Raiding Gaurds Chime in

[Barrak13]

<DIV>Is the Buckler Line worth it anymore? I have found myself starting out the fights with the tower shield in hand, because the initial few seconds are very tough, untill the mob gets some debuffs on him. Past few raids I have used the buckler less and less, and except for the occasional group encounter that kills a warlock I dont seem to be having to much trouble with keeping agro without the buckler. So I have been thinking those AA points might be better spent.</DIV> <DIV> </DIV> <DIV>I have been thinking of the Wis line final ability, it gets rid of any negative affects from our stances. With the way skills work now, it seems very important to have slash/crush/pierce as high as possible.</DIV> <DIV> </DIV> <DIV>Str line for the increase Hate, not sure how much it adds, with a dirge or coercer in group I dont have to much trouble.</DIV> <DIV> </DIV> <DIV>Intel line for the maxed out parry. Even grouped with a Dirge I am still just at the begining of the curve, can still get some nice increases in avoidance by maxing out the parry.</DIV> <DIV> </DIV> <DIV>Have any other Raid MT's looked at this, or givin up the buckler? I know we only loose about 3% avoidance (by the numbers) but it seems greater than that.</DIV>

[wes_GS]

<P>I dropped the buckler a couple of nights ago.  I am currently 4/5/8/8 STR 4/4/8/8 WIS.</P> <P>The decision came when I realized I wasnt really avoiding any attacks.  I had noticed that other guards with worse gear and less achievements were doing a better job at not dying.  After a few single group instances switching back and forth between buckler and draconic deflector, I noticed that buckler doesnt really seem viable for tanking any longer.</P> <P>I went with strength to make up the loss of hate missing double attack, increased riposte, and buckler reversal.  The crits are very nice and the hate gain is amazing.  I have one wizard in the guild that can quite easily strip agro from me whenever he wants.  After respecing down strength, he couldnt take agro from me even when opening with fusion or crit ice nova.  I lost about 50 dps or so on single target fights by switching to strength, but my dps has gone up by 100 - 200 on fights with more than one target.  With the hate tests i have done so far, with a dirge/swash in my group and a troub in the sorcerer group, the raid dps should be able to go up quite a bit.</P> <P>I want to spec down agi line instead of wisdom line as well since Unshakeable doesnt seem as necessary as it was before the combat change.  I will probably do that in the next couple of days sometime when the guild has adjusted to my current respec.</P> <P>The biggest loss I see for giving up the buckler line is the resists.  I have 6 bucklers all with really good resists that I used in different situations.  I really only have 2 tower shields, grizfazzles and stormguard.  Stormguard is the only one with resists.  I also have a draconic deflector which I use most of the time now.  I dont see alot of choices in tower shields, maybe I'm just not killing the right stuff or maybe I'm just spoiled by all the pretty bucklers out there.</P>

[Ep]

berserker->guard few days after eof, from sta->wis around same time. It's all about the skills now imo. Btw i don't think the 4th line in agi or int are worth the 8aa, i mean 14parry for 8aa? come on, that in relation is a rare adornment on the forearm. I tested em out it wasn't much, course if you pack on the parry, you could reach cap if you want( i think 455 now?) never have to worry about def as a guard, so agi should not be an option.but yes i ditched the buckler, i have no aggro issues i dont' go down 4th line of str tho, so, could just be the +skills.<div></div>

[Yimway]

I went AGI for the defense, I think INT is parry...Anyway, I'm self buffing to 7800 Avoidance, and raid config hitting 9k.  This seems to be working pretty well for me as avoiding more dammage seems to be key.I've also noticed the dodge / block / avoidances go way up as the mobs are debuffed.  When we shift people off nameds to take care of add spawn, etc, about 20 seconds after the switch named DPS ramps WAY up from the loss of debuffs, and I don't avoid much at all.   But seems real high avoidance vs debuff mob is working out for me.   Granted I'm only hitting 5900 Miti as I'm not the best geared Guard around, but this is working well.Also the Parry adornment was nerfed to +7.<div></div>

[Original Cinadien]

I dropped the buckler after 3 raids in EoF. I went Str  4/4/8/8 and Wis 5/4/8/8. Honestly I went with the bucker line to hold aggro better and it worked in KoS, EoF...not so much. With my new AA's in the guardian tree I was able to negate the need for the buckler and keep my beloved tower shield for the duration. I am overall happy with the changes in EoF. In the Guardian Tree I went Enchance Overpower 5/5 Enhance Vindictive Strike 5/5 Enhance Flay 5/5 Lay Waste 5/5 Double Attack I am waiting to decide what to do next. The jury is still out. Hope this helps. <div></div>

[Barrak13]

<DIV>I did some parsing, and with a Coercer but not Dirge or Warden to up my slashing skill, I was missing about 50% of the time vs yellow con trash. It got a little better once the mob got debuffed, but it was still very very noticable. Even with a Dirge in the group buffing my Slash/crush/pierce I was still missing more than I like. Considering 2 of our taunts rely on hitting the mob (3 if you include reinforcemnt) I am seriously leaning to Wis 4/4/4/8/8  Str 4/4/4/8  or something close. Getting rid of the melee skill penalty in defensive should help a bunch with the misses.</DIV> <DIV> </DIV> <DIV>For EoF I went right to the enhance Reinforcement, I have that maxed now, not sure where I will go next.  Double attack looks good, but so does Got your Back.</DIV>

[Siniac]

I will be swapping out of the buckler line once I have 13p together.  I can't believe SOE completely changed the entire combat system but did not give us a free respec.  They must really really need to get plat out of the economy.<div></div>

[Mjollnyr]

I'm keeping sta/wis until i get close to 100 AA. Str/Wis is the spec of choice for me now, but i find myself solo'ing alot to do quests for AA, and the added dps certainly makes it tolerable. <div></div>

[Ep]

wow sucks they nerfed +parry on forearm adornment to 7. Now it's really only worthwhile to invest in the c/p/s forarm adornment and skip the parry one all together(unless your goal is to really max out parry, but i'm also a t7 xmuter so i know how difficult t7 mana vials come, xmuted 4boxes of fabled and got about 20ish vials).<div></div>

[premiere]

<DIV>Heres my thoughts on the subject.</DIV> <DIV> </DIV> <DIV>Spent over a month and half testing out new combat system in beta tried every different combo and came to this conclusion.</DIV> <DIV> </DIV> <DIV>The agillity is a must so i dedicated 8 of my points to that.</DIV> <DIV> </DIV> <DIV>Initially I was str/agi for the defense but as an offtank during raids i opted to ditch the defense and go 4 4 5 8 down STR and 8 Down Agi and 4 4 5 8 down Sta.</DIV> <DIV> </DIV> <DIV>This decision was a number of things first off I found that hate gain sux on eof so using a buckler for crap grps is still fun esp when adding str line and for offtanking its an awesome alternative while still giving me the opportunity to use tower shield and maintain hate.</DIV> <DIV> </DIV> <DIV>For the optimum main tank setup </DIV> <DIV> </DIV> <DIV>4 4 8 8 STR</DIV> <DIV>8 4 6 8 Agillity</DIV> <DIV> </DIV> <DIV>The defense may not be hard to come by but being over cap is good seeing as how 90% of the debuffs debuff defense and not parry so its imperative to have good curers or overcap defense seeing as how our loss in mitigation forces us to fall back on higher avoidance.</DIV> <DIV> </DIV> <DIV>Hope this helps.</DIV>

[Chaostik]

<div><blockquote><hr>premiere wrote:[...]<div>Spent over a month and half testing out new combat system in beta tried every different combo and came to this conclusion.</div> <div> </div>[...]<hr></blockquote>I thought everyone's big complaint was that the combat revamp was sneaked in when everything went live?  If it was in beta for a month and a half and it was the mess it was when it arrived live I'm even more depressed <span>:smileysad:</span><span></span></div>

[Sir_Halbarad]

<div><blockquote><hr>Chaostik wrote:<div><blockquote><hr>premiere wrote:[...]<div>Spent over a month and half testing out new combat system in beta tried every different combo and came to this conclusion.</div> <div> </div>[...]<hr></blockquote>I thought everyone's big complaint was that the combat revamp was sneaked in when everything went live?  If it was in beta for a month and a half and it was the mess it was when it arrived live I'm even more depressed <span>:smileysad:</span><span></span></div><hr></blockquote>They introduced it 48h before release.</div>

[Forms]

<DIV><BR> <BLOCKQUOTE> <HR> Mjollnyr wrote:<BR>I'm keeping sta/wis until i get close to 100 AA.<BR><BR>Str/Wis is the spec of choice for me now, but i find myself solo'ing alot to do quests for AA, and the added dps certainly makes it tolerable.<BR> <BR> <HR> </BLOCKQUOTE><BR>I'm going to have to agree with this as well. I'm currently sta/wis at 70aa and don't think its worth the 10p just yet to respec the fighter tree <img src="/smilies/8a80c6485cd926be453217d59a84a888.gif" border="0" alt="SMILEY" /> , specialy if a guard does solo quest for aa. I'm on a pvp server where i can't stand in a open area for 10 mins trying to kill a solo green no arrow mob. But the str line does look tempting and will probably be my final line for raid mt.</DIV>

[premiere]

<DIV>Having seen recently a set of the new EoF armor and all the defense gained from it Im going to renig on what I said previously im thinking the best line may be </DIV> <DIV> </DIV> <DIV>STR</DIV> <DIV>4 4 6 8</DIV> <DIV>AGI</DIV> <DIV>8</DIV> <DIV>WIS</DIV> <DIV>4 4 4 8</DIV> <DIV> </DIV> <DIV>Without your defense atleast 10 over cap then suck up every bit of defense you can get however if your defense is 450+ then id say go for the mit from wis line.</DIV> <DIV> </DIV> <DIV> </DIV>

[Cykotik]

I would venture to say in the not so far off future, giving up the wisdom line for some improved avoid skills and hate gain will be fairly common. Even now with my current mid-range group mit of about 6k, 300 mit is just about 1.3%. And it seems like there are alot of other places where those points can be spent especially considering how many points are spent on not very useful things up to that point.

[aislynn00]

<BR> <BLOCKQUOTE> <HR> Sir_Halbarad wrote:<BR> <DIV><BR> <BLOCKQUOTE> <HR> Chaostik wrote:<BR> <DIV><BR> <BLOCKQUOTE> <HR> premiere wrote:<BR>[...]<BR><BR> <DIV>Spent over a month and half testing out new combat system in beta tried every different combo and came to this conclusion.</DIV> <DIV> </DIV>[...]<BR> <HR> </BLOCKQUOTE><BR>I thought everyone's big complaint was that the combat revamp was sneaked in when everything went live?  If it was in beta for a month and a half and it was the mess it was when it arrived live I'm even more depressed <SPAN>:smileysad:</SPAN><BR><SPAN></SPAN><BR></DIV><BR> <HR> </BLOCKQUOTE>They introduced it 48h before release.<BR></DIV><BR> <HR> </BLOCKQUOTE> <P>What are you talking about?  They didn't introduce any changes whatsoever during the final 48 hours.  </P> <P>As a matter of fact, the vast majority of the combat changes were in place a month before EoF went live.  </P> <P>The various AA trees were only there in a very rough initial form and were finalized the last week of beta, but that wasn't any big issue.</P> <P>As for the mitigation and avoidance changes, which are undoubtedly the most important aspects of the combat revamp, they didn't change in any significant degree the last three weeks of beta, and before then, the numbers were progressively tweaked based on beta tester feedback.</P> <P>So, to sum up: The notion that SOE somehow dropped the combat changes on an unsuspecting player base is blatantly untrue.</P>

[premiere]

<P>To sum up what he just said in 3 letters.</P> <P> </P> <P>N.D.A.</P> <P> </P> <P>If you didnt know then you werent on beta.</P>

[Aandien]

<DIV>I'm not sure how you guys are maxing your defense....</DIV> <DIV> </DIV> <DIV>I have all the best KOS gear there is for a tank, including jewelery (at least from a KOS perspective...) and am using 2 dark chitin rings (for the +def), and am fully specced down the agility line and I *STILL* don't cap my defense (I think its at 43<img src="/smilies/b2eb59423fbf5fa39342041237025880.gif" border="0" alt="SMILEY" />.  With duststorm up, this goes up to 448 -- still below the cap.</DIV> <DIV> </DIV> <DIV>However, I am capped on parry (down the int line) at 458 parry in the MT group (also using the +7parry forearms adorn).</DIV> <DIV> </DIV> <DIV>The def/parry numbers are in a MT group btw: guard, dirge, coercer, templar, defiler, warden</DIV> <DIV> </DIV> <DIV>My opinion is to drop wisdom entirely -- head down agi/int.  Put enough points in those lines to cap your parry and defense and then put the remainder in either agility or stamina for extra avoid/hp.</DIV> <DIV> </DIV> <DIV>Also, make sure to get as many +block adornments as you can.  Wear your DT bracelet on your neck with +block, and put +block on your 2 wrists.</DIV><p>Message Edited by AncientElster on <span class=date_text>11-30-2006</span> <span class=time_text>08:22 AM</span>

[Barrak13]

<P>With our group defense buff, and defense boost when in defensive you get close to cap, add a few items and you are there, or [expletive haxx0red by Raijinn] close</P> <P>I changed my AA line around, I went Str 4,4,4,8  wis 4,4,4,8,(<img src="/smilies/b2eb59423fbf5fa39342041237025880.gif" border="0" alt="SMILEY" /> .  We raided Mistmoore Inner Sanctum last night, and it went much much better. Had Dirge, Swashy, Templar, Defiler, Fury in MT group. (we dont have a warden).  I had no trouble keeping agro, Str line hate gane, plus the final ability in wis kept my slashing nice and high, so I missed very little. Staying Tower shield helped with the damage spikes I used to take with bucker so healers were able to concentrate a bit more on dealing with the AE's and Damage shields instead of constantly watching just me.</P> <P>I might switch around in the future if I find a way to keep my slashing nice and high on raids and some better gear to make up for the Mitigation loss. But for now this seems to be working well.</P>

[Mjollnyr]

While i generally agree Wisdom and sta are not the way to go anymore. I'm not sure Agi/int are worth that much either. Without EoF gear, which seems to include defense and parry most of the time, i'm already nearly capped on parry in the MT group,  442 (cap = 455).  Thats also without my forearm adornment, because hardened mana's hate me. Defense isn't quite there, its about 430.  Our EoF set along gives that last remaining 25 pnts.  Not to mention any tank jewelery thats found along the way. I still think STR is the best option, with another line to top it up.   Probably favoring agi, since the defense can be handy until your well over cap, and respec to another line that provides some benefit. <div></div>

[Aandien]

<P>yes -- the only reason to go down int/agi right now is for the defense and parry.  Once you get enough of each to cap them without those lines -- then you should drop them in favor of wis/str.</P> <P>Without EOF gear though --  you won't be going far past 420ish defense and 430ish parry.  So until then, these lines are good.</P> <P>I'm already 3 over the parry cap, the whole line all the way down gives I think 14ish parry -- so once I get some EOF +parry item, I'll probably respec and drop intelligence and move it back to wis (for the end ability primarily = aggro + dps).  Once I get defense high enough -- which probably won't happen any time soon based on the drops I've seen, I'll drop agility and move that one to str (for the extra aggro).</P>

[premiere]

<DIV>My main thing about being way over defense cap is that the majority of the debuffs out there debuff defense few debuff parry and with a dirge in most every MT grp parry cap is easy to achieve these days defense im shooting for having 470 self buffed but this is gonna be when I have atleast 3 pieces of EoF fabled set.</DIV> <DIV> </DIV> <DIV>Choker of accurita even though i passed it up a few times seems to be looking hot these days.  </DIV> <DIV> </DIV> <DIV>Its gonna be hard overall not having seen the new jewelry dropping in EoF to determine what will be the best setup to get the block adornments on there and still get that defense capped high.</DIV> <DIV> </DIV> <DIV>Seems that sony giving us a 25 bonus for defense for full set of EoF armor must have been guessing wed be sitting at 430 with jewelry so cant wait to see the eof defense jewelry</DIV>

[Gungo]

<BR> <BLOCKQUOTE> <HR> premiere wrote:<BR> <DIV>My main thing about being way over defense cap is that the majority of the debuffs out there debuff defense few debuff parry and with a dirge in most every MT grp parry cap is easy to achieve these days defense im shooting for having 470 self buffed but this is gonna be when I have atleast 3 pieces of EoF fabled set.</DIV> <DIV> </DIV> <DIV>Choker of accurita even though i passed it up a few times seems to be looking hot these days.  </DIV> <DIV> </DIV> <DIV>Its gonna be hard overall not having seen the new jewelry dropping in EoF to determine what will be the best setup to get the block adornments on there and still get that defense capped high.</DIV> <DIV> </DIV> <DIV><FONT color=#ffff00>Seems that sony giving us a 25 bonus for defense for full set of EoF armor must have been guessing wed be sitting at 430 with jewelry so cant wait to see the eof defense jewelry</FONT></DIV><BR> <HR> </BLOCKQUOTE>You give them WAY to much credit on preplanning. While it would be optimal if they planned caps w the best of the best gear thus always allowing for specialization and gear usefulness. They don't. gear is created based on specific devs and point allocations.

[Sirlutt]

I think we will see some changes once they realise their "scaling" of mit and avoidance issnt working out.. if people are tanking almost as sgood in cloth armor as they are in fabled plate then the sytem is very broken and I think you'll see our avoidance get toned down some how..it is true though.. every attacked avoided is an attack 100% mitigated.<div></div>