Holy Ground - Now worthless (raiding)

[I_am_Me]

(This is from a Raiding perspective so please don't add in grouping comments)I've given myself about 6 weeks of raiding to see how I like the new holy grounds and how the paladin measures up as a raid tertiary-tank in SF (was OT in RoK and TSO). The new holy grounds is worthless.With the changes to Holy Grounds, the paladin is no longer able to deal in any way shape or form with aggro dumping mobs. Most hate position change that can be attained by a paladin is 7 positions, nowhere near adequate for tanking aggro dumpers. Controlling aggro has been the paladin's verture. The Paladin has been good at single and group raid encounters. Though the Guardian is better with single target encounters while the SK and Zerker are better with groups encounters. The one thing the Paladin's have always excelled at was aggro control, but with holy ground's change that's gone too.Beyond just that, Holy Grounds is now considered to be a DPS spell. While it does accomplish that goal, the hate increase and hate gain is death in a raid when you only have one healer who is not focus on your survival. (Before anyone says you can run out, cast, then run back in ok sure. But doing that you've already lost about 2-3 secs of the cast and if it's a multi mob encounter or you by accident are too close you'll get aggro)Solution? Drop the worthless spell which is the current Holy Grounds and give us back our class defining ability. If the 24 positions was too much change it to be only 4-5 hate positions a hit. The DPS increase of holy grounds was suppose to be an olive branch but i say forget it. I'm a tank, I don't need to be nor want to be at the top of the parse.

[VALKOR]

I think the change is expected to come in raid setup and thinking, not in paladin abilities.  Mobs that drop you to a big fat zero on the hate meter are intended to be tanked by two or more tanks who can alternate holding them.  I believe it is one more mechanism for trying to get more fighters into a raid.  The 24 position holy ground provided an inadvertent work-around to keep with the old raid philosophy of one MT and one OT.  I seriously doubt you'll see any change when the solution is simply to bring another fighter along.

Though I am generally the MT, our raid hasn't had any issues with hate dropping mobs thus far when we have 3 tanks in the raid.  One tank holds the big name and the other 2 tanks swap the adds back and forth.  I noticed you said tertiary so if you are already running with 3 tanks in your raid, how come the other tank isn't just below you on the adds?  And if the third tank is off doing something else, the answer you'd likely get from SOE would be bring a 4th tank!

Amends, Cavalier's Cry, Holy Ground, Sigil, and our other taunt abilities quickly allow me to rebuild hate in a sustainable manner.   While I have certainly not experienced all of the new raid content in both easy and hard mode, I believe you are barking up the wrong tree requesting a significant ability change that would reduce the need for additional fighters in a raid.

[I_am_Me]

Let me add this here as well. If Holy Grounds is to be as DPS ae instead of an aggro builder. Please remove the 1 hate position increase. This'll at least make it viable in raids for DPS.

[Boli32]

I am only experiancing problems with complete hatedumps when they come rapidly over an extended duration of time. For instance haladan enraged is a perfect example; as it stands right now if you had to tank everything at same level you're going to need 4-6 tanks; maybe more depending on recasts of abilities. Most of the time in TSF raids that is not an issue and whlst there are memwiping mobs use of 2 or 3 tanks high on the hate list generally solves that problem.

HG as it stands now is great for pickign up adds, fast casting and unresitable means if adds are arorund and I cast... 99% of the time they stick on me; in fact as an OT or MT (yes I will use HG in an OT position as the guardian MT will use reinforce in a similar fashion). and I love the way it has changed... it alters our playstyle completly and in a way I enjoy.

However with the change we are stcuk back to square one where we have little in the way of snap agro... which is needed as an OT to grab the adds/named back ASAP. Its possible to be 2nd on hate list all the time... and I do enjoy the DPS you need to do to get there but if you are in full defensive this hate generation is not as simple.

[Camnus]

Also from a raiding perspective but from the mt pov, i have to say holy ground is awesome. A full 1/4 of my hate generation, if the mob does wipe i have an ot and bruiser to grab it for the 3 or 5 seconds it takes for me to grab the mob back. I can see the difficulties from the ot position, but to say it is worthless in raiding is just wrong. On a mob that doesnt wipe my hate is locked in from the beginning of the encounter.

[Costa]

i have agree with Boli on the OT problems in that Pally snaps are very limited. My Zerk has 5 snaps, 2 of which are ae. Pally has 2 and Holy Ground. I'm not sure you can call it a snap as it only has a positional increase of 1 and then large taunt and small damage. I have to say i do use it to pull encounters and the MT guard will peel the named out and leave me to the rest of the group but that seems to be its best use as of yet. Give it a 3 or 4 positional increase would certainly be better or maybe 1 position on each attack rather than on the initial hit(or am i reading that wrong?). Being able to cast on the run would be pretty damned usefull to like Sigil but maybe thats going too far???

[Xxenophobia]

Holy Ground is not worthless... if you notice there is a damage component that is AWESOME! ... I use it in raid all the time and its like my #3 to #5 big DPS list...  my dps ranges from 15k to has high 30k dps.  If you are expecting reinforcements ... its not reinforcements.  If you dont want to take aggro when you cast it .. make sure you are out about 20m .. i cast it all the time .. i dont have the numbers in front of me but i think it was averaging as high as 1k dps.

[I_am_Me]

Xxenophobia wrote:

Holy Ground is not worthless... if you notice there is a damage component that is AWESOME! ... I use it in raid all the time and its like my #3 to #5 big DPS list...  my dps ranges from 15k to has high 30k dps.  If you are expecting reinforcements ... its not reinforcements.  If you dont want to take aggro when you cast it .. make sure you are out about 20m .. i cast it all the time .. i dont have the numbers in front of me but i think it was averaging as high as 1k dps.

Learn to read the entire post. Kthx

[Rainmare]

Holy ground is very much worthless.

the damage is does isn't anyhting special. and the REASON for it is SNAP AGGRO. on mobs like Halden enraged, or Xebnok, where he throws you to the bottom of the hate list, adn you got about 20 seconds to get back to number1, Holy Ground doesn't cut it anymore.

and when I say that yes, we brought 3 tanks to Xebnok. 2 tanks for the main named, 1 tank for the detonators. Paladin(me) starts tanking Xeb, gets charmed, and the guard takes over. from that point, the Guard is supposed to be the MT, and it's treated that way. the paladin is supposed to steal aggro just long enough to get charmed...but the charm comes probably 10-15 seconds after it wears off.

even with holy ground, I can't jump up the hate meter against the entire raid force using all thier abilities like they should be doing, and that includes with a high dmg dealer Amended, fast enough. before, I'd hit Holy Ground, and bam, I have him, I get charmed, we rinse repeat.

not to mention, Holy Ground lasts only 10 seconds..adn if the MT gets charmed, Xebnok goes running off with him in tow, and is well out of range for holy grounds 'ae' effect. and killing half the raid while he's at it nad power draining them.

and he's not the only mob like that. Halden's mammoth friend is like that, were he throws you to the bottom of the hate list. the 4 mobs in Palace that you fight as a 'smart' group, 2 of them memwipe you to the bottom of the hate list. granted it's much easier in a group to get it back with HG, but even in a group I can have trouble usually when one person is doing another job...like the chanter mezzing one of the add sets and when he gets a memwipe, the mob is out of range for HG adn I got nothing else to try and get it but Rescue or the AA ability both of which are unreliable as they have this really bad habit of being resisted or flat out ignored...especially my mobs 4 levels higher then me.

even the SK's version of Holy Ground.....Grave Sacrement, is a better ability. as it jumps them 2 levels, and lasts longer. I beleive grave sacrement is 20 seconds and 2 positions on a hit.

Give me back my snap aggro. that's the only desperate cling paladins have a lot fo the time. SKs and Zerkers out dps us, and Guards outdo us on survival. Aggro managment was supposed to be our forte' and without holy ground that's coming into question too.

[Bruener]

Rainmare@Oasis wrote:

Holy ground is very much worthless.

the damage is does isn't anyhting special. and the REASON for it is SNAP AGGRO. on mobs like Halden enraged, or Xebnok, where he throws you to the bottom of the hate list, adn you got about 20 seconds to get back to number1, Holy Ground doesn't cut it anymore.

and when I say that yes, we brought 3 tanks to Xebnok. 2 tanks for the main named, 1 tank for the detonators. Paladin(me) starts tanking Xeb, gets charmed, and the guard takes over. from that point, the Guard is supposed to be the MT, and it's treated that way. the paladin is supposed to steal aggro just long enough to get charmed...but the charm comes probably 10-15 seconds after it wears off.

even with holy ground, I can't jump up the hate meter against the entire raid force using all thier abilities like they should be doing, and that includes with a high dmg dealer Amended, fast enough. before, I'd hit Holy Ground, and bam, I have him, I get charmed, we rinse repeat.

not to mention, Holy Ground lasts only 10 seconds..adn if the MT gets charmed, Xebnok goes running off with him in tow, and is well out of range for holy grounds 'ae' effect. and killing half the raid while he's at it nad power draining them.

and he's not the only mob like that. Halden's mammoth friend is like that, were he throws you to the bottom of the hate list. the 4 mobs in Palace that you fight as a 'smart' group, 2 of them memwipe you to the bottom of the hate list. granted it's much easier in a group to get it back with HG, but even in a group I can have trouble usually when one person is doing another job...like the chanter mezzing one of the add sets and when he gets a memwipe, the mob is out of range for HG adn I got nothing else to try and get it but Rescue or the AA ability both of which are unreliable as they have this really bad habit of being resisted or flat out ignored...especially my mobs 4 levels higher then me.

even the SK's version of Holy Ground.....Grave Sacrement, is a better ability. as it jumps them 2 levels, and lasts longer. I beleive grave sacrement is 20 seconds and 2 positions on a hit.

Give me back my snap aggro. that's the only desperate cling paladins have a lot fo the time. SKs and Zerkers out dps us, and Guards outdo us on survival. Aggro managment was supposed to be our forte' and without holy ground that's coming into question too.

To address the Grave Sac for SKs.  It is 2 hate positions on the initial hit along with damage and threat.  After that it is a DoT and HoT every 4 sec.  Also you need to understand that Grave Sacrament is on over twice as long of a recast as Holy Ground.

Now that that is cleared up how many mobs have you noticed that drop you down to the bottom of the hate list in SF?  SOE has really backed of on agro ditching mobs and now if they do agro ditch it is usually not to the bottom.  Something easily handled by 2 tanks in a raid.  Also, they moved the hate position over time abilities to the Brawler classes instead, most likely to help them fill in their niche for raids.  The only other class besides Brawlers that has multiple hate position buff abilities are Guards.  Guards maintain Reinforcement which helps them control ST and washes out with the fact they usually can't climb up the hate ladder as fast as the other tanks.

Holy Ground in its current form is much more usefel than it was in the past since you can literally use it everytime it is up and not worry about wiping the raid.

[Rainmare]

the only reason to use holy ground is for when you want aggro. and yes you are threatening the raid when you use it like a damage ability.  Sure it's so weak now that it's not a huge risk, but it's a risk all the same and not one I'm willing to take. I'm not interested in my parse number. I'm interested in doing my job, and risking the raid as little as possible doing it.

and yes, not alot of mobs memwipe. but for example, Sara in the Labs, requires a tank switch between Archtypes. thanks to all the hate abilities/armor procs our guard has, Holy Ground isn't good enough either. we literally had to put me in the MT group to amend our MT to take aggro, becuase 1 hate position and 3k threat isn't able to overcome the raid and his own threat on hit/threat when hit procs in the like 5-7 seconds I have to take aggro before the named 1 shots him.

the guard should not have to stop attacking, and tell the raid to stop attacking, so that I can do my job on memwiping or tank switch fights. This is what holy ground was for. to hit holy ground, and have aggro solidly no matter what for at least ten seconds...and usually meaning enough of your own hate is there so that when it wears off you are still tanking, until the next switch is needed or the mob memwipes/charms again.

we also used holy ground on mobs like Gynok, so that I would eat the DT and not the MT. again, a use that holy ground had, that doesn't work anymore. you know maybe is there was a level 90 version of Holy Ground that had double the threat numbers or something, maybe. but when all your big hitters have 10k+ spells, and everyone has 30%+ potency to go with it...3k hate and 1 position doesn't cut it.

our rangers/assassin and wizards and even our swashy post 15-20k+ parses. even with holy ground as it is, I'm not able to to overcome the threat transfer of the swash + Guard's 'when hit' threat procs + Raid dps + Guard's procs on damage. adn that's with our highest Ranger amended and the 5% threat increase to amend adornment...or the Assassin amended, depending on which one is there or in group. and lord help me if my Amend target dies for any reason, all my hate just died with him.

[Kahling]

Everyone keeps quoting old content when looking at HG and requiring snap agro?  So far on new content I havent had a problem with it, its grabbed adds when I want them and increases my dps to boot.

I am not having any problems with mem whiping mobs working with the other tanks in raid tbh, its all working out nicely.

Is there a specific example where we need holy ground in its old form for new content?

Personally I would like to see something really rubbish changed to a snap agro, like gift of armament for instance, I would say that 0% of Paladins/SK's use that now with the aa for mit for the entire raid non tanks.

Kahling

[Boli32]

Rainmare@Oasis wrote:

the only reason to use holy ground is for when you want aggro. and yes you are threatening the raid when you use it like a damage ability.  Sure it's so weak now that it's not a huge risk, but it's a risk all the same and not one I'm willing to take. I'm not interested in my parse number. I'm interested in doing my job, and risking the raid as little as possible doing it.

and yes, not alot of mobs memwipe. but for example, Sara in the Labs, requires a tank switch between Archtypes. thanks to all the hate abilities/armor procs our guard has, Holy Ground isn't good enough either. we literally had to put me in the MT group to amend our MT to take aggro, becuase 1 hate position and 3k threat isn't able to overcome the raid and his own threat on hit/threat when hit procs in the like 5-7 seconds I have to take aggro before the named 1 shots him.

the guard should not have to stop attacking, and tell the raid to stop attacking, so that I can do my job on memwiping or tank switch fights. This is what holy ground was for. to hit holy ground, and have aggro solidly no matter what for at least ten seconds...and usually meaning enough of your own hate is there so that when it wears off you are still tanking, until the next switch is needed or the mob memwipes/charms again.

we also used holy ground on mobs like Gynok, so that I would eat the DT and not the MT. again, a use that holy ground had, that doesn't work anymore. you know maybe is there was a level 90 version of Holy Ground that had double the threat numbers or something, maybe. but when all your big hitters have 10k+ spells, and everyone has 30%+ potency to go with it...3k hate and 1 position doesn't cut it.

our rangers/assassin and wizards and even our swashy post 15-20k+ parses. even with holy ground as it is, I'm not able to to overcome the threat transfer of the swash + Guard's 'when hit' threat procs + Raid dps + Guard's procs on damage. adn that's with our highest Ranger amended and the 5% threat increase to amend adornment...or the Assassin amended, depending on which one is there or in group. and lord help me if my Amend target dies for any reason, all my hate just died with him.

If you can't pull agro off a guard tank you need to L2P!

[Rainmare]

here's the ones I have issues with, or where holy ground in it's old form would be nice....or at least a more powerful form then we got now.

Sara Greenheart

Halden Enraged

Gynok

Xebnok

Mynzak (used to use it when the MT would have to go clear the purple screen and thus not drag the named mob through the raid)

the second stage of the ring event in Palace of Rohen Theer second floor (trying to get good aggro on the sorceress alone to keep her out of the raid and thus not spamming elemental on everyone)

and even then I'm not asking for HG to be back as the 24 position thing. but 1 position and 3k hate isn't strong enough in most of these fights. give it 5-6 positions and 3k hate. makes it so in 3-4 swings or spells I hit the top of the hate list.

We do t8 stuff normally when we run out of t9 stuff to do...which isn't long. no one I think is asking for HG back as it was. yes that form is rather OP....but sony should have used a scapel, where they used a sledgehammer.

[Costa]

I'm not sure if HG is actually working as it's intended to. I was sure prior to the change coming there was something posted (can't find it) that HG was to raise our hate position by 1 place with every successfull spell/ca for its duration. As it stands at the moment from my own experience it only does it on the initial hit. Now i don't have an SK but speaking to my brother in law that plays one he was telling me that Sacrement increases threat position by 2 when he uses it and then does taunts and damage there after. It would be nice to have a more detailed explanation of it than that but if that is the case then why did ours get so badly nerfed?

Its nice having abilites that we call our own but when you have a guardian that has 3 single target snaps plus thier reinforcement and Zerks that have 3 single target snaps plus 2 AE snaps if they have myth ability and end TSO, why do both Crusaders get 2 single target snaps and very weak ae snaps? I don't know maybe i am missing something but as it stands right now HG is nothing like the description for the spell. As the ability stands right now its only real functions are to grab adds if they spawn or to use as an additional dps spell, not quite the being the 2nd most hated target of my enemy.

[kemlo]

Boli32 wrote:

If you can't pull agro off a guard tank you need to L2P!

QFE

i have to say i love HG as it is now, its in no way OP, and it gives me a far greater control over my aggro. i have dual tanked Hard tox with our Guard and even after being swallowed and spat out (your position drops) i have zero issue getting to no.1 or no.2 in plenty of time by using HG, same deal with all the other mobs that drop a hate position -  scavinator, pharacelsis (or however his name is spelled - and while not a memwipeing mob....people get charmed which has pretty much the same effect when your cured) etc.

if your worried about pulling aggro.....ask your MT what the next number on his hate meter is, if its you dont use it unless you intend to peel, if its not then use your judgement

[Rainmare]

maybe it's crappy group makeup or whatever but I have a hard time snapping aggro off the guard. and that's what I mean. it's not about being able to take it or build it up it's when I have to take it RIGHT NOW. like in 2-5 seconds. it could just be the combination of dirge buffs, swashy transfer, coercer buffs, his own threat generaters, armor/jewelry peices that proc hate when hit.

where as I get a dirge. and that's the extent of my buffing for threat, save Amends, and a few jewelry peices that proc hate. and like I said, if my amends target dies, prolly 50% or more of my hate generation died with him.

[Azurro]

I wouldn’t call Holy Ground in its current form useless it’s just that losing the old abilities hate snap hurts us a lot on raids.  Holy Ground is routinely the top parsing threat generator when I am MT and when I’m OT I really can’t use it or I will pull agro from the tank.  The problem is that I believe Pally’s now have fewer hate position increasers than any other plate tank class.  It shows on the threat parse to.  My threat numbers are comparable with a Guardian even to the point that if you count Amends we are probably the highest raw threat parsing plate tank class out there.  But on threat position increases it’s no comparison.  The Guardian beats me out 5 to 1.  Positional increases are much more powerful on a raid then raw threat when going from 0 to 100.

 

The fix is pretty easy IMO.  Scale back the raw threat component of Holy Ground somewhat, Increase the initial threat position increase and add a threat increase to the recurring part of the spell.  That would give use the ability to at least build back up the hate list quickly without the instant snap that the old Holy Ground had which apparently was too much for some people.

[Azurro]

Rainmare@Oasis wrote:

here's the ones I have issues with, or where holy ground in it's old form would be nice....or at least a more powerful form then we got now.

Sara Greenheart

Halden Enraged

Gynok

Xebnok

Mynzak (used to use it when the MT would have to go clear the purple screen and thus not drag the named mob through the raid)

the second stage of the ring event in Palace of Rohen Theer second floor (trying to get good aggro on the sorceress alone to keep her out of the raid and thus not spamming elemental on everyone)

and even then I'm not asking for HG to be back as the 24 position thing. but 1 position and 3k hate isn't strong enough in most of these fights. give it 5-6 positions and 3k hate. makes it so in 3-4 swings or spells I hit the top of the hate list.

We do t8 stuff normally when we run out of t9 stuff to do...which isn't long. no one I think is asking for HG back as it was. yes that form is rather OP....but sony should have used a scapel, where they used a sledgehammer.

The third named in the new X2 is a real PITA to solo tank as a Pally.  It's a complete agro dump.

[Tanna]

I think Holy Ground is fine, and actually enjoy it more this way than how it was before. But I'm quite a DPS finatic, as I understand that dps = hate. I also have all my highest hitting folks in my group with their hate xfers on me. I haven't had any problems with aggro dumping mobs since the expansion. Even did TSO raids just for the fun of it and had no trouble getting aggro.

If you have the right person amended, rescue, holy ground, sneering assault or sigil of heroism will most definitely get you aggro within a second or two.

[Rainmare]

see that's what I mean. my normal group doesn't have any threat transfers, or I get 1.

I usually get a dirge, an illy, a conjy, 2 healers, and a random class. sometimes it's a scout, sometimes it's another fighter, sometimes it a wizard.

and yes, Holy Ground only seems to jump a hate position on teh first hit. after that it's just a threat increase.

[Costa]

Azurro wrote:

Rainmare@Oasis wrote:

here's the ones I have issues with, or where holy ground in it's old form would be nice....or at least a more powerful form then we got now.

Sara Greenheart

Halden Enraged

Gynok

Xebnok

Mynzak (used to use it when the MT would have to go clear the purple screen and thus not drag the named mob through the raid)

the second stage of the ring event in Palace of Rohen Theer second floor (trying to get good aggro on the sorceress alone to keep her out of the raid and thus not spamming elemental on everyone)

and even then I'm not asking for HG to be back as the 24 position thing. but 1 position and 3k hate isn't strong enough in most of these fights. give it 5-6 positions and 3k hate. makes it so in 3-4 swings or spells I hit the top of the hate list.

We do t8 stuff normally when we run out of t9 stuff to do...which isn't long. no one I think is asking for HG back as it was. yes that form is rather OP....but sony should have used a scapel, where they used a sledgehammer.

The third named in the new X2 is a real PITA to solo tank as a Pally.  It's a complete agro dump.

The 3rd named in the new x2? Isn't that the one that you need someone to peel the adds to stop the knockback and power drain? Not seen any issues with it memwiping but then we've not been in there for a couple weeks.

As for the threat increases etc we did Sara for the 1st time this weekend and i have to admit switching agro between myself and our MT guard was np with HG. I was certainly in a more gimped group that desired (no enchanter and only 1 dps class) but could keep my self 2nd on the hate list by amendsing the brig in group and HG was all i needed to switch places. SoH was then used if it was looking iffy on someone pulling it back and was just a straight rinse and repeat till she died.

Whether it needs to be changed or not i'm going to sit on the fence at the moment but after Sundays experience it seemed to perform to what was required when needed but then we're still in the early stages of SF raid content.

[knightofround]

I can't believe people are complaining about HG being worthless. You folks are crazy.

I just betrayed to pally yesterday, and on my first raid as a pally holy ground generated more zw threat than our MT guardian's entire threat parse. And that's only considering the threat portion, not even the damage portion.

Holy ground: 3.1k threat per second

MT Guardian's entire threat parse:  2.9k threat per second

There is not a single tank out there that has anything close to a 24 positional anymore, so its not like pallys are lacking compared to other tanks. In fact HG is still probably the best anti-memwipe tool...maybe reinforcement is a little better, but not much.

[VikingGamer]

Well I am just an ignorant noob, new to the game and still leveling but it seems like the problem of only gaining 1 position is really a problem when you have 23 people above you rather than just 5. So SOE needs to scale the spell based on the number of people in the group. 6 people = +1 position and 24 people = +4 positions. Does this game have half sized raids? if so then 12 people = +2 positions. This way the paladin is only ever 6 hits away from the top.

I dunno. Maybe I completely missed something but it doesn't sound like rocket surgery to me.

[cloudybe]

how is it useless last night on crab thing the adds spawn holyground bam insta aggro  at one point i was tanking the crab it would memwwipe and thanks to my wizzy snapping back to me about 3 seconds after the wipe

ps as to what the person said about not being able to pull hate off a guard put a dirge and a coercer hate gain on and put amends ona decent player and u can afk and hold hate better  true story

[Hikinami]

I wouldn't mind if it was more than one hate position. We have the least amount of snaps of any of the tanks.

[circusgirl]

Personally, I think paladins are kind of crazy awesome.  Sure, you're not perfect for every encounter, and occassionally it'll benefit you more to have your brawler OT something (Sarah Greenheart, for example, is really designed for a brawler to tank), but thats just the way raids this expansion are set up--things are really quite well designed for multiple tanks, and different tanks do better in different situations.  Kendis in Palace is best tanked by a Crusader, for example, and warriors or brawlers would have a much harder time of it since we can't generate much aggro on a mob that we can't hit.  We all have our strengths, and there are some things a paladin can do that no one else can.  Passive aggro generation is a Paladin's forte, and Snap aggro is a brawler's.  Different strengths for different situations.  OT the things your built to OT, and send in Warriors or Brawlers for the things you're not!

[Erlandor]

Hi ppl.

Maybe i'm completely telling Nonsense, that may come through i'm  a newbie. Joined Valor a few days before last Christmas and hit lvl 80 just around the SF launch.

So i can not tell what Holy Ground may have been before SF, and i have not done many Raids also.

Just sharing my Thoughts here...

It's true that i sometimes have a hard time Keeping Aggro in Groups, but that may just be due to the Fact that i'm not that much expierienced as a tank and do not yet have HG on Master (Research will end on Monday ).

Amends, which i have at Expert-Level, is just nice. But has its disadvantages when you have more than one really strong hitters in the group. For example Assasin and Wizzard. Whoever you give amends to, it might have been the wrong choice...

I occasionally group with a Guardian (Played by my Brother) who seems to taunt with about every hit, and i have a quite hard time of keeping aggro against him although he is 3 Levels below me.

Well.. but thats it. No one ever told that being a Tank is an easy job. It surely is not.

Single encounters are no real problem to keep on me,  my single-taunt was Grandmaster Choice in lev 85, and i recently discovered that we also got some "hate hit proc" with SF.  I Think its named "Cavalier's Shout"...

Groups, especially with adds are more challenging. If they resist Righteousness or it simply is too weak, Sigil may be the only way to keep the Mobs away from the Casters...

But well, at least for "normal" Groups, Holy Ground does the trick when i pull some encounter and want to ensure they stick on me....

So useless might not be the right term. Sure, Holy Ground could be a bit stronger... 1 Position does not seem to be very much... maybe they could add a second 1P-Increase as the spell wears off or something, but at least you can not call it completely useless.

Nevertheless i enjoy playing my Paladin, and can't await getting all those spell to master degree and enough AA Points to unlock some moe abilities in the shadows tree. Maybe some Hate-Gain adornments may also help our role as tank and after all a Pally simply isn't made to steal Agro from a well fitted Guardian who knows how to play.

I mean... they are much more "pure" fighters than we are... if it is not about keeping aggro, then what the're good for?

Maybe SOE could be nice to us and offer some more "tweaking" of HG, for example with spending AA-Points on Forced Following. - Just to aid those who have problems while the others can spend their points somewhere else.

So if every word in this post may be garbage, don't slaughter me, but i do not think SOE does not like Paladins any more and nerfed HG to make us angry

Like some dwarven Pally once said to me... "Those who are in fear of darkness, surely never saw a warrior of light in rage!"

So keep up guarding the weak and innocent and don't worry too much about numbers my Brethren

Greetings,

Erlandor

[Mavrin]

Holy ground can be very nasty if used properly.

The 1 hate position thing kinda blows compared to grave sacrament but my sk off tank and I have an understanding if he uses it anywhere near me I'll kill him so that solves that issue. We've also taken time out of our day to figure out our overlap range so we avoid any issues.

What you want to to do if you happen to have an sk over lapping your HG is make sure your big guns are available before you push the button. By big guns I mean your 5 fastest CA's your pallies you can figure out which ones I mean. By the third cast you should have the mob back(good time to pop sigil) by the 5th the wizzy/assassin should be at 12 and the sk somewhere below there on the hate meter.

I also highly recommend you have max points in cavs cry so you can double or triple dip the taunt components having 100 crit/100 DA also is very handy.

I've seen numbers well over 30k taunt(per attack) come out of HG added up with all the procs I fire off while its active if you cant hold hate with that you're probably too low dps to be a main tank and need to work on it.

The only problem with HG I have is the recast and thats really not a problem the recast is very appropriate but its nice to dream.