Upcoming Warrior Changes

[Kronos v]

Also, with the Reaver changes already up on PTS, this opens up the option for additions to the soul such as a toggle that reduces survivability but boosts damage done by DoT effects. Effectively making it a ranged DPS soul. As it is, I think it'll be pretty fun in Conquest. I did like the suggestion of Dire Blow and Cyclone Strike refreshing DoTs too.

I'm of two minds about the idea of a toggle for reaver. much of the point of using a tank soul is to create a hybrid that has better survivability than a pure dps. the current drawback is that too much damage is lost for too little survivability.
on the other hand, such a toggle would make reaver work better with tempest and riftblade, which it really needs too do, similar to how well paladin works with warlord
such a toggle would need to work with corrosion damage too, and preferably also "switch off" the reaver's agro investment, enabling reaver to be used as dps in pve.

on the topic of changing the ability that refreshes the DoTs, any ability chosen to perform this task would have to be a ranged ability.

[Soulshield]

yea but for pvp where vk already kills your damage it would be a nerf IMO. i would leave that alone. what they need to do is remove the increased pack time and put something usefull there along with making some shielding passive like RS. its a waste of a 3 point finisher to use DS in pvp and im not sure how much you would actually use that in pve either. there are a ton of wasted talents and abilities in our tank souls right now that need major overhaul

For VK:
As long as you could play with the soultree you could probably bringing Spell Sunder down to TIer 3 and DS down to Tier 2 if Void Propulsion(1 new place for a new talent in Tier 6) is not over importantly skill in pvp.
In addition Spellbreaker could be off-gcd and Efficient Conversion could be removed and just lower the power cost of these abilities by 6.
Then you put Energy Retention into Tier 2 and making 5/10/15 secs more duration and now you add a Tier 1 talent with 1/2/3/4/5% dmg by lowering something in the higher trees.

There is always place to improve, but it needs work and testing. Balance is not easy to achieve or to hold.

[Vladd]

One thing that still concerns me, and this is more of a encounter design than anything, is the fact Justicars are preferred on some PvE boss fights still (Proteus for sure). I don't think I should be able to use some "super special I love this spec" hybrid on every boss encounter, but I do think every class should be able to tank every encounter. Warriors, rogues, clerics. No discrimination. Adding in some form of ambient threat (even if it must be managed!) would be fantastic. We already have this to a small degree with Void Knight's Surge, but I feel the area of effect is too small when compared to a Justicar. Reaver's ground targeted corruptions will go a long way into helping get ranged threat, and I don't mind the extra work at all, I just want to be able to reach 70% of what a Justicar can do (again even if I must work a ton to manage it).

I agree that It is one thing to be a preferred soul for an encounter and quite another to be the ONLY soul for an encounter. I want all of the callings including the upcoming Mage one to be in the conversation when considering which soul to use on each encounter. I'm also all for giving skilled players options to excel and show off their prowess.

It looks like people seem to be after some kind of way to make them a viable target for DPS players, which should never be the case.

I'll disagree that this shouldn't be the case. The core function of a tank is to absorb and mitigate damage while protecting the rest of the party. So, the question is, how do we get people to want to attack tanks instead of just going for the healer first?

Makes sense. The whole "sacrifice your mitigation to increase your mitigation" deal was always a bit awkward. The Accords would just be offensive, mobility etc buffs rather than for it's core tank stats. Leaving pacts to ne more freely spent to fuel it's cooldowns or heavy hitting abilities (pacts should definitiely remain a central mechanic to the soul however!).

You and I are on the same page here, Kedon. This is what I'm aiming for with the change.

[archaionfm]

I agree that It is one thing to be a preferred soul for an encounter and quite another to be the ONLY soul for an encounter. I want all of the callings including the upcoming Mage one to be in the conversation when considering which soul to use on each encounter. I'm also all for giving skilled players options to excel and show off their prowess.

im inclined to ask how you feel about tank compositions for fights that arent intended so to speak (single tank inyrkta is the most relevant example, though u can also single tank thrax, 2 tank volan). are you aiming to normalize tanks in a way that allows all of them, with proper cd usage, to tank in that way or is it going to remain a by product of certain cds like defer death/scatter on inyr for example? obv i know inyr can be single tanked by a cleric too but rogue makes it significantly easier.

You and I are on the same page here, Kedon. This is what I'm aiming for with the change.

a while ago there was an idea thrown out about having pacts provide their respective mitigation effects up to 5 pacts only, leaving the other 5 for strategic cd/dps usage. i liked that idea as it made vk dps require a more strategic thought process.

[Sedvick]

a while ago there was an idea thrown out about having pacts provide their respective mitigation effects up to 5 pacts only, leaving the other 5 for strategic cd/dps usage. i liked that idea as it made vk dps require a more strategic thought process.

This was discussed and shot down. The problem lies in the fact that people would think pacts are a useless mechanic, so "why have pacts at all" comes into the picture.

[Kronos v]

I'll disagree that this shouldn't be the case. The core function of a tank is to absorb and mitigate damage while protecting the rest of the party. So, the question is, how do we get people to want to attack tanks instead of just going for the healer first?

*cough*Defiler*cough*
unfortunately, the answer commonly used by other MMOs is unsuitable to rift, due to the abilities being either wide spread across all classes/souls (CC abilities), heavily invested in another class (rogue heal debuffs), or assigned to another soul in another class (defiler links).
we simply cannot utilise any of these without gutting every other class/soul in the game - to a lesser or greater degree.

now for a constructive suggestion that will likely be a lot of work for you:
how about giving tanks the ability to share certain of their attributes/abilities with allies?
kind of a soul binding thing. have rogue with a low pool of hit points, the tank can share his to increase the allies hit points, or grant his mitigation to a mage.

alternatively, a tank can assign a specific ally as soul bound. if an enemy attacks that ally, the tank receives buffed damage against that enemy, or attacking that enemy procs heals onto the soul bound ally.

[Killian26]

This was discussed and shot down. The problem lies in the fact that people would think pacts are a useless mechanic, so "why have pacts at all" comes into the picture.

If those offensive abilities that took pacts were worth the loss to DS then it would be worth it.

[Tookmyjob]

I'll disagree that this shouldn't be the case. The core function of a tank is to absorb and mitigate damage while protecting the rest of the party. So, the question is, how do we get people to want to attack tanks instead of just going for the healer first?

Currently, a healer could heal a tank to full HP (or very close) after the DPS players get close to killing the tank and then continue on as normal; this makes attacking a different target a much better option than attacking a tank. Killing the DPS players is still preferable to killing the tank.
I'm not saying that it couldn't be done, but overcoming this problem will be extremely difficult with the amount of healing going around.

Kronos' suggestions would give a decent incentive to attack a tank, but would require some pretty radical changes.



Maybe an AE damage interception skill, rather than targetted abilities? So the Tank's mere presence intercepts the damage done to nearby players.

[barakuen]

In regards to "getting players to hit tanks instead of healers"- as queried by Vladd, I've found vk to be quite effective at producing this effect.

You need to fulfil these requirements:
-You need to make your presence known
-You need to know where your healers are
-You need to be confident in the fact that your job is to agitate them enough to warrant them killing you

Now, for everyone who says- "Good Pvp'ers will kill the healers etc, avoid the tank"; I can't refute this statement, however, I would add that Good Pvp'ers would notice a good tanks presence--- but that statement really- counts for any good player out there. Generally, I find if you get abusive tells after tanking in warfronts or conquest-- you were quite effective.

I generally find that- disrupting the flow of fights can work quite well- in particular the first few fights when *everyone says don't hit X he is a tank"- this can be disrupted in 2 ways- pulling people into your raid/ out of range of their heals or pulling people away from their raid- ideally moving healers 30+meters behind the engagement- each method will inherently get you killed so its quite fun ... this can be expanded into pulling people into LoS, into water, occupying new resses- whilst utilising LoS/Positioning tactics yourself.

Before *grounded came into being* this was even more terrifying- so they will definitely kill you/target you- as long as you make yourself a target and not stick with the *HUGE clash* and have a dance party whilst tickling people.

-In regards to "swinging RNG parses"- isn't everyone Doping during major raid buffs? and praying to the Rift Gods?

-In regards to "the tank solutions"- is reaver still suffering from energy issues or was the ogcd change to corruptions lifted? Could a underlying issue with VK be the 'immunity that some mobs have to the summons?'--- What's the thought on damage redirection cds? e.g 3 seconds of all damage redirected?

To put my 2 cents of tanks in pvp- I think the "Player should be the Tank" not "Tank be the Player" i.e. Give the Tools and let the Player use them -rather than things that let the Tank (class) do Tanking for the Player. (I can flesh this out more if necessary, but I think I've passed this idea enough)

[Tookmyjob]

Ran out of edit timer...


For PvP tanks

An ability (toggled or lasts 20 seconds or whatever) that intercepts 30% of the damage done to up to 8 nearby allies within a 30m radius. The warrior receives 100% of the intercepted damage.


The warrior would need to use their own HP pool to keep the team alive and it would make attacking the tank worth while.

[Valnak]

I'll disagree that this shouldn't be the case. The core function of a tank is to absorb and mitigate damage while protecting the rest of the party. So, the question is, how do we get people to want to attack tanks instead of just going for the healer first?

Step 1: Make tanks squishier. A lot squishier. Not as squishy as a full on glass cannon, but something along the lines of a 61defiler/15justicar. So relatively difficult to kill, but not a waste of target like the current full tank specs. Make them a viable target, but not something you'd want to primary first.

Step 2: Introduce debuffs from taunts. 30% reduced damage, must hit the tank 3 times to remove this debuff.

Step 3: Make tanks do a lot more damage. Not the horrifically bad damage we have now, but like a melee-damage dealer light. Something where you can apply pressure but not really any burst. A DoT based-build would be perfect.

Step 4: Introduce a full on guard. Make this new guard at the 40 point level or higher in tank tree roots. 50% damage taken goes to warrior but ignores the tank's mitigation outside blocking. Make this guard damage blockable. This is a permanent buff that can be on only one player at a time. Unpurgeable.

Step 5: Introduce more utility to the tank souls. Pulls are a good start. The VK's shield other spells are great too. VK is really perfect as-is, Paladin/Reaver need a lot of help in this area. Maybe put some of the utility Rogues got from Warriors back into these tank souls.

Essentially what I'm describing is copying and pasting Warhammer tanks onto this.

[RoughRaptorsOld]

Step 2: Introduce debuffs from taunts. 30% reduced damage

Oh, you mean Subdue...

[Kronos v]

An ability (toggled or lasts 20 seconds or whatever) that intercepts 30% of the damage done to up to 8 nearby allies within a 30m radius. The warrior receives 100% of the intercepted damage.

30% x 8 = dead tank, no matter how many hit points the tank has.

[dday]

i really hate the idea of taunts, its bad enough playing with a dom on you imagine a dom and a tank on you. would make the game miserable.

i do like the idea of intercepting damage much like defiler. having cds to reduce aoe or increase HP would be cool as well. there is legit a ton of things that could be done to make tanks fun and worth playing, i dont think taunts is one of them but a lot could be done. start with making sub 25 points worth going into so we can get some hybrids back and actually play melee without a pocket healer

[Tookmyjob]

30% x 8 = dead tank, no matter how many hit points the tank has.

It doesn't take much of an imagination to adjust it.