Typical Den: 14tanks, 2 healers, 1 mage and some scouts...

[snowli]

I think the popularity of certain classes often speaks volumes for the current state of class balance. Seems like many healers and mages aren't having much fun with current balance in BG PvP, especially in dens.

I see more and more people are BG-ing with their tank alts, massive survivability, massive damage and massive self healing all in 1 package.

[Avirodar]

Before the caster dps nerf, I noticed that most tanks in BGs were of average or above competency. Obviously there will always be some exceptions, but most could taunt worth a [Removed for Content], and understood the basic strategy to the map, etc.A couple of weeks after the caster dps nerf, I noticed a significant decrease in the amount of noob casters, but I have noticed a massive increase in the amount of incompetent tanks that prove to be complete liabilities for their team. Tanks who run around like headless chickens, have no idea what to do in the map, have no idea what a taunt is, and that stand back and WAIT for others to run in first, is becoming more common in BG matches, especially 24 vs 24.Looks like all the [Removed for Content] who ran around hitting ice comet every 40'ish seconds, thinking they had skill, now just run around with a tank, blindly mashing random buttons.

[Colleptic3]

I agree on this. This is less apparent in Gears, but really apparent in Ganak. In Smugglers there are enough good players to "usually" compensate for the morons. In Ganak (today for direct example) I played about 5 games in a row where tanks where running around not taunting at all...rangers and mages made quick work of me. The next game, got into a group with PvP people, never died once and assisted though the tank we had ftw. But, all-in-all, I have found my Assassin becoming useless lately. Even in that group I was struggling to get the kill count I was getting just a few weeks ago. I am trying to figure out if it is just me?

[BChizzle]

Colleptic3 wrote:

I agree on this. This is less apparent in Gears, but really apparent in Ganak. In Smugglers there are enough good players to "usually" compensate for the morons. In Ganak (today for direct example) I played about 5 games in a row where tanks where running around not taunting at all...rangers and mages made quick work of me. The next game, got into a group with PvP people, never died once and assisted though the tank we had ftw. But, all-in-all, I have found my Assassin becoming useless lately. Even in that group I was struggling to get the kill count I was getting just a few weeks ago. I am trying to figure out if it is just me?

Wait, are you are calling other people morons when you assist through your tank?

[Sydares]

Tanks and parse-hungry healers: SMUGGLER'S DEN IS AWESOME ~~~~~~

Everyone Else: NNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGHHHHHHHHHHHH.

[TheVekk]

The reason you do not see many healers in these BG's is becuse how people in those act they expect the healer to chase YOU down and heal you instead of YOU staying near them. this is EXTREMELY annoying as a healer and gets old Very fast, atleast from my experince healers are just getting tired of it, and this is just one of many thing that make healers just not want to do them, the bigger raid like den is just not fun as a healer becuse your grp can not stay together so you are forced to let half your grp die half the time.

[Novusod]

You can't really say it is all tanks being flavor of the month. If you look at the makeup of a Den packed with tanks then 8 of those 14 tanks are SKs, then 3 or 4 Zerkers, then maybe an odd pally, monk, or bruiser.

[Colleptic3]

BChizzle wrote:

Colleptic3 wrote:

I agree on this. This is less apparent in Gears, but really apparent in Ganak. In Smugglers there are enough good players to "usually" compensate for the morons. In Ganak (today for direct example) I played about 5 games in a row where tanks where running around not taunting at all...rangers and mages made quick work of me. The next game, got into a group with PvP people, never died once and assisted though the tank we had ftw. But, all-in-all, I have found my Assassin becoming useless lately. Even in that group I was struggling to get the kill count I was getting just a few weeks ago. I am trying to figure out if it is just me?

Wait, are you are calling other people morons when you assist through your tank?

What? Your question states way too much beyond I what I typed. Where did I call someone a [Removed for Content] who does not assist through the tank? Once again, my “[Removed for Content]” statement is directly linked to good players compensating for the bad ones...I did mention a specific round where we assisted through a great tank who switched targets perfectly. Of course, we re-targeted to take out whoever we wanted, but if the tank had a good target we assisted. Over all, no one in the group died once. It was a perfect group imo. If that is where you got confused, I am not sure how, but hope it is clearer now.

 

[Tehom]

Novusod wrote:

You can't really say it is all tanks being flavor of the month. If you look at the makeup of a Den packed with tanks then 8 of those 14 tanks are SKs, then 3 or 4 Zerkers, then maybe an odd pally, monk, or bruiser.

I think that proportion is a little bit exaggerated. I usually see a high amount of all tanks, though SKs are somewhat more common. It's amazing on the 80-89 battlegrounds how much a single tank can carry an entire team, though. I've seen Smugglers where a single tank pretty much topped the stats in every single category and had more than everyone else on his team combined.

[Grayspirit]

Senior programmer plays a shadowknight so they're the only class not getting nerfed in pvp. It explains why SK is so popular and will remain so.

Most tanks try or pretend to be dps so of course they're not chasing down the other team's dps and taunting (that gets you killed).--- so why be a healer or squishy if nobody is there to protect you? It's just easier to log onto your crusader alt.

[Brynhild]

It really sucks being a healer in BG unless it's gears.  gears, no problem, the other two, extremely annoying.

Can't do a thing by yourself as a healer, you have to have your group, and the group NEVER stays with you or even in one spot or even together so everyone is out of heal range, all the time.   Groups should pick one person to follow and stay with them, period.  If you die regroup before you do anything.  Makes it extremely boring being a healer when you can't find anyone to heal except people who aren't in your group that you can't use group heals/cures to hit.

[KatrinaDeath]

Brynhild wrote:

It really sucks being a healer in BG unless it's gears.  gears, no problem, the other two, extremely annoying.

Can't do a thing by yourself as a healer, you have to have your group, and the group NEVER stays with you or even in one spot or even together so everyone is out of heal range, all the time.   Groups should pick one person to follow and stay with them, period.  If you die regroup before you do anything.  Makes it extremely boring being a healer when you can't find anyone to heal except people who aren't in your group that you can't use group heals/cures to hit.

Here is what you do as a pug healer in Den/Ganak...

1. Make a macro that says /g Following %t. Stay close for heals.

2. Follow the tank in your group (If there are 2+ tanks simply pick one, if there no tanks pick something that you think would enjoy having a "pocket healer.")

3. Heal everything in range of the tank you are following, do not go out of your way to heal the idiots that run off on their own as it will cause more overall death.

Everyone I have ever grouped with has enjoyed this and they won't even try to flame you for not healing them when they died on the other side of the map. I have even had others defend me in this but saying "Didn't you read group chat?"

It's not a perfect solution but it's one of the best things you can do to help win.

[Yimway]

TheVekk wrote:

The reason you do not see many healers in these BG's is becuse how people in those act they expect the healer to chase YOU down and heal you instead of YOU staying near them. this is EXTREMELY annoying as a healer and gets old Very fast, atleast from my experince healers are just getting tired of it, and this is just one of many thing that make healers just not want to do them, the bigger raid like den is just not fun as a healer becuse your grp can not stay together so you are forced to let half your grp die half the time.

Actually, I just expect them to stay in heal range of their primary tank, thats all.

Unfortunately, more than 80% of them can be expected to fail to do this.

[EverRude]

To the OP. Overall I see the same thing you do. And I believe for the same reason you posted. However in the last few days I have had several Klak and Ganak matches with not even 1 tank. Not even a brawler. Had one ganak with 6 scouts, 5 mages and a healer. So it's still, atleast partly, a match maker issue. As to the healers struggling issue. I have definitely seen healers get killed due to a failure to taunt. Seriously with a paladin and an sk tank in range it should be super hard to kill the healer. But I watched a defiler drop within a minute of spawning over and over. It's like both the tanks thought it was the other guys job to taunt. On that note. I play a ranger and it's my job to kill healers when possible. To do that I have to avoid enemy tanks that are taunting. That means I am often out of range for heals. That's ok. It's my job to die as long as I can take 3 or 4 enemy before I do. I'll never complain a healer failed me. I would like to send a big thank you to those healers that do manage to stop and heal me while they run to the tank.

[Oakum]

Atan@Unrest wrote:

TheVekk wrote:

The reason you do not see many healers in these BG's is becuse how people in those act they expect the healer to chase YOU down and heal you instead of YOU staying near them. this is EXTREMELY annoying as a healer and gets old Very fast, atleast from my experince healers are just getting tired of it, and this is just one of many thing that make healers just not want to do them, the bigger raid like den is just not fun as a healer becuse your grp can not stay together so you are forced to let half your grp die half the time.

Actually, I just expect them to stay in heal range of their primary tank, thats all.

Unfortunately, more than 80% of them can be expected to fail to do this.

Because the tank runs off without them of course. Then when the healer is killed before the rest of the group, he/she has to guess if the group will still be alive by the time he can get back to where the tank/group was.  If he makes a mistake he/she just ran almost all the way back to see the tank go down or get one heal in on the tank before they go down and then they are dead again.

So then you have sometimes less then a second to decide where to revive at, is it the closest tower where people are saying a big enemy group went to or is it the base, is it being camped by the enemy raid members? Then, even when you revive, you have (as a warden) 5 buffs plus group buffs that you might have had debuffed right before you died to cast which you can cast on the run BUT if you run into a group right off your revive point, then you are in full spam heal mode and lucky if you can get a few seconds inbetween to recast buffs.

So, part of the probem is we cant tell where OUR groups are when we revive, then when we target a group member and spin in a circle to see where their name highlights at, we can head toward them. We have to hope the rest is there, we dont get picked off by the scouts (since they seem to be the the only playes that can kill other players and especially healers) within 1 to 4 seconds if not one shot us), and that they are still alive by the time we get there.

It can be a bit frustrating spending 10 minutes and never getting caught up with your tank again before one side or the other wins. What can you do though, your best bet for survivability is to follow someone else in the raid while you hope to meet up with your tank/group again.  When that group attacks someone, you help heal them as best you can from outside the group and dps as you can also.

One of the things that could help is if the raid groups were color coded on the map. Saying use chat is not a good response, not everyone is in voice, has working mics, and/or speaks the same lanquage plus has time to type while they run/fight since AF will fail eventually if the person you are following are faster then you or you get hit with a  detrimental snare ect.

The other issue is an easier way to tab target players in your own raid but not in your group for healers that doesnt involve scanning the raid window for their name while you are group healing/running . There is probably a command for it and I just need to look it up I am sure.  

[Gorgamorph]

If they had a potion avaiable to change my wizard to an sk or pal...ye know what...i'd prob buy it