*sigh* all those other tank classes do is kick me when I'm down.

[Cusashorn]

<DIV>Yes this is another Tanking thread...</DIV> <DIV> </DIV> <DIV>Excuse me while I vent.</DIV> <DIV> </DIV> <DIV>Ok be honest here. Am I the only one who thinks that monks should have MORE HP than the other classes? We're the ones who physically train our bodies. They're the ones who die from heart attacks while lugging aroudn all that armor. We train our bodies to live 40% longer than our racial life expectancy.</DIV> <DIV> </DIV> <DIV> </DIV> <DIV>I think it'd be only fair that we gain 3 times more HP than a Guardian or Berzerker or Paladin or Crusader when we level up because its compensation for getting hit for so hard when we tank. I mean yeah. We're avoidance based but dammit it still ****Ing hurts when you get hit. Thats why we'll never be allowed to tank raid mobs.</DIV> <DIV> </DIV> <DIV> </DIV> <DIV>My guild leader is a level 50 guardian who shows ABSOLUTELY NO RESPECT FOR MY CLASS WHATSOEVER!</DIV> <DIV> </DIV> <DIV>He says monks arn't tanks.</DIV> <DIV> </DIV> <DIV>Then why can we taunt? </DIV> <DIV> </DIV> <DIV>He says we are DPS.</DIV> <DIV> </DIV> <DIV>Then why arn't we scouts?</DIV> <DIV> </DIV> <DIV>He says that monks are "Secondary" tanks.</DIV> <DIV> </DIV> <DIV>Bull ****! THEN WHY ARE WE TANKS!?</DIV> <DIV> </DIV> <DIV> </DIV> <DIV> </DIV> <DIV> </DIV> <DIV> </DIV> <DIV>Personally: I think all the other tank classes should have an honest-to-god Avoidance Cap.</DIV> <DIV> </DIV> <DIV>As in: A guardian cannot have a higher avoidance rate than 10%. This GUARANTEES that they take just as much damage as monks when we fight. This will mean they can't even avoid getting hit by grey mobs.</DIV> <DIV> </DIV> <DIV> </DIV> <DIV> </DIV> <DIV> </DIV> <DIV>Raise our HP or Mitigation (Preferably both)</DIV> <DIV> </DIV> <DIV>Actually nerf and cap out thier avoidance levels.</DIV> <DIV> </DIV> <DIV> </DIV> <DIV> </DIV> <DIV> </DIV> <DIV> </DIV> <DIV>I want ****ing equality!</DIV> <DIV> </DIV> <DIV>That is my idea of balance, and I"m not looking to be flamed by anyone here. I just wanna hear some oppinions.</DIV>

[woo]

<P>first off.. if you disagree with your guild leader on something that big, well.. ..</P> <P>iv always been a monks-are-tanks advocator.  we could use <EM>some</EM> more hp, we take less damage than a guardian (this can and has been proved by both parses and math).  if anything i think that the gap just needs to be widened (give us more avoidance and guardians more mitigation).</P> <P>look at the two most played classes in EQ2 (they outnumber any other class almost 3 to 1) -- guardian and templar.  these are cookie cutter classes, the templars reactives work effortlessly on the guardian due to mitigation and the, well, reactive nature of the reactives.  because 1/4 of the people that play this game play a guardian and templar, many times the guardian will group with a shaman or a druid and think *hmm the templar sure was healing me better..* so templars are deemed the better healer.  or visa versa: the templar will group with a monk, and reactives do <EM>not</EM> work well <EM>at all</EM> with monks, so the templars quickly find out that monks are 'crappy tanks'.</P> <P>but what if instead of guardian and templar being so popular.. it was monk and warden?  everyone would think monks are the best tanks and wardens are the best healers.. you see my point.</P> <P>the problem with monks tanking lies in the community's ignorance to this.  many are set to the "templar:healer, guardian:tank, everyone else:stuff" state of mind from EQ1.</P> <P> </P> <P>i agree with you 100%, and it happens all the time..  currently on my server i made a name for myself as a good tank and people who have grouped with me a lot will choose me without blinking over a plate-tank to tank, and many times the guy will declare world war on EQ2 because someone is tanking who has less mitigation than him (oh noes!).</P> <P>that said..  i do also let others tank who are better equipped than me, but iv only seen 1 tank with better equip/stats than me.  i see a lot of guardians with 'okay' gear who think that just because they are a guardian that they are THE tank, and on examine ill have +-100hp, =mitigation and 25-35% higher avoidance because of equipment differences.  ill fully admit it, i have a big ego when it comes to tanking -- but i make sure i keep my equipment above par so i can fill that ego.</P><p>Message Edited by woode on <span class=date_text>05-24-2005</span> <span class=time_text>10:21 PM</span>

[Sc0rpi]

imo it is only a matter of preference.  I like tanking and i like being dps.  I am suited to doing both well.  If i am in a group with a guardian/paladin/sk/zerker and they wanna tank i don't argue.  At that point i sit back and kick [Removed for Content].  If they want me to tank then i will but i'm best when teamed with a warden or shaman.  I try to play to my strengths.  It doesn't have to be a cut and dried issue.  Play the game to have fun and do your best no matter what the situation. Ahnramin 50 monk Befallen <div></div>

[Jezekie]

<span><blockquote><hr>woode wrote:iv always been a monks-are-tanks advocator.  we could use <em>some</em> more hp, we take less damage than a guardian (this can and has been proved by both parses and math).  if anything i think that the gap just needs to be widened (give us more avoidance and guardians more mitigation).<hr></blockquote>I don't know what you've parsed, but there's no raid encounter where a bruiser/monk is better suited, and we certainly don't come even remotely close to taking as little damage as Guardians, Berzerkers, Shadowknights or Paladins. Even in full T5 rare, 1 fabled, and better sta/hp on gear then most other fighters in my guild I still can't hold a candle to them due to their better efficiency from sta/hp and I'm tired of it. They already push 3500-4000 mitigation at raids, their avoidance matters little when they can mitigate all the damage down to little to nothing per hit, easily healable by any priest. Our supposably better avoidance (all though very minor currently) means nothing since 53+ raid mobs has no problems hitting us anyway, and our pity full mitigation in comparison to our plate wearing </span>brethren<span> just makes us tank as well as a mage. Brawlers were said to have to pay attention to their gear to match up, but damnit there ain't any better gear out there suited for tanking other then the newly introduced Woven Vulcanized that all drops off the same mob which is highly contested by 4-5 guilds on my server and easily downed just if you have the numbers there first. Yet heavy armor weares have armor off several mobs that boosts their tanking (CL boots with +s/p/c mitigations, Vox full set of armor, cursed full set of armor). Think the last raid mob I tanked was AL in Ant instance way back before the many changes the epic encounters has gone through that has all by alienated bruisers from tanking any of the raid encounters efficiently, there's little to say in our favor that would convince a raid to letting a brawler tank now adays other then due to the fact of who is behind the character. I've always played the class as it's intended, a tank class, but *shrug*, even I have to see the flaws/inequality of the class' and accept it or move on. Combat Revamp/Spell revamp is still no where near in sight, so there is no hope and nothing to look forward to as things just won't get better.</span><div></div>

[-UGG-Andy]

<P>Well,im 47 now,and i finally start to see the truth.I have tanked from lvl 1,and always thought i did ok,with some decent dps-and this was post agility nerf,so i never benefitted at any lvl from godly agi making me immune to attacks.I step aside and let my guardian friend tank now,even though he is 3 levels lower,he does a better job at it than i can,i don't even take the adds,it STILL better if he tanks the adds at the same time rather than me taking them.Why?cos i typically take about 1000-1500+ everytime im hit,that means about 3 hits and im gone,even blue or greens can do that to me,even though they hit less often.I dps now,and crazy though it is,i out dps the wizard in the group.</P> <P>Its not meant to be that way though,we are meant to be viable tanks,and not even compete with a scouts damage let alone a wizards,and im sure that will change,i just hope we are balanced in our tanking ability,or then we would become truly useless.</P> <P>To summerise my opinion is this monks are intended to be tanks,but this is pretty broken,especially as you get higher,you change from tank to dps.</P>

[stfields]

<DIV> <HR> <DIV>My guild leader is a level 50 guardian who shows ABSOLUTELY NO RESPECT FOR MY CLASS WHATSOEVER! <HR> </DIV> <DIV> </DIV> <DIV>I'd leave the guild.  You don't need that.  It's one thing to say monks can't tank raid mobs... its another to say they can't tank anything at all.  More importantly, a guild leader "should" see the value in each and every member.  If they don't, I'd ditch that guild in a heartbeat.</DIV> <DIV> </DIV> <DIV>I'm 46 now and have tanked all the way to 46.  While the majority of my leveling was spent duoing white and blue ^^ mobs, when I do tank stuff that is orange (either at level 20 or at level 46), as long as the group knows what they are doing I do just fine.  </DIV> <DIV> </DIV> <DIV>I will say that the one place I feel we are lacking (aside from raid tanking ability) is in taunts.  I have a guardian alt (/gasp) that I play for fun since I like decking him out w/ stuff my armorer and weaponsmith can make... and they get altogether too many taunts (or we don't get enough).  Yes, he does very very little damage... but he doesn't need to.  At level 25, he has two 8-second single taunts, the standard 30 second AoE taunt... plus at least 3 group buffs that draw a ton of aggro (the +hp, +defense, +attack)... and the Hold the Line type buff (I'm not sure what this does to be honest... I hit the mob, and I taunt?  Or the mob hits me and I taunt)?</DIV> <DIV> </DIV> <DIV>Oh, and at level 25 this little guardian bugger has 55% mitigation and 55% avoidance.  It really is overpowered.  It might change at later levels... I dunno.</DIV></DIV>

[bonesbro]

I spent most of 1-50 playing tank in XP groups and did just fine.  The 50+ raid mobs crush me like a bug.  Disappointing, but at least I (currently) have a dps/stifle/stun role to fall back on. <div></div>

[Rohlstu]

<P>To the OP point, yes as monks, we supposedly have trained our bodies, but we don't get any skills that exemplify this little "fact".  We get no major str or agi buffs.  Our haste buffs don't stack.  Our self buffs are very limited compared to others.  I mean, it's a little disheartening hearing a guildie 46 swash talk about how he can now buff his agi over 200 and here I am a 47 monk who can buff....defense by 15.</P> <P>Last night in PF, I took over as MT since he had to afk for about 30 mins.  Well, let's just say that a couple times it got a little embarassing to start the fight, take a 800pt whack right away, keep the aggro going and get the mob down, but you see the healer at 25% power compared to 75% when the pally is MT.  Even when using Control Breathing and Face of Mountain, it seemed the mobs hit me more often, and I did /bug it because hit streaks came more often with those up.  When he came back, the group speed moved much faster because there was no downtime to let the healer regen up.</P> <P>Even a couple times in Cazic-Thule, at 45 I didn't argue when the 43 guardian said he was MT.  And of course when I did tank over for a 15 min afk, it was embarassing that here I am at 45 taking on a spider who whacks me to 50% in 2 hits right away.  Guardian comes back and it's a whole new story.</P> <DIV>Now I am not advocating we become unhittable, but you know, it's sometimes disheartening to know that when it comes to group time, accept that you might not be the main tank, even if you are up in levels.  It's disheartening to know that as pretty much every class gets to put up some ac/stat buffs which 90% of them stack, we get little very little and let's not talk about stacking.  It's disheartening to know that if in a raid, if the MT does go down, you won't last half as long.</DIV> <DIV> </DIV> <DIV> </DIV>

[Gaige]

<DIV>Well at least we know the combat system is broken and changing, we just don't know what they're changing it too.</DIV>

[Rohlstu]

<BR> <BLOCKQUOTE> <HR> Gage-Mikel wrote:<BR> <DIV>Well at least we know the combat system is broken and changing, we just don't know what they're changing it too.</DIV><BR> <HR> </BLOCKQUOTE><BR>Aye, it's coming and in ways, it's very scary.  Very little information or head's up as to what the plans are.  Well, 2.5 more levels to go for me.

[stfields]

<DIV> <HR> Gage-Mikel wrote:<BR> <DIV>Well at least we know the combat system is broken and changing, we just don't know what they're changing it too. <HR> </DIV> <DIV> </DIV> <DIV>I'm very concerned that they are going to scale back our damage AND still not be able to tank raid mobs.  </DIV></DIV>

[FamilyManFir]

<blockquote><hr>Cusashorn wrote:<DIV>Personally: I think all the other tank classes should have an honest-to-god Avoidance Cap.As in: A guardian cannot have a higher avoidance rate than 10%. This GUARANTEES that they take just as much damage as monks when we fight. This will mean they can't even avoid getting hit by grey mobs.</DIV><hr></blockquote>FWIW (not much, I know) so far in the Big Combat Revision they've implemented Avoidance <i>buff</i> caps. Therefore, in theory, no plate tank will be able to get as much Avoidance as a Monk or Bruiser because plate tanks don't have Deflection adding to their base Avoidance.My only concern about this theory is the new effectiveness of shields. Currently, in the Combat Changes, kite and tower shields have a "base Avoidance" of 20%; if Deflection isn't significantly more than that then Monks and Bruisers will have been shafted again.Of course, the Big Combat Revision is nowhere near complete yet, so don't hold your breath. They've bitten off a HUGE batch of changes to incorporate into this and it's going to take a long, long time by my estimation. It seems like they've largely settled on melee changes, but still to go are: Priest Aggro Balancing, Priest Heal Balancing, Enchanter DPS Balancing (& both Sub-Classes), Summoner DPS Balancing (& both Sub-Classes, Scout DPS Balancing (of all 10 Archetype, Classes, and Sub-Classes), plus the review and revision to nearly <b>all</b> CAs/Spells to remove the leveling improvements ... did I miss anything? Moreover, anybody remember how long it took them to review and fix just one sub-class within the current framework? About 1 month each is my recollection. I think it's going to be a <b>long</b> time before the Big Combat Revision goes live.P.S. Okay, re-reading the above I realize that this sounds like a whine. I guess it is a whine, but it has some basis to it. Given the immense amount of work SOE has created for itself in this Big Combat Revision I personally think that, once the expansion is done, SOE should suspend new content creation and commit those devs to this Big Combat Revision; alternatively, bring in some devs on a temporary basis to accelerate the process. Looking at what they have cut out for themselves I can't see this Revision going live in less than 9 months with current resources; meantime classes with serious issues are going without attention because "they'll be fixed in the Big Combat Revision."Just my 2cp.

[Cusashorn]

<BR> <BLOCKQUOTE> <HR> Rohlstusk wrote:<BR> <P>To the OP point, yes as monks, we supposedly have trained our bodies, but we don't get any skills that exemplify this little "fact".  We get no major str or agi buffs.  Our haste buffs don't stack.  Our self buffs are very limited compared to others.  I mean, it's a little disheartening hearing a guildie 46 swash talk about how he can now buff his agi over 200 and here I am a 47 monk who can buff....defense by 15.</P> <HR> </BLOCKQUOTE><BR> <DIV>If its any consolation, I was grouped with a level 50 dwarf brigand today. I checked his stats. With group buffs, his 220 agility only gave him an avoidance of 64.5%.</DIV> <DIV> </DIV> <DIV> </DIV> <DIV>I'm level 45. my avoidance without buffs is.. 76.1% with some 140 or so agility (forget what it is at the moment.)</DIV><p>Message Edited by Cusashorn on <span class=date_text>05-25-2005</span> <span class=time_text>05:24 PM</span>

[Lareal]

  Personally I like tanking and I like DPS, either roll is fine. I honestly don't think we should be able to tank as well as a guardian in all situations, let's face it , that is their job. They will never be DPS. We can't be the best(or even =guardian) tanks in all situations, and higher dps than them, it would be unfair to Guards.    That being said I think there is a solution that would make some of us happier: Situational tanking. Instead of making every uber mob hit harder and harder so that mitigation becomes the most important factor, make some boss mobs that hit for low damage, but have some sort of proc/strike that is irrestable, and unmitigatable, so that avoidance becomes the more important factor for that mob. It would take some thinking, but I'm sure SOE could come up with some ideas. Maybe a proc that affects everone in the raid when it hits. Although it is low dmg, it would still be a danger if it hit often, cause the lower HP folks would go down in mass. That just one quick idea, I'm sure folks here could come up with more innovative attacks where avoidance>mitigation. Then there would be a tank roll for Guards against hard-hitters, and one for us against special attack mobs.    ATM though, my roll is usually not Tank or purely DPS, I'm usually on interrupt/stifle duty, which is a roll I think we are well equipped for at 50. Lareal <div></div>

[Bladewind]

Instead of giving us extra health, why not give us a mitigation bonus that is a function of level to represent our body hardening?  I do exercises in kung fu that are designed to toughen my body.  My sifu's forearms and shins are so hardened that it feels like your arm or leg is going to break when he blocks your punch or kick.  This type of conditioning could easily translate into a mitigation bonus of x points per monk/bruiser/brawler level... <p>Message Edited by Bladewind on <span class=date_text>05-26-2005</span> <span class=time_text>02:26 PM</span>

[Parax]

Have a level 50 monk now for several months, got all the best stuff i can for him...bleh! Quit the monk and now have a 30 berserker. Such a (huge) difference in tanking. spaming dps is no problem either, berserkers get tons of haste and counter attacks that do alot of dmage. I love them multi group heroics now <img src="/smilies/3b63d1616c5dfcf29f8a7a031aaa7cad.gif" border="0" alt="SMILEY" /> have a single, group and 2 attacks that have taunt in them plus a chance to go berserk with them <img src="/smilies/3b63d1616c5dfcf29f8a7a031aaa7cad.gif" border="0" alt="SMILEY" /> plus hold the line which taunts all mobs in the encounter. Zerkers are the best kept toon in the game IMO. <div></div>

[Cusashorn]

<DIV>way to kill the topic there. >_></DIV>