People are talking in another thread about Rift's future being affected by other MMO's coming out soon. I think it will have little impact compared to the huge issue with the lack of people willing to play a tank or healer, from level 1-50.
It's bonus XP week, and I'm still sitting in queue for an hour or so for a tank or a healer. (I'm DPS) This is from L1-40. Same when queuing for T2's.
Then when you get a tank, at least half of the time they're terrible or don't work out. By the latter I mean suddenly they DC and never return (this happens often for some reason..). Or they make up some excuse, "can someone else tank because I'm not really geared for this". Lol. Also, Rifstalkers should not be allowed to tank without some kind of gear check made, only 1 out of 10 can actually tank, the rest get 2 shotted by everything.
Similarly for healers, I hear excuses like, "I probably won't be able to heal this I'm not geared enough". Or the second I switch to a heal role to rez someone, they make some excuse and suggest I heal. (And yet I do 3 times the DPS of everyone else which is a total waste)
SO..
I'm wondering why this isn't discussed that often on the forums. This is a huge problem with Rift and unless all you do is PvP, it's going to make the game get boring fast.
When I played Vanguard, all the classes were fun. My tank did great damage and gave the group some nice buffs (like a Warlord but without the huge 5 min restriction). My Disciple was a very good healer, gave nice support buffs, and did great damage as well.
What I'd like to see is Rift allow for tanks to do a lot more DPS. Something like the Berserker in EQ2. They tank well and do massive AE DPS. The Berserker relies more on damage for threat than abilities that generate threat. That is a great concept. Similarly the Disciple relies on the strength of their attacks and the combination of attacks, towards healing.
One change I'd like to see is Chlormancers given more AE damage and that it translates to more healing. So basically the more mobs you pull, the more healing a Chloro can dish out. And provide a threat transfer to their Synthesis, transferring a percentage of their threat to the target of their Synthesis. (Or maybe another activated ability that does this) And maybe give them an AE life based root, like roots coming out of the ground, that does not break on damage but has a 6 sec duration or something. Most of the time I see a tank charge in and there's always like 1 or 2 adds that run off to attack that bard giving the group buffs, or the healer, or the ranged DPS that started firing earlier, all of which are standing waaaaay in the distance to make the mob run as far away from the tank as possible. LMAO. Stuff like that, to make it more FUN to play as a healer, more things we can do that help in different situations.
The other concern I have is with the players. Most players I group with just can't create an effective role, or more than one role. And a lot of players refuse to acknowledge the importance of making a healing role so they can rez. So everyone has to run all the way back through a dungeon after a wipe, because they didn't want to pay the plat for another role, or be forced to play it (healer). Considering the inconvenience of running all the way through a dungeon every wipe, that says a lot towards people's aversion to healing.
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