses I quite like these.  Enhance:  Call of Shielding may be a little underpowered in current mechanics (its only operable bonus being 250hp.  That's not much for 5 AA points).  I Like Enhance:  Call to Arms.</p><p>Overall this makes me think, currently, that Stability might be an option if these changes go through.  It may not be, once we can get down to actually playing with it but at least it gets me thinking.</p><p><cite>Xelgad wrote:</cite></p><blockquote><p> The "Crippling" tree has been replaced with a new tree titled "Aggression."  This new tree is intended to provide extra threat generation, especially in cases where the Guardian doesn't have full hate buffs.  Aggression Tree:</p><ul><li>Enhance: Provoke, which grants 7% potency to the taunt with each point.</li><li>Enhance: Shout, which reduces the reuse of the ability by 0.4 seconds per point and improves the resistability by 2% per point.</li><li>Enhance: Hatred, which offers 2% hate mod per point.</li><li>Enhance: Rescue, which is the same as it was in the Stability tree.</li><li>Enhance: Reinforcement, which is the same as it was in the Stability tree.</li><li>Shoulder the Burden, which is a 10% hate siphon that can be placed on any group member.</li></ul></blockquote><p>This makes sense, the crippling tree was like we'd been given Brigand AAs by mistake.  Aggression is what a tank should have.  In terms of shout I don't think you could really add anything more to that ability, but it needs a bit more heft.  Consider either changing it to get rid of the reuse speed bonus (to be replaced with a 5% potency per level) or consider changing Taunting Assault.  That ability sucks real bad and shout almost needs to make up for that at the moment.  All taunting assault needs is a faster cast time to be viable.</p><p><cite>Xelgad wrote:</cite></p> <blockquote><p> Other AA changes:</p><ul><li>"Double Attack" in the Guardian tree has been replaced with 3% chance to flurry and has been renamed to "Flurry."</li><li>"Bind Wound" in the Warrior tree is now a 100% heal (still out of combat).</li><li>Enhance: Plant now increases the duration of the ability by only 0.4 seconds per point (see below).</li><li>"Aggressive Nature" now increases the threat generated by Hold the Line by 5% per point instead of adding a threat proc on blocks (see below).</li></ul></blockquote> <p>I like flurry.</p><p>Is the buff portion of Bind Wound still there?  10% damage bonus on CAs is not to be sniffed at.</p><p>The plant enhancement AA is...  well.  Not great.  But only because the effect on Plant is likely to be ignored by most mobs.  If target force immunities are removed then this is a very nice AA.</p><p>Good move on aggressive nature.  That ability makes up a significant portion of my total threat (taunts) output.</p><p><cite>Xelgad wrote:</cite></p> <blockquote><p> Class ability changes:</p><ul><li>Recapture now lowers the threat position of non-fighters in the Guardian's group to the target encounter. While that effect is only groupwide, the raidwide effect that increases the threat position of other fighters is still present. The reuse on this ability has been increased to 45 seconds.</li><li>Iron Will now grants a reduction to snare effects on the Guardian in addition to the Stamina buff.</li><li>Plant has been redesigned. It is now a blue AE target lock with a small threat component. The base duration of the target lock is 6 seconds with the level 90 master. The base casting time remains at 1 second, and the recast is still 60 seconds.</li><li>Hold the Line now has the "Aggressive Nature" effect automatically built into the ability. It's as if you spent the 5 AA points in the Shadows tree without actually having to spend the points.  "Aggressive Defense," a Berserker ability, recieved the same change.</li></ul></blockquote><p>So you've given Recapture a purpose in groups.  Can't complain about that really.</p><p>The change to Iron Will is nice, any idea how much the snare effect reduction will be?</p><p>Plant is probably my main sticking point in this list.  With the number of mobs that are immune to target locks it makes this ability very very spotty.  And it still needs to be backed up by Reinforcement (even if it does work) if we hope to <em>hold</em> aggro.  Reinforcement is one of our defining strengths but it has to do a lot of work already.  I'd give the new Plant a larger threat component if you're not planning to remove the immunity to target lock (it also really depends on the resistability of the ability; Cry of the Warrior when it was implemented probably had a 90% resist rate, and that was just on the mobs where it could work).  As an example I only really use Cry of the Warrior because it does have one hate position on it.  I use it as a watered down Rescue on fights like Sara Greenheart so that I don't have to use Rescue.</p><p>Again, I like the aggressive nature change.</p><p><cite>Xelgad wrote:</cite></p> <blockquote><p>Keep the feedback coming! The discussion has obviously shifted beyond just utility, and we're looking for feedback on all of these changes.  Any other suggestions for the class are welcomed as well, but understand that we are focusing mostly on more general changes rather than class or AA ability changes to solve the survivability problem.</p></blockquote> <p>A re-working of the mit-curve?  <img src="/eq2/images/smilies/97ada74b88049a6d50a6ed40898a03d7.gif" border="0" /></p>

[Rahatmattata]

<p><cite>Gungo wrote:</cite></p><blockquote><p>The Stone sphere change was a huge bump in survivability. You cant just massively increase survivability and hate and then request the same dps as every other tank. That simply is not balanced. </p></blockquote><p>I don't see how Stone Sphere change is a huge increase in survivability. All the change really does is make it so the guard doesn't die when using this... and tbh, I used Stone Sphere all the time, and I can't remember the last time it killed me. Dying from Stone Sphere was pretty much a one in a thousand occurance for me, so meh.</p>

[Rahatmattata]

<p><cite>steelbadger wrote:</cite></p><blockquote>While fairly standard little bonuses I quite like these.  Enhance:  Call of Shielding may be a little underpowered in current mechanics (its only operable bonus being 250hp.  That's not much for 5 AA points).</blockquote><p>You are confusing Battle Tactics with Call of Shielding.</p><p>Taunting Assault -> Change to a point-blank AoE and/or reduce casting time.</p>

[Soul_Dreamer]

<p><cite>Rahatmattata wrote:</cite></p><blockquote><p><cite>steelbadger wrote:</cite></p><blockquote>While fairly standard little bonuses I quite like these.  Enhance:  Call of Shielding may be a little underpowered in current mechanics (its only operable bonus being 250hp.  That's not much for 5 AA points).</blockquote><p>You are confusing Battle Tactics with Call of Shielding.</p></blockquote><p>No, Call of shielding is meant to be gaining 1000hp according to previous proposed changes, which means the AA will increase the HP and also the defense, the defense is useless so the only real benefit is 250hp.</p><p>The Mit curve would be my guess as well, or giving each class their own mit curve so damage can be tweaked for each class as needed. The latter would probably be the best option.</p><p><span style="font-size: 11.6667px;">Main points.... again incase it's been missed in these walls of multicoloured text <img src="/eq2/images/smilies/3b63d1616c5dfcf29f8a7a031aaa7cad.gif" border="0" /></span></p><p><span style="font-size: 11.6667px;">Call to arms: This ability is buffed in another AA as well, need this AA to do something different or moving to a different ability.</span></p><p>Shout: We don't want to be taunt bots, can you change to adding potency rather than reduing the reuse, the benefit is the same but we're not spamming the taunt anymore then.</p><p>Hatred:We had an AA for hate increase elsewhere, another isn't really needed. A Heroic tank DPSing at say 6k DPS, if he's also getting 2k hate per second from Hold the line etc, a 10% increase will be a total of 800 extra hate per second. You could easily add this 800 hate to every CA and gain approximately the same result of 10% increase in hate. This way though it effects everyone even those at max 50% hate bonus.</p><p>Flurry: 3% is very low, can we have this doubled or up near 10%? 1 in 33 attacks flurrying isn't really a great deal <img src="/eq2/images/smilies/9d71f0541cff0a302a0309c5079e8dee.gif" border="0" /></p><p>Recapture: recast penalty for the change, the ability is now useful, there shouldn't be a need to amend the recast.</p><p>Taunting Assault: Cast time is just too large, 2 seconds for this ability means it's hardly ever used and the AA to improve it is hardly ever taken, can it be reduced to the standard CA recast? 0.5 seconds.</p><p>Iron Will: At level cap the stamina buff is worthless and we already have a HP buff, put a Guard at level 90 and give him 500 stamina. Now add 90 Stamina, how much HP did it give? I'd guess in the region of 200HP. The better a Guardian gets the less benefit we get from this buff until finally (and very quickly) we get no benefit at all. How about:</p><p>A 200pt regenerating ward<span style="font-size: 11.6667px;">A 33% chance to resist Mezz/Charm effects if we have been mezzed or charmed in the last 30 seconds.</span><span style="font-size: 11.6667px;">Reduction in magical damage, 10% damage reduction in spell damage only?</span></p><p>There are lots of possible buffs.</p><p>Guardian Sphere: Small change, pop the first stoneskin on spell cast instead of just relying on luck. We then know it's up and can successfully use it to help stop damage on group members rather than hoping it procs after they've been hit <img src="/smilies/3b63d1616c5dfcf29f8a7a031aaa7cad.gif" border="0" alt="SMILEY" /></p><p><span style="font-size: 11.6667px;">The main point though is....</span></p><p>The disparity between survivability and DPS between the tanks and the fact that no more survivability is actually needed. This really needs addressing, I'm not going to compare with other tanks because I think we all know just how bad it is.</p>

[Rahatmattata]

<p><cite>Soul_Dreamer wrote:</cite></p><blockquote><p>No, Call of shielding is meant to be gaining 1000hp according to previous proposed changes, which means the AA will increase the HP and also the defense, the defense is useless so the only real benefit is 250hp.</p></blockquote><p>I see. BTW, I would rather have more defense for everyone in my group than 250 HP if I had to chose.</p>

[Soul_Dreamer]

<p>Seconded, since we're not really a "Defensive" tank anymore due to tank survivability being more or less equal, it could be beneficial if our utility came in the form of keeping the group alive and reducing the spiking of the group. I think I'd prefer this than increasing the DPS of the group.</p>

[steelbadger]

<p><cite>Soul_Dreamer wrote:</cite></p><blockquote><p><cite>Rahatmattata wrote:</cite></p><blockquote><p><cite>steelbadger wrote:</cite></p><blockquote>While fairly standard little bonuses I quite like these.  Enhance:  Call of Shielding may be a little underpowered in current mechanics (its only operable bonus being 250hp.  That's not much for 5 AA points).</blockquote><p>You are confusing Battle Tactics with Call of Shielding.</p></blockquote><p>No, Call of shielding is meant to be gaining 1000hp according to previous proposed changes, which means the AA will increase the HP and also the defense, the defense is useless so the only real benefit is 250hp.</p></blockquote><p>Indeed, I assumed that the previously stated change was going through.</p><p><cite>Soul_Dreamer wrote:</cite></p><blockquote><p>The Mit curve would be my guess as well, or giving each class their own mit curve so damage can be tweaked for each class as needed. The latter would probably be the best option.</p><p><span style="font-size: 11.6667px;">Main points.... again incase it's been missed in these walls of multicoloured text <img src="/eq2/images/smilies/3b63d1616c5dfcf29f8a7a031aaa7cad.gif" border="0" /></span></p><p><span style="font-size: 11.6667px;">Call to arms: This ability is buffed in another AA as well, need this AA to do something different or moving to a different ability.</span></p><p>Shout: We don't want to be taunt bots, can you change to adding potency rather than reduing the reuse, the benefit is the same but we're not spamming the taunt anymore then.</p><p>Hatred:We had an AA for hate increase elsewhere, another isn't really needed. A Heroic tank DPSing at say 6k DPS, if he's also getting 2k hate per second from Hold the line etc, a 10% increase will be a total of 800 extra hate per second. You could easily add this 800 hate to every CA and gain approximately the same result of 10% increase in hate. This way though it effects everyone even those at max 50% hate bonus.</p><p>Flurry: 3% is very low, can we have this doubled or up near 10%? 1 in 33 attacks flurrying isn't really a great deal <img src="/eq2/images/smilies/9d71f0541cff0a302a0309c5079e8dee.gif" border="0" /></p><p>Recapture: recast penalty for the change, the ability is now useful, there shouldn't be a need to amend the recast.</p><p>Taunting Assault: Cast time is just too large, 2 seconds for this ability means it's hardly ever used and the AA to improve it is hardly ever taken, can it be reduced to the standard CA recast? 0.5 seconds.</p><p>Iron Will: At level cap the stamina buff is worthless and we already have a HP buff, put a Guard at level 90 and give him 500 stamina. Now add 90 Stamina, how much HP did it give? I'd guess in the region of 200HP. The better a Guardian gets the less benefit we get from this buff until finally (and very quickly) we get no benefit at all. How about:</p><p>A 200pt regenerating ward<span style="font-size: 11.6667px;">A 33% chance to resist Mezz/Charm effects if we have been mezzed or charmed in the last 30 seconds.</span><span style="font-size: 11.6667px;">Reduction in magical damage, 10% damage reduction in spell damage only?</span></p><p>There are lots of possible buffs.</p><p>Guardian Sphere: Small change, pop the first stoneskin on spell cast instead of just relying on luck. We then know it's up and can successfully use it to help stop damage on group members rather than hoping it procs after they've been hit <img src="/eq2/images/smilies/3b63d1616c5dfcf29f8a7a031aaa7cad.gif" border="0" /></p><p><span style="font-size: 11.6667px;">The main point though is....</span></p><p>The disparity between survivability and DPS between the tanks and the fact that no more survivability is actually needed. This really needs addressing, I'm not going to compare with other tanks because I think we all know just how bad it is.</p></blockquote><p>On your points:</p><p>Enhance:  Call to Arms.  0.5% accuracy per level?  (that stacks with the 5% from the red adorn)</p><p>Hatred:  Yeah, I'd certainly never use it but it may be that others would.  If the class gets to a point where we can be effective heroic tanks without dirge/coercer then this might be useful.  Never know.</p><p>Flurry:  10% flurry would be way too much.  2% isn't much though, I agree. Most other Flurry sources are 2% (red adorns, Inquissy Inquest adorn).  It definitely shouldn't be more than 5% (Battle Cry).</p><p>Recapture:  agree</p><p>Taunting assault:  agree</p><p>Iron Will:  People below level cap aren't capped on stamina.  I think you'll have to accept that any change to this buff will retain the stamina component.</p><p>And I completely agree on the subject of survivability.  So much of that can be fixed with a few tweaks to mit though.</p>

[Soul_Dreamer]

<p>Iron Will: I don't think we should have to accept the stamina part, even at lower levels it will add tiny amount of health that it's not even worth it. A regenning ward, even if only small will help absorb those small hits and parts of larger ones. While it's not a self heal it does mean these hits aren't just chipping away at our health. Zerkers have self heal procs, SK's can lifetap and ward, Pallies can ward and heal. I don't think it's too much to ask to give Guardians some small self healing/warding ability personally. The lack of self heals/wards compared to every other tank class is something that needs attention, I was in a BG the other day and 9 of us where beating on "Vaux (Berserker)" we couldn't kill him, he just stayed green the whole time. While I'm not asking for that sort of self healing (some also came from gear and BG Toughness damage limitation), I believe we should have a small amount. Levels of Spell: 28 - Master - 26 Stamina -> 40 hp regenning ward. 42 - Master - 39 Stamina -> 80 hp regenning ward. 56 - Master - 53 Stamina -> 120 hp regenning ward. 70 - Master - 66 Stamina -> 160 hp regenning ward. 80 - Master - 79 Stamina -> 200 hp regenning ward. 90 - Master - 93? Stamina -> 240 hp regenning ward. Change them all to have a regenerating ward instead of the Stamina, it retains it's usefulness of increasing survivability (hp) slightly but it's usefulness doesn't just fade away and dissapear as you get better gear at the level cap. Why should any ability just stop working the better you get?</p>

[Aull]

<p><cite>Soul_Dreamer wrote:</cite></p><blockquote><p>Iron Will: I don't think we should have to accept the stamina part, even at lower levels it will add tiny amount of health that it's not even worth it. A regenning ward, even if only small will help absorb those small hits and parts of larger ones. While it's not a self heal it does mean these hits aren't just chipping away at our health. Zerkers have self heal procs, SK's can lifetap and ward, Pallies can ward and heal. I don't think it's too much to ask to give Guardians some small self healing/warding ability personally. The lack of self heals/wards compared to every other tank class is something that needs attention, I was in a BG the other day and 9 of us where beating on "Vaux (Berserker)" we couldn't kill him, he just stayed green the whole time. While I'm not asking for that sort of self healing (some also came from gear and BG Toughness damage limitation), I believe we should have a small amount.Levels of Spell: 28 - Master - 26 Stamina -> 40 hp regenning ward. 42 - Master - 39 Stamina -> 80 hp regenning ward. 56 - Master - 53 Stamina -> 120 hp regenning ward. 70 - Master - 66 Stamina -> 160 hp regenning ward. 80 - Master - 79 Stamina -> 200 hp regenning ward. 90 - Master - 93? Stamina -> 240 hp regenning ward. Change them all to have a regenerating ward instead of the Stamina, it retains it's usefulness of increasing survivability (hp) slightly but it's usefulness doesn't just fade away and dissapear as you get better gear at the level cap. Why should any ability just stop working the better you get?</p></blockquote><p>Good idea. Could possibly trigger this ward when hold the line procs?</p>

[Loendar]

<p><cite>Gungo wrote:</cite></p><blockquote><p> The Stone sphere change was a huge bump in survivability. You cant just massively increase survivability and hate and then request the same dps as every other tank. That simply is not balanced. </p></blockquote><p>But I think we all agree that Suvivability isn't the problem.  None of the fighters have an issue with survivability that requires any massive buffs to it.  We *do* need DPS changes: either a Guardian move up, or everyone else brought down to what the archetype originally seemed intended to do.  Leaving us without a pretty considerable DPS change one way or the other isn't going to help us in groups or raids.</p><p>I run instances on this toon - no raiding.  If my group of friends have the choice of doing the instances easier in less than half the time with an SK (or Paladin, or zerker) who am I to force them to take the slow road because my class simply can't bring anything to the table?</p><p>I had been considering retiring the Guardian entirely and simply letting the SK have the group until I started reading the changes and then people post that the DPS facet doesn't need to be changed.  I assure you - it definitely does.</p>

[Soul_Dreamer]

<p><cite>Aull wrote:</cite></p><blockquote><p><cite>Soul_Dreamer wrote:</cite></p><blockquote><p>Iron Will: I don't think we should have to accept the stamina part, even at lower levels it will add tiny amount of health that it's not even worth it. A regenning ward, even if only small will help absorb those small hits and parts of larger ones. While it's not a self heal it does mean these hits aren't just chipping away at our health. Zerkers have self heal procs, SK's can lifetap and ward, Pallies can ward and heal. I don't think it's too much to ask to give Guardians some small self healing/warding ability personally. The lack of self heals/wards compared to every other tank class is something that needs attention, I was in a BG the other day and 9 of us where beating on "Vaux (Berserker)" we couldn't kill him, he just stayed green the whole time. While I'm not asking for that sort of self healing (some also came from gear and BG Toughness damage limitation), I believe we should have a small amount.Levels of Spell: 28 - Master - 26 Stamina -> 40 hp regenning ward. 42 - Master - 39 Stamina -> 80 hp regenning ward. 56 - Master - 53 Stamina -> 120 hp regenning ward. 70 - Master - 66 Stamina -> 160 hp regenning ward. 80 - Master - 79 Stamina -> 200 hp regenning ward. 90 - Master - 93? Stamina -> 240 hp regenning ward. Change them all to have a regenerating ward instead of the Stamina, it retains it's usefulness of increasing survivability (hp) slightly but it's usefulness doesn't just fade away and dissapear as you get better gear at the level cap. Why should any ability just stop working the better you get?</p></blockquote><p>Good idea. Could possibly trigger this ward when hold the line procs?</p></blockquote><p>No, just a constant regenning ward of 200-300 hp at level 90, to replace the stamina buff on Iron will.</p>

[bishoph]

<p><cite>Xelgad wrote:</cite></p><blockquote><p>To clarify, the intercept portion has been removed from Guardian Sphere. We have many more changes on the way.  Here are some of them, but this list is still not complete. Stability Tree:</p><ul><li>Enhance: Intercept now gives 2% damage reduction per point in addition to the reuse reduction.<span style="color: #99ccff;"> If both the guardian and the Target get the 2%, it might be worth while in a few cases.  As stated by a few people, needs longer range.  Have used this as a "death save" for other tanks, but with me dieing in their place.  Ok the MT is still up, but all my buffs are down on my group of scouts.</span></li><li>Enhance: Moderate now grants 1 crit bonus per point instead of additional hate gain reduction. <span style="color: #99ccff;">Not a buff at all, since I will want to add the crit bonus to healers, not the DPS who might already be giving me threat issues.  Even with Imp Mod, A drige and Mod on a Warlock we have, he can still pull agro on AE pulls, and now I get to buff his damage even more? oh joys, he will love it.</span></li><li>Enhance: Rescue has been moved to another tree and replaced with Enhance: Call of Shielding, which increases the effectiveness of that buff by 5% per point.</li><li>Enhance: Reinforcement has been moved to another tree and replaced with Enhance: Call to Arms, which increases the effectiveness of that buff by 7% per point.  <span style="color: #99ccff;">Ok, the 8 points I now have in the Stability tree are free to go some place else.  </span></li></ul><p> The "Crippling" tree has been replaced with a new tree titled "Aggression."  This new tree is intended to provide extra threat generation, especially in cases where the Guardian doesn't have full hate buffs.  Aggression Tree:</p><ul><li>Enhance: Provoke, which grants 7% potency to the taunt with each point.</li><li>Enhance: Shout, which reduces the reuse of the ability by 0.4 seconds per point and improves the resistability by 2% per point.</li><li>Enhance: Hatred, which offers 2% hate mod per point.</li><li>Enhance: Rescue, which is the same as it was in the Stability tree.</li><li>Enhance: Reinforcement, which is the same as it was in the Stability tree.</li><li>Shoulder the Burden, which is a 10% hate siphon that can be placed on any group member. </li></ul><p><span style="color: #99ccff;">Would have rather seen something good happen to the Crippling tree.  There was a lot that could have been done with the tree.  </span></p><p><span style="color: #99ccff;">Maybe Enhance: Taunts - with adds 7% potency to the taunt effect of Provoke and shout.  </span></p><p><span style="color: #99ccff;">Then Enchance: Tuanting assult - Lower cast speed by 10% ? </span></p><p><span style="color: #99ccff;">Enhance: Hatred -  Adds 5% flurry to auto attacks, or a hate proc on auto attacks. </span></p><p><span style="color: #99ccff;">Shoulder the Burden - Do not want amends, anything else here would be better.  a raid buff that summons food on auto attack would be more wanted.  A hate trans on Moderation for AA, would be nice, but I do not want another buff just for a hate transfer.  The one thing that really Limits this; If the Guard has Imp Mod buff, we get a lot less hate from this, since the Imp Mod, will lower the hate gain, before we even see it.  Plus if there is other group wide lower hate buff, we may get 2% of their hate.</span></p><p>Other AA changes:</p><ul><li>"Double Attack" in the Guardian tree has been replaced with 3% chance to flurry and has been renamed to "Flurry." <span style="color: #99ccff;">3% flurry is not even close to 9% DA.  Keep the DA.</span></li><li>"Bind Wound" in the Warrior tree is now a 100% heal (still out of combat). <span style="color: #99ccff;">weeeee a PvP change, not really needed at all.</span></li><li>Enhance: Plant now increases the duration of the ability by only 0.4 seconds per point (see below).</li><li>"Aggressive Nature" now increases the threat generated by Hold the Line by 5% per point instead of adding a threat proc on blocks (see below).</li></ul><p> Class ability changes:</p><ul><li>Recapture now lowers the threat position of non-fighters in the Guardian's group to the target encounter. While that effect is only groupwide, the raidwide effect that increases the threat position of other fighters is still present. The reuse on this ability has been increased to 45 seconds. <span style="color: #99ccff;">Either way, will not really be used much unless you have to do tank swaps or there is mem wipes.</span></li><li>Iron Will now grants a reduction to snare effects on the Guardian in addition to the Stamina buff. <span style="color: #99ccff;">Drop the stam off of this.  Add in a ward (as posted above) or a reactive heal.</span></li><li>Plant has been redesigned. It is now a blue AE target lock with a small threat component. The base duration of the target lock is 6 seconds with the level 90 master. The base casting time remains at 1 second, and the recast is still 60 seconds. <span style="color: #99ccff;">Like many have said, not a huge buff at all.  Might even be a bit worse now.  To many mobs ignore target locks.  At first read it was like, this could be really nice, but thinking on it, its very Meh, at best.  Maybe - A Blue AE, that will inturrpt all targets in range, moves the Guardian up one threat position, and adds 2,000 to 3,000 hate.  Still way less powerfull than holy ground or Grave Sac (witch is way over powered) but better than what you have listed.</span></li><li>Hold the Line now has the "Aggressive Nature" effect automatically built into the ability. It's as if you spent the 5 AA points in the Shadows tree without actually having to spend the points.  "Aggressive Defense," a Berserker ability, recieved the same change. <span style="color: #99ccff;">As posted above, add in parry to it, or make the AA add parry to it.  Maybe the AA adds a reflective damage to blocking and parry.</span></li></ul><p>Keep the feedback coming! The discussion has obviously shifted beyond just utility, and we're looking for feedback on all of these changes.  Any other suggestions for the class are welcomed as well, but understand that we are focusing mostly on more general changes rather than class or AA ability changes to solve the survivability problem.</p></blockquote><p>Over all, its not quite enough.  Maybe you are saving the best changes for last?  Some kind of DPS boost is needed.  Even if we get to the point where we have 90k TPS, if we are still only doing 20k to 30k DPS, the class is still not wanted on DPS check fights.</p>

[Yimway]

<p>Let me first say, thats alot to digest, but it looks to me like your removing much of the frustrations people find with playing the class day-to-day.  Particularly in regaurds to threat management and utility.</p><p>Unfortunately, none of that is actually going to make them raid desireable again.</p><p><cite>Xelgad wrote:</cite></p><blockquote><p>Stability Tree:</p><ul><li>Enhance: Intercept now gives 2% damage reduction per point in addition to the reuse reduction.</li><li>Enhance: Moderate now grants 1 crit bonus per point instead of additional hate gain reduction.</li><li>Enhance: Rescue has been moved to another tree and replaced with Enhance: Call of Shielding, which increases the effectiveness of that buff by 5% per point.</li><li>Enhance: Reinforcement has been moved to another tree and replaced with Enhance: Call to Arms, which increases the effectiveness of that buff by 7% per point.</li></ul></blockquote><p>This line is still very undesireable.  Certainly most classes have an aa line that doesn't make sense or offers too little reward.  The 5% per rank on Call of Shielding will increase the new health component as well?  Unless you plan to make defense stats mean something again, this component of the buff still needs consideration.  Same with Call to Arms, +melee skills just isn't highly valued.</p><p>In the end, this tree still will not help the player enough in the classes core deficiencies to warrant putting points in this tree over any other.  I'm sure some newb gaurds will think its neat and try it out, but in the end, the overall effectiveness will be sub-par and anyone that pays attention at all will abandon this line. </p><p><cite>Xelgad wrote:</cite></p><blockquote><p> Aggression Tree:</p><ul><li>Enhance: Provoke, which grants 7% potency to the taunt with each point.</li><li>Enhance: Shout, which reduces the reuse of the ability by 0.4 seconds per point and improves the resistability by 2% per point.</li><li>Enhance: Hatred, which offers 2% hate mod per point.</li><li>Enhance: Rescue, which is the same as it was in the Stability tree.</li><li>Enhance: Reinforcement, which is the same as it was in the Stability tree.</li><li>Shoulder the Burden, which is a 10% hate siphon that can be placed on any group member. </li></ul></blockquote><p>This tree starts to make some headway into making the class 'fun to play' again, particularly in your random pug group.  I don't think it will help guards ever find groups, but when they do, they'll have better tools to get the job done.</p><p>Shoulder the Burden is lack luster as an endline ability.  But it does match the abilities above it.  I honestly can see taking some of that tree and skipping the endline.</p><p>You really need to rethink rescue though,  with it being in both the guardian and SF trees, its possible to spec beyond the reuse cap with aa alone.  Some other enhancement there would definately add more interest in this tree.</p><p><cite>Xelgad wrote:</cite></p><blockquote><p>Other AA changes:</p><ul><li>"Double Attack" in the Guardian tree has been replaced with 3% chance to flurry and has been renamed to "Flurry."</li><li>Enhance: Plant now increases the duration of the ability by only 0.4 seconds per point (see below).</li><li>"Aggressive Nature" now increases the threat generated by Hold the Line by 5% per point instead of adding a threat proc on blocks (see below).</li></ul></blockquote><p>Double Attack to 3% Flurry isn't enough.  When the tree was new, and it was 10% DA in an era that DA couldn't be capped, it was an impressive ability.  3% flurry is more desireable than 9 DA, but it is still very weak when compared to the bonuses other tanks are seeing on melee attacks.  I'd suggest going much bigger on this but have a 'shield requirement'.</p><p>Plant is interesting, but target locks are so buggy historically.  If 90% of raid content is going to ignore target locks, whats the point in this new ability?</p><p>Aggressive Nature - Be careful about how much of playing a class is from passive abilities.  This change is fine and good, but I don't want to see >25% of my aggro management from passive abilities, be mindful of making things too passive.</p><p><cite>Xelgad wrote:</cite></p><blockquote><p>Class ability changes:</p><ul><li>Recapture now lowers the threat position of non-fighters in the Guardian's group to the target encounter. While that effect is only groupwide, the raidwide effect that increases the threat position of other fighters is still present. The reuse on this ability has been increased to 45 seconds.</li><li>Iron Will now grants a reduction to snare effects on the Guardian in addition to the Stamina buff.</li><li>Plant has been redesigned. It is now a blue AE target lock with a small threat component. The base duration of the target lock is 6 seconds with the level 90 master. The base casting time remains at 1 second, and the recast is still 60 seconds.</li><li>Hold the Line now has the "Aggressive Nature" effect automatically built into the ability. It's as if you spent the 5 AA points in the Shadows tree without actually having to spend the points.  "Aggressive Defense," a Berserker ability, recieved the same change.</li></ul></blockquote><p>Recapture - Thanks for finally listening on Recapture.  We petitioned hard for this very change in beta with no response either way.</p><p>Iron Will - I agree with others stamina is still a worthless stat, but reduction of snare effects is something no one is going to complain about. </p><p>Plant - See my previous comments.  too many things are immune to target locking.  So unless this target lock is going to work where others don't... meh.  I'd much rather lose the lock and get 1 hate position and more hate over time for a longer durration.  3000 threat every 3s for 15s, 1 min reuse?  Again, unless the target lock is actually going to work this time.</p><p>All in all, these are positive changes to the class, they address player's frustation with playing the class once they find a group or raid slot, but unfortunately they don't do much in increasing the classes desirability to be picked for either in today's game.</p>

[Brildean]

<p>Maybe change Call of shielding + defense to.. a proc that increases crit mit or damage reduction.</p><p>so it would look like</p><p>Call of Shielding</p><p>*Increases hp's by 1000</p><p>*Any Spell or Combat art will proc 10% damage reduction to all damage for 10 seconds.. 2ppm</p><p>This would provide more defense than say 34 defense you get at master.. and it would be beneficial to groups and raids.</p>

[Brildean]

<p>also Iron Will should be changed from snare effect reduction to.. to increasing our block radius to 300 degrees instead of the 180 right now.</p><p>so adept would be 220 degree expert would be 260 and master would be 300.This would give us somethin that other plate tanks don't have.</p>

[Yimway]

<p><cite>Brildean wrote:</cite></p><blockquote><p>Maybe change Call of shielding + defense to.. a proc that increases crit mit or damage reduction.</p></blockquote><p>Increase Block Chance of raid by 5%, or</p><p>Increase Mitigation of raid by 350 (m1).</p><p>Or, redesign mechanics for defense stat to be relevant, and the current buff looks good.</p>

[Brildean]

<p>ya i dont even know why they have a plus defense stat if it does absolutly nothin to raid mobs same with + parry.. but yet it litters the raid gear and its at higher point value on the d efensive set. i'd rather have a few points of potency and crit bonus than +11 parry and +11 defense..</p>

[Wasuna]

<p>Tons of information. I've read the post and all of the posts since so I'll just offer some comments:</p><p>1. Thanks for all the buffs to hate. In the Legendary gear area this really is the biggest problem I have. I do very well in groups currently but that becasue I flat won't invite classes that the current group setup won't allow me to keep agro off.</p><p>2. I like that plant is being changed. I don't like what it is being changed to. I very much against giving Guardians more snap agro tools. Make us able to do our job, don't give us tools to compensate for us not being able to do our job. I like having an AoE hate tool but not one given to the class becasue we fail at what we are suppose to be. I have reinforcement, rescue, cry of the warrior and sneering assulat. I either get a good group and have tons of DPS and never need them or I get a group with bad hate crutches for me and I have to dicker around before I pull again to wait for one of them to refresh.</p><p>3. I like the flurry idea but 3% just is not enough. I do almost exactly 50% of my damage with autoattack. Adding 3% flurry will in essance increase my autoattack DPS, what, 3-5%? That means my total DPS goes up max 2.5%? All the posts you see have Crusaders and Berserkers doing 1.5-2x more dps than Guardians do. This is not enough. At first blush I like the idea of making the flurry limited. I believe it was stated that the flurry should be WITH shield but this would then be the same as Knights Stance. Can do more DPS in a defensive mode. I would love this if it's something like 15-20% flurry but limites to NO SHIELD. Then Guardian DPS would go up for weak encounters where they DW and we could offer more DPS when not in a tanking role.</p><p>In conclusion, thanks for the better agro tools, revisit Plant please and up the flurry by a huge amount but make it for DPS mode only, not tanking.</p>

[steveatk]

<p><cite>Xelgad wrote:</cite></p><blockquote><p>To clarify, the intercept portion has been removed from Guardian Sphere. - <span style="color: #ff0000;">Could we please get the first stone skin coverage up when this is cast? We rely on luck far too much already should be able to control some aspects of our protection abilities.</span> We have many more changes on the way.  Here are some of them, but this list is still not complete. <span style="color: #ff0000;">- Can't wait to see the rest!</span> Stability Tree:</p><ul><li>Enhance: Intercept now gives 2% damage reduction per point in addition to the reuse reduction. <span style="color: #ff0000;">- Where does the damage reduction occur? Is it always on the target or are we talking about reducing the damage taken by the Guardian on an intercept?</span></li><li>Enhance: Moderate now grants 1 crit bonus per point instead of additional hate gain reduction. <span style="color: #ff0000;">- ok</span></li><li>Enhance: Rescue has been moved to another tree and replaced with Enhance: Call of Shielding, which increases the effectiveness of that buff by 5% per point. <span style="color: #ff0000;">- ok</span></li><li>Enhance: Reinforcement has been moved to another tree and replaced with Enhance: Call to Arms, which increases the effectiveness of that buff by 7% per point. <span style="color: #ff0000;">- ok</span></li></ul><p><span style="color: #ff0000;">You can't have every skill or AA choice made to be outstanding or must haves. I think this has a good balance and offers a real alternative in AA choices although I don't neccessarily believe that many people will go very deep into this tree.</span><span style="color: #ff0000;"> If Got Your Back can be altered from your previous suggestion to something more in line with protecting your group/raid rather than other fighters and then potentially makes this tree a solid choice.</span></p><p>The "Crippling" tree has been replaced with a new tree titled "Aggression."  This new tree is intended to provide extra threat generation, especially in cases where the Guardian doesn't have full hate buffs.  Aggression Tree:</p><ul><li>Enhance: Provoke, which grants 7% potency to the taunt with each point. <span style="color: #ff0000;">- ok</span></li><li>Enhance: Shout, which reduces the reuse of the ability by 0.4 seconds per point and improves the resistability by 2% per point. <span style="color: #ff0000;">- ok</span></li><li>Enhance: Hatred, which offers 2% hate mod per point. <span style="color: #ff0000;">- Seriously do no agree with this one. We have enough hate mod already and this will not help us to generate hate as both heroic and raid Guardians can easily cap this value. We need a mechanism to help us build hate smoothly over time. Let's have something that reflects the name of this AA by either adding hate procs to our CA's or auto attack or something else which significantly boosts the hate we generate from triggered and reactive taunts.</span></li><li>Enhance: Rescue, which is the same as it was in the Stability tree. <span style="color: #ff0000;">- ok</span></li><li>Enhance: Reinforcement, which is the same as it was in the Stability tree. <span style="color: #ff0000;">- ok</span></li><li>Shoulder the Burden, which is a 10% hate siphon that can be placed on any group member. <span style="color: #ff0000;">- How does this work with Moderate and Improved Moderate? Surely the best target for this would be the one generating the most hate and this person also happens to be the one that we are capping their hate reduction to -50%. I think this either needs to be a group wide siphon like Trak shield or preferably something else entirely. I would prefer a method of generating hate for myself rather than controlling/siphoning the hate of others.</span></li></ul><p><span style="color: #ff0000;">Enhance: Hatred is the red headed step child of this tree and I hope that it doesn't go live in this state. Please give us methods to generate significant hate for ourselves. This will allow us to keep agro from other tanks in raids and to confidently hold agro in heroic content rather than trying to manipulate the hate of others. Our single target agro really should be better than all other tanks.</span></p><p> Other AA changes:</p><ul><li>"Double Attack" in the Guardian tree has been replaced with 3% chance to flurry and has been renamed to "Flurry." <span style="color: #ff0000;">- Change this to 5% and you have my vote</span></li><li>"Bind Wound" in the Warrior tree is now a 100% heal (still out of combat). <span style="color: #ff0000;">- Don't see the point in this. Let us use it in combat but interruptable - this would let us heal whilst Reflexes is up and would bring us in line with other tanks restorative abilities assuming we do get to reduce incoming damage with further changes.</span></li><li>Enhance: Plant now increases the duration of the ability by only 0.4 seconds per point (see below). <span style="color: #ff0000;">- add a <strong>large</strong> threat amount with the final point?</span></li><li>"Aggressive Nature" now increases the threat generated by Hold the Line by 5% per point instead of adding a threat proc on blocks (see below). <span style="color: #ff0000;">- This seems slightly low to me based on our current inability to hold AOE agro however with the Plant change and the hate siphon on an AOE class it may prove to be sufficient. I'm holding judgement until I see it in action but I think that our AOE agro in particular will still be woefully insufficient when fighting more than one encounter. I have a feeling that it would need to be 10% per point and even then we are relying on luck for it to proc.</span></li></ul><p> Class ability changes:</p><ul><li>Recapture now lowers the threat position of non-fighters in the Guardian's group to the target encounter. While that effect is only groupwide, the raidwide effect that increases the threat position of other fighters is still present. The reuse on this ability has been increased to 45 seconds. <span style="color: #ff0000;">- I still don't see why we can't use this to recapture hate for ourselves. If in testing the whole package agro appears to be fine and we can actually hold agro over time then this change is good as it is.</span></li><li>Iron Will now grants a reduction to snare effects on the Guardian in addition to the Stamina buff. <span style="color: #ff0000;">- The Stamina doesn't do anything for us. I agree with the suggestion of a small regenerating ward, reactive heal or even a noticable in combat health regen. Actually a regen might be the answer as it would work incredibly well for the solo player, have a noticable impact on heroic content and be about as useful as the current STA buff for raid content.</span></li><li>Plant has been redesigned. It is now a blue AE target lock with a small threat component. The base duration of the target lock is 6 seconds with the level 90 master. The base casting time remains at 1 second, and the recast is still 60 seconds. <span style="color: #ff0000;">- This needs to have a large threat component otherwise I don't believe that Hold the Line would have done enough to help maintain agro once the lock wears off.</span></li><li>Hold the Line now has the "Aggressive Nature" effect automatically built into the ability. It's as if you spent the 5 AA points in the Shadows tree without actually having to spend the points.  "Aggressive Defense," a Berserker ability, recieved the same change. <span style="color: #ff0000;">- Excellent change, thumbs up!</span></li></ul><p>Keep the feedback coming! The discussion has obviously shifted beyond just utility, and we're looking for feedback on all of these changes.  Any other suggestions for the class are welcomed as well, but understand that we are focusing mostly on more general changes rather than class or AA ability changes to solve the survivability problem.</p><p><span style="color: #ff0000;">Thank you for outlining some of the other changes that you had in mind, we now have a much clearer picture of where we are going. I like the fact that all 4 plate tanks are viable as main tank and also like the fact that you are steering Guardians towards being able to protect the group/raid effectively as part of their defensive edge.</span></p><p><span style="color: #ff0000;">We do however need further work done on generating our own hate (both single target and AOE) rather than manipulating the hate of others and we also need significantly more single target dps in addition to the hate changes to bring us up to where we should be in the desirability department and solidify the class as a solid or even preferential main tank candidate. The ability to comfortably keep agro while main tanking from the off tank without annoying the off tank as they have to throttle themselves would be very nice.</span></p><p><span style="color: #ff0000;">I'm also keen to see your further suggestions on survivability of the class to set us apart again in that department. I'm not sure it would have any benefit in the current expansion to guilds already progressing well but it would certainly help the "lower" tier guilds and provide the design team with interesting options for future expansion and raid zone difficulty levels and scripts.</span></p></blockquote>

[metalhed]

<p>nm</p>

[Holyduke1234]

<p><cite>Wulfghar@Nektulos wrote:</cite></p><blockquote><p><cite>Holyduke1234 wrote:</cite></p><blockquote><p><cite>Soul_Dreamer wrote:</cite></p><blockquote><p><cite>Xelgad wrote:</cite></p><blockquote><ul><li>Enhance: Moderate now grants 1 crit bonus per point instead of additional hate gain reduction.</li></ul><p><span style="color: #3366ff;">I'm not sure which would be best, potency or crit bonus, I've heard Crit bonus isn't working correctly for Shaman wards. Either way a nice change and means we give something to the group.</span></p><p><span style="color: #003300;"><strong><span style="color: #003366;">OMG please dont take this away; the additional hate gain reduction. If I have 2 or 3 heavy hitting DPS'ers in my group without being able to reduce their hate I'm going to lose agro all the time. If you want, add the extra 1% crit bonus, but please dont remove this! Scouts doing 60k get reduced to 45K. Giving me an extra 5% crit bonus is NOT going to give me that much more hate. Again the guardians main issue is DPS. Because of this we cannot hold agro without a perfect group setup. Dirge or Coecer or going dual weild or all 3. This is the one and only ability that we have that helps alot with groups.</span><span style="color: #003366;"><span style="color: #ff0000;"> - As was posted previously, Group Moderate ftw if you have that much trouble. <span style="color: #003366;">My bad. I missunderstood when the dev said "Instead of additional hate gain reduction".. what is our one and only hate gain reduction? Improved Moderation. As described in what I said Scouts doing 60K get reduce to 45K with improved Moderation (5 points) If they are removing the hate gain "INCREASE" and giving us 1% crit bonus ok...but still, Take something away and give us something else.</span></span></span></strong></span></p><ul><li>Enhance: Call to Arms, which increases the effectiveness of that buff by 7% per point. </li></ul><p><span style="color: #3366ff;">Hmm, not really very usefull unless it also effects the buffs added via the red adorn and the other AA for it, I'd suggest changing the buff this enhances since we already have an AA that enhances this ability. Maybe Enhance Sentinal: Add a chance to intercept magical attacks as well and greatly reduce the amount of damage intercepted down to about 10%, if a 10k AOE hits the target has a chance to only receive 50% say and I only intercept 20%. This ability also needs the amount intercepted lowered, I can't use this ability on some fighters since it has a chance to kill me <img src="/eq2/images/smilies/3b63d1616c5dfcf29f8a7a031aaa7cad.gif" border="0" /></span></p><p><span style="color: #3366ff;">All the Guardian abilities that have a chance to kill us need that part removing really or drastically reducing, other fighters when they buff the groups DPS don't have their DPS lowered as a result, why when we increase the groups survivability do we pay a survivability penalty ourselves?</span></p><p><strong><span style="color: #003366;">Ok its an upgrade. 7% I will assume will also include the ability modifier of group (118.6 Mastered/maxed) and increase curshing, piercing, slashing and ranged of group members by 33.6. So after 5 points it would be 160.11 and 45.3 crushing, etc. Well thanks for an extra 50 points damage for the group and the extra 12 crushing, etc. As long as everyone is not maxed this will help everyone.... a little. </span><span style="color: #003366;"><span style="color: #ff0000;">- A little clarification is needed, but I doubt the 7% increase will apply to the ability modifier portion due to its origin being from an AA line. <span style="color: #003366;">/Agree... little increase</span></span></span></strong></p><p><strong><span style="color: #003366;">This reminds me of the SK ability Essence Siphon. Recast 25 seconds last 30 seconds. What does it do? Increases INT and STR of group by 77, increase ability modifier by 140, inflicts 2,500 damage and decrease the same things on the mob.</span></strong></p><p><strong><span style="color: #003366;">Also agree with what Xelgad is saying on the abilities that kill the guardian.</span></strong></p><p>The "Crippling" tree has been replaced with a new tree titled "Aggression."  This new tree is intended to provide extra threat generation, especially in cases where the Guardian doesn't have full hate buffs.  Aggression Tree:</p><ul><li>Enhance: Provoke, which grants 7% potency to the taunt with each point.</li></ul><span style="color: #3366ff;"><img src="/eq2/images/smilies/e8a506dc4ad763aca51bec4ca7dc8560.gif" border="0" /> <span style="color: #003366;"><strong><-- big thumbs up!!<span style="color: #ff0000;"> - Not worth spending 5 points on.</span></strong></span></span><ul><li>Enhance: Hatred, which offers 2% hate mod per point.</li></ul><p><span style="white-space: pre;"><span style="color: #3366ff;">I can't see myself using it but some will so good change.</span></span></p><p><span style="white-space: pre;"><span style="color: #003366;"><strong>More hate = better guardian<span style="color: #ff0000;"> - Obviously you don't know how hate mod works, or perhaps you skimmed over the dozens of posts pointing it out. Hate mod caps at 50%, which is easily attainable via gear/adorns, or good ol' dirge/coercer buffs. </span></strong></span></span></p><p><span style="white-space: pre;"><strong><span style="color: #003366;">Sure if everygroup I can get a dirge and/or a coercer. If you are not at this cap or dont have the correct group setup my statement stands: more hate = better guardian or.. maybe that dirge can run a diffrent buff gasp!</span></strong></span></p><ul><li>Shoulder the Burden, which is a 10% hate siphon that can be placed on any group member. </li></ul><p><span style="color: #3366ff;">Useful in groups, not so much in a raid unless you're in a 3 healer group, I suppose then siphoning off the dirge could be useful. Good change.</span></p><p><span style="color: #3366ff;"><strong><span style="color: #003366;">again...</span><span style="white-space: pre;"><span style="color: #003366;">More hate = better guardian. Watch out pally's we are coming after you! </span><span style="color: #003366;"><span style="color: #ff0000;">- Your enthusiasm is as fake as our need for more hate mod or hate siphon/transfer. <span style="color: #003366;">/See above</span></span></span></span></strong></span></p><p> Other AA changes:</p><ul><li>"Double Attack" in the Guardian tree has been replaced with 3% chance to flurry and has been renamed to "Flurry."</li></ul><p><img src="/eq2/images/smilies/e8a506dc4ad763aca51bec4ca7dc8560.gif" border="0" /> <span style="color: #3366ff;">but more please <img src="/eq2/images/smilies/3b63d1616c5dfcf29f8a7a031aaa7cad.gif" border="0" /></span></p><p><span style="color: #003366;"><strong>With 5 points that would be 15% flurry. THANK YOU!!!<span style="color: #ff0000;"> - ....You do realize that "Double Attack" is an ability which only allows 1 point, seeing as its an endline?  So, theoretically "Flurry" would also only allow 1 point for a maximum of 3%, which is nice to look at, but nowhere enough. <span style="color: #003366;">You are correct and I stand corrected. 3% flurry is weak.</span></span></strong></span></p><ul><li>Enhance: Plant now increases the duration of the ability by only 0.4 seconds per point (see below).</li></ul><p><span style="color: #003366;"><strong>OK so we can lock all targets on us for 6 seconds. and it has a small hate proc? I hope after the 6 seconds we can hold onto them. At least this will give us something we can use. </strong></span></p><p><strong><span style="color: #003366;">All tanks get Rescue, and can get Sneering Assault, and Cry of the Warrior.</span></strong></p><p><span style="color: #003366;"><strong>Looking at our brother Berserker they get Insolence and Jeering Inslaught. Jeering is a rescue AoE that they can use every 45 seconds.... 45 seconds! 3 hate proc and damage proc. Same for Insolence Damage proc and hate. </strong></span></p><p><strong><span style="color: #003366;">SK's have Grav Sacrament. </span></strong><strong><span style="color: #003366;">Does 3,200 - 4,700 Disease damage AoE PLUS 1,500 - 2,200 Disease AoE every 4 seconds. PLUS increases threat by 2 AoE, PLUS Increases threat AoE by 7,800 - 9,100 instantly and by 7,500 - 9,100 every 4 seconds lasting 20 seconds. recast is 2 minutes 45 seconds. AND they get Death march recast every 2 minutes 15 seconds. </span></strong></p><p><span style="color: #003366;"><strong>We get Reinforcement last 15 seconds (more with points) and increase hate everytime we hit plus 1,600 threat, recast every 1 minute 45 seconds. Plus now we will be able to "lock them" for 6 seconds. Personally SK, Pally's and Zerkers have more ago tools then we do. If this is the only bone we can get I will glady take it but its a very small bone.</strong></span></p><p><strong><span style="color: #003366;">Do you see the same theme? All other tanks are getting Damage procs. While we get a little hate proc. OK, like I said. Thank you sir, I will take anything you are willing to give us but you are offering very little.</span><span style="color: #003366;"><span style="color: #ff0000;"> - This may help with heroic content or battlegrounds, but has almost no use whatsoever in epic content.  Personally I agree with previous posters that it should be one of 2 things: a.) A toggleable buff that provides immunity to kickback/etc, or b.) A blue background AE with either threat or positional hate up front and over time.</span></span></strong></p><ul><li>"Aggressive Nature" now increases the threat generated by Hold the Line by 5% per point instead of adding a threat proc on blocks (see below).</li></ul><p> <span style="white-space: pre;"><span style="color: #3366ff;"> See below.</span></span></p><strong><span style="color: #003366;">I like this one. If I am getting hit, I will generate more hate, but I need to try my hardest to do everything I can so I dont get hit. Talk about a catch 22! </span><span style="color: #003366;"><span style="color: #ff0000;">- For the first time, you really hit the nail on the head.  Tanking is about living as long as you can and holding agro the best you can(TPS).  Part of survival is negating incoming damage via stoneskins and block, which reduces the effectiveness of this ability.  With the change to Sphere, this will be even more so.</span></span></strong></blockquote><blockquote><p>Class ability changes:</p><ul><li>Recapture now lowers the threat position of non-fighters in the Guardian's group to the target encounter. While that effect is only groupwide, the raidwide effect that increases the threat position of other fighters is still present. The reuse on this ability has been increased to 45 seconds.</li></ul><p><span style="white-space: pre;"><span style="color: #3366ff;">Shame about the 50% increase in reuse when the ability should really have worked this way from start. </span></span><span style="color: #3366ff;">Any chance of leaving it at 30 seconds?</span></p><p><span style="color: #003366;"><strong>Well good move. This will be like a reverse rescue of sorts. Lower everyone else and raise my position. 45 seconds is ok. I use recapture alot if I need to send a mob to another tank. or switching on fights like sara green heart. Could we have 40 seconds reuse if not 30?<span style="color: #ff0000;"> - Personally I say leave it as it was originally if this is the proposed change.  If we can get a fix to our DPS problem, we won't need to lower the threat position of our group, now will we?</span></strong></span></p><ul><li>Iron Will now grants a reduction to snare effects on the Guardian in addition to the Stamina buff.</li></ul><p><span style="color: #3366ff;">Except very low levels the stamina buff doesn't actually do anything, even heroic legendary geared Guardians are very close or over the stamina cap at level 90. We only have one offensive buff not counting offensive stance, can this be changed to : procs 500 mental damage and then 500 hate to every CA for the next 10 seconds. 2 times a min proc rate. A tiny DPS increase and a hate increase.</span></p><p><span style="color: #003366;"><strong>I feel like Oliver. Getting a bowl of watery soup while all the rich kids are eating steak. "Please sir may I have some more?"I guess someone had to get stuck with the STA group and raid wide buff.. or wait thats a SK that also increases spell damage by 4.38% and potency (with AA) by 1.3% group and raid wide. </strong></span></p><p><span style="color: #003366;"><strong>We are talking about the guardians self STA buff that gives us 80ish STA. So looks like we are getting a chance of not being snared? ** looks at his mythical/epic buff says chance to proc 1.8 per minute a 10 second immunity to Stun, Stifle, root, Fear and Daze. Well what do you know, snare is not there. </strong></span></p><p><strong><span style="color: #003366;">Could I suggest we get something called Aura of the Guardian? A spell/combat art that we can cast that would dispel hostile root, daze, etc and then give us 20 seconds of immunity to these effects. Let us recast that every 50 seconds?.... oh wait, Pallys and SK's already have those, my bad. Thank you for the reduction of snare effects. </span><span style="color: #003366;"><span style="color: #ff0000;">- Well said.  SK's get an addition to their group buff that adds 10% casting speed and reuse, we get...[Removed for Content]?  Ability modifier and accuracy?  Accuracy by itself is nice, but couple it with something more beefy than AM.  For the STA buff, make it % based increase to your HP pool.  3% at Expert level and 5% at Master level.</span></span></strong></p></blockquote><p><span style="color: #3366ff;">The main issues I have here are:</span></p><p><span style="color: #3366ff;">A.) While there are hate changes to increase hate, I don't think they go far enough, not enough to balace hate across the fighters. *</span></p><p><span style="color: #003366;"><strong>/Agree </strong></span></p><p><span style="color: #ff0000;">- While I do agree that changes aren't going far enough(or in the right direction), I believe that we need more work like the addition of flurry, rather than increases to taunt size or hate mod/xfer.</span></p><p><span style="color: #3366ff;">B.) No DPS changes, the game is all about DPS now and nothing in the above changes where we stand with the other fighters, which is often more than  50% less in the same setting. **</span></p><p><span style="color: #3366ff;"><span style="color: #003366;"><strong>/Agree</strong></span></span></p><p><span style="color: #3366ff;"><span style="color: #003366;"><strong></strong></span><span style="color: #ff0000;">- I also completely agree, and will continue to agree until changes are made to remedy this situation.  Perhaps it might help if one of the Devs in charge of making these changes actually played a Guardian in current content.  Perhaps after they feel the sting of getting your ego handed to you by an SK with an evil grin and a chuckle, they might start thinking along the right lines.</span>Think of it this way... Some mobs have DPS checks, not enough DPS in the raid/group and the mob doesn't die, it's that simple. SK/Zerk/Pally bring very very respectable DPS and can take hits as much as is required. Guardian bring next to no DPS and there is no call for our extra survivability. </span></p><p><span style="color: #3366ff;"><span style="color: #003366;"><strong>/Agree</strong></span></span></p><p><span style="color: #3366ff;"><span style="color: #ff0000;">- Ditto.  Moar DoTs! (DD's would work too, <img src="/eq2/images/smilies/908627bbe5e9f6a080977db8c365caff.gif" border="0" />)</span>** The only way I can effectively see this working is if in the mechanics changes you're eluding to, other plate fighters loose survivability, to an extent that survivability to Hate/Utility is balanced. Currently it's not, and not in a big way, if the mechanics change doesn't fix this issue then Guardians need more DPS to compete.</span></p><p><strong>/Agree</strong></p><p><span style="color: #ff0000;">- I would think changing the mechanics of an entire expansion's content would be a tad bit more involved than reworking an outdated class to allow for more DPS.  Reworking existing content = Guardians in the same boat next year.  Reworking the Guardian class = Guardians taken seriously from now on.</span></p><p><span style="color: #003366;"><strong>My comments.</strong></span></p><p><span style="color: #003366;"><strong>Make me a guardian that is wanted. I want to be the rock of a group or raid. Tough-as-nails and able to take a beating. My two jobs are staying alive and holding ago. If that needs to be done by hate and not DPS I am fine with that. We each have a role to play in this game. Mine was being the end all "take a beating tank" that can survive where other tanks cannot. This is no longer the case which is why we are here now talking about guardians.</strong></span></p><p><span style="color: #003366;"><strong>If you need ideas look at the other tanks and compare what they have to what a guardian has. You will see a big difference in what they bring to groups and raids. Give us some utility that sets us apart. </strong></span></p><p><span style="color: #003366;"><strong>Raid stone skin </strong></span></p><p><span style="color: #003366;"><strong>Raid ward against physical damage.. something that Protects our raid and/or group. </strong></span></p><p><span style="color: #003366;"><strong>Even a group AoE blocker so our healers dont have to joust out. 3 person AoE blocker short range?</strong></span></p><p><strong><span style="color: #003366;">Have an AA that turns our taunts into damage also. So for every 100 point taunt or threat we do 1 point of slashing damage. Spend 5 points and get 5 slashing damage per 100?</span></strong></p><p><strong><span style="color: #003366;">As far as what you have posted the flurry is the best... but we lose double attack. It seems everything you offer us you take something away. Or what you are offering is a very small upgrade.</span></strong></p><p><strong><span style="color: #003366;">Still this guardian is happy for what you are doing. *Picks up his bowl*, please sir, can I have some more?</span></strong></p></blockquote></blockquote></blockquote>

[Soul_Dreamer]

<p>Aerin:</p><p>Hate reducers and increasers are applied after transfers so you'd get 10% of their hate then the 90% hate has the reducer applied. I don't think it's that bad and benefits the legendary geared Heroic Guardian more. The issues I have with this line is I don't want to be mashing shout more often, it should just be increased. I also don't want 10% more hate gain when we have that in another line.</p><p>Switch them:<span style="font-size: 11.6667px;">Move Share the Burden to where Hated currently is and have it at 2% per rank.Hated: After each agression ability is used we gain 25% of the hate generated by the ability added to each CA for 5 seconds. It's then up to us to keep this buff going and getting the extra hate. And it means following "Rescue" we get more hate onto CA's than we would from Shout etc. </span></p>

[steelbadger]

<p><cite>Soul_Dreamer wrote:</cite></p><blockquote><p>Aerin:</p><p>Hate reducers and increasers are applied after transfers so you'd get 10% of their hate then the 90% hate has the reducer applied</p></blockquote><p>Wrong, this has been tested and it has been shown that hate Reducers apply <em>before</em> transfers.  By applying a hate reducer to someone you reduce the amount of hate you receive from the transfer.</p><p>And hate increasers don't effect transferred hate.</p>

[Soul_Dreamer]

<p><cite>steelbadger wrote:</cite></p><blockquote><p><cite>Soul_Dreamer wrote:</cite></p><blockquote><p>Aerin:</p><p>Hate reducers and increasers are applied after transfers so you'd get 10% of their hate then the 90% hate has the reducer applied</p></blockquote><p>Wrong, this has been tested and it has been shown that hate Reducers apply <em>before</em> transfers.  By applying a hate reducer to someone you reduce the amount of hate you receive from the transfer.</p><p>And hate increasers don't effect transferred hate.</p></blockquote><p>How and when was this tested, this is the first time I've seen it claimed this way around and I usually read the forums pretty often. Not saying you're wrong just want to know how you know you're right <img src="/smilies/3b63d1616c5dfcf29f8a7a031aaa7cad.gif" border="0" alt="SMILEY" /></p>

[spudsmckenzie2]

<p>make guardian reversal on a 20 second timer and have the effect hit up to 4 mobs standing in front of the guardian when the guard blocks, parries, deflect,ripostes. when dungeon crawling or on raids i often pick up more then one trash mob and sometimes holding on to everything is tough. this would just be another ability that would allow us to hold multiple content a little better.</p>

[Davngr1]

<p>well it took what seems like more then 2 years to fix what the "fighter revamp" broke but late is better then never i guess.     changes look good but i still think you need to give guard some single target damage ability.    taking away survivability from other tanks is not an option imo. </p>

[Theren]

i like what other have said about the flurry buff. I'd say give if 5% flurry w/o a shield and 25% w/ shield. (the two won't stack to 30%) that way you get a little bit for all around dps and a ton when tanking. think crusader's similar ability. also, would call to arms be better if it had a proc for damage and say 10% static accuracy and strikethrough???

[Madmonte]

<p>If we're talking about guardian survivability, I don't see how any of the proposed changes actually address survivability except for guardian sphere.  Not any of the ones you listed anyways.  They all seem to target aggro, which is nice, but I've gotta say, aggro in groups/raids IS way less than other tanks and so needed to be addressed, but it wasn't my problem with guardian, my problem is that I can watch an SK in the exact same group avoid 2.5 times the damage in the exact same gear, just off his 20 second riposte alone.</p><p>EXCEPT for guardian sphere of course.  That one will be huge and worthwhile...so don't go making it like an 8 second duration with a 15 minute recast, because so far, that's ALL we're getting for survivablity...</p><p>As for someone commenting that 3% with 5 points = 15% flurry!  Look again, it's an end line...</p><p>So addressing survivability, what still doesn't get addressed is that all of these other plate classes have passive heals that account for a LOT of their survivability.  Avoidance checks aside, where guardian sphere addresses that...the guardian is less of a wall because they require their healers to do more, in the exact same groups. </p><p>The extra utility is nice, the extra aggro is nice, but it doesn't help us stand better...and guardian sphere is a temp that will be SO useful...but when it's not up...boom the guardian still STANDS alone as less survivable.</p><p>I've made a paladin dual me in the guild hall.  We had a lot of the same gear, so we geared exactly the same.  Then all we did was auto attack each other, we tried it in defensive spec (and he was winning with 100% health, but it was taking too [Removed for Content] long)</p><p>Then (again no temps, nothing) we did it in offensive.  I wore a shield, he wore the same shield to be fair.  At the end, he was at 100% health, and I was at 0%. </p><p>I've checked those same scenarios in raid with a similar geared SK, and his 2k heals per second had the healers working MUCH less hard. </p><p>So what's the solution, giving the guardian a passive heal?  Maybe, and if you are willing to give that in aa or any respect, it would instantly balance the guards survivability.  But as other guys have already said, proccable stone skin works just as well, and actually keeps to the guardian theme. </p><p>All this aggro control stuff is fine, but the talented guards could hold aggro even though the other tanks COULD hold it better...it REMAINS survivability that needs to be addressed, and the improved guardian sphere is only a start.</p><p>Also I would like to mention that Last Man Standing, you pull something group, the bloody thing only lasts like 2 seconds...what the hell good is that?  7 hits absorbed, christ let us keep the 80% damage reduction for the full 30!</p>

[Yimway]

<p>I want to go back to utility for a bit.</p><p>I think Call of Shielding, and potentially Call to Arms needs further adressing, but let me frame my opinion a bit.</p><p>There is a significant raidwide dps differential chosing to bring a guard vs really any other tank.  But I think you've got to look at the most extreme example of a guard vs crusader.</p><p>No matter how much you fix the aggro or survivability, this gap remains, and when the current challenge of the content doesn't necesitate the miniscule survivability bonus we have. More needs to be done to close the dps gap.</p><p>I know many posting here and particularly at flames are lobbying strongly that if no DPS love is given the class, this rework is a failure out the door.</p><p>I may get flamed for suggesting it, but...</p><p>I don't think our dps should be raised, instead I think we need to go back to the utility portion and provide enough of a raidwide dps increase from our group and raid buffs to offset the dps hit a raid takes allowing us to come along.</p><p>That is I believe the right decision is to compensate raidwide dps for the differential and not overly buff guardian dps output. </p><p>Call of Shielding - Going to need to look at potency and reuse, resistability and accuracy, or flurry and spell double attack as meaningful areas where the raidwide buff could apply a bonus that players at or near attainable caps can still get an improvement to offset the dps liability of the guardian.</p><p>Call to Arms - Similarly, doing more to buff MT group dps/heals could be applied to help address the same concern.  Given the location and makeup of  guardian groups, looking at putting potency, reuse, or additional accuracy here is compelling.</p><p>I want to avoid large buffs that would overly favor the guard vs the entire raid / group, but if nothing is done to offset the raidwide dps potential, the class will remain benched.</p><p>If raidwide dps doesn't take a hit, and we have the aggro tools to do our job, then and only then can we begin to earn raidslots back.  Unless of course your going to actually take survivability away from every other tank so that we have a meaningful advantage again.</p>

[Loendar]

<p><cite>Atan@Unrest wrote:</cite></p><blockquote><p>I want to go back to utility for a bit.</p><p>I think Call of Shielding, and potentially Call to Arms needs further adressing, but let me frame my opinion a bit.</p><p>There is a significant raidwide dps differential chosing to bring a guard vs really any other tank.  But I think you've got to look at the most extreme example of a guard vs crusader.</p><p>No matter how much you fix the aggro or survivability, this gap remains, and when the current challenge of the content doesn't necesitate the miniscule survivability bonus we have. More needs to be done to close the dps gap.</p><p>I know many posting here and particularly at flames are lobbying strongly that if no DPS love is given the class, this rework is a failure out the door.</p><p>I may get flamed for suggesting it, but...</p><p>I don't think our dps should be raised, instead I think we need to go back to the utility portion and provide enough of a raidwide dps increase from our group and raid buffs to offset the dps hit a raid takes allowing us to come along.</p><p>That is I believe the right decision is to compensate raidwide dps for the differential and not overly buff guardian dps output. </p><p>Call of Shielding - Going to need to look at potency and reuse, resistability and accuracy, or flurry and spell double attack as meaningful areas where the raidwide buff could apply a bonus that players at or near attainable caps can still get an improvement to offset the dps liability of the guardian.</p><p>Call to Arms - Similarly, doing more to buff MT group dps/heals could be applied to help address the same concern.  Given the location and makeup of  guardian groups, looking at putting potency, reuse, or additional accuracy here is compelling.</p><p>I want to avoid large buffs that would overly favor the guard vs the entire raid / group, but if nothing is done to offset the raidwide dps potential, the class will remain benched.</p><p>If raidwide dps doesn't take a hit, and we have the aggro tools to do our job, then and only then can we begin to earn raidslots back.  Unless of course your going to actually take survivability away from every other tank so that we have a meaningful advantage again.</p></blockquote><p>I see what you are saying here and it makes sense - but when you talk raid-wide are you also referring to group-wide?  Our group-based DPS is pretty horrible by comparison to the other plate tanks to the point where I actually feel bad being the instance tank when there is an SK waiting in the wings.  I actively [Removed for Content] our group just so I can play a toon that I want.</p><p>For the same reasons that it is dangerous to be forced to rely on other classes for our aggro I think it is equally dangerous to expect other classes to carry our DPS burden by simply buffing them.  The more classes you have in your group that are slacking off the worse you will look while crusaders, etc. pumping out their own DPS will continue to shine.</p>

[Madmonte]

<p>Yeah but at the same time, he is trying to stay true to guardians not being designed to be the BEST at dps, but BEST at other things.  Perhaps an increase to single target dps, I don't know, but personally, I specced my guard to be very high on hitrate, focusing on c/p/s, strikethrough and accuracy that other tank classes flat out don't get as well as a guard does...</p><p>And then focused my gear towards auto attack, like dps and haste mods, and honestly, I don't REALLY see dps as that horrid on the guard, personally...just compared to the other tanks lol</p>

[Wasuna]

<p>Guardians are suppose to be a tank that allows others to do their job. Giving us a buff that would boost the raid/group dps is a decent way to offset the dps disparity between tanks. I think that will be very hard to setup though. The dps disparity is much more prounced in a group setting than in a raid setting.</p><p>Also, lets never loose site of the fact that utility is only one aspect of the balance equations. If this is all SoE is going to balance then lets throw it all in now. If they are going to visit the other aspets later then lets just look at what we need in terms of Utility to be what a Guardian is suppose to be.</p>

[Rahatmattata]

<p><cite>Soul_Dreamer wrote:</cite></p><blockquote><p><cite>steelbadger wrote:</cite></p><blockquote><p><cite>Soul_Dreamer wrote:</cite></p><blockquote><p>Aerin:</p><p>Hate reducers and increasers are applied after transfers so you'd get 10% of their hate then the 90% hate has the reducer applied</p></blockquote><p>Wrong, this has been tested and it has been shown that hate Reducers apply <em>before</em> transfers.  By applying a hate reducer to someone you reduce the amount of hate you receive from the transfer.</p><p>And hate increasers don't effect transferred hate.</p></blockquote><p>How and when was this tested, this is the first time I've seen it claimed this way around and I usually read the forums pretty often. Not saying you're wrong just want to know how you know you're right <img src="/eq2/images/smilies/3b63d1616c5dfcf29f8a7a031aaa7cad.gif" border="0" /></p></blockquote><p>There was a long thread about it on the guard boards at eq2flames a year or so ago. Basically it was tested with a training dummy, guardian, and assassin. The end result was noone could prove either way how it works. I believe moderate does not nerf a threat transfer, but I don't care to try and prove it or have a debate about it. I will continue to moderate dps if they are ripping aggro whether they are feeding me hate or not.</p><p>It would be best for a dev to tell everyone how it works once and for all... if they know.</p>

[Yimway]

<p><cite>Loendar@Unrest wrote:</cite></p><blockquote><p>I see what you are saying here and it makes sense - but when you talk raid-wide are you also referring to group-wide?  Our group-based DPS is pretty horrible by comparison to the other plate tanks to the point where I actually feel bad being the instance tank when there is an SK waiting in the wings.  I actively [Removed for Content] our group just so I can play a toon that I want.</p></blockquote><p>This is honestly why I mentioned both raid and group buffs.</p><p>However, I expect us to still be behind in aggregrate heroic group dps.  I don't see a way to fix this without breaking other things, and honestly I'm comfortable for there being sacrafices in some content for gains in another, even if its a tough pill to swallow.</p><p>As the other poster indicated, I'm trying to solve the problem and keep the class grounded, rather than just say buff us up to everyone else.  This constant cycling of buffing up the weakest class isn't a sustainable class design metric.</p>

[WarmMachine]

<p>How guardians generate agro.  It is generated from three ways; damage to the mob though attacks and combat arts (dps); though taunts; and though passive abilities like hold the line that procs when you take damage.  Looking at log files of hate generated on epic content witch does not include dps, Hold the Line does 30-40% of the threat that I generate in a fight.  Then other hate procs like undeniable malice witch for the most part proc off taking damage plus attacks make up another 20-30% of my threat.  Sentential Strike then does 20-25%, shout does about 10-13%, provoke does 8-12%, taunting blow does 1-5% and taunting assault deals 1-2%.  So to break it down, 60-70% of the threat generated by a guardian is passive and sentential strike typically does more threat than all of our other 4 taunt attacks combined.  Epic mobs basically don't miss unless I am running defensive minded, even then the number of misses is typical under 5% for the entire fight.  Now in Heroic content mobs don't land attacks 30 to 75% of the time depending on how much defensive gear is on, witch lowers the threat generated 15-50%.  A simple change of hold the line from any damage to any attack would help heroic guards a good bit.  So in the ball park of 80-90% of our threat is generated from dps and passive ablities.  The Aggression line mainly focuses on improving taunts with generates much less hate than our passive ablies and dps, this is why it will not help guardians very much</p><p>So lets look at the changes proposed in the new Aggression line.  Over all it is heading in the right direction, however there are several problems with it.  The biggest problem is it does little to nothing to address our biggest problem of poor group encounter agro.  For the most part our single target agro is alright, not great but is not horrible, improved moderate helps a great deal.  As this current line goes this will help guards that under 200 aa but a guards get to the end game this line helps very little.  For the most part people solo while they level up or do small groups with friends, these changes will not help very much and they would see better results from putting points into the slaughtering line.</p> <p>-<span style="color: #0000ff;">Enhance: Provoke, which grants 7% potency to the taunt with each point</span>. This gives a total of 35% more to all taunts, plus the 30% we already get from Executioner's Anger that sounds great on paper, but read the first paragraph about how guardians generate threat and you will see that we don't generate 25% of our threat from taunting (and yes I do use taunts every time they are up, guards should have no problems keeping 95% of their abilities on reuse timers during a fight.) So this would only add another 2-3% to guardians threat.  Again I understand not everything can be a winner, this seems like a nice ablity on paper but when looking at the numbers it is a very small improvement.</p> <p>-<span style="color: #0000ff;">Enhance: Shout, which reduces the reuse of the ability by 0.4 seconds per point and improves the resistability by 2% per point</span>.  This is another ok, ability.  Shout, guardians group taunt is on a 10 sec recast timer, 5 points would lower it down to 8 seconds and 10% lower chance resist is nice.  Shout is the first thing every guardian should use on an incoming group of mobs since the range is longer than any melee ability and when a mob or two resist it on incoming the guard can loose agro on incoming.  I think this ability will help guards more than any other in the aggression line for group encounter, however it still does nothing for unlinked encounters. Improving the cast time and resistance of a spell that does not generates 5% of my threat will only improve the threat about 1-2%.  So with the 10 AA sunk into shout and taunt amounts, shout will at most be 8-10% of threat generated.  Not this does not account for the reduction in dps, because you have to be clicking shout more often that means you are not using a combat art, witch should make any hate gained on a single target about the same as the dps lost.</p> <p>-<span style="color: #0000ff;">Enhance: Hatred, which offers 2% hate mod per point</span>.  First of all I will explain how hate modifiers work.  The are multipliers of the threat you generate from your actions and have a range of 0.5 or -50 hate mod to 1.5 or 50 hate mod.  So 50 hate mod would increase the threat of your actions by 1.5, 60 hate mod not add any more since it is over the cap.  Negative hate mod would reduce the threat you recive by up to .5 or half. The hate mod does not help very much, right now Guards are sitting at 15 hate mod (10 from Executioner's Anger 5 from Improved Moderate), and can add 15 hate mod though regular adornments and another 17.5 with yellow adornments or 35 with red adornments.  Then Dirges give 30 hate mod and Coercers give 22 hate mod with a transfer.  So reaching the 50 cap is already crazy easy.  Add the -25 hate mod that Improved Moderate puts the entire group at .75 hate generation, and moderate will move the highest dpser to .5 hate generation while putting the tank at least 1.15 hate generation.  The point being the cap of 1.5 hate generation is very easy so this will not help much of anything.  The 25 hate reduction on improved moderate does more for a guard than hate mod because multiplying a high number by .75 or .50 (with moderate on) is going to reduce the number by a lot more than adding 1.15 or 1.25 modifier to the guardians low numbers.  A 10k dps parsing guard would generate 11.5k dps with 1.15 modifier, 12.5k dps at 1.25 modifier and 15k at the cap of 1.5.  However a dps class doing 50k would generate 37.5k hate with improved moderate, then slap moderate on to put them at the cap of .5 and they would generate 25k hate from their 50k dps.  Another words 1.5 times a small amount is just a slightly larger amount.</p> <p>-<span style="color: #0000ff;">Enhance: Rescue, which is the same as it was in the Stability tree</span>.  No changes but will say, snaps should rarely be use for when changing tanks and mobs that mem wipe, they should not be a part of a regular rotation, so reuse time should not be very important.</p> <p>-<span style="color: #0000ff;">Shoulder the Burden, which is a 10% hate siphon that can be placed on any group member</span>. This is basically amends lite a 40% hate transfer that palies get.  Considering it is a watered down 25% as effective spell that another class gets, this does not look appealing to me.  I know their are/were issues with amends stacking with hate transfers, and have to be applied correctly (I don't follow other classes very closely) that should be considered.  Considering wizards, warlocks, swashbucklers, coercers, and assassins all get hate transfers, this is going to do very little to change things.  The only thing I can see this doing is make less of a difference between a scrub guardian and a well played guardian.</p> <p>Over all the aggression tree will do very little, and Guardians will still be the lowest hate generating tank in the game. Taunts have never worked well in this game, unless there is underlying improvements to the way threat is handled with them they will never be as good as dps.  Plus doing damage makes the mob die and gives threat, where doing taunts only give threat.  There is a threat meter in the game so nobody has the excuss of they did not know they were putting out too much threat and mistakenly took agro.  But the truth is dps classes want to put out as much dps as they can, and will not group with a tank that will force them to hold back. </p> <p>Again Guardians need help holding multiple mobs, to do this you can give us more blue spells, give us more ae auto attacks.  Another change is to up the proc rate on Hold the Line, or change it so that it has a chance to proc even on missed attacks (the second option would help heroic more than epic content). </p> <p><strong>While we are the lowest hate generating tank, I would be happy with these changes if we really shined in survivability. Leaving us with yes we can live though almost anything, just have to keep agro on them mob as our problem, while other tanks have no problem keeping agro on the mob but have a much harder time keeping alive.  It should be in proportion to the dps/hate advantage the other tanks have on us now of roughly 30%.  It should be in damage reduction not avoidance since most of our hate is generated from passive abilities that proc when we take damage.  This would keep in line with the idea that guardians are armored behemoths who can absorb massive amounts of damage, however they do a much less damage because the are in such heavy armor.  To to respond to the people who will reply with all tanks can tank current content with out any major survivability issues.  I will say yes it should that every tank can tank any mob in this game.  This however would let guardians be more flexible in the fact that a poorly geared or less than ideal healer could keep them up, where they could not another tank.  On a raid, if a templar/defiler/dirge is out for the night it would not affect a guardian as much as the other tank.  An example of this would be on Mandori/Medorius/Mikla (esay) in palace where a guardian or zekerker has to tank Mandori, with higher surivablity, we could switch run only one healer with the guard, letting us move the other healer to help one of the other two fighters, where as the zerker would still need 2 healers. To me that has a lot of appeal, we would be the ideal option for clearing new content while everyone was gearing up.  However other tanks would still be the ideal pick zones that are on farm status.  It would give us a uniquie role from the other tanks and fit with how the class was orginally envisioned.  </strong></p>

[Yimway]

<p><cite>WarmMachine wrote:</cite></p><blockquote><p><strong>While we are the lowest hate generating tank, I would be happy with these changes if we really shined in survivability. Leaving us with yes we can live though almost anything, just have to keep agro on them mob as our problem, while other tanks have no problem keeping agro on the mob but have a much harder time keeping alive. </strong></p></blockquote><p>Given a guardian revamp isn't including nerfing every other class, this option isn't on the table.</p><p>Fact is, any tank can live thru almost anything today.  The gap in survivability has been closed to almost nil, giving us more survivability than the current content requires isn't in any way helping the class.</p><p>TBH, the tone of your post reminds me of a KOS/EOF era guard.  The game has changed much since then and I don't see that viewpoint being managable in today's game.</p>

[Wasuna]

<p><cite>Atan@Unrest wrote:</cite></p><blockquote><p>This is honestly why I mentioned both raid and group buffs.</p><p>However, I expect us to still be behind in aggregrate heroic group dps.  I don't see a way to fix this without breaking other things, and honestly I'm comfortable for there being sacrafices in some content for gains in another, even if its a tough pill to swallow.</p><p>As the other poster indicated, I'm trying to solve the problem and keep the class grounded, rather than just say buff us up to everyone else.  This constant cycling of buffing up the weakest class isn't a sustainable class design metric.</p></blockquote><p>I agree but several other fighter classes are not grounded. I don't want this to be our only chance at balance and us take the high road and walk away as a slightly different version of an underperformaning fighter.</p><p>1. AoE tanks can do EVERYTHING a ST tank can.</p><p>2. Crusaders and Berserkers can Pump out 1.5x2 the DPS of a Guardian.</p><p>3. TPS crom a Crusader or Guardian is 1.5x that of a Guardian.</p><p>4. Some other fighters can maximize survivability & DPS at the same time.</p><p>Sure, fix utility and give us good stuff but all of the above needs to be balanced in one way or another.</p>

[Yimway]

<p>Xelgad,</p><p>My last remaining question for now...</p><p>Short term mitigation buffs that have distinguished the class since inception are no longer relevant due to the current mitigation curve and gear.</p><p>Is there any chance we'll see our shorterms made into something relevant again?  Or mitigation curves changed to make them relevant?</p><p>Hunker Down and Battle Cry abilities have been largely marginalized with the SF expansion, and given they used to be the bread and butter of what distinguished the class, any adjustments to the class that overlook these seem a bit off target.</p>

[Madmonte]

<p>I agree, actually...with 10 points in dragoon line and specced great for auto attacks, I don't really have a problem holding aggro on group mobs...NEVER in groups, and in raids, just put hate decreasers on the heavy aoe guys...no worries...aggro for any tank at 90 is a joke, guard included, we only need more aggro to keep up to the other TANK classes. </p>

[Yimway]

<p><cite>Wasuna wrote:</cite></p><blockquote><p>I agree but several other fighter classes are not grounded. I don't want this to be our only chance at balance and us take the high road and walk away as a slightly different version of an underperformaning fighter.</p><p>1. AoE tanks can do EVERYTHING a ST tank can.</p><p>2. Crusaders and Berserkers can Pump out 1.5x2 the DPS of a Guardian.</p><p>3. TPS crom a Crusader or Guardian is 1.5x that of a Guardian.</p><p>4. Some other fighters can maximize survivability & DPS at the same time.</p><p>Sure, fix utility and give us good stuff but all of the above needs to be balanced in one way or another.</p></blockquote><p>I understand your stance on the issue, and I certainly understand others taking this approach, I wont fault you or them for it.</p><p>I however prefer to see us built as a functional, balanced class. I can then continue to rally for an overall archtype balancing effort, cause  I firmly believe whatever is done to us, there is still huge balancing issues accross the archtype that need addressing.</p><p>And to be honest, if I lobby for my class to be OP here, I lose all credibility when I argue for fighter balance.</p>

[Madmonte]

<p>Yes and I would argue that increasing our dps and giving us a crap tonne of aggro still doesn't feel like guardian to me.  I would argue that being the guy that stands up best to mobs DOES.  Give us a passive heal like the other tanks?  Proccing stoneskins?  Fix the mitigation curve as atan suggests?  More survivability should be the focus on a class that doesn't stand up as well to a mob, when that is what theoretically the class is supposed to do BETTER than the other plate tanks.</p>

[Britty]

<p><cite>WarmMachine wrote:</cite></p><blockquote><p> Over all the aggression tree will do very little, and Guardians will still be the lowest hate generating tank in the game. Taunts have never worked well in this game, unless there is underlying improvements to the way threat is handled with them they will never be as good as dps.  Plus doing damage makes the mob die and gives threat, where doing taunts only give threat.  There is a threat meter in the game so nobody has the excuss of they did not know they were putting out too much threat and mistakenly took agro.  But the truth is dps classes want to put out as much dps as they can, and will not group with a tank that will force them to hold back. </p></blockquote><p>Fully agree. Static taunts are basically worthless. You activate them and barely see the threat meter blip. In todays EQ2 DPS is everything and the name of the game is kill stuff as fast as you can.</p><p>To which I have never understood how a class which can wields 2 weapons does LESS DPS than a class that can only wield one weapon and a shield given equal footing. Sword and board only classes get the benefit of the added defense AND the best DPS?? </p><p>How does that work???</p><p>Has anyone parsed how much damage a shield does?</p>

[WarmMachine]

<p><cite>Atan@Unrest wrote:</cite></p><blockquote><p><cite>WarmMachine wrote:</cite></p><blockquote><p><strong>While we are the lowest hate generating tank, I would be happy with these changes if we really shined in survivability. Leaving us with yes we can live though almost anything, just have to keep agro on them mob as our problem, while other tanks have no problem keeping agro on the mob but have a much harder time keeping alive. </strong></p></blockquote><p>Given a guardian revamp isn't including nerfing every other class, this option isn't on the table.</p><p>Fact is, any tank can live thru almost anything today.  The gap in survivability has been closed to almost nil, giving us more survivability than the current content requires isn't in any way helping the class.</p><p>TBH, the tone of your post reminds me of a KOS/EOF era guard.  The game has changed much since then and I don't see that viewpoint being managable in today's game.</p></blockquote><p>Keep reading my post...."<span><strong>To to respond to the people who will reply with all tanks can tank current content with out any major survivability issues.  I will say yes it should that every tank can tank any mob in this game.  This however would let guardians be more flexible in the fact that a poorly geared or less than ideal healer could keep them up, where they could not another tank." </strong></span></p><p> </p><p>Yes every tank should be able to tank every mob, I do not want to go back to KoS/EoF where your only option for main tank was guardians.  If we move to a true defensive tank, where we take a lot less damage, this will let us tank things in much less than idea set ups.  What happens if the MT templar or defiler does not show up one night for raids, for the most part guilds will go back and clear stuff on farm status or does not raid at all.  This would make guardians the ideal tank for group that the set up is less than ideal.  At this point in the expansion I don't see anything that it would break.  I have cleared the heroic palace with a furry healing.  What this would do is let heroic geared guardians be as good as taking damage as raid geared tanks, only with out the dps.  With this there would be a very fine line that would take a lot of tweaking.  If they give guardians too much survivability it will trivialize hard content, and make them the only tank people take to hard mode stuff.  If they don't give guardians the ability to hold agro people will not take guardians because while they are staying alive the mob has killed the rest of the raid.  I honestly don't see this happening, because right now the developers can make a new encounter and test it with one tank since all tanks are taking roughly the same damage, instead of having to figure in if a guard would be taking too little damage or if the other tanks are taking too much damage.  I have said it before, this is what I would like to see happen, but I don't think it will so they should just up our dps about 50% so we are on par with other tanks, instead of giving us a few utilities and saying we are "fixed" enjoy being a worthless tank for the next 2 years.</p>

[Rhita]

<p>Another idea would be to remove the hate gain and dehate gain cap from 50%. We removed other caps that raise dps. Why not remove the cap that raises hate? That would give us an advantage with the extra hate gain in the warrior and guardian tree. Not to mention all the gear that helps.</p>

[Madmonte]

<p>An advantage to tank a mob less well...still a good idea though.</p>

[RafaelSmith]

<p>Well, Ive been keeping quiet with regards to all these proposed changes. For the most part I like some of the changes but until they are in game and we can test them out in actual play conditions there really isnt much feedback to give.  Of all the changes.......the Guardian Sphere and Recapture ones seem about the best and the most in keeping with what I believe the class should be.</p><p>First I want to say that I applaud SOE for finally communicating as they are with this thread.  For good or for worse this is the type of communication we need.</p><p>Reading thru some of the proposed changes I am left with the feeling more now than ever that the Guardian class simply is a relic and its hard for us and even SOE to decide how to "fix" it so it fits in todays game and give the class its own unique identity.</p><p>The thing that gave Guardian identity over the other fighters was "surviveability"....not mit numbers...not avoidance numbers but actual "being the one that takes the hits that others crumble under".</p><p>Over time that identity was given to the other tanks and now Guardian is actually the one that crumbles while the others stay standing.  This didnt happen recently......I recall it starting actually from day one......even prior to release where as I recall Guardian was originally suppose to be able to wear a super-plate type of armor......then it was Tower Shields given to Crusaders....etc.....The identity of the class has been beat down for while now.</p><p>While alot of these new proposed changes look ok....and some sure will be nice to have while others im afriad will remain unused ......I just dont see anything that will return things to the point where Guardian has a unique identity. The others will continue to outshine Guardian in every way.</p><p>I think what SOE and the players need to do is decide if its the class thats broken or if its simply the game has changed so much that the class itself nolonger fits.   As of late sadly I believe its the latter and honestly I just dont see it as something that can be fixed with some changes to AAs.  There is a fundamental problem with the archetype as a whole that I doubt anyone wants to address.</p>

[Feldorm]

<p>Please please dont change plant. It's about the only good spell we have in battlegrounds, otherwise we have no defense against scouts (which are the only archtype against which we fair well). I know its considered useless in PvE but now it will be useless in PvP, unless against lots of enemies at once.</p><p><cite>Xelgad wrote:</cite></p><blockquote><p>To clarify, the intercept portion has been removed from Guardian Sphere. We have many more changes on the way.  Here are some of them, but this list is still not complete. Stability Tree:</p><ul><li>Enhance: Intercept now gives 2% damage reduction per point in addition to the reuse reduction.</li><li>Enhance: Moderate now grants 1 crit bonus per point instead of additional hate gain reduction.</li><li>Enhance: Rescue has been moved to another tree and replaced with Enhance: Call of Shielding, which increases the effectiveness of that buff by 5% per point.</li><li>Enhance: Reinforcement has been moved to another tree and replaced with Enhance: Call to Arms, which increases the effectiveness of that buff by 7% per point.</li></ul><p> The "Crippling" tree has been replaced with a new tree titled "Aggression."  This new tree is intended to provide extra threat generation, especially in cases where the Guardian doesn't have full hate buffs.  Aggression Tree:</p><ul><li>Enhance: Provoke, which grants 7% potency to the taunt with each point.</li><li>Enhance: Shout, which reduces the reuse of the ability by 0.4 seconds per point and improves the resistability by 2% per point.</li><li>Enhance: Hatred, which offers 2% hate mod per point.</li><li>Enhance: Rescue, which is the same as it was in the Stability tree.</li><li>Enhance: Reinforcement, which is the same as it was in the Stability tree.</li><li>Shoulder the Burden, which is a 10% hate siphon that can be placed on any group member. </li></ul><p> Other AA changes:</p><ul><li>"Double Attack" in the Guardian tree has been replaced with 3% chance to flurry and has been renamed to "Flurry."</li><li>"Bind Wound" in the Warrior tree is now a 100% heal (still out of combat).</li><li>Enhance: Plant now increases the duration of the ability by only 0.4 seconds per point (see below).</li><li>"Aggressive Nature" now increases the threat generated by Hold the Line by 5% per point instead of adding a threat proc on blocks (see below).</li></ul><p> Class ability changes:</p><ul><li>Recapture now lowers the threat position of non-fighters in the Guardian's group to the target encounter. While that effect is only groupwide, the raidwide effect that increases the threat position of other fighters is still present. The reuse on this ability has been increased to 45 seconds.</li><li>Iron Will now grants a reduction to snare effects on the Guardian in addition to the Stamina buff.</li><li>Plant has been redesigned. It is now a blue AE target lock with a small threat component. The base duration of the target lock is 6 seconds with the level 90 master. The base casting time remains at 1 second, and the recast is still 60 seconds.</li><li>Hold the Line now has the "Aggressive Nature" effect automatically built into the ability. It's as if you spent the 5 AA points in the Shadows tree without actually having to spend the points.  "Aggressive Defense," a Berserker ability, recieved the same change.</li></ul><p>Keep the feedback coming! The discussion has obviously shifted beyond just utility, and we're looking for feedback on all of these changes.  Any other suggestions for the class are welcomed as well, but understand that we are focusing mostly on more general changes rather than class or AA ability changes to solve the survivability problem.</p></blockquote><p>Please can you explain how these changes will help the guardian as a class?</p><p>If the current situation is something like:</p><p>dps - guardian:other plate tank = 1:1.5</p><p>threat - guardian:other plate tank = 1:1.5</p><p>group heals /buffs (or other group utility) - guardian: other plate tank = 1:1.5</p><p>Then If all changes suggested so far are implemented the ratios might all change to 1:1.4 i.e. not the balance the class needs. (The numbers are arbitary - the point is the changes look insignificant).</p><p>In particular, if you look at hate generation numbers, the whole agression tree will be "useless", bar the final ability, due to the nature of threat generation and hate cap. 9% DA or 3% flurry is no real difference. Plant - see above. Bind wound - normally crits for a complete heal anyway. So I see the majority of these changes as... sideways... rather than helping guardians.</p>

[Netty]

<p><cite>WarmMachine wrote:</cite></p><blockquote><p><cite>Atan@Unrest wrote:</cite></p><blockquote><p><cite>WarmMachine wrote:</cite></p><blockquote><p><strong>While we are the lowest hate generating tank, I would be happy with these changes if we really shined in survivability. Leaving us with yes we can live though almost anything, just have to keep agro on them mob as our problem, while other tanks have no problem keeping agro on the mob but have a much harder time keeping alive. </strong></p></blockquote><p>Given a guardian revamp isn't including nerfing every other class, this option isn't on the table.</p><p>Fact is, any tank can live thru almost anything today.  The gap in survivability has been closed to almost nil, giving us more survivability than the current content requires isn't in any way helping the class.</p><p>TBH, the tone of your post reminds me of a KOS/EOF era guard.  The game has changed much since then and I don't see that viewpoint being managable in today's game.</p></blockquote><p>Keep reading my post...."<span><strong>To to respond to the people who will reply with all tanks can tank current content with out any major survivability issues.  I will say yes it should that every tank can tank any mob in this game.  This however would let guardians be more flexible in the fact that a poorly geared or less than ideal healer could keep them up, where they could not another tank." </strong></span></p><p>Yes every tank should be able to tank every mob, I do not want to go back to KoS/EoF where your only option for main tank was guardians.  If we move to a true defensive tank, where we take a lot less damage, this will let us tank things in much less than idea set ups.  What happens if the MT templar or defiler does not show up one night for raids, for the most part guilds will go back and clear stuff on farm status or does not raid at all.  This would make guardians the ideal tank for group that the set up is less than ideal.  At this point in the expansion I don't see anything that it would break.  I have cleared the heroic palace with a furry healing.  What this would do is let heroic geared guardians be as good as taking damage as raid geared tanks, only with out the dps.  With this there would be a very fine line that would take a lot of tweaking.  If they give guardians too much survivability it will trivialize hard content, and make them the only tank people take to hard mode stuff.  If they don't give guardians the ability to hold agro people will not take guardians because while they are staying alive the mob has killed the rest of the raid.  I honestly don't see this happening, because right now the developers can make a new encounter and test it with one tank since all tanks are taking roughly the same damage, instead of having to figure in if a guard would be taking too little damage or if the other tanks are taking too much damage.  I have said it before, this is what I would like to see happen, but I don't think it will so they should just up our dps about 50% so we are on par with other tanks, instead of giving us a few utilities and saying we are "fixed" enjoy being a worthless tank for the next 2 years.</p></blockquote><p>For the first. I MT everything back in kos on a zerk guess something was broken then since guards was the only option. up guard dps with 50%? I dont play my guard anymore but the guard dps is no where that bad as you make it sound. Sure i agree it should be abit higher but 50%? If anything they should nerf Reflect and knight stance. Since that is kinda much the only reason they are parsing those high numbers. Its not that guards do to litle dps Crusaders do to much with nearly no trade off in def. UT better hate and some more dps will put guards where they should be the other stuff is mostly a bad design by other classes and need to be nerfed/fix in that way aswell.</p><p>There should always be a trade off for dps... Warriors do it brawlers do it but crusaders dont and that is not a guardian problem.</p>

[steelbadger]

<p><cite>Rahatmattata wrote:</cite></p><blockquote><p><cite>Soul_Dreamer wrote:</cite></p><blockquote><p><cite>steelbadger wrote:</cite></p><blockquote><p><cite>Soul_Dreamer wrote:</cite></p><blockquote><p>Aerin:</p><p>Hate reducers and increasers are applied after transfers so you'd get 10% of their hate then the 90% hate has the reducer applied</p></blockquote><p>Wrong, this has been tested and it has been shown that hate Reducers apply <em>before</em> transfers.  By applying a hate reducer to someone you reduce the amount of hate you receive from the transfer.</p><p>And hate increasers don't effect transferred hate.</p></blockquote><p>How and when was this tested, this is the first time I've seen it claimed this way around and I usually read the forums pretty often. Not saying you're wrong just want to know how you know you're right <img src="/eq2/images/smilies/3b63d1616c5dfcf29f8a7a031aaa7cad.gif" border="0" /></p></blockquote><p>There was a long thread about it on the guard boards at eq2flames a year or so ago. Basically it was tested with a training dummy, guardian, and assassin. The end result was noone could prove either way how it works. I believe moderate does not nerf a threat transfer, but I don't care to try and prove it or have a debate about it. I will continue to moderate dps if they are ripping aggro whether they are feeding me hate or not.</p><p>It would be best for a dev to tell everyone how it works once and for all... if they know.</p></blockquote><p>Not wanting to go off topic or anything but my post explaining Davngrs results was pretty unambiguous.</p><p>14% transfer caused the Guardian to have 17% of the aggro of the assassin both with and without Moderate.  The possible results are:</p><p>Transfer first, Moderate second:</p><p>Assassin has 1000 hate.</p><p>140 goes to Guardian.</p><p>The remaining 860 hate gets reduced by 36%:  550.4</p><p>End Result:</p><p>Assassin at 550.4 (100%)</p><p>Guardian at 140  (25.436%, would be rounded up in client to 26%)</p><p>Moderate First, Transfer Second:</p><p>Assassin has 1000 hate.</p><p>Hate gets reduced by 36%:  640 hate</p><p>14% of 640 goes to the Guardian: 89.6</p><p>End Result:</p><p>Assassin at 640-89.6:  550.4 (100%)</p><p>Guardian at 89.6 (16.279%, would be rounded up in client to 17%)</p><p>Just Transfer, no moderate at all:</p><p>Assassin has 1000 hate.</p><p>140 hate goes to Guardian.</p><p>End Result:</p><p>Assassin at 860 (100%)</p><p>Guardian at 140 (16.279%, would be rounded up in client to 17%)</p><p>Origional post <a href="http://www.eq2flames.com/guardians/47956-moderate-test-no-flames-pls.html" target="_blank">here</a>.  As you can see the result squares firmly with Moderate happening before Murderous Design.</p><p>Now we return you to your previously scheduled programming <img src="/eq2/images/smilies/97ada74b88049a6d50a6ed40898a03d7.gif" border="0" /></p><p>My Moderate generally goes on my Dirge, but only because I like to put it somewhere.  Really I don't need to use it at all.  If I needed to I wouldn't hesitate to put it on the ssin.</p>

[Yimway]

<p><cite>WarmMachine wrote:</cite></p><blockquote><p>Keep reading my post...."<span><strong>To to respond to the people who will reply with all tanks can tank current content with out any major survivability issues.  I will say yes it should that every tank can tank any mob in this game.  This however would let guardians be more flexible in the fact that a poorly geared or less than ideal healer could keep them up, where they could not another tank." </strong></span></p><p>Yes every tank should be able to tank every mob, I do not want to go back to KoS/EoF where your only option for main tank was guardians.  If we move to a true defensive tank, where we take a lot less damage, this will let us tank things in much less than idea set ups.  What happens if the MT templar or defiler does not show up one night for raids, for the most part guilds will go back and clear stuff on farm status or does not raid at all.  This would make guardians the ideal tank for group that the set up is less than ideal.</p></blockquote><p>No thanks, I'll pass on being the favored tank for scrub groups.</p><p>More to your point, no temp or defiler?  Great, I'd rather have a mystic and inquisitor anyway.</p><p>Like I said previously, your comments seem to be grounded in another era of gameplay that isn't really relavent or on par with how the game is played today.  Any two healers in my group is enough healers to clear almost all the current content, or just one really good healer for atleast 50% of it.  I'd be more concerned if I didn't have any hate buffers than the flavor of healer available.</p><p>There was a time in the game that if there was no MT templar you might tuck your tail, but all the classes are so versitile and powerful in their own way, specific tank group build like this just aren't as relevant.</p><p>Raidleaders are less concerned about picking the tank 'easiest to heal' like I think your getting at, vs the tank that can pump out dps with enough survivability to get by.</p>

[Yimway]

<p><cite>Feldorm wrote:</cite></p><blockquote><p>Please please dont change plant. It's about the only good spell we have in battlegrounds, otherwise we have no defense against scouts (which are the only archtype against which we fair well). I know its considered useless in PvE but now it will be useless in PvP, unless against lots of enemies at once.</p></blockquote><p>This is why my plant suggestion was 50% snare and hate over time.  The snare in pvp is still beneficial in a similar way that the current plant is.</p>

[Rahatmattata]

<p>I'd rather guardians just be clearly the most defensive tank again. It's why I rolled a guard in the first place. I like to play pure classes that are the best at what they do... guards... assassin/wizard... templar... Instead of making guards do damage on par with shadowknights... just make them harder to kill. In today's content let them mass pull trash no other tank could live against; in tomorrow's content, make mobs hit harder. Having a beast of a tank makes up for lack of dps. This is all assuming nerfing other tanks isn't an option.</p>

[Loendar]

<p><cite>Rahatmattata wrote:</cite></p><blockquote><p>I'd rather guardians just be clearly the most defensive tank again. It's why I rolled a guard in the first place. I like to play pure classes that are the best at what they do... guards... assassin/wizard... templar... Instead of making guards do damage on par with shadowknights... just make them harder to kill. In today's content let them mass pull trash no other tank could live against; in tomorrow's content, make mobs hit harder. Having a beast of a tank makes up for lack of dps. This is all assuming nerfing other tanks isn't an option.</p></blockquote><p>The only way that can happen though is to bring all the other classes down via nerfs or put in changes to give us a decided advantage and then buff the mobs across the game.  I don't see either options taking place.  When an crusader can pull entire floors of mobs (while a guardian can't) and survive without blinking an eye something is wrong.</p><p>The problem I see with the defensive approach is that it is playing into what the archetype was originally formulated on but is nowhere near where the game has gone (or is headed).  Your thoughts and those of Atan sound good on paper but make no mistake that DPS is the name of the game and any change that doesn't address that is going to leave us in the same shape we are now.  If our DPS is contigent on others getting a boost from us to up theirs we are still more work than people want to put in. Why form the perfect group around a Guardian for max DPS when you can insert any other fighter and let everyone do their own thing?</p><p>I know that people want things to go back to the way they were to some degree where class distinction actually mattered but the system has been so diluted over the past few years where every other tank got the advantages of the Guardian class without the disadvantage that the system of old cannot be supported any longer.</p><p>Edit:  I have a very real concern that taking the high road to stay true to an outdated class description is going to gut our one chance, in how long?, of getting the fixes we really need to make us needed.  I don't want to be OP but I want to be on par with the other classes - whether that means forcing them back down into the mold they were supposed to be in all along or by bringing us up.  I don't really care which but I will be beyond [Removed for Content] if we sqaunder this chance at real changes and fixes by actively short-changing ourselves in the name of outdated concepts of what our class was meant to be.</p>

[aislynn00]

<p>While MT'ing today, with just one of my temporary Mitigation buffs running, I was sitting at almost 20K mitigation.  I wasn't even wearing a full set of +Mit gear, so I could easily have pushed higher.  And yet, the current mitigation cap vs 98th level mobs is, what, 14K?  Perhaps 16K if you are facing a mob whose physical attacks are, as the abilities say these days, "Harder than normal to resist". </p><p>How about making mitigation worth something again?  It is long overdue.</p>

[Gungo]

<p><cite>Karnos@Nektulos wrote:</cite></p><blockquote><p><cite>Gungo wrote:</cite></p><blockquote><p>People also seem to forget the above list was not the complete list of changes for guards. The Stone sphere change was a huge bump in survivability. You cant just massively increase survivability and hate and then request the same dps as every other tank. That simply is not balanced. </p></blockquote><p>1) The Guardian Sphere change is a situational bump in survivability for an instance group, or in raids, when the proverbial excrement hits the fan and adds are loose.  That said, however, it isn't anything like an AE blocker or a damage reducer.</p><p>Perhaps you don't know how it works, so I'll elaborate:</p><p>Whenever you take damage and GS is running, GS has a chance of proc'ing a stoneskin on you.  Do note: This stoneskin does <em>nothing</em> to help against the damage that actually <em>caused</em> it to proc.  If you were hit by an AE, the AE still deals its normal damage; you just have a stoneskin sitting on you for 10 seconds after the AE hit. </p><p>Now, if a <em>second</em> AE hits before those 10 seconds are up, it will be blocked by said stoneskin.  Great!  However, if you don't take damage during those 10 seconds, too bad; the stoneskin didn't do jack.</p><p>In other words, unless your group members are taking damage more frequently than every 10 seconds, which isn't the case even vs mobs with a lot of AE's, such as Waansu, GS doesn't improve group survivability at all.  Every other AE, on the average, will just proc a stoneskin, which will then sit unused and expire.</p><p>In order for GS to help the group as intended on raids, the duration of the stoneskins should be extended to at least 20 sec, or GS should just afford 50% Damage Reduction to every non-fighter in the group and 25% Damage Reduction to the guardian himself for the duration.</p><p>2) As for the guardian himself, the GS change isn't bad, but it really isn't much to write home about.  It only means he is able to use the ability in a few situations he wouldn't otherwise have been able to. </p><p>Personally, I have been using it on raids for years without issues.  It only has a 10m range, so vs any enemy with a large-ish hit box, even the dirge right on the opposite side of the mob, is out of range.  In encounters where I otherwise wouldn't be able to use it (i.e., mobs with a small hit box), I just ask the MT group scouts to move back a bit when they see my Guardian Sphere macro.</p><p>The problem with the ability, though, is that it is unreliable, and even in its new guise, remains situational. </p><p>On one hand, <strong>it doesn't improve guardian baseline survivability</strong>: When GS isn't up, I won't be taking less damage, so you aren't going to pick a guardian to tank a tough mob because of this ability. </p><p>On the other hand, even when GS is running, I don't actually know for certain that I'm going to stop or reduce incoming damage for a while (i.e., sometimes you get only one or two procs over the course of the entire duration), so it isn't really good to use in response to damage spikes.</p><p>I would much rather have a temporary 25% Damage Reduction buff (like a half-strength Adrenaline) with the current reuse of GS or a maintainable 5% - 10% Damage Reduction buff--one could be used more reliably vs damage spikes while the other would increase baseline survivability, which I think guardians need: aside from still lacking a maintainable death preventer (I still haven't given up hope that Unyielding Will will become a maintainable buff), we have enough damage spike compensation abilities in Block, ToS, and Last Man Standing.</p><p>3) In order for any amount of survivability to mean anything, it has to be needed.  You show me mobs that require a guardian tank, then I'll stop asking for more DPS.</p></blockquote><p>My class has no less then 4 seperate stone skin procing abilities and i have been using the t7 avatar boots up until they were nerfed last live update. I am quite knowledgable how stone skins works. I have no intention of getting in an argument with you because you either obviously do not know what you are talking about or you are simply being neglectful. If you truly beleive the change to guardian sphere "doesnt improve the guardian baseline survivability" you do not have a clue. a 25% chance to proc a stone skin for 20 secs with unlimited charges is phenominal ability at reducing damage. I have no intention of explaining to you how these abilities work or why they work even when you take no actual damage (read warded). </p><p>Bottom line my point still stands you can not request both superior survivabilty, equal hate, and then request equal dps on top of that. That is no where near the realm of balanced. I have no issues with xelgad bumping flurry AA to 6% for the 1 AA point spent, but lets not go overboard with damage abilities on the class that was already marginally better survivability before these changes even occurred.  </p><p>I however still think unyielding will should be until canceled and the hate transfer "shoulder the burden" should be the same exact buff as the trak shield and work on EACH member of the group. </p>

[Ardors]

<p><span style="font-family: Verdana; color: #ffffff; font-size: 9pt;">I am a raid tank so I am obviously interested in what changes will affect Guardians at that level. Your latest proposed changes will undoubtedly help the casual and heroic Guard with hate and utility, and that’s great for them, it was greatly needed. </span></p><p><span style="font-family: Verdana; color: #ffffff; font-size: 9pt;">As for high end raid Guard however, I am convinced those changes will do nothing to increase our chances to find some work… <span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>I am sure you already know hardly any high end guilds run<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">  </span>with a Guard at the moment… the post “Top End Guild DPS Parse” is a great evidence to that and I am certain you are aware of this fact…This is what I would like to see change… So what you figure we need to get a spot in those guilds?<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">  </span>More hate?... more survivability?... I think not…Not with the current encounters and mechanics anyways…</span></p><p><span style="font-family: Verdana; color: #ffffff; font-size: 9pt;">In this MAX DPS oriented raid encounters, I don’t blame raid leaders atm to bring a 30-40k parsing SK or Pally vs the 15-20k Guards…when they can survive the beating…why not.</span></p><p><span style="font-family: Verdana; color: #ffffff; font-size: 9pt;">Without increasing our DPS, any changes you do to Guardians needs to make up for that gap in damage output…so it better be [Removed for Content] good…To be honest, I have no idea why you have let other tanks slip to such high DPS while granting them similar survivability as Guards…</span></p><p><span style="font-family: Verdana; font-size: 9pt;"><span style="color: #ffffff;">So please Xelgad, find me a raid spot would you? <span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span></span></span></p><p><span style="font-family: Verdana; color: #ffffff; font-size: 9pt;"><span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">Cheers! and thanks for your efforts!</span></span></p>

[Soul_Dreamer]

<p>So Guardians need more survivability so those poorly geared Guardians survive better, is that honestly your opinion Warmachine?</p><p>There are another couple of Guardians in this thread also feedbacking that we need more survivability, what do you think will happen when groups/raids are geared enough to not need the survivability you bring? You'll be in exactly the same situation. We do need a decent death save and out mit buffs changing to 10/20/30 damage reduction, or the mit curve fixing but that should be it survivability wise. The rest is fixing broken abilities and adding hate/DPS. </p><p>If you're sat there providing feedback to just increase Survivability all you're doing is forcing us into the same niche we've always been in (MT) and eventually the same thing will happen, the well rounded robust classes will over take us and in 2 years we'll be complaining yet again that we're not needed.</p><p>Reason for deathsave and mitigation/temp buff change..Our SK tanks Toxxulia to avoid those 1 shots she occasionally does against us and he survives easier until and the whole raid gets there.  Simply because the 1 shot hit I occasionally take he can shrug off with bloodletter. Situationally he actually has more survivability then me. (we're currently working on HM Tox, Waansu and Maalus). </p><p>I'm full T2 with over 20k resists across the board, 33k HP and 128% crit mit when I'm fighting her, if block/tower of stone/last man standing aren't up I have to eat the full effect of these huge AOE's. If other tanks temporary absorbs aren't up.. and it was a:</p><p>Zerker they can reduce the damage of every single set of AOE's by 50%. </p><p>SK they will just live through it with one of his 3 procs of bloodletter</p><p>Paladin they will live through it with his 10% damage reduction and healing..</p><p>Before people say it, no I don't suck, my healers always live and I always get the placement right, however when the SK Takes over he lives but 1 or 2 of his healers are often dropping due to having to get too close to keep heals on him. Guess what, he still survives while the Healer is pulled up due to his abilities. I can pop both my mit increases in this scenario and I'm still getting hit just as hard because everyone is bloody capped, then there is Sphere, which I can't use incase the Dirge or one of the healers missplaces by a small amount, add to that I can't use Sentinal to absorb damage on a group member cos I'll also eat their AOE (Piercing Pestilence) when it goes off, I can't use Sentry watch to save them if they are low on HP and missplaced since it will also kill me, I can't always use my death save because I broke my F**king crystal ball, I can't AOE avoid them to reduce their damage, even with the change to stone sphere it's just luck..... Is the picture clear enough yet?</p><p>We simply cannot compete against the toolset the other tanks bring as a whole package. There either needs to be a subsantial difference in survivability (bring other tanks down) with the Guardian the clear winner, or Guardians need to offer what all other plate tanks currently do and have similar tools. I'm sorry but 50% damage absorption 50% of the time, being able to die 3 times, 10% damage absorption and 10% healing are just grossly over powered when combined with the DPS and Hate these classes also produce and when compared to a Guardian, these tools alone are also better than almost all the Guardian survivability tools. The numbers simply do not lie, how many SK's/Pallies/Zerks do you see running around in groups and in the ranks of raiding guilds, then compare it to Guardians, our numbers in game have plumeted.</p><p>Those people who say "But it was like that before and only 1 tank (Guardian) was the clear choice", no it wasn't like that before, because before Paladins/SKs/Zerks didn't have such massive utilty and DPS, their utility and DPS was similar to Guardians but Guardians had a clear edge in Survivability. </p><p>Other tanks have complained and moaned about the Guardian class for years, gradually our class specific abilities have been chipped away or given to other classes and we've never received anything for it. This is the culmination of this chipping away and buffing... Sorry Zerkers, using you as an example <img src="/eq2/images/smilies/9d71f0541cff0a302a0309c5079e8dee.gif" border="0" /></p><p>Zerkers have been given a mini tower of stone, they have been given Adrenaline, one of the best survivability tools in game, they've got Gut Roar, they have been given 2 deathsaves, self proccing heals, a heal proc if they drop below 30% HP, they still have the same temp mit buffs a Guardian does, you essentially have almost all the survivability tools of a Guardian right here. What have they paid for these defensive skills in other areas? Nothing... they've in fact been given more offensive skills and hate tools, Adrenaline allows them to duel weild with a 50% damage reduction, who needs a shield to block 30% of attacks when you can just reduce them all by 50%, they get 25% of all their damage as hate, they have 100% AOE auto attack, Gybe as a snap along with all other snaps, their Mythical as a snap agro tool (Insolence), Jeering Onslaught as a snap, added hate when they have Adrenaline up... The list just keeps growing.</p><p>As I've said, Guardians need the tool set to compete with other tanks. Right now, it's just not there. Our utility should mean our groups/raid has a lot more survivability, our hate and DPS need to be closer to that of other tanks and we need more AOE hate. </p><p>If this means Guardians are now able to compete as raid offtanks which was never their area then so be it, other tanks now do more than compete for the MT slot, they've successfully taken over. </p><p>If it means Guardians are more offensive than they are now and are in balance with the other tanks.. why does it matter, they have equal or better in some cases survivability to us. </p><p>I've seen lots of other tanks shout down and drown out Guardian threads with arguments against DPS/Hate improvements and their justification just isn't there anymore, I firmly believe they're just happy keeping us down. My favorite all time reason is "You've had your time at the top now deal with it, we deserve this"</p><p>The Guardian community needs to be listened to with this feedback and things need to change, this is the last chance for me, it's taken 2 years to get this attention and if only minor changes are done and the class isn't balanced with other fighters, this is another Guardian who's leaving game.</p>

[FimisOrbe]

<p><cite>Xelgad wrote:</cite></p><blockquote><p>To clarify, the intercept portion has been removed from Guardian Sphere. We have many more changes on the way.  Here are some of them, but this list is still not complete. Stability Tree:</p><ul><li>Enhance: Intercept now gives 2% damage reduction per point in addition to the reuse reduction.</li><li><span style="color: #ff0000;">Really depends if we would get a permanent dmg reduction with it or just while casted.</span></li><li>Enhance: Moderate now grants 1 crit bonus per point instead of additional hate gain reduction.</li><li><span style="color: #ff0000;">Like other posted, a shaman can get 5CB for the whole Group and we can only get it for one Person, just not that much useful, especially if you have to spec Intercept before.</span></li><li>Enhance: Rescue has been moved to another tree and replaced with Enhance: Call of Shielding, which increases the effectiveness of that buff by 5% per point.</li><li><span style="color: #ff0000;">meh... i really don't know... Buffing 1k HP already is nice, ofc like 250 more is dandy, but somehow I think its too weak.</span></li><li>Enhance: Reinforcement has been moved to another tree and replaced with Enhance: Call to Arms, which increases the effectiveness of that buff by 7% per point.</li><li><span style="color: #ff0000;">Would be nicer to get a Strikethrough effect added to it. The skills do almost nothing if you are high enough. And it only adds another 10 to melee skills, not worth the points.</span></li></ul><p> The "Crippling" tree has been replaced with a new tree titled "Aggression."  This new tree is intended to provide extra threat generation, especially in cases where the Guardian doesn't have full hate buffs.  Aggression Tree:</p><ul><li>Enhance: Provoke, which grants 7% potency to the taunt with each point.</li><li>Enhance: Shout, which reduces the reuse of the ability by 0.4 seconds per point and improves the resistability by 2% per point.</li><li>Enhance: Hatred, which offers 2% hate mod per point.</li><li>Enhance: Rescue, which is the same as it was in the Stability tree.</li><li>Enhance: Reinforcement, which is the same as it was in the Stability tree.</li><li><span style="color: #ff0000;">As long as it takes the place as the current Decimate Increase is in, I'm fine with it. If we have to spec in more Hate stuff, it's a slightly nerf in case of AA spending (spending 3 in Rescue + 5 in Reinforcement in the current trees)</span></li><li>Shoulder the Burden, which is a 10% hate siphon that can be placed on any group member.</li></ul><p><span style="color: #ff0000;">From a Raid point this isn't useful at all. If you really want to spend Point's in this tree, you would have to sacrifice for DPS which grants more Hate and also helps to kill mobs faster to some Point. Or you would even sacrifice in the current Stalwarting (which would be pointless).</span></p><p> Other AA changes:</p><ul><li>"Double Attack" in the Guardian tree has been replaced with 3% chance to flurry and has been renamed to "Flurry."</li><li><span style="color: #ff0000;">3% Flurry.... this adds like what? 100DPS to a Zonewide? It's a joke.</span></li><li>"Bind Wound" in the Warrior tree is now a 100% heal (still out of combat).</li><li><span style="color: #ff0000;">Fix, since it's a 100% heal already because of potency, cb and crit.</span></li><li>Enhance: Plant now increases the duration of the ability by only 0.4 seconds per point (see below).</li><li><span style="color: #ff0000;">That's fine.... now if only most Raidmobs wouldn't be immune to it.</span></li><li>"Aggressive Nature" now increases the threat generated by Hold the Line by 5% per point instead of adding a threat proc on blocks (see below).</li><li><span style="color: #ff0000;">In my opinion it's not useful. The only point I spec'd into it was because of the Threat on a successful block, since you merged it from start on, how about adding a dmg Proc to it?</span></li></ul><p> Class ability changes:</p><ul><li>Recapture now lowers the threat position of non-fighters in the Guardian's group to the target encounter. While that effect is only groupwide, the raidwide effect that increases the threat position of other fighters is still present. The reuse on this ability has been increased to 45 seconds.</li><li><span style="color: #ff0000;">You shouldn't get punished just because you made it useful in Groups. Revert it to 20sec and change it to an Encounter Taunt, higher then Shout, since its on a 20sec recast. And we have more then enough other snaps if you time it right for memwipes in groups.</span></li><li>Iron Will now grants a reduction to snare effects on the Guardian in addition to the Stamina buff.</li><li><span style="color: #ff0000;">Wish you would change the Stamina to a pure HP buff. At 90 you are almost or fully capt on Stamina. And the Gain in Defense Raid gear from this buff is around 60 HP.</span><span style="color: #ff0000;">Why not change the Stamina in a 1:3 or 4 ratio to HP, in other words, if its 92 Stamina now it would be almost 300HP after. Even the low lvls not capt on stamina would gain more from it.</span></li><li>Plant has been redesigned. It is now a blue AE target lock with a small threat component. The base duration of the target lock is 6 seconds with the level 90 master. The base casting time remains at 1 second, and the recast is still 60 seconds.</li><li>Hold the Line now has the "Aggressive Nature" effect automatically built into the ability. It's as if you spent the 5 AA points in the Shadows tree without actually having to spend the points.  "Aggressive Defense," a Berserker ability, recieved the same change.</li></ul><p>Keep the feedback coming! The discussion has obviously shifted beyond just utility, and we're looking for feedback on all of these changes.  Any other suggestions for the class are welcomed as well, but understand that we are focusing mostly on more general changes rather than class or AA ability changes to solve the survivability problem.</p></blockquote><p><span style="color: #ff0000;">The only useful change so far for me is Guardians Sphere, Plant to some point and the change to HtL, everything else isn't much of an Upgrade or I never had problems with those parts you changed/buffed.</span></p><p>Wonder what the other, not documented yet, change will look like.</p><p>My 2 cents.</p>

[Landiin]

<p><cite>Soul_Dreamer wrote:</cite></p><blockquote><p>So Guardians need more survivability so those poorly geared Guardians survive better, is that honestly your opinion Warmachine?</p><p>There are another couple of Guardians in this thread also feedbacking that we need more survivability, what do you think will happen when groups/raids are geared enough to not need the survivability you bring? You'll be in exactly the same situation. We do need a decent death save and out mit buffs changing to 10/20/30 damage reduction, or the mit curve fixing but that should be it survivability wise. The rest is fixing broken abilities and adding hate/DPS. </p><p>If you're sat there providing feedback to just increase Survivability all you're doing is forcing us into the same niche we've always been in (MT) and eventually the same thing will happen, the well rounded robust classes will over take us and in 2 years we'll be complaining yet again that we're not needed.</p><p>Reason for deathsave and mitigation/temp buff change..Our SK tanks Toxxulia to avoid those 1 shots she occasionally does against us and he survives easier until and the whole raid gets there.  Simply because the 1 shot hit I occasionally take he can shrug off with bloodletter. Situationally he actually has more survivability then me. (we're currently working on HM Tox, Waansu and Maalus). </p><p>I'm full T2 with over 20k resists across the board, 33k HP and 128% crit mit when I'm fighting her, if block/tower of stone/last man standing aren't up I have to eat the full effect of these huge AOE's. If other tanks temporary absorbs aren't up.. and it was a:</p><p>Zerker they can reduce the damage of every single set of AOE's by 50%. </p><p>SK they will just live through it with one of his 3 procs of bloodletter</p><p>Paladin they will live through it with his 10% damage reduction and healing..</p><p>Before people say it, no I don't suck, my healers always live and I always get the placement right, however when the SK Takes over he lives but 1 or 2 of his healers are often dropping due to having to get too close to keep heals on him. Guess what, he still survives while the Healer is pulled up due to his abilities. I can pop both my mit increases in this scenario and I'm still getting hit just as hard because everyone is bloody capped, then there is Sphere, which I can't use incase the Dirge or one of the healers missplaces by a small amount, add to that I can't use Sentinal to absorb damage on a group member cos I'll also eat their AOE (Piercing Pestilence) when it goes off, I can't use Sentry watch to save them if they are low on HP and missplaced since it will also kill me, I can't always use my death save because I broke my F**king crystal ball, I can't AOE avoid them to reduce their damage, even with the change to stone sphere it's just luck..... Is the picture clear enough yet?</p><p>We simply cannot compete against the toolset the other tanks bring as a whole package. There either needs to be a subsantial difference in survivability (bring other tanks down) with the Guardian the clear winner, or Guardians need to offer what all other plate tanks currently do and have similar tools. I'm sorry but 50% damage absorption 50% of the time, being able to die 3 times, 10% damage absorption and 10% healing are just grossly over powered when combined with the DPS and Hate these classes also produce and when compared to a Guardian, these tools alone are also better than almost all the Guardian survivability tools. The numbers simply do not lie, how many SK's/Pallies/Zerks do you see running around in groups and in the ranks of raiding guilds, then compare it to Guardians, our numbers in game have plumeted.</p><p>Those people who say "But it was like that before and only 1 tank (Guardian) was the clear choice", no it wasn't like that before, because before Paladins/SKs/Zerks didn't have such massive utilty and DPS, their utility and DPS was similar to Guardians but Guardians had a clear edge in Survivability. </p><p>Other tanks have complained and moaned about the Guardian class for years, gradually our class specific abilities have been chipped away or given to other classes and we've never received anything for it. This is the culmination of this chipping away and buffing... Sorry Zerkers, using you as an example <img src="/eq2/images/smilies/9d71f0541cff0a302a0309c5079e8dee.gif" border="0" /></p><p>Zerkers have been given a mini tower of stone, they have been given Adrenaline, one of the best survivability tools in game, they've got Gut Roar, they have been given 2 deathsaves, self proccing heals, a heal proc if they drop below 30% HP, they still have the same temp mit buffs a Guardian does, you essentially have almost all the survivability tools of a Guardian right here. What have they paid for these defensive skills in other areas? Nothing... they've in fact been given more offensive skills and hate tools, Adrenaline allows them to duel weild with a 50% damage reduction, who needs a shield to block 30% of attacks when you can just reduce them all by 50%, they get 25% of all their damage as hate, they have 100% AOE auto attack, Gybe as a snap along with all other snaps, their Mythical as a snap agro tool (Insolence), Jeering Onslaught as a snap, added hate when they have Adrenaline up... The list just keeps growing.</p><p>As I've said, Guardians need the tool set to compete with other tanks. Right now, it's just not there. Our utility should mean our groups/raid has a lot more survivability, our hate and DPS need to be closer to that of other tanks and we need more AOE hate. </p><p>If this means Guardians are now able to compete as raid offtanks which was never their area then so be it, other tanks now do more than compete for the MT slot, they've successfully taken over. </p><p>If it means Guardians are more offensive than they are now and are in balance with the other tanks.. why does it matter, they have equal or better in some cases survivability to us. </p><p>I've seen lots of other tanks shout down and drown out Guardian threads with arguments against DPS/Hate improvements and their justification just isn't there anymore, I firmly believe they're just happy keeping us down. My favorite all time reason is "You've had your time at the top now deal with it, we deserve this"</p><p>The Guardian community needs to be listened to with this feedback and things need to change, this is the last chance for me, it's taken 2 years to get this attention and if only minor changes are done and the class isn't balanced with other fighters, this is another Guardian who's leaving game.</p></blockquote><p>As much as I like the way guards was in past I have to agree 100% here.</p>

[WarmMachine]

<p><cite>Netty wrote:</cite></p><blockquote><p><cite>WarmMachine wrote:</cite></p><blockquote><p><cite>Atan@Unrest wrote:</cite></p><blockquote><p><cite>WarmMachine wrote:</cite></p><blockquote><p><strong>While we are the lowest hate generating tank, I would be happy with these changes if we really shined in survivability. Leaving us with yes we can live though almost anything, just have to keep agro on them mob as our problem, while other tanks have no problem keeping agro on the mob but have a much harder time keeping alive. </strong></p></blockquote><p>Given a guardian revamp isn't including nerfing every other class, this option isn't on the table.</p><p>Fact is, any tank can live thru almost anything today.  The gap in survivability has been closed to almost nil, giving us more survivability than the current content requires isn't in any way helping the class.</p><p>TBH, the tone of your post reminds me of a KOS/EOF era guard.  The game has changed much since then and I don't see that viewpoint being managable in today's game.</p></blockquote><p>Keep reading my post...."<span><strong>To to respond to the people who will reply with all tanks can tank current content with out any major survivability issues.  I will say yes it should that every tank can tank any mob in this game.  This however would let guardians be more flexible in the fact that a poorly geared or less than ideal healer could keep them up, where they could not another tank." </strong></span></p><p>Yes every tank should be able to tank every mob, I do not want to go back to KoS/EoF where your only option for main tank was guardians.  If we move to a true defensive tank, where we take a lot less damage, this will let us tank things in much less than idea set ups.  What happens if the MT templar or defiler does not show up one night for raids, for the most part guilds will go back and clear stuff on farm status or does not raid at all.  This would make guardians the ideal tank for group that the set up is less than ideal.  At this point in the expansion I don't see anything that it would break.  I have cleared the heroic palace with a furry healing.  What this would do is let heroic geared guardians be as good as taking damage as raid geared tanks, only with out the dps.  With this there would be a very fine line that would take a lot of tweaking.  If they give guardians too much survivability it will trivialize hard content, and make them the only tank people take to hard mode stuff.  If they don't give guardians the ability to hold agro people will not take guardians because while they are staying alive the mob has killed the rest of the raid.  I honestly don't see this happening, because right now the developers can make a new encounter and test it with one tank since all tanks are taking roughly the same damage, instead of having to figure in if a guard would be taking too little damage or if the other tanks are taking too much damage.  I have said it before, this is what I would like to see happen, but I don't think it will so they should just up our dps about 50% so we are on par with other tanks, instead of giving us a few utilities and saying we are "fixed" enjoy being a worthless tank for the next 2 years.</p></blockquote><p>For the first. I MT everything back in kos on a zerk guess something was broken then since guards was the only option. up guard dps with 50%? I dont play my guard anymore but the guard dps is no where that bad as you make it sound. Sure i agree it should be abit higher but 50%? If anything they should nerf Reflect and knight stance. Since that is kinda much the only reason they are parsing those high numbers. Its not that guards do to litle dps Crusaders do to much with nearly no trade off in def. UT better hate and some more dps will put guards where they should be the other stuff is mostly a bad design by other classes and need to be nerfed/fix in that way aswell.</p><p>There should always be a trade off for dps... Warriors do it brawlers do it but crusaders dont and that is not a guardian problem.</p></blockquote><p><!-- @page { margin: 0.79in } P { margin-bottom: 0.08in } --> <p style="margin-bottom: 0in;">Yes zerkers could tank as far back as KoS, however not many people wanted them over guardians because they took more damage since guardians had higher mit.  As far as upping guardians dps 50%, yes this is roughly how much we need to be improved.  My best parse on this expansion so far is 32k, I was happy until I saw our zerker did 88k. Single target I sit around 20k, while the zerker sits around 35k.  The highest guard parse I have seen was 37k on a single target.  So yes upping our dps 50% would make us slightly out dps zerkers on single targets while having the multiple mob encounters still favor the zerkers.  I went and checked on other boards to see the parses of other zerkers were I saw a this was about average, then I looked at the SK boards where they were a bit higher.  As far as Paladins are concerned I feel they should also get a dps boost to bring them in line to where they parse higher but I don't play one so not sure how much love they need.  Also odds are if they up Guardian dps, they will not look as the numbers on some random post, they are more to illistrate the gap in dps between Guardian and SK/Zerkers while the defensive difference is miniscule.</p></p>

[lollipop]

<p>Great changes so far. I have decided to bring back my old guardian. I stopped playing her a while back. I am leveling her up to 90/250 now. Cant wait for the changes to go live. This is going to help the guardian class alot.</p><p>Though I would make it 10% flurry while shield is equiped as the aa skill. Then I think we are good to go! I know tons here will keep asking for more and more but really people just want thier class number 1 and not equal to others =/. Thanks for helping us out!</p>

[lollipop]

<p><cite>WarmMachine wrote:</cite></p><blockquote><p><cite>Netty wrote:</cite></p><blockquote><p><cite>WarmMachine wrote:</cite></p><blockquote><p><cite>Atan@Unrest wrote:</cite></p><blockquote><p><cite>WarmMachine wrote:</cite></p><blockquote><p><strong>While we are the lowest hate generating tank, I would be happy with these changes if we really shined in survivability. Leaving us with yes we can live though almost anything, just have to keep agro on them mob as our problem, while other tanks have no problem keeping agro on the mob but have a much harder time keeping alive. </strong></p></blockquote><p>Given a guardian revamp isn't including nerfing every other class, this option isn't on the table.</p><p>Fact is, any tank can live thru almost anything today.  The gap in survivability has been closed to almost nil, giving us more survivability than the current content requires isn't in any way helping the class.</p><p>TBH, the tone of your post reminds me of a KOS/EOF era guard.  The game has changed much since then and I don't see that viewpoint being managable in today's game.</p></blockquote><p>Keep reading my post...."<span><strong>To to respond to the people who will reply with all tanks can tank current content with out any major survivability issues.  I will say yes it should that every tank can tank any mob in this game.  This however would let guardians be more flexible in the fact that a poorly geared or less than ideal healer could keep them up, where they could not another tank." </strong></span></p><p>Yes every tank should be able to tank every mob, I do not want to go back to KoS/EoF where your only option for main tank was guardians.  If we move to a true defensive tank, where we take a lot less damage, this will let us tank things in much less than idea set ups.  What happens if the MT templar or defiler does not show up one night for raids, for the most part guilds will go back and clear stuff on farm status or does not raid at all.  This would make guardians the ideal tank for group that the set up is less than ideal.  At this point in the expansion I don't see anything that it would break.  I have cleared the heroic palace with a furry healing.  What this would do is let heroic geared guardians be as good as taking damage as raid geared tanks, only with out the dps.  With this there would be a very fine line that would take a lot of tweaking.  If they give guardians too much survivability it will trivialize hard content, and make them the only tank people take to hard mode stuff.  If they don't give guardians the ability to hold agro people will not take guardians because while they are staying alive the mob has killed the rest of the raid.  I honestly don't see this happening, because right now the developers can make a new encounter and test it with one tank since all tanks are taking roughly the same damage, instead of having to figure in if a guard would be taking too little damage or if the other tanks are taking too much damage.  I have said it before, this is what I would like to see happen, but I don't think it will so they should just up our dps about 50% so we are on par with other tanks, instead of giving us a few utilities and saying we are "fixed" enjoy being a worthless tank for the next 2 years.</p></blockquote><p>For the first. I MT everything back in kos on a zerk guess something was broken then since guards was the only option. up guard dps with 50%? I dont play my guard anymore but the guard dps is no where that bad as you make it sound. Sure i agree it should be abit higher but 50%? If anything they should nerf Reflect and knight stance. Since that is kinda much the only reason they are parsing those high numbers. Its not that guards do to litle dps Crusaders do to much with nearly no trade off in def. UT better hate and some more dps will put guards where they should be the other stuff is mostly a bad design by other classes and need to be nerfed/fix in that way aswell.</p><p>There should always be a trade off for dps... Warriors do it brawlers do it but crusaders dont and that is not a guardian problem.</p></blockquote><p style="margin-bottom: 0in;">Yes zerkers could tank as far back as KoS, however not many people wanted them over guardians because they took more damage since guardians had higher mit.  As far as upping guardians dps 50%, yes this is roughly how much we need to be improved.  My best parse on this expansion so far is 32k, I was happy until I saw our zerker did 88k. Single target I sit around 20k, while the zerker sits around 35k.  The highest guard parse I have seen was 37k on a single target.  So yes upping our dps 50% would make us slightly out dps zerkers on single targets while having the multiple mob encounters still favor the zerkers.  I went and checked on other boards to see the parses of other zerkers were I saw a this was about average, then I looked at the SK boards where they were a bit higher.  As far as Paladins are concerned I feel they should also get a dps boost to bring them in line to where they parse higher but I don't play one so not sure how much love they need.  Also odds are if they up Guardian dps, they will not look as the numbers on some random post, they are more to illistrate the gap in dps between Guardian and SK/Zerkers while the defensive difference is miniscule.</p></blockquote><p>Zerker dps on single target is almost equal to guardian. They dont get any special dps tools when buffed equal over guards. Both will have max dps mod, max haste cap'd crit and da. The only edge is 100% aoe auto attk. So on single target that does not matter.</p><p>I have a guardian, zerker, paly used to have a SK and a bruiser that I betrayed from a monk. For dps issues they need to up the dps of guards and zerkers while holding a shield.Something like a flurry or auto attk mod.</p><p>Then add something like a regen ward for guard when they have weapon in secondary. Something like 25% chance while hit to proc a 250 point ward (only while weapon is in sec slot). (should be reduced alot for pvp of course)</p><p>Death prevent needs to be until cancel. Thier group temp ac buff needs to be a straight 5% dmg reduction for the group.Would be even cool if it was perma group buff. (cant stack of course). If it was a temp buff would cause massive hate like death march for non linked targets.</p><p>With the other changes that would be perfect imo. The plate classes would be balanced to each other. Monk/Bruiser is another story lol.</p><p>EDIT - belly smash not needing knock back would help to!</p>

[Madmonte]

<p><cite>Feldorm wrote:</cite></p><blockquote><p>Please please dont change plant. It's about the only good spell we have in battlegrounds, otherwise we have no defense against scouts (which are the only archtype against which we fair well). I know its considered useless in PvE but now it will be useless in PvP, unless against lots of enemies at once.</p></blockquote><p>I agree here that the root portion of plant is much needed in PvP.  Guardians play with such horrible range that actually being able to keep them in tight for ANY amount of time is irreplacable.</p>

[Madmonte]

<p><cite>Soul_Dreamer wrote:</cite></p><blockquote><p>The Guardian community needs to be listened to with this feedback and things need to change, this is the last chance for me, it's taken 2 years to get this attention and if only minor changes are done and the class isn't balanced with other fighters, this is another Guardian who's leaving game.</p></blockquote><p>I didn't necessarily agree with ALL you said, but you are right in stressing that guards have a long way to go to catch back up.  The DAY before my attention was drawn by a guildmate to this thread, I [Removed for Content] near deleted and rerolled after doing extensive ACT math including comparible avoidance reports.  Guardian just didn't, in any way shape or form, add up to being a useful toon...and honestly, if GU57 fails, I will still change classes.</p>

[WarmMachine]

<p><cite>Soul_Dreamer wrote:</cite></p><blockquote><p>So Guardians need more survivability so those poorly geared Guardians survive better, is that honestly your opinion Warmachine?</p><p>There are another couple of Guardians in this thread also feedbacking that we need more survivability, what do you think will happen when groups/raids are geared enough to not need the survivability you bring? You'll be in exactly the same situation. We do need a decent death save and out mit buffs changing to 10/20/30 damage reduction, or the mit curve fixing but that should be it survivability wise. The rest is fixing broken abilities and adding hate/DPS. </p><p>If you're sat there providing feedback to just increase Survivability all you're doing is forcing us into the same niche we've always been in (MT) and eventually the same thing will happen, the well rounded robust classes will over take us and in 2 years we'll be complaining yet again that we're not needed.</p><p>Reason for deathsave and mitigation/temp buff change..Our SK tanks Toxxulia to avoid those 1 shots she occasionally does against us and he survives easier until and the whole raid gets there.  Simply because the 1 shot hit I occasionally take he can shrug off with bloodletter. Situationally he actually has more survivability then me. (we're currently working on HM Tox, Waansu and Maalus). </p><p>I'm full T2 with over 20k resists across the board, 33k HP and 128% crit mit when I'm fighting her, if block/tower of stone/last man standing aren't up I have to eat the full effect of these huge AOE's. If other tanks temporary absorbs aren't up.. and it was a:</p><p>Zerker they can reduce the damage of every single set of AOE's by 50%. </p><p>SK they will just live through it with one of his 3 procs of bloodletter</p><p>Paladin they will live through it with his 10% damage reduction and healing..</p><p>Before people say it, no I don't suck, my healers always live and I always get the placement right, however when the SK Takes over he lives but 1 or 2 of his healers are often dropping due to having to get too close to keep heals on him. Guess what, he still survives while the Healer is pulled up due to his abilities. I can pop both my mit increases in this scenario and I'm still getting hit just as hard because everyone is bloody capped, then there is Sphere, which I can't use incase the Dirge or one of the healers missplaces by a small amount, add to that I can't use Sentinal to absorb damage on a group member cos I'll also eat their AOE (Piercing Pestilence) when it goes off, I can't use Sentry watch to save them if they are low on HP and missplaced since it will also kill me, I can't always use my death save because I broke my F**king crystal ball, I can't AOE avoid them to reduce their damage, even with the change to stone sphere it's just luck..... Is the picture clear enough yet?</p><p>We simply cannot compete against the toolset the other tanks bring as a whole package. There either needs to be a subsantial difference in survivability (bring other tanks down) with the Guardian the clear winner, or Guardians need to offer what all other plate tanks currently do and have similar tools. I'm sorry but 50% damage absorption 50% of the time, being able to die 3 times, 10% damage absorption and 10% healing are just grossly over powered when combined with the DPS and Hate these classes also produce and when compared to a Guardian, these tools alone are also better than almost all the Guardian survivability tools. The numbers simply do not lie, how many SK's/Pallies/Zerks do you see running around in groups and in the ranks of raiding guilds, then compare it to Guardians, our numbers in game have plumeted.</p><p>Those people who say "But it was like that before and only 1 tank (Guardian) was the clear choice", no it wasn't like that before, because before Paladins/SKs/Zerks didn't have such massive utilty and DPS, their utility and DPS was similar to Guardians but Guardians had a clear edge in Survivability. </p><p>Other tanks have complained and moaned about the Guardian class for years, gradually our class specific abilities have been chipped away or given to other classes and we've never received anything for it. This is the culmination of this chipping away and buffing... Sorry Zerkers, using you as an example <img src="/eq2/images/smilies/9d71f0541cff0a302a0309c5079e8dee.gif" border="0" /></p><p>Zerkers have been given a mini tower of stone, they have been given Adrenaline, one of the best survivability tools in game, they've got Gut Roar, they have been given 2 deathsaves, self proccing heals, a heal proc if they drop below 30% HP, they still have the same temp mit buffs a Guardian does, you essentially have almost all the survivability tools of a Guardian right here. What have they paid for these defensive skills in other areas? Nothing... they've in fact been given more offensive skills and hate tools, Adrenaline allows them to duel weild with a 50% damage reduction, who needs a shield to block 30% of attacks when you can just reduce them all by 50%, they get 25% of all their damage as hate, they have 100% AOE auto attack, Gybe as a snap along with all other snaps, their Mythical as a snap agro tool (Insolence), Jeering Onslaught as a snap, added hate when they have Adrenaline up... The list just keeps growing.</p><p>As I've said, Guardians need the tool set to compete with other tanks. Right now, it's just not there. Our utility should mean our groups/raid has a lot more survivability, our hate and DPS need to be closer to that of other tanks and we need more AOE hate. </p><p>If this means Guardians are now able to compete as raid offtanks which was never their area then so be it, other tanks now do more than compete for the MT slot, they've successfully taken over. </p><p>If it means Guardians are more offensive than they are now and are in balance with the other tanks.. why does it matter, they have equal or better in some cases survivability to us. </p><p>I've seen lots of other tanks shout down and drown out Guardian threads with arguments against DPS/Hate improvements and their justification just isn't there anymore, I firmly believe they're just happy keeping us down. My favorite all time reason is "You've had your time at the top now deal with it, we deserve this"</p><p>The Guardian community needs to be listened to with this feedback and things need to change, this is the last chance for me, it's taken 2 years to get this attention and if only minor changes are done and the class isn't balanced with other fighters, this is another Guardian who's leaving game.</p></blockquote><p></p> <p>@ Soul_Dreamer I can't find a flaw with your argument, you win.  Yes guardians need to be improved in all areas, but I don't think this will happen.  What I see happening is them tweaking a few utilities, then over the next two years as guards scream for help, they will reply but you were "fixed".  Honestly I am considering leaving the game as well if these changes turn out to be as trivial as the ones posted so far.  I feel like I am not contributing enough to the raids to justify me taking up a spot, they could replace me with an average SK/Zerker and still out preform me when I am busting my backside doing the best I can for every fight on the raid. </p> <p>SoE seems focused to not let Guardians dps well since we are "defensive".  However they want every tank to be able to tank any mob, witch means there can be no significant difference in the damage received because it will make content trivial or only tankable by defensive tanks.  Since we are also considered a single target tank, why not focus the upgrades by bumping single target dps, by upping the proposed furry to a respectable % along with a few other dps upgrades.  That way zerkers/sk would out parse guardians on group encounters, while guardians would have a slight edge in single target dps. </p> <p>Honestly the more I read on this topic the more it makes me not want to play my guard, and that is not a good sign.</p> <p style="margin-bottom: 0in;"> </p>

[Soul_Dreamer]

<p>As soon as they cracked and caved in to the crys from all plate tanks that "All tanks can tank all mobs" they removed the "Defensive" tanks role. It just doesn't exist any more, how can it if all tanks can tank it all but some offer more DPS and utility doing it.Tank A, survives the hits and does 20k DPS while increasing his groups DPS by 200DPS.Tank B, survives the hits and does 50k DPS while increasing his raids DPS by 3% (500k raid - 15k).</p><p>Which would any sane raid leader pick?IF Tank A was..Survives the hits and does 50k DPS whlie increasing the survivability of the raid by 3%. 3% less damage received.ORSurvives the hits easier giving more room for error and does 40k DPS while increasing the survivability of the raid by 3%.The choice gets a little bit harder and it's more on your own guilds strengths/weaknesses and the quality of player. Which is how it should be!</p><p>If they want to put Guardians into a "Defensive" roll then the only way to now do it and allow for balance is for us to add survivability to our group/raid instead of DPS as the other tanks do. They can then balance our personal DPS and hate against the other plate tanks and everyone should be happy. A Gurdian is just as viable an option as the other tanks for the roles tanks are meant to fulfil.</p><p>The current proposed changes only really effect hate and only in small quantities, they don't fix a lot of abilities. To buff a raid with 5% potency an SK doesn't give up 5% potency himself or any other DPS abilities, why should a Guardian give up Survivability/risk his life when he saves a group member from dying? </p><p>Sphere should be just the start.</p><p>Sentinal needs to absorb damage, not transfer it to us. Sentry watch needs to absorb damage, not transfer it to us.Iron will needs to be something usefull and not Stamina. Unyeilding will needs to be always on, and it's reuse reduced. If it stays at 1 proc with no way to increase it then it could also do with being castable in combat.</p><p>I'm not going to list them all again, in other posts I already have and other people already have, I just hope we can get the message through when there are Guardians like Lollipop above who are claiming these changes are the be all end all and will fix everything wrong with us <img src="/eq2/images/smilies/9d71f0541cff0a302a0309c5079e8dee.gif" border="0" /></p>

[Oodog]

<p>not sure if anyone said it yet to many posts to read but</p><p>Plant should make you immune to kickbacks.</p>

[WarmMachine]

<p><cite>lollipop wrote:</cite></p><p><em><span >Zerker dps on single target is almost equal to guardian. They dont get any special dps tools when buffed equal over guards. Both will have max dps mod, max haste cap'd crit and da. The only edge is 100% aoe auto attk. So on single target that does not matter.</span></em></p><p>No, guardian and zerker dps are not almost equial on single target.  Yes, they do get special tools to out dps Guards.  Bezerker Rage, Abandoned Furry, Aggressive Defense, Weapon Counter, Open Wounds, Juggernaunt.  Guards get defensive minded (Self RoA).  If a Zerker is out parsed by a Guard in similar gear the zerker is slacking plain and simple. The gap on single target mobs is 20-50% range, while on group enounters the gap moves to the 100-150% range.</p>

[Rahatmattata]

<p><cite>Soul_Dreamer wrote:</cite></p><blockquote><p>So Guardians need more survivability so those poorly geared Guardians survive better, is that honestly your opinion Warmachine?</p><p>There are another couple of Guardians in this thread also feedbacking that we need more survivability, what do you think will happen when groups/raids are geared enough to not need the survivability you bring? You'll be in exactly the same situation. We do need a decent death save and out mit buffs changing to 10/20/30 damage reduction, or the mit curve fixing but that should be it survivability wise. The rest is fixing broken abilities and adding hate/DPS.</p></blockquote><p>I didn't read your entire wall of text but, guards have always been known for being the most defensive pure tank. The guard could pull more trash at once making the zone go faster, and SOE could make future content do more damage making guardian survivability useful in that way as well. Basically, I see 2 camps. One group wants guard dps buffed to shadowknight levels to be more or less equal in just about every way. The other group wants survivability boosted so they can pull and tank things that would wtfpwn a shadowknight.</p><p>I could care less about dps. I want to play the most defensive pure tank in the game that can tank the hardest content. Whatever class that is, just let me know so I can re-roll or whatever I need to do.</p>

[dark0men]

<p>Two camps:</p><p>Increase dps to make us viable options in raids for content that calls for dps check fights</p><p>Best survivability to follow what the Guardian has been all about, survivability.</p><p>================</p><p>Why not just create some tools for us or modify existing effects to increase our dps the more we take or absorb damage.  This may sound beserkerish, however, I think that we can work out some great ideas to follow along this mechanic that could still set the Guardian apart from tank flavor a or b.</p><p>Eg.</p><p>Guardian Sphere change is a damage absorption to the group which deals x% of damage to the mob for every point absorbed or blocked, modified by potency and crit bonus.</p><p>Defensive Minded, add a ward component that releases damage at the end of the effect for x% of the damage dodged</p><p>When wearing a shield our defensive buff adds a damage ward compenent that absorb %x damage and returns %x damage to the target</p><p>Abilities can be adjusted or added to create burst capable dps for guardian, damage over time dps for guardian or sustained damage.  That way we can still choose how to adjust per fight to increase our damage or our absorption.</p><p>Flurry for us can be increased to become 100% with the appropriate combination of absorption buffs that we use, for brief periods of time.  Maybe this would give us a reason to use intercede or to use sentinel.</p><p>Think VC for bards, where damage is calculated in a short burst and released in mass.</p><p>Anyway, the mechanics can be worked out.  Point is that the requirement for both can be met by some creative thinking on our part or SOE's part.  I'd much prefer that we keep some of the uniqueness of the class through a new means of creating hate through damage absorbtion mechanics.</p>

[Khalindor]

<p><span style="text-decoration: underline;">Recapture</span></p><p> Why not change it so that it wipes another fighter's threat and transfers said fighter's amount of hate over to the guardian instead? And the amount of the threat being transfered graded after the the lvl of the recapture.</p><p> It would give you guardians a more threat managing role and being able to put those other nosy fighters who cant manage their own hate into place. Along with the fact that it would give the guardian a huge hate spike and the ability to climb from 0 hate to top in one go.</p><p> Would give the guardian a real command and dominance on the field of battle as the real leading tank. </p>

[Davngr1]

<p><cite>Wasuna wrote:</cite></p><blockquote><p>Guardians are suppose to be a tank that allows others to do their job. Giving us a buff that would boost the raid/group dps is a decent way to offset the dps disparity between tanks. I think that will be very hard to setup though. The dps disparity is much more prounced in a group setting than in a raid setting.</p><p>Also, lets never loose site of the fact that utility is only one aspect of the balance equations. If this is all SoE is going to balance then lets throw it all in now. If they are going to visit the other aspets later then lets just look at what we need in terms of Utility to be what a Guardian is suppose to be.</p></blockquote><p> this sounds good and all but "in game" it won't work imo.</p><p>  SK is the best dps "utility" tank in game.  you will see conciderable gains if one is in your group, to make/give guardians the same utillity would still leave the SK as the better dps tank with the same utillity.     to give guard more utillity then SK would basicly turn guard into a bard/chanter.</p><p>   i still say single target dominace is the way to go.   sure this expac seems to be mosly single target but there are some ae encounters and i'm sure most/a lot of the new stuff will be AE.   </p><p>  that's what made my guard not be useless back in the kos/eof days.  the fact my single target damage(with buckler) was decent and if i lost agro in an ae fight i could target that mob and get agro back with reasonable effort.   </p><p>  after buckler line was lost (completly in fighter revamp 1) my guard fell to almost where my SK had been in expansions prior "hovering" over saves.  instead of stressing out hopeing that "death march" would pop soon like i did on my SK in kos/eof/rok it became stressing out waiting for reinforce to pop.</p><p> i think it's a far better idea to make all 4 plate tanks fun to play then it is to make one plate tank the only option for harder content.</p>

[Soul_Dreamer]

<p><cite>Rahatmattata wrote:</cite></p><blockquote><p><cite>Soul_Dreamer wrote:</cite></p><blockquote><p>So Guardians need more survivability so those poorly geared Guardians survive better, is that honestly your opinion Warmachine?</p><p>There are another couple of Guardians in this thread also feedbacking that we need more survivability, what do you think will happen when groups/raids are geared enough to not need the survivability you bring? You'll be in exactly the same situation. We do need a decent death save and out mit buffs changing to 10/20/30 damage reduction, or the mit curve fixing but that should be it survivability wise. The rest is fixing broken abilities and adding hate/DPS.</p></blockquote><p>I didn't read your entire wall of text but, guards have always been known for being the most defensive pure tank. The guard could pull more trash at once making the zone go faster, and SOE could make future content do more damage making guardian survivability useful in that way as well. Basically, I see 2 camps. One group wants guard dps buffed to shadowknight levels to be more or less equal in just about every way. The other group wants survivability boosted so they can pull and tank things that would wtfpwn a shadowknight.</p><p>I could care less about dps. I want to play the most defensive pure tank in the game that can tank the hardest content. Whatever class that is, just let me know so I can re-roll or whatever I need to do.</p></blockquote><p>I honestly don't think this is ever going to exist again, it would be nice but they've already gone down the "All tanks can tank everything, only some better" route, why would they reverse all of that? Who cares what fighters have always been known for what, the game has evolved and the other classes with it, the Guardian class is in the situation it is because it's stayed static and true to it's original purpose where the other fighters haven't.</p><p>Whats wrong with wanting to be equal, isn't that what Balance is all about? It doesn't have to be in every way but we need to offer similar levels of utility/hate/dps or a balanced combination of them. </p><p>Leave other tanks doing more DPS if the "Illusion" of the defensive tank is to be kept, but it can't be the 50-100% more that it currently is , more like 10% difference and the Guardian will need some sort of Utility or other hate to make up for it. This is the state all other tanks are in, they are all pretty close, the Guardian needs to be brought in line.</p><p>Mark each tank out of 100 on:DPSHate from sources other than DPSUtilitySurvivability</p><p>When you're done the sum of these marks should be relatively equal, currently the Guardian is lagging behind in all but 1 area.</p>

[Pervis]

<p><cite>Ardors wrote:</cite></p><blockquote>Without increasing our DPS, any changes you do to Guardians needs to make up for that gap in damage output…so it better be [Removed for Content] good…To be honest, I have no idea why you have let other tanks slip to such high DPS while granting them similar survivability as Guards…</blockquote><p> This is a statement I can agree with 100%.</p><p>Back when I was MTing raids on my guardian (T7/RoK mostly, but also some in T5/T6), a guardian was the safe bet for all content. We could tank anything in the game with a two healer group, and things were fairly stable. A Bezerker or Paladin could fill in if needed, but on harder content, would need a third healer in the MT group to reach the same stability a guardian could provide. SKs also fell in to this range in RoK.</p><p>This meant that a raid with a guardian as MT needed one less healer overall, while still retaining the same stability. This in turn opened up a spot for another T1 DPS class, which more than offset the additional DPS the other, non-guardian plate fighter bought in over the guardian.</p><p>Now, every plate fighter in the game can tank any encounter in the game with a two healer group setup. This means that the survivability bonus a guardian bought to the raid is nulified. Nothing you do to improve guardian survivability - short of giving them either wards equal to a defiler or reactives equal to a templar, and buffs to match - will make that back up. We will still need a two healer group to stay alive, and that is all any other plate fighter will need as well.</p><p>If you want to make guardians viable as raid MTs, you need to give them something that will allow a raid to take at least one less healer if a guardian is tanking, especially on top end hard mode encounters.</p><p>I've not pulled all hard mode encounters yet (and have never been in the Underfoot zone), but my first suggestion for something along these lines is a buff placed on a healer in any other group in the raid that makes his whole group immune to the next AE that targets the guardian directly. Put it on a short enough recast to be able to <em>just</em> use it on any one AE in most multi-AE encounters (75 second un-modified recast), and you have something of a winner, imo.</p><p>While others have ideas as to what they want to guardian class to be, I think we can all agree that you will be unwilling to increase guardian DPS to the same level as an SK, and that any increase in survivability you give the guardian class itself is un-needed without alterations to encounters. Allowing us to protect others, to the point where the raids DPS increases significantly, is the only other option I can think of other than turning guardians into DPS buff bots.</p>

[aislynn00]

<p><cite>Gungo wrote:</cite></p><blockquote>If you truly beleive the change to guardian sphere "doesnt improve the guardian baseline survivability" you do not have a clue.</blockquote><p>"Baseline" doesn't mean "average" or "20 sec every couple of minutes".</p><p>The baseline is the worst-base scenario, the basis to which all temporary effects are added, the lowest it ever gets.</p><p>In terms of survivability in EQ2, it means your survivability with only maintainable effects considered.</p><p>Baseline survivability is important to consider, because when you end up with no temporary survivability boosts running and no saves available, that is usually when the vast majority of deaths occur.  I'm pretty sure you'll agree that SK's don't tend to die while Shadowknight's Furor is running, just as guardians don't often bite the dust when four ToS stoneskins are up.</p><p>Most of the time, though, you don't enjoy those survivability peaks.  Most of the time, all you have is your mitigation, your normal avoidance, plus any maintainable buffs, such as the two guardian temporary mitigation buffs, one of which will always be in effect if you cast one after the other.</p><p>When a full ward isn't up and an AE plus a melee double attack hits you and none of your temporary survivability boosts are up, you need the baseline survivability to not die instantly.</p><p>In that regard, guardians used to be number one due to being the only class that could realistically cap mitigation (EoF and RoK days) while also enjoying solid avoidance.  In TSO, however, with the advent of easily available +Mitigation gear, all plate tanks could eventually reach the mitigation cap, and in SF, things have grown completely silly, where even tier 1 gear will put a shadowknight at the cap.</p><p>Meanwhile, berserkers have 5% permanent Damage Reduction, and paladins enjoy 10% permanent Damage Reduction, plus automatically healing 10% of all damage incurred, which puts paladins ahead of all other tanks in baseline survivability.  Guardians, for the record, have no permanent Damage Reduction at all.</p><p>That is broken. Guardians should have the highest baseline survivability, bar none, and the hardest raid bosses should <em>require</em> that kind of survivability.</p><p>Give us that, then I don't give a [Removed for Content] whether my DPS isn't up to par.</p><blockquote>a 25% chance to proc a stone skin for 20 secs with unlimited charges is phenominal ability at reducing damage.</blockquote><p>We already <em>have</em> that ability now, though, so this isn't this dramatic survivability <em>improvement</em> you are making it out to be.</p><p>I and other guardians have been using it on raids ever since KoS, when the stoneskin procs were added. </p><p>What has changed about it are the reduced duration (down 20 sec from 30 sec), the removal of the damage transferral from targets within 10m, the removal of the number of stoneskins cap (currently 6 stoneskins), and the addition of stoneskins to group members.</p><p>Against multiple mobs, such as when pulling rooms in a heroic instance, I'm sure that the removal of the max number of stoneskins and the duration reduction will benefit us.</p><p>However, the duration reduction is actually a significant <em>nerf</em> vs raid boss mobs, given that I, for instance, frequently never get to proc all six stoneskins before the buff expires. In order to actually get six procs out of it, it takes an average of 24 hits that bypass my avoidance (35% or so vs a raid boss), 3% Riposte buff from the defiler, Shield Ally (4% - 5% or so), the avoidance of our bruiser (usually 21% - 23% avoidance), Percussion of Stone (something like 12% stone skin proc chance), and Unyielding Benediction (16% stone skin proc chance).</p><p>24 successful hits in 30 seconds doesn't happen most of the time vs single mobs; in 20 seconds, it happens very rarely indeed.</p><p>And again, all of this only applies for 20 sec every couple of minutes. </p><p>If we only have a survivability edge 15% - 30% of the time, we still aren't the toughest tank, because what happens when our unmaintainable temp buffs are down?</p><p>I reiterate: what we need are <em>not</em> more temp buffs. We need <em>baseline survivability increases</em>: damage reduction effects that can be maintained.</p><p>Then we need content that requires our (hopefully) newfound survivability edge.</p>

[Soul_Dreamer]

<p>I completely agree, I just can't see it happening, not to the extent it would need to happen by to make a difference. The more likely solution is just to buff up our DPS/Hate, fix the broken abilities and bring us a lot closer to the other tanks in all areas.</p><p>Can't you see the SK/Zerk/Pally complaint threads popping up if they suddenly started dying left and right to content they've been killing all year?</p>

[Tessen-R]

<p>I'm playing guardian as raid MT for 3 years. Please STOP! You DESTROY our class! Guardians historically were raid MT, we have less DPS and aoe-agro than other tanks because we were best in our role – solo target survivability. You now make us an OK class for group instances and destroy our hope for actual class redesign and the return of our primary role as raid MT. With your incoming changes we can tank group instances in any party but still are not the best choice for it, this is good only if we have something different as our primary role. Please take a look at the real problem of guardians – we don't have any real usability – with you changes we would be an OK choice as a group tank but still not the best (zerkers, SK and pally still do more DPS and have better buffs), but our role in raids wouldn’t change. Do you want to make guardians OK for group instances (but still not the best) and worse than any other plate tank as raid MT? We have many problems and group instance agro management isn’t really the first one on the list. If you want to make a plate bard without any role of his own but with many buffs for other much more capable tanks – thanks, I would quit.Guardian's AA give us more mitigation than anyone else, but new raid armor has more mitigation than actually is needed. I have ~17000 mitigation in our raid, our SK/pally have ~13000, but 13000 is cap! Why at all do we need so much miti? Crusaders have greater block chance from AA's (pally has 39%) and still have mitigation capped. The Guardian is still one and only plate tank class without a normal deathsave - Unyielding Will is not a constant buff like Divine Favor (pally), Bloodletter (SK) or Visions of Madness (zerker). Many of our abilities are pointless - we don't need mitigation buffs (we are capped solo!), sta buff (it's capped), plant (it doesn’t really work in a raid), our raid buff is nothing and our avoidance buffs is nearly useless, too. Please don't change Recapture, guardians have many useless abilities and Recapture isn't one of this.Concerning survivability, guardians have fewer HP's than pally, fewer than a SK. All 4 plate tank classes have capped mitigation. Crusaders also have greater block chance than guardians. Zerker and pally have more damage reduction than guardians. We have fewer antispike abilities than SK, but more than pally, zerkers have Adrenaline, and it is really OP, 32 sec with adrenaline (50% damage reduction is amazing!) and 28 sec without. Immunity to riposte damage doesn't really matter - ripostes do very little damage.Also guardians have less aggro than other plate tanks - we have huge aggro proc for 30 sec with 300 sec reuse, zerker's have the same AND a huge aggro proc on Adrenaline with 32 sec duration and 28 sec reuse. Pally's have Amends and Holy Ground with a huge aggro and damage proc. It has 13 sec duration and 45 sec reuse (TSO AA allows pally to cap reuse on it). SK have a TSO final ability. Yes, we have reinforcement, it can help to return the 1st aggro position after a memwipe or something similar, but reinforcement is not good to hold agro.Also guardians have less DPS than other tanks if we use a shield. If we are using dual weapons, we have same DPS as other tanks, but have much less survivability than others. If we would be best in survivability, then we would need to have less DPS, but now we have less DPS, less agro, fewer buffs, inferior survivability.If SOE wants to save the Guardian class, these disadvantages should be compensated and our useless abilities reviewed. Please, focus on our defense, this is primary role of guardian.For example it maybe something like1) Change our sta buff to constant deathsave like divine favor with ~5-7 min reuse2) Improve our raid buff is good idea. We buff defense now, it would be good to give us something which would actually improve raid survivability, like an hp buff (maybe 700-800).3) Enlarge mitigation cap OR reduce "mitigation increase" on SF raid armor OR give us something, which would really improve our survivability, instead of senseless mitigation increase buffs and achievements (warrior TSO line and SF wisdom line in KoS). Maybe buffs can improve not only mitigation, but also block chance (10% is not bad, but SK's/pally have 30%/39% in achievement, guardian have only 12% and 10% as temporary buff, 20-25% instead 10% in TSO AA is normal) or HP (600-800 on our group mitigation buff for example) or damage reduction (10% on any of these buffs for example). These abilities are planned as temporary survivability improvements, so that would do.4) Change our mythical buff. Only SK have less damage reduction, but SK is dps-aoe tank, isn't it? Maybe 5% damage reduction AND 5-10% damage reduction proc instead only 5% proc5) Plant is not working on epics, also guardians need an aggro ability. If plant is changed to a huge aggro proc ability like pally's Holy Ground, but without damage/aggro position, it would be very good. There is no need to remove root from guardian or change EoF AA modification for this ability! Root guardian and give him 1500-2000 aggro with any successful attack for 13 sec (18 with 5 AA) and 1 min reuse. This change can solve guardian's problems with agro and would allow guardians to hold aggro in group instances without 2-3 agro buffers. Maybe it would be good to additionally improve guardian's survivability when it activated, like zerker's adrenaline, which combines aggro and survivability, like the immunity to strikethrough.6) Our debuff EoF line is really not working - why do we need a debuff to mob's riposte damage if we are immune to it? It's stupid. We need something that really works – like a decrease of the mob's autoattack modifier by 0.05 (like SK's debuff on crit bonus)7) Review our survivability achievement boost. Guardians now have much less HP than crusaders, maybe in KoS our HP buff was balanced with crusader's 5% HP boost, but since KoS much has changed, and now items have more and more HP, now we can have 450-500 HP from 1 item, this is a HUGE boost compared to the 5% HP increase achievement. Our TSO achievement boosts our group HP buff by ~35 HP for 1 AA, this is very, VERY small amount. I think this achievement must additional improve guardian's HP's by 2.5-3% with 5 AA. If you boost our HP on a raid HP buff it would work on any tank in the raid, and guardian as tank will still remain useless.Fix zerker's adrenaline or give something similar to guardians, for example i heard about guardian's sphere changes to 25% stoneskin and 20 sec duration, rly? 20 sec with 25% stoneskin proc and ~90 sec without VS 32 sec with 50% damage reduction and 28 sec without? Adrenaline is better as damage reduction (it works on all damage, not gives a chance) , 1.5 times better duration and 3 times better reuse, combined this change is more 5 times less effective than adrenaline. I think 30 sec duration and 120 sec base recast (if your don't change our EoF AA improvement of this ability) and 20-25% stoneskin proc or 25% damage reduction is OK. But this change requires decreasing a group defense component of this ability, maybe to 10-15% damage reduction or remove it completelyWith these changes guardians would have best survivability as raid MT, useful raid buffs and will be able hold agro. Yes, with these changes guardians would not be the best choice for group instances, but would be still useful in this role. Please don't make guardian a half-dps, group tank class without any utility in raids. We must be the first in solo target survivability, DPS and aoe damage and agro is zerker role</p>