Toogeloo Posted February 17, 2012 Share Posted February 17, 2012 (edited) Not that the game needs a Support class yet, but with new content, and tweaks to the balance, having two classes that have a Support/Utility role might open up, and since these classes offer nothing BUT dps at the moment, and to a large majority of the community, only one tree in each of them is really worthwhile, would it be out of line to suggest that the weaker dps tree be converted into some form of Support Tree that does a bit less dps, but buffs the raid and debuffs the encounters? This could open up possibilities to future content where some form of utility might be required for progression as well. Edited February 17, 2012 by Toogeloo Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
WarSiren Posted February 17, 2012 Share Posted February 17, 2012 Not that the game needs a Support class yet, but with new content, and tweaks to the balance, having two classes that have a Support/Utility role might open up, and since these classes offer nothing BUT dps at the moment, and to a large majority of the community, only one tree in each of them is really worthwhile, would it be out of line to suggest that the weaker dps tree be converted into some form of Support Tree that does a bit less dps, but buffs the raid and debuffs the encounters? This could open up possibilities to future content where some form of utility might be required for progression as well. I think it would make them more interesting, TBH. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
CogitoErgo Posted February 17, 2012 Share Posted February 17, 2012 Then I'd have to reroll. I always play the support class when it's an option. Wasn't one here so I rolled healer. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
rzrknight Posted February 17, 2012 Share Posted February 17, 2012 Not that the game needs a Support class yet, but with new content, and tweaks to the balance, having two classes that have a Support/Utility role might open up, and since these classes offer nothing BUT dps at the moment, and to a large majority of the community, only one tree in each of them is really worthwhile, would it be out of line to suggest that the weaker dps tree be converted into some form of Support Tree that does a bit less dps, but buffs the raid and debuffs the encounters? This could open up possibilities to future content where some form of utility might be required for progression as well. Would be a good idea ... but i cant imagine the amount of trouble BW would have to go so this is balanced ... i mean really this would be OP if not well polished. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Razot Posted February 17, 2012 Share Posted February 17, 2012 (edited) Yes they should.. You know all that CC getting tossed around, remove most of it from the heal/dps and tank/dps specs and have viable specs for the dps classes that offer CC and utility. Obviously you cant just leave classes with no CC like Sorc/Sage get some push backs and melee gets some snares but the hard CC should be bought and payed for with skill points. CC should cost something and those classes will be more needed and viable in groups both in PVE and PVP when or if dual spec ever comes to TOR, as of now it wont benefit the dps classes at all. Edited February 17, 2012 by Razot Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Lord_of_Stone Posted February 17, 2012 Share Posted February 17, 2012 An interesting suggestion I think. Maybe. I think it would some a lot of issues with grouping, but maybe create a lot of balance issues too. It would take a lot of work to work out the kinks. TBH, after leveling my sniper to 50, all my classes are now either tank or heals. Its simply too hard to find a group with dps. Its fun though, my sage is always in demand, and so is my vanguard. Its odd, you would think that since companions make solo play a lot more viable for healers and tanks than in other MMOs, you would see more of them. But for some reason, i see less:confused: idk. I would love to explore the reasons behind it. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
areto Posted February 17, 2012 Share Posted February 17, 2012 An interesting suggestion I think. Maybe. I think it would some a lot of issues with grouping, but maybe create a lot of balance issues too. It would take a lot of work to work out the kinks. TBH, after leveling my sniper to 50, all my classes are now either tank or heals. Its simply too hard to find a group with dps. Its fun though, my sage is always in demand, and so is my vanguard. Its odd, you would think that since companions make solo play a lot more viable for healers and tanks than in other MMOs, you would see more of them. But for some reason, i see less:confused: idk. I would love to explore the reasons behind it. I think people are just a little scared to tank or heal. For some reason they have a much greater feeling of responsibility, maybe because if you do badly it's more visible, idk. A lot of sorcs I've noticed won't even heal for black talon at level 10 ( I level at lot of characters to 10 for some reason). And with tanking you really do need to take a leadership role and control the pace and watch a lot of things so I can understand that. But maybe I don't know what I'm talking about lol. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Azumio Posted February 17, 2012 Share Posted February 17, 2012 I think people are just a little scared to tank or heal. For some reason they have a much greater feeling of responsibility, maybe because if you do badly it's more visible, idk. A lot of sorcs I've noticed won't even heal for black talon at level 10 ( I level at lot of characters to 10 for some reason). And with tanking you really do need to take a leadership role and control the pace and watch a lot of things so I can understand that. But maybe I don't know what I'm talking about lol. Tanking seems about the same as DPS, perhaps a little more pressure. Healing is where the high pressure is. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Lord_of_Stone Posted February 17, 2012 Share Posted February 17, 2012 Tanking seems about the same as DPS, perhaps a little more pressure. Healing is where the high pressure is. Thats for sure. Once you get a rotation down it gets hard core intense. Sage and sorc healers know what I'm talking about. When bosses enrage and your party is at half health, you got to act FAST. Operations are even crazier. I have a 50 heals and dps, and a 33 tank, and so far heals is the most intense by a long shot. In a completely good way. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
jdi_knght Posted February 17, 2012 Share Posted February 17, 2012 Sure. Although keep in mind that the Watchman/Annihilation tree for Sents&Maras already does buff the group to an extent through the group healing (and we don't even give up any dps for it - such a strong tree! ). Actually I'd be fine with ditching the Focus/Rage tree altogether (merge any of the decent stuff with Combat/Carnage imo) and replacing it with something a little more support-oriented (though I'd try to keep the new 3rd tree as simple-to-play). --- Oh and while I'm at it, I'd like to see a 4th tree for healing AC's (another healing tree, and sure, you could make it more support-oriented). Healers get about 0 diversity when it comes to choosing talents (with the slight exception of Sorc/Sage hybrid). On my healer it seems my choices and playstyle have already been determined for me - I'm yearning for another tree that plays a little differently. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
paul_preib Posted February 17, 2012 Share Posted February 17, 2012 Sure. Although keep in mind that the Watchman/Annihilation tree for Sents&Maras already does buff the group to an extent through the group healing (and we don't even give up any dps for it - such a strong tree! ). Actually I'd be fine with ditching the Focus/Rage tree altogether (merge any of the decent stuff with Combat/Carnage imo) and replacing it with something a little more support-oriented (though I'd try to keep the new 3rd tree as simple-to-play). --- Oh and while I'm at it, I'd like to see a 4th tree for healing AC's (another healing tree, and sure, you could make it more support-oriented). Healers get about 0 diversity when it comes to choosing talents (with the slight exception of Sorc/Sage hybrid). On my healer it seems my choices and playstyle have already been determined for me - I'm yearning for another tree that plays a little differently. I have to agree wholeheartedly here. I have made four classes total (unless you count those still sitting on starter planets) with one being at 50. Of those 3 of the 4 have the potential to heal and yet as someone who has always played a dedicated healer as his main in MMO's I have spent a lot of time in their dps trees. The utility/diversity given to the offensive side of classes is fun and varies. Yes technically my commando can pretty much use a rotation of 3-4 abilities fairly effectively, but there's a time and place for a dozen other items. My Sorc (the 50) and sage are the one's I have the most experience actually healing with. Traited fully for healing I am still have basically six abilities. This isn't bad but it does feel a bit... lacking. As much as I hate bringing "other game's have X" into play I do like to illustrate the game I played prior to SWTOR for a nice example of what I like in a dedicated healer-- I played LOTRO and my main was a minstrel. There were three trees, one was damage, one was buff-utility centric, one was direct-heal centric. In your average instance run I would end up utilizing something in the neighborhood of 12-18 different abilities with frequency (rolling different buffs, oh-crap cooldown heals, short heals, insta-short cooldown heals, traditional direct 1-2 second cast heals, etc.). There was a host of things you could do, as well as a host of ways you could effectively play. You could play it half a dozen different ways and still be quite effective in any one of them. I feel quite pigeonholed with the sorc. healing mechanics thus far and from what I've read they are actually supposed to be among the more diversified. It's a shame, I love healing generally and enjoy this game tremendously, but healing and this game just haven't jibed that well for me thus far. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Nitewolfe Posted February 17, 2012 Share Posted February 17, 2012 Not that the game needs a Support class yet, but with new content, and tweaks to the balance, having two classes that have a Support/Utility role might open up, and since these classes offer nothing BUT dps at the moment, and to a large majority of the community, only one tree in each of them is really worthwhile, would it be out of line to suggest that the weaker dps tree be converted into some form of Support Tree that does a bit less dps, but buffs the raid and debuffs the encounters? This could open up possibilities to future content where some form of utility might be required for progression as well. NO! one of the reason i like gunslinger is that i can NEVER be asked to do any thing BUT dps! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
paul_preib Posted February 17, 2012 Share Posted February 17, 2012 Not that the game needs a Support class yet, but with new content, and tweaks to the balance, having two classes that have a Support/Utility role might open up, and since these classes offer nothing BUT dps at the moment, and to a large majority of the community, only one tree in each of them is really worthwhile, would it be out of line to suggest that the weaker dps tree be converted into some form of Support Tree that does a bit less dps, but buffs the raid and debuffs the encounters? This could open up possibilities to future content where some form of utility might be required for progression as well. There are a few aspects to this that may be a bit of a concern. Primarily right now pve endgame is already very non CC centric, so adding that utility aspect as a primary focal point would require a significantly different approach to designing content. Paired with that is the fact that the primary PVP venue right now are warzones, which are objective-based (take/defend points, capture the flag/ball) and a class built around CC-centrism would cause a lot of angry mobbers in the pvp world unless they revamped Resolve in which case it would be tough to spruce it up while keeping that CC-heavy class relevant. Other group utility is an interesting aspect however and fairly untapped thus far. Eying again a different MMO I had played one of the classes had very good aoe damage (when specced for damage) coupled with being very utility centric. This made it great for solo leveling and on trash pulls that didn't need the utility to come into play, but then made up for its limited single-target sustained damage by having boatloads of group-benefitting utility. The only tough part I see from that front however could be the limiting factor of the small group size. The traditional instance/dungeon/flashpoint group in said other one was 6 people, thus there was room to shoe in pure utility. With a four man group that would make things especially awkward with say an enrage fight unless the group is already extremely well geared. I like the idea of things like the buffs, potential minor offhealing, perhaps resource (force/energy/ammo/heat/etc.) replenishment, etc. just hard to see where they'll fit in. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
jdi_knght Posted February 17, 2012 Share Posted February 17, 2012 (edited) NO! one of the reason i like gunslinger is that i can NEVER be asked to do any thing BUT dps! I don't believe the OP is suggesting that all gunslingers be forced into a support role by any means. Just that 1 talent tree be changed to be support-oriented. Presumably, 2 of the 3 trees (the 'strongest' ones, whatever they happen to be for gunslingers) would remain pure dps, and you'd have to intentionally spec into the 3rd tree to get the support abilities. In addition, people have different ideas as to what 'support' would actually entail. Sure, it could mean extra things you have to actively do do, though it could also simply mean that just by DPSing you buff the group via procs/triggers/etc on your damaging abilities. Edited February 17, 2012 by jdi_knght Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
ChicksDigHarleys Posted February 17, 2012 Share Posted February 17, 2012 Its odd, you would think that since companions make solo play a lot more viable for healers and tanks than in other MMOs, you would see more of them. But for some reason, i see less:confused: idk. I would love to explore the reasons behind it. The DPS trees are just so much better than the tank and heal trees. There is absolutely no contest in leveling ease of DPS Sages/Sorcs over heal spec, and ditto DPS Tanks over tanky tanks, except maybe for Shadows/Assassins. Not saying any class or spec combo in this game is hard, but still... Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Toogeloo Posted February 17, 2012 Author Share Posted February 17, 2012 Once you get a Heal Companion, leveling as DPS is much faster than any other spec. Conversely, I did level as Immortal Jug and used Vette for DPS, and had very little down time as well. I had the slower time leveling as Healer with a DPS companion though. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
-Fritz- Posted February 17, 2012 Share Posted February 17, 2012 obviously if you want to level fast taking a DPS route is going to yield the best results. the game is designed so for the most part you can solo everything you need to with nothing more than some med packs really. adding defensive or heal talents does not increase kill speed. The main reason i would see someone leveling in those specs is mainly for the experience of playing those specs so when you got high level and respec you were not a complete noob all of a sudden.... Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Caelrie Posted February 18, 2012 Share Posted February 18, 2012 (edited) They don't need it. NO! one of the reason i like gunslinger is that i can NEVER be asked to do any thing BUT dps! For this reason. Some players don't want the option to tank, be support or heal, and there need to be classes for those players. Edited February 18, 2012 by Caelrie Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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