The Future of Tanking (Is this fun?)

[steelbadger]

Ooookay, so I've been playng around with numbers in eq2 for a long while now and I thought I'd try to do a comprehensive analysis of the tanking changes.  Keep in mind that my main is a Guard and he's who I have been using to check up on the numbers.

Intro...

My first though was concerning taunts, their massive power in holding aggro is, I think, something of a mixed blessing.

Consider how it is (on live) at the moment, taunts are ancillary to our primary method of holding aggro through dps.  They only provide about 700-800 threat per second if used with perfect efficiency.  That is not great, I admit, but their individual effectiveness was slightly better than our highest damage abilities (ie the Guardian Impede [primary single target taunt] gains more threat than Mar [Highest damage Guardian single target CA]).  This means that, as it is at the moment a bit of on-the-fly thinking has to be applied when choosing between our various CAs and taunts.

On test, however, this is very different.  Taunts are the primary method of holding aggro, but we still only have 6 primary taunts (Impede, Infraction, Guard, Gut Kick, Lay Waste and Slanderous Assault).  These 6 abilities alone constitute 4500-5000 hate per second while solo, in full defensive gear.  Whats more is that of that more than 2000 is from Impede alone.  Another consideration is that melee auto-attack has had it's effectiveness reduced quite a bit too (though the way this 0.5 modifier is applied is a little strange).

The upshot of those facts means that 1)  Hitting Taunts is entirely important, any taunt that is up should be hit immediately for maximum aggro and 2)  Auto-attack timing is considerably less important than it is on live.

Taunt and CA effectiveness

So I decided to check up on my taunt effectiveness...  and while I was at it why not check up on my dps CAs too, they still get me hate anyway:

damage and hate are summed to in the max and min dmg columns (quick and dirty).  TPS is Threat per Second, DPC is dmage (or threat) per second of casting/recovery.  I have ordered it by DPC as I feel that this is the most important factor when choosing the most efficient ability at any particular time (get yourself the maximum possible hate at any particular moment).

So, I reckon, if I were to work at 100% efficiency in using my abilities I can count on 4447 TPS before we factor in my auto-attack.

Lets factor in auto-attack

From my weapon damage prediction table I get:

315 dps with 100% hit rate.

Just as an aside the 0.5 modifier from defensive stance does not effect the bonuses from STR and DPS, byt this I mean that the 0.5 mod basically removes half of the min damage (quoted on the weapon) from the actual min damage as modified by STR and DPS (which can be found using /weaponstats).  This is why we haven't lost all that much in the way of auto-attack dps.

Anyway, so I'm predicting that I will get more than 4500 hate per second from taunts and about 315 hate per second from auto-attack, If I can find a mob with zero avoidance.

Again this is all quick and dirty so taunt values will actually be higher as I have not factored in the effects of taunt crits and these will increase the effects of taunts by about 10% (My taunt crit rate appears to be about 35% even though my only taunt crit bonus is from STR4 AA (8 points).  I assume that aggression has a limited taunt crit effect as well as a base taunt effect.

So with crits I reckon I'll get about 5000 TPS from Taunts and CAs and about 315 TPS from auto-attack.

Theorycraft?

This is all just Theorycraft though, it has no real bearing on real life or what will happen in game and it is therefore unreasonable to continue on my line of reasoning based solely on theorycraft, right?

I beg to differ:

This parse is one of my many (I repeated this experiment 10 times) fights against Baron Dracious (a lvl 25 epic x2 in EFP).  I chose this mob because I have a 100% hit rate against him.

What do we see?

We see that Taunts and CAs constitute 4933 TPS.

We see that auto-attack constitutes 306 TPS.

We see that other unconsidered procs consitute 500 TPS.

So, essentially, my theorycraft is right.  The procs cannot be accurately checked using a low level mob (Aggressive Nature would ordinarily be less effective than on this parse as my avoidance would be lower and I would block less [and thus it would proc less]) and Holding the Line would be more effective (I would avoid less and be hit more and therefore it would proc more).  I have ignored these in my analysis because I am analysing the most efficient way to use my abilities, these will operate at a constant effectiveness no matter what order I hit my taunts.

In Raids

5500 TPS should be enough to hold aggro in any group situation (because over short encounters the effectiveness of our taunts is increased) but in raids it's less certain.  My gear is far from great (especially the old gear on my un-updated test guard) but I wonder if I can hold aggro off an assassin doing 10k dps?

5500 TPS, In a raid with a coercer and dirge I will have a nice 20% hate gain increase, another 12.4% taunt increase (on top of the 8% hate and taunt on my defensive stance) and a 10% transfer from the coercer.  Lets assume a slack coercer with only 3k dps. (all are master 1 abilities, but also un AA buffed).

About 8000 TPS minimum (taking into account dps increase from raid buffs/debuffs).  That should be more enough to hold aggro off an assassin that actually uses their detaunts (they have a 10% deaggro, will probably have various de-aggro procs like Peaceful Link, Ignorant Bliss and such).

What does this all MEAN?

Aggro is going to be easier after the changes for myself, at least.  But the problem I forsee is the inequality in the threat values of our individual abilities.  It will never be worth-while delaying a taunt for even a moment to get an auto-attack swing in.  With all this in mind the possibility of a do-all macro becomes a possibility.  Thus I made a little macro:

This macro was made using the first spreadsheet I showed.  I sit and spam this button and it will hit Impede then Lay Waste then Gut Kick, Infraction, Guard etc.  If Impede is back up before it makes it to the bottom it till hit Impede.  It will use my taunts more efficiently than I could possibly hope to achieve by doing it manually.  Indeed the parse I posted above was gained in a fight where I simply spammed this one button and it came out as being almost 100% efficient compared to theory.  I did another few fights where I tried to do it manually and I was only 90% efficient, a loss of 10% efficiency, or 550 TPS.  I can also make a macro that will do the same, but in a slightly different order for group mobs (as DPC will become more effective on my group taunts)

Finally

Is this the future of tanking?  A single button that deals with all hate considerations better than I could hope?  Yes, I know that this is not the case with multi-target encounters, and I will still have to coordinate defensive buffs but I forsee tanking in the future being a bit boring, and highly likely to wear out my mouse.

In groups:  Solo heroic, spam macro.

Group Heroic:  Either spam macro on main target (assuming the group is one tough guy and lots of little guys) or spam macro while tabbing (assuming encounter is 2-3 equal strength mobs).

In Raids:  Solo epic, spam macro, hit defensive stuff every now and then.

group epic:  Get zerker to take adds (zerker spams macro, this they can do thanks to the massive effectiveness of their aoe taunt).

Another possible problem is that although these hate changes are fine for me (just getting into VP) it remains to be seen if there will be enough +aggression and +taunt gear to allow for a linear progression into the top tiers (where dps classes can do 15-20k dps in spikes).

Reassure me!

[Rothgar]

So what you're saying is we need to limit the number of spells you can put in a single macro.  I'm already seeing people do similar macros and this can't be good for server performance, spamming it with so many commands in a short period of time.  Obviously we don't want to throttle casting commands, but these 'spam' macros are not good.  If the trend moves more towards this type of play style we will be forced to limit the number of spells and command steps you can add to a macro.

[Dasein]

Rothgar wrote:

So what you're saying is we need to limit the number of spells you can put in a single macro.  I'm already seeing people do similar macros and this can't be good for server performance, spamming it with so many commands in a short period of time.  Obviously we don't want to throttle casting commands, but these 'spam' macros are not good.  If the trend moves more towards this type of play style we will be forced to limit the number of spells and command steps you can add to a macro.

That's only treating the symptom. The real issue is that optimal TPS efficiency can be achieved with such a simple script. If the tanking game can be solved so easily, then is it going to have much longevity? Think of it this way - tanking in its current form is like chess while the proposed changes reduce tanking to tic-tac-toe.

[Cragger]

Rothgar wrote:

So what you're saying is we need to limit the number of spells you can put in a single macro.  I'm already seeing people do similar macros and this can't be good for server performance, spamming it with so many commands in a short period of time.  Obviously we don't want to throttle casting commands, but these 'spam' macros are not good.  If the trend moves more towards this type of play style we will be forced to limit the number of spells and command steps you can add to a macro.

Your only treating the symptom not the cause. If you reduce the amount of spells you can put in a single macro all that would happen is they would be split into two macros which you would alternate spamming. As things are on test tanking doesn't require any skill or timing or knowledge of your abilities. You just spam the taunts when their up. On live even though I agree the system is out of whack you need to effectively time and use in the proper order your abilities to hold aggro.

[steelbadger]

Dasein wrote:

Rothgar wrote:

So what you're saying is we need to limit the number of spells you can put in a single macro.  I'm already seeing people do similar macros and this can't be good for server performance, spamming it with so many commands in a short period of time.  Obviously we don't want to throttle casting commands, but these 'spam' macros are not good.  If the trend moves more towards this type of play style we will be forced to limit the number of spells and command steps you can add to a macro.

That's only treating the symptom. The real issue is that optimal TPS efficiency can be achieved with such a simple script. If the tanking game can be solved so easily, then is it going to have much longevity? Think of it this way - tanking in its current form is like chess while the proposed changes reduce tanking to tic-tac-toe.

I got to agree with Dasein here, the problem is that so few abilities have such a massive impact on threat generation that the other abilities are completely secondary.  If it's not doable in the in-game macro system then people will simply make up a keyboard macro to achieve the same thing.  At the moment a do-all macro is unreasonable because there is much more balance in the effectiveness of taunts/CAs and Auto-attack and so one has to time taunts/CAs as well order them so that auto-attack is as effective as possible, lose a little bit of taunt/CA dmg to gain a little bit more auto-attack dps.  On test the taunt values are so massive that they completely overshadow all other methods of aggro generation.

Even if you did reduce the number of macro-able abilities I can achieve a similar effectiveness with only 5 abilities macroed (the primary taunts)

[Zibleez]

Rothgar wrote:

So what you're saying is we need to limit the number of spells you can put in a single macro.  

Actually, I think more of the concern is that you can now sort abilities from left to right by amount of aggro generated and just spam those abilities in that order - negating all need for timing w/autoattack.  Admittedly, you can order abilities by TPS right now which removes all added survivability from knockdowns/stuns/interrupts, but DPS is such a negligable amount of hate generation under the new system that there's no longer a point to trying to time CA's.

I can see both sides of the argument - we're losing the viability of timing CA's, however clearly putting all abilities on one macro won't be the optimal way to play one's class at all.  Either way, Roth, your reply seems a bit snippy.

I'm assuming the level of negative feedback you guys are seeing on the forums wears on you after awhile - don't let it.  Many of us are pleased with the direction the game is going and just want to ensure that adequate consideration is given to a system with 24 unique classes.

__________________________________

So for my constructive non-pandering 2cp:  Any consideration given to the ideass of:

1: making certain taunts ToT (taunt over time)

2: non-stacking with other taunts/abilities

3:taunt for extra damage if they're hit within 1 second BEFORE an autoattack

4:taunt for extra taunt if they're hit within 1 second AFTER an autoattack

5:having taunts combo with other abilities to hit for more hate: i.e kockdown, stomp, taunt on a bruiser, etc

Just some random ideas I threw together here - but the idea holds.  Add complexity to the tanking classes so that there's more skill involved as the current system seems to be limiting skill more to AA/Gear buildouts and multi-mob control.  Single mob tanking and hate generation appears to be of reduced complexity under the new system.

[007djdeadly]

Rothgar wrote:

So what you're saying is we need to limit the number of spells you can put in a single macro. 

If you really think that is what he is saying, then with all due respect your lack of understanding concerning this fundamental flaw in game mechanics is shocking.  If as I suspect, however, you meant that as a flippant remark, then with all due respect your lack of tact is equally shocking. 

[Obadiah]

But why couldn't you do that on Live and achieve the same results? It's not any more or less complex. The fact that things are more balanced taunts/CAs doesn't really make that much of a difference. Some are still better than others and thus would reside higher on your macro. The only real difference is that timing your Autoattack isn't as important on Test, and that ST taunt refreshes so often.

If your autoattack is only 300 on Test, then it's probably only about 400 on Live. So really timing your autoattacks isn't important there either.

[Dreyco]

It completely and totally astounds me what some people will do to get slightly higher numbers on a parse...

On my tank, I follow a simpler procedure.

Am I holding agro? Yes.

Am i taking damage well? Yes.

Is everyone else not dying? Yes.

... the rest? Well, who cares.

[Zibleez]

Different strokes for different folks, as they say.  Some people like to try and optimize what they're doing as much as possible - if they're holding aggro well enough and people aren't dying, the next goal is to *never* have to use rescue on single or group encounters.  Or the next goal is to do more damage to help make mobs die faster.  Or... etc. etc.

A couple more thoughts:

1: Why not have every fighter ability generate some level of aggro?  Some more than others, but all of them be taunts of some form

2: Elemental/mob based aggro - a taunt that works better on non-sentient and one that works on sentient, both on same re-use timers for example

3: Spike hate that dissipates over time unless "locked" in by a follow-up ability within x seconds

etc.

There's TONS of things you could do to keep the TPS parses consistent with where they are on test but still require a player to have skill to execute it, and to make taunting and hate generation its own form of "mini-game".

[Dimhammer]

Dreyco wrote:

It completely and totally astounds me what some people will do to get slightly higher numbers on a parse...

On my tank, I follow a simpler procedure.

Am I holding agro? Yes.

Am i taking damage well? Yes.

Is everyone else not dying? Yes.

... the rest? Well, who cares.

I completely agree.  Too many people are worried about the numbers instead of just having fun.

[Zibleez]

Dimhammer wrote:

I completely agree.  Too many people are worried about the numbers instead of just having fun.

To some people, the intellectual challange of analyzing the numbers and optimizing them, and in a way deconstructing the system, provides more fun than just wacking buttons repeatedly and killing the same mobs over and over to get incremental upgrades to entries in a database. 

[Dreyco]

Zibleez wrote:

Dimhammer wrote:

I completely agree.  Too many people are worried about the numbers instead of just having fun.

To some people, the intellectual challange of analyzing the numbers and optimizing them, and in a way deconstructing the system, provides more fun than just wacking buttons repeatedly and killing the same mobs over and over to get incremental upgrades to entries in a database. 

... thus making it worth completely bypassing the system as it is in place by creating automated macros so that those numbers look slightly better than they do?

... or throwing fits if those numbers drop even slightly?

That's a little much

[feldon30]

Kurgan@Everfrost wrote:

But why couldn't you do that on Live and achieve the same results? It's not any more or less complex. The fact that things are more balanced taunts/CAs doesn't really make that much of a difference. Some are still better than others and thus would reside higher on your macro. The only real difference is that timing your Autoattack isn't as important on Test, and that ST taunt refreshes so often.

If your autoattack is only 300 on Test, then it's probably only about 400 on Live. So really timing your autoattacks isn't important there either.

Do you even have a tank character past level 25? I think not.

If you can hold agro on Live through taunts, then your group SUCKS.

Most tanks right now are having to generate nearly as much DPS as the highest DPS classes in their group just to hold agro. This requires full usage of combat arts, auto attacks, and requires you know, BEING AWAKE.

What this thread has uncovered is that after this revamp, only 1 button will be required to hold agro during a fight. Instead of actually FIGHTING to hold agro, you are just standing there taunting.

Dreyco wrote:

It completely and totally astounds me what some people will do to get slightly higher numbers on a parse...

On my tank, I follow a simpler procedure.

Am I holding agro? Yes.

Am i taking damage well? Yes.

Is everyone else not dying? Yes.

... the rest? Well, who cares.

So you can hold agro while doing 500 DPS against an Assassin who is doing 3,000 DPS? I don't believe you. Not for one second.

[Dreyco]

feldon30 wrote:

Dreyco wrote:

It completely and totally astounds me what some people will do to get slightly higher numbers on a parse...

On my tank, I follow a simpler procedure.

Am I holding agro? Yes.

Am i taking damage well? Yes.

Is everyone else not dying? Yes.

... the rest? Well, who cares.

So you can hold agro while doing 500 DPS against an Assassin who is doing 3,000 DPS? I don't believe you. Not for one second.

you're overexagerating, heh.  Of course i'm doing more DPS than that if i'm going to be holding agro against an assassin that's doing that much.  That's what they're fixing.

[Obadiah]

feldon30 wrote:

Kurgan@Everfrost wrote:

But why couldn't you do that on Live and achieve the same results? It's not any more or less complex. The fact that things are more balanced taunts/CAs doesn't really make that much of a difference. Some are still better than others and thus would reside higher on your macro. The only real difference is that timing your Autoattack isn't as important on Test, and that ST taunt refreshes so often.

If your autoattack is only 300 on Test, then it's probably only about 400 on Live. So really timing your autoattacks isn't important there either.

Do you even have a tank character past level 25? I think not.

If you can hold agro on Live through taunts, then your group SUCKS.

Most tanks right now are having to generate nearly as much DPS as the highest DPS classes in their group just to hold agro. This requires full usage of combat arts, auto attacks, and requires you know, BEING AWAKE.

What this thread has uncovered is that after this revamp, only 1 button will be required to hold agro during a fight. Instead of actually FIGHTING to hold agro, you are just standing there taunting.

Where did I say I hold aggro through taunts? I said it was more balanced CA/taunt. Taunts account for roughly 15-20% of my aggro, CAs account for roughly 30% of my aggro on live. Much more balanced than what is on Test, where it's more like 60-65% taunts, 10% or less CA. That doesn't make it more complex.

The point is, whether it's a CA or a Taunt you can do the same thing he did. Macro them all with the most effective ones on top - whether they are CAs or taunts is entirely moot. It's the same thing as what he did. The difference is, on Live you will lower your DPS (and therefore TPS) more because you will throw off CA timing with Autoattack. On Test, you still will, but it's less of an issue because your autoattack DPS has been squelched.

I think I have a tank past 25 somewhere, let me look lol.

I'm still trying to figure out how it's possible to get your autoattack damage that low, even with these changes. Frankly if it's only 400 on Live you needn't worry about delaying taunts to allow another autoattack hit anyway.

[Motzi]

Dimhammer wrote:

Dreyco wrote:

It completely and totally astounds me what some people will do to get slightly higher numbers on a parse...

On my tank, I follow a simpler procedure.

Am I holding agro? Yes.

Am i taking damage well? Yes.

Is everyone else not dying? Yes.

... the rest? Well, who cares.

I completely agree.  Too many people are worried about the numbers instead of just having fun.

The game requries everyone to maximize output to beat more challenging encounters.  If you want to group scion 24x7, then yes this mentality is fine.  If you want to complete all content in this expansion before the next one is released, everyone in your group/raid is going to have to analyze how they can squeeze every possible ounce of performance out of their class.

If your not intersted in these goals, then the kiddie table is the other forums, and your probably not in the right area.

[Motzi]

Rothgar wrote:

So what you're saying is we need to limit the number of spells you can put in a single macro.  I'm already seeing people do similar macros and this can't be good for server performance, spamming it with so many commands in a short period of time.  Obviously we don't want to throttle casting commands, but these 'spam' macros are not good.  If the trend moves more towards this type of play style we will be forced to limit the number of spells and command steps you can add to a macro.

No, what he's saying is the new system is flat, unchallenging, requires no thought, and is in general too vanila to keep the interest of the current tanking population.

But way to trivialize the hard work of your customer trying to demonstrate where your problems are before you launch them!

[Zibleez]

It seems that what's changing is a huge increase to a small # of abilities to make up for the gap in dps between tanks and other classes.  Taunts > all with the new LU as it's laid out.

Not your abliity to hold aggro > all, since that ability is being reduced to mastery of a few very rapidly refreshing abilities.  If you had to use every CA you had, timed relative to CA's, to maximize your aggro generation to hold aggro off a high dps class, that'd be excellent.

From what I'm seeing on test, the hate generated by a very skilled player will not be largely different than the hate generated by an unskilled player on test.

[Rothgar]

Striothia@Antonia Bayle wrote:

Rothgar wrote:

So what you're saying is we need to limit the number of spells you can put in a single macro.  I'm already seeing people do similar macros and this can't be good for server performance, spamming it with so many commands in a short period of time.  Obviously we don't want to throttle casting commands, but these 'spam' macros are not good.  If the trend moves more towards this type of play style we will be forced to limit the number of spells and command steps you can add to a macro.

Your only treating the symptom not the cause. If you reduce the amount of spells you can put in a single macro all that would happen is they would be split into two macros which you would alternate spamming. As things are on test tanking doesn't require any skill or timing or knowledge of your abilities. You just spam the taunts when their up. On live even though I agree the system is out of whack you need to effectively time and use in the proper order your abilities to hold aggro.

Let me back up and re-phrase.

I'm not the developer handling the fighter revamp.  I did create the threat meter, but I have nothing to do with the change to the combat arts and taunts.  I'm sorry that I did not make that clear.  I did however do the macro revamp several years back and one of my biggest concerns lately has been server performance.  My response was not meant to solve the issues you have with the fighter revamp, but to address the concern I have if more and more people choose the playstyle of creating a 'spam all' macro.  As I mentioned, I've witnessed players doing this already, so even if your tanking issue is solved I still have a concern about the growing issue of spamming macros with large number of CA's in them. 

So perhaps I should be the one taking this issue to another thread, but I simply had to respond when I saw the post proposing a macro with this many spells in it.  I have no doubts that if 24 players in a raid were spamming a similar macro that you'd see degradation in server performance.  So how do we fix that?  Do we throttle ability usage in general?  I think this solution would negatively impact many people who had legitimate reasons for casting quickly.  The last thing I'd want to do is have someone's cast denied because they were casting too fast.  So what is our other option besides limited the number of ability commands you can send to the server in a single keystroke?

[Zibleez]

Stop derailing our discussion!

Seriously though - if the mechanics that encourage this style of play are removed (though I don't think this style of play is in any way optimal at this point), then you've solved the problem.  I think the OP was using hyperbole to point out the diminishing complexity of the CA rotation and tanking role with the very taunt-heavy TPS on test.

[Motzi]

Rothgar wrote:

Striothia@Antonia Bayle wrote:

Rothgar wrote:

So what you're saying is we need to limit the number of spells you can put in a single macro.  I'm already seeing people do similar macros and this can't be good for server performance, spamming it with so many commands in a short period of time.  Obviously we don't want to throttle casting commands, but these 'spam' macros are not good.  If the trend moves more towards this type of play style we will be forced to limit the number of spells and command steps you can add to a macro.

Your only treating the symptom not the cause. If you reduce the amount of spells you can put in a single macro all that would happen is they would be split into two macros which you would alternate spamming. As things are on test tanking doesn't require any skill or timing or knowledge of your abilities. You just spam the taunts when their up. On live even though I agree the system is out of whack you need to effectively time and use in the proper order your abilities to hold aggro.

Let me back up and re-phrase.

I'm not the developer handling the fighter revamp.  I did create the threat meter, but I have nothing to do with the change to the combat arts and taunts.  I'm sorry that I did not make that clear.  I did however do the macro revamp several years back and one of my biggest concerns lately has been server performance.  My response was not meant to solve the issues you have with the fighter revamp, but to address the concern I have if more and more people choose the playstyle of creating a 'spam all' macro.  As I mentioned, I've witnessed players doing this already, so even if your tanking issue is solved I still have a concern about the growing issue of spamming macros with large number of CA's in them. 

So perhaps I should be the one taking this issue to another thread, but I simply had to respond when I saw the post proposing a macro with this many spells in it.  I have no doubts that if 24 players in a raid were spamming a similar macro that you'd see degradation in server performance.  So how do we fix that?  Do we throttle ability usage in general?  I think this solution would negatively impact many people who had legitimate reasons for casting quickly.  The last thing I'd want to do is have someone's cast denied because they were casting too fast.  So what is our other option besides limited the number of ability commands you can send to the server in a single keystroke?

Rothgar,

The client is aware which abilities are ready, the macro button could in fact parse what the client knows about the abilities and only send maybe a max of 4 to the server based upon the 4 the client believes to be available.

I know the client and server are not always in sync about ability readiness, but capping the overload on a single macro to 2 rather than n abilities seems like a more reasonable / efficient fix without impacting the players ability to create longer macros.

2cp.

[Rothgar]

Zibleez wrote:

Stop derailing our discussion!

Seriously though - if the mechanics that encourage this style of play are removed (though I don't think this style of play is in any way optimal at this point), then you've solved the problem.  I think the OP was using hyperbole to point out the diminishing complexity of the CA rotation and tanking role with the very taunt-heavy TPS on test.

So basically what you're saying is that the taunts are either too powerful, or refresh too fast.  Is that right?  Because that's the only change that contributes to the point the OP is trying to make.

The mechanics of generate hate havent changed.  You still have X number of abilities each that generate different amounts of hate.  In the current system, Decimate might be the highest hate generator for a Guardian, so you're still "forced" to use it every time its available.  This is the same mechanic as what the OP has pointed out.  The only difference is that taunts have now become the highest hate generators.  Since they have a short recast time you're proposing that the priority to use those abilities trumps all others causing you to do nothing but taunt when you have other CA's you could be using, but using them wouldn't be efficient for hate generation.

This leads me back to my statement about taunts are either too powerful or refresh too fast.

Or, maybe there are other variables to take into consideration.  Let me use healers as an example.  If we gave healers a HUGE heal with fast refresh timer, would it make sense for the healer to continuously spam this heal everytime it was available?  No, that would be ridiculous.  Why would the healer cast a heal spell on a groupmate if they didn't need to be healed? 

Can't we say the same thing for fighters and their taunts?  Sure, the taunts might be the most efficient hate generators, but thats all they do, generate hate.  If you have sufficient hate on your target, why would you continue rotating them instead of using your other combat arts to increase your DPS?

It seems to me that these changes just cause you to evaluate how much hate you have, and you have to make the decision to keep taunting or do some DPS.

Is my analysis off base?  If so please point out what I'm missing.  Again, the class balancing and spell changes aren't my project but I do have a great interest in seeing it successful.

[Motzi]

Rothgar wrote:

Can't we say the same thing for fighters and their taunts?  Sure, the taunts might be the most efficient hate generators, but thats all they do, generate hate.  If you have sufficient hate on your target, why would you continue rotating them instead of using your other combat arts to increase your DPS?

How exactly do we do that if you wont expose meaningful data to the tank on the hate meter?

[Couching]

Rothgar wrote:

Striothia@Antonia Bayle wrote:

Rothgar wrote:

So what you're saying is we need to limit the number of spells you can put in a single macro.  I'm already seeing people do similar macros and this can't be good for server performance, spamming it with so many commands in a short period of time.  Obviously we don't want to throttle casting commands, but these 'spam' macros are not good.  If the trend moves more towards this type of play style we will be forced to limit the number of spells and command steps you can add to a macro.

Your only treating the symptom not the cause. If you reduce the amount of spells you can put in a single macro all that would happen is they would be split into two macros which you would alternate spamming. As things are on test tanking doesn't require any skill or timing or knowledge of your abilities. You just spam the taunts when their up. On live even though I agree the system is out of whack you need to effectively time and use in the proper order your abilities to hold aggro.

Let me back up and re-phrase.

I'm not the developer handling the fighter revamp.  I did create the threat meter, but I have nothing to do with the change to the combat arts and taunts.  I'm sorry that I did not make that clear.  I did however do the macro revamp several years back and one of my biggest concerns lately has been server performance.  My response was not meant to solve the issues you have with the fighter revamp, but to address the concern I have if more and more people choose the playstyle of creating a 'spam all' macro.  As I mentioned, I've witnessed players doing this already, so even if your tanking issue is solved I still have a concern about the growing issue of spamming macros with large number of CA's in them. 

So perhaps I should be the one taking this issue to another thread, but I simply had to respond when I saw the post proposing a macro with this many spells in it.  I have no doubts that if 24 players in a raid were spamming a similar macro that you'd see degradation in server performance.  So how do we fix that?  Do we throttle ability usage in general?  I think this solution would negatively impact many people who had legitimate reasons for casting quickly.  The last thing I'd want to do is have someone's cast denied because they were casting too fast.  So what is our other option besides limited the number of ability commands you can send to the server in a single keystroke?

The answer is simple.

Make a combat system that players can get better performance without using macro.

Don't make a system that encourage people being a macro bot, like the fighter revamp on test server. It's an epic fail.

[Obadiah]

Motzi@Unrest wrote:

Rothgar wrote:

Can't we say the same thing for fighters and their taunts?  Sure, the taunts might be the most efficient hate generators, but thats all they do, generate hate.  If you have sufficient hate on your target, why would you continue rotating them instead of using your other combat arts to increase your DPS?

How exactly do we do that if you wont expose meaningful data to the tank on the hate meter?

Dang. You beat me to it.

His excuse was a good one though. If it's going to cause any sort of performance hit I'd rather do without. Certainly would like it to remain on the table for the future though.

[Zibleez]

Roth:

It seems like the spread between hate generation now on live on my fabled bruiser for instance:

DPS/CA's: 2k TPS (assuming 1 to 1 relationsihp of damage to hate)

Taunts: 800 TPS

Vs. the new system on test:

DPS/CA's: 1.75k TPS

Taunts: 4k TPS

Now, this is a hypothetical situation - one which I haven't crunched the numbers on at all.  The spread between CA/DPS hate generation and Taunt based hate generation trivializes the importance of using CA/DPS based threat generation - and it's not like we have a huge # of taunts to cycle through that have different survivability impact (knockdown, stun, positioning, etc.)

If I have 11 CA's, for instance, and the timing of my autoattack to juggle on the one hand generating 1.25k TPS, and 5 taunt/CA's generating 4.5k on the other hand, the benefit of doing the simple 5 far outweighs the benefit of the complex 11 - and the simple 5 have an insanely low recast now.

It reduces complexity and shows a greater imbalance than the current system even has for playing.  Yes, tanks will be able to hold aggro more easily, but no, it's not due to them doing a better job of it or mastering a new complex system.

[RafaelSmith]

Rothgar wrote:

Zibleez wrote:

Stop derailing our discussion!

Seriously though - if the mechanics that encourage this style of play are removed (though I don't think this style of play is in any way optimal at this point), then you've solved the problem. I think the OP was using hyperbole to point out the diminishing complexity of the CA rotation and tanking role with the very taunt-heavy TPS on test.

So basically what you're saying is that the taunts are either too powerful, or refresh too fast. Is that right? Because that's the only change that contributes to the point the OP is trying to make.

The mechanics of generate hate havent changed. You still have X number of abilities each that generate different amounts of hate. In the current system, Decimate might be the highest hate generator for a Guardian, so you're still "forced" to use it every time its available. This is the same mechanic as what the OP has pointed out. The only difference is that taunts have now become the highest hate generators. Since they have a short recast time you're proposing that the priority to use those abilities trumps all others causing you to do nothing but taunt when you have other CA's you could be using, but using them wouldn't be efficient for hate generation.

This leads me back to my statement about taunts are either too powerful or refresh too fast.

Or, maybe there are other variables to take into consideration. Let me use healers as an example. If we gave healers a HUGE heal with fast refresh timer, would it make sense for the healer to continuously spam this heal everytime it was available? No, that would be ridiculous. Why would the healer cast a heal spell on a groupmate if they didn't need to be healed?

Can't we say the same thing for fighters and their taunts? Sure, the taunts might be the most efficient hate generators, but thats all they do, generate hate. If you have sufficient hate on your target, why would you continue rotating them instead of using your other combat arts to increase your DPS?

It seems to me that these changes just cause you to evaluate how much hate you have, and you have to make the decision to keep taunting or do some DPS.

Is my analysis off base? If so please point out what I'm missing. Again, the class balancing and spell changes aren't my project but I do have a great interest in seeing it successful.

The issue is with "progression".  Currently on live the order in which we use CAs or Taunts is dependent on our gear, our AAS, and the various bonues they have.  With the new system..as far as I can tell....once a tank has masters of his taunts....there is very little in the way of gear progression that will change the fact that all he has to do to keep aggro is spam those taunts when they are up.   With the new system.......when tanking....our DMG is pathethic (not by choice...forced on us by the new stances and buff mergers) and such a small % of our hate that trying to squeeze a tiny bit more of something so small is not worth it.

[Motzi]

Kurgan@Everfrost wrote:

Motzi@Unrest wrote:

Rothgar wrote:

Can't we say the same thing for fighters and their taunts?  Sure, the taunts might be the most efficient hate generators, but thats all they do, generate hate.  If you have sufficient hate on your target, why would you continue rotating them instead of using your other combat arts to increase your DPS?

How exactly do we do that if you wont expose meaningful data to the tank on the hate meter?

Dang. You beat me to it.

His excuse was a good one though. If it's going to cause any sort of performance hit I'd rather do without. Certainly would like it to remain on the table for the future though.

I believe if we used the suggested % of hate rather than the 0-100 scale, there wouldn't be any significant impact to server performance.  The server is already aware of YOUR % of hate.  The performance hit came in when the server had to communicate yoru value AND the next highest person.

[Santi Dominiti]

The fact of the matter is this... On test any tank can hold agro by spamming their taunts. So why not make a macro of taunts and spam that? Because it has been stated that tanks only job is to hold agro and take dmg. On live now if all you do is spam your taunts you will lose agro in no time at all. So instead people have come up with casting orders to maximize their dps and hate gain. So ill stress it again on TEST all you need to do is spam your taunts and CAs with hate and you have agro. THIS is why people are not happy with the changes it is taking the challenge and fun out of tanking. I personally strive to do as much dps as I possibly can while tanking, so that i am not just another one of those "meatshield" tanks, and I will continue to do this after the test but I can tell you right now doing 3k dps and holding agro is no where near as fun as doing 6k dps and holding agro...... As far as making a macro like the OP stated imo thats just a waste you might as well go play WoW. Do you need to limit the number on each macro no... The problem is the fact that you could viably do that and still be a decent tank.