Jump to content

Official Juggernaut Questions


lMarlfoxl

Recommended Posts

What I don't understand is why the class rep for Juggs is someone who I've never seen post in the Jugg forums, instead of someone like ssfish who has been very active on here and provided great feedback for a long time now.

 

The fact it became a popularity contest where that player had his friends vote for him even though he's shown little care for the class on the forums in the past is sad... which is why the selection process was flawed to begin with. Oh well. Would have been nice if there was an additional forum activity requirement to be the rep, like at least 10 posts in this forum over the past 6 months.

 

Hopefully after we get our answers, they allow us to vote to remove the current class rep. I'm tempted to just post a new thread with the questions via consensus, but I think I have already done enough damage.

 

EDIT: http://www.swtor.com/community/showthread.php?t=660014

 

So that's how we got our class rep... disgusting. I'm disappointed in this process, these questions, everything. The vanguards and sorcs got awful answers because they had awful class reps (the vanguard questions were just terrible, and looked to be written by a 5-year old), and now we're in danger of facing the same thing. Sigh.

 

If the current PvE and general questions are switched to the original drafted ones quoted above, and a new pvp question is drafted up, that should be enough to satisfy everyone. The situation is entirely salvageable, but the rep hasn't showed his face since he posted these.

 

Likewise, the devs haven't posted here either because of the cantina event. I'm tempted to just start a new thread with the questions via community consensus, but I think I have caused enough damage as it is. If ssfish were to take the initiative and do that, the community would probably get behind him.

Edited by Marb
Link to comment
Share on other sites

  • Replies 115
  • Created
  • Last Reply

Top Posters In This Topic

What I don't understand is why the class rep for Juggs is someone who I've never seen post in the Jugg forums, instead of someone like ssfish who has been very active on here and provided great feedback for a long time now.

 

The fact it became a popularity contest where that player had his friends vote for him even though he's shown little care for the class on the forums in the past is sad... which is why the selection process was flawed to begin with. Oh well. Would have been nice if there was an additional forum activity requirement to be the rep, like at least 10 posts in this forum over the past 6 months.

 

Hopefully after we get our answers, they allow us to vote to remove the current class rep.

 

EDIT: http://www.swtor.com/community/showthread.php?t=660014

 

So that's how we got our class rep... disgusting. I'm disappointed in this process, these questions, everything. The vanguards and sorcs got awful answers because they had awful class reps (the vanguard questions were just terrible, and looked to be written by a 5-year old), and now we're in danger of facing the same thing. Sigh.

 

Holy f*****. That was bad. Oh, well....

Link to comment
Share on other sites

This is what happens when the developers don't monitor "elections" and who has contributed to the community.

Just like marshmallow(who is gone now), this individual most likely won due to his friends in-game and spamming/offering handouts.

 

Pure did no such thing. If people voted for him, its because he has been vocal on our server with other players. Which he was. He never offered handouts, or went around asking friends to vote for him.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

As for the PvP question:

 

No. It should stay like that, and that is a high level PvP perspective coming at that. A lot of you are PvE players who casually PvP, or at the very least, there are very few of you who do pvp at a high level. There is a huge difference in the perspective there because the damage output/healing output at that level of play isn't just significantly higher its likely twice as high if not more. Playing a jugg DPS in ranked is brutal because you can quite literally be globaled.

 

The problem with this assumption is that high level PvP is already properly balanced and only needs minor tweaks here and there. That is not the case whatsoever. In fact, many specs, and in some cases entire AC's, are excluded from high level PvP save for if the player has extraordinary skill because of the current balance in the game.

 

Marl's suggestion does nothing to address PvP balance, it simply boosts the "haves" (in this case Rage Juggernauts, which are just on the border of being a great PvP class in ranked and already are in solo/reg play) and does nothing for the "have-nots", such as Vengeance.

 

On top of this, the idea of the best PvP'ers is determined by many by who dominates in ranked matches, which is relating the team to the player, when that shouldn't be the case. It's like suggesting Robert Horry is better than LeBron James because he's won more championships.

 

The truth is, Horry is not better than LeBron, and even if you said LeBron is the best, he's still not the most suited to have a discussion on the rules of the NBA with, which is what you're suggesting by claiming Marl makes the best representative for Juggernauts for this reason.

 

If you didn't get my NBA analogy, apologies.

Edited by wadecounty
Link to comment
Share on other sites

The problem with this assumption is that high level PvP is already properly balanced and only needs minor tweaks here and there. That is not the case whatsoever. In fact, many specs, and in some cases entire AC's, are excluded from high level PvP save for if the player has extraordinary skill because of the current balance in the game.

 

Marl's suggestion does nothing to address PvP balance, it simply boosts the "haves" (in this case Rage Juggernauts, which are just on the border of being a great PvP class in ranked and already are in solo/reg play) and does nothing for the "have-nots", such as Vengeance.

 

On top of this, the idea of the best PvP'ers is determined by many by who dominates in ranked matches, which is relating the team to the player, when that shouldn't be the case. It's like suggesting Robert Horry is better than LeBron James because he's won more championships.

 

The truth is, Horry is not better than LeBron, and even if you said LeBron is the best, he's still not the most suited to have a discussion on the rules of the NBA with, which is what you're suggesting by claiming Marl makes the best representative for Juggernauts for this reason.

 

If you didn't get my NBA analogy, apologies.

 

I do get it, and you're wrong.

Nor does anyone think that it is "mostly" balanced. Rather, we know what classes are completely excluded, and we also know WHY.

 

 

And no, Rage juggernauts are absolutely not viable for either RWZ or RA. They are in the same spot that lethality operatives are at. Too squishy to do anything, but huge damage output. Vengeance juggs ARE viable for 4v4 arenas because they are just sturdy enough to pass when paired with a range that can peel for them. Vengeance is in a good spot for the upcoming patch, whereas Rage is not. You guys need to realize that balancing around regs, is how classes become unbalanced in the first place. You need to balance around the highest level play first, and everything underneath will fall into place much quicker.

For example, had BW paid attention to the last 6 months on Bastion where literally no team takes a sorcerer healer anymore and instead runs dual Oper heals.... Well maybe they would have balanced that a bit more. Same for Oper DPS, Sin DPS, Jugg DPS, PT DPS(hey they did at least fix this one up for arenas!).

 

Merc/Sorc/Sniper/Marauder are the only DPS classes that are particularly viable in the current build.

 

 

Regarding your NBA analogy, as a tank, if you are bad it will become immediately apparent. Pure is easily one of the best tanks on the server. Thats a non issue. At the level of play that Don't Panic and Hey im mvp play at, even one weak player would become immediately an issue.

Edited by Treblt
Link to comment
Share on other sites

Well, speaking for the juggernaut class, there is an obvious correlation between the amount of dps potential vs. survivability with each tree.

 

Rage spec is designed to do more dps than the other trees, and it does. It surpasses in both single target and aoe capabilities. This is good.

 

Vengeance spec does less overall damage, but has much better survivability. Depending on how the players choose to apply their attacks, well, that boils down to style and strategy.

 

Now. If you look at the dps/mitigation potentials of rage and vengeance( pvp context ), you will see that the specs are truly working as intended. It would be unfair to give vengeance the dps potential of rage and let it retain its defensive cooldowns. Same could be said for rage. That's why if vengeance gained dps potential, Rage would need more survivability. I'm sure that the developers did not design rage and vengeance to be balanced equations. Otherwise the different forms, would simply execute differently, but retain identical damage/survivability capabilities, and thus would become trivial.

 

In actuality, when one considers the context of how each spec must be played (solo pug or group play), you'll actually discover some unsuspected truths. Vengeance is actually incredibly easy to play in any context. Rage is easiest to play, but insurmountably harder to master.

Edited by UndyingHadyn
Link to comment
Share on other sites

Well, speaking for the juggernaut class, there is an obvious correlation between the amount of dps potential vs. survivability with each tree.

 

Rage spec is designed to do more dps than the other trees, and it does. It surpasses in both single target and aoe capabilities. This is good.

 

Vengeance spec does less overall damage, but has much better survivability. Depending on how the players choose to apply their attacks, well, that boils down to style and strategy.

 

Now. If you look at the dps/mitigation potentials of rage and vengeance( pvp context ), you will see that the specs are truly working as intended. It would be unfair to give vengeance the dps potential of rage and let it retain its defensive cooldowns. Same could be said for rage. That's why if vengeance gained dps potential, Rage would need more survivability. I'm sure that the developers did not design rage and vengeance to be balanced equations. Otherwise the different forms, would simply execute differently, but retain identical damage/survivability capabilities, and thus would become trivial.

 

In actuality, when one considers the context of how each spec must be played (solo pug or group play), you'll actually discover some unsuspected truths. Vengeance is actually incredibly easy to play in any context. Rage is easiest to play, but insurmountably harder to master.

 

There is a LOT of speculation in this post masquerading as fact. First and foremost, are you speaking in terms of only PvP or is it all unless otherwise specified? If you are also talking about PvE you are absolutely wrong, while this is from the Sentinel answers, it is our shared tree and it is a safe assumption that the philosophy behind the tree is not changed between the two advanced classes:

 

If Rage/Focus had the best burst damage, the best AoE damage, and the best sustained damage; then there would be very little to no incentive for a Marauder/Sentinel to ever spec anything else. Rage/Focus is the top burst spec for a Marauder/Sentinel, and that is by design.

 

Particularly, the fact that the argument that it is balanced and fine falls on its face when you consider that Rage Juggs are not in that great of a place either. Compare them to Marauders who have far superior defensive CDs but arguably, slightly less precise Shockwave generation due to having a longer CD on the free instant 3stack Shockwave - Frenzy>Berserk as opposed to Enrage and definitely have a lower damage output due to the lack of a main stat boosting talent. Which is more preferred though? The Jugg for his taunt or the Mara for his CDs?

 

Now this situation is reversed in PvE where Rage is really not viable in endgame for Maras (save for in a few very specific fights with very specific raid comps) but because of the variability of Vengeance DPS many Juggs chose to go Rage for all encounters thus either limiting their single-target DPS potential or pigeon-holing themselves into "add-duty". Some might argue that Snipers have a similar issue except that the single target DPS of their Engineering (the AoE heavy one, if my memory serves) is still very competitive and the size of the AoE allows for them to easily continue DPS on boss as well as adds.

 

Back to PvP though, I honestly do not use my Juggernaut for PvP. Let me say that again since in the past it has been misunderstood: I do not play my Juggernaut in PvP. That said, I find it hard to believe, given how simplistic Rage is for Marauders (I have played Rage on my Mara) that the skill cap is raised to such a high degree for Juggernauts with all of the same core abilities. Now, don't misunderstand me: there will always be a skill gap between bad players, good player, great players and truly amazing players. Look at a class where that skill cap is more easily identifiable: Sorcerers. A bad Sorc healer will constantly die because they just stand there and take the pounding. A good Sorc Healer will try to control the incoming damage and may be able to do a good amount of it but will still eventually fail. A great Sorc Healer will be the one you see constantly LoSing while still getting off heals and generally topping the healing charts. a truly amazing Sorc healer will be the one who is constantly out of your reach no matter what you do. That's all easily said but how many of us can actively accomplish it? Where is that difference for a Rage player? A bad Smasher simply smashes. A good Smasher gets multiple people with their smashes. A great Smasher will also be utilizing the downtime between smashes to control and pressure. An amazing Smasher will what? I've known some great damn Smashers but I honestly can't think of what that ultimate level would be that takes them from a great player to a truly amazing one.

 

As for Vengeance, it does have the passive survivability, yes, but there is still an issue with their ability to deliver damage effectively. The entire spec revolves around a 3 second channel. I can tell you for a fact that baddies will never stop you from getting off a Ravage, no matter what spec of Warrior you are. They sit there thinking "Oh gosh this isn't hurting. Oh wait that hurt. Oh its not hurting. Oh that hurt too! Never mind I should be fine. HOLY CRAP HOW DID HE KILL ME?! HACKER! OP! NERF!" Anyone who knows even a little about PvP will always stop a Ravage simply because it hits like a truck regardless of spec. At least in Carnage its not the entirety of your damage; you still have VT, FS, and Massacre all hitting 7k+ but thats not even close to true for Vengeance. The damage output to survivability is skewed way too far in favor of survivability.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

In respone to the complaints about the PvE and General questions, I actually had completely different questions and had asked the community to vote on them or tell me what they wanted. What I ended up getting was people complaining about what was wrong with them and that I should replace them with the two new questions that are currently up. The questions I had posted were in the *Not Final* thread and if you go back and read the posts you will find that I had the intention of posting those originally but I was told they were two lengthy and that these new questions were more direct. I read all the posts in that thread regarding the questions and the overall theme was that the Official Questions were better. Every time I had tried to get a concise answer about what needed to be asked, I had 10-15 people throwing in their own ideas about what the questions should be instead of helping to improve the current ones. Most of the time people's responses weren't even about the questions, they were more focused on arguing about what was wrong with the class and never giving me a clear indication on how to better revise the questions.

 

As for the PvP question let me start by saying that I have been playing my Juggernaut since launch and have played over a thousand rated matches. I have also played regular matches every day and have probably played thousands of them. When it comes to PvP I know my class very well and have had ample time to decide what the biggest issues are. The PvP question is absolutely the most important issue with the dps trees. My question does tend to lean a lot more towards the Rage Tree, but I did this for a reason. The reason being because the PvE question is primarily focused on Vengeance dps which also happens to be the biggest problem for the Vengeance Tree in PvP. So If the Rage Tree's Cooldowns were improved as well as the increase to Vengeance dps, I would be solving both problems.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Thanks for posting Marl.

 

It wasn't entirely your fault, and I had a part in this debacle. I think if you change the PvE and general questions back to your original drafted ones, a compromise would be reached.

 

The PvP question would require a new question, and we don't have the time to go through the draft process. Sticking to your guns on the current one would be an understandable position to take considering the circumstances.

Edited by Marb
Link to comment
Share on other sites

These are the old questions I had originally posted in the "Not Final" thread.

 

PvP

We the community believe that the most outstanding issue with the juggernaut dps tree's are their lack of adequate cooldowns with an emphasis on "Enraged Defense." In the Vengeance Tree "Enraged Defense" is arguably one of the best cooldowns for dps juggernauts. In the rage tree however it is almost useless when fighting 1v1 and incredibly useless when being focused by multiple enemies. A solution to the Rage Tree "Enraged Defense" would be to increase the amount of healing received by the skill or to make it similar to the Vengeance Tree "Enraged Defense." Also it will be extremely important to remove the resource cost of the skill and the resource cost while the skill is active in both trees. As it stands by using "Enraged Defense" for both trees you are inhibiting your ability to put out dps. We understand that in PvP scenarios rage juggernauts put out an incredible amount of pressure and damage, but the damage to survivability ratio is severely imbalanced. We also understand that juggernauts have the utility to taunt and mitigate damage to other players, but you can't taunt if you cannot survive.

 

Question: What solutions/thoughts does the combat development team have regarding the above issue?

 

PvE

Outside of an armor debuff, which can be applied by multiple other classes/role assignments, Juggernaut DPS has very limited group utility. Off-tanking or emergency tanking is not encouraged by any mechanics at end-game, and is not practical without sacrificing competency in our primary role as damage dealers. Similarly, abilities such as Enraged Defense and Intercede, will providing increased survivability, detract from our primary function as damage dealers (Intercede for using a global to do something other than damage and ED for the Rage cost), causing our already unimpressive damage potential to dip even further; they are also completely unneeded in end-game PvE.

 

With the current state of affairs with regards to class balance, a group would be better served bringing a Juggernaut tank, a Sniper, or a Mercenary for their armor debuff, due to other benefits provided by those classes/roles in addition to the armor debuff. This leaves Juggernaut DPS players without something that they can offer a group as far as utility abilities are concerned. Further, Juggernaut DPS is woefully lacking with the exception of one specific spec in one specific fight in the current tier of content.

 

Question: Is it intended that Juggernauts' damage output and group utility while using either of the DPS trees be sub-par due to the fact that we have the option of fulfilling the tank role?

 

General

Vengeance currently suffers from two distinctive problems which affect its performance in both PvP and PvE.

 

First is the dependency on the Rampage proc to refresh Ravage. Unlike many other specs, Vengeance can not refresh Ravage through ability spam, as both Impale and Shatter have significant cooldowns accompanied with a comparatively low proc chance of similar abilities (30%). Given the long 30 sec cooldown on Ravage, this creates great variance in damage performance when DPS and rage generation dip down due to a 'no proc' scenario.

 

Second is the fact that Ravage is a melee channel, and suffers from all the vulnerabilities that go with these types of abilities. Much of its damage can be avoided simply with movement (which leaves the Juggernaut outside of melee range) and it can be be shut down with mezzes, stuns, knockbacks, etc. This is a significant issue due to how little damage our filler abilities deal, leaving Vengeance at great risk of being shut down completely in group PvP environments after the initial Ravage (from unstoppable).

 

To be clear, the community enjoys Ravage and considers it the cornerstone of the spec.

 

Question: With this in mind, would the combat team consider making some changes to ensure Vengeance can more easily deal reliable and consistent single target damage in PvE and PvP?

Link to comment
Share on other sites

In respone to the complaints about the PvE and General questions, I actually had completely different questions and had asked the community to vote on them or tell me what they wanted. What I ended up getting was people complaining about what was wrong with them and that I should replace them with the two new questions that are currently up. The questions I had posted were in the *Not Final* thread and if you go back and read the posts you will find that I had the intention of posting those originally but I was told they were two lengthy and that these new questions were more direct. I read all the posts in that thread regarding the questions and the overall theme was that the Official Questions were better. Every time I had tried to get a concise answer about what needed to be asked, I had 10-15 people throwing in their own ideas about what the questions should be instead of helping to improve the current ones. Most of the time people's responses weren't even about the questions, they were more focused on arguing about what was wrong with the class and never giving me a clear indication on how to better revise the questions.

 

As for the PvP question let me start by saying that I have been playing my Juggernaut since launch and have played over a thousand rated matches. I have also played regular matches every day and have probably played thousands of them. When it comes to PvP I know my class very well and have had ample time to decide what the biggest issues are. The PvP question is absolutely the most important issue with the dps trees. My question does tend to lean a lot more towards the Rage Tree, but I did this for a reason. The reason being because the PvE question is primarily focused on Vengeance dps which also happens to be the biggest problem for the Vengeance Tree in PvP. So If the Rage Tree's Cooldowns were improved as well as the increase to Vengeance dps, I would be solving both problems.

 

Thanks. Well if that what the community wants then will go with it, but the responses will not be good unfortunately. They will be better than sorc's and VG anyway.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

These are the old questions I had originally posted in the "Not Final" thread.

 

PvP

We the community believe that the most outstanding issue with the juggernaut dps tree's are their lack of adequate cooldowns with an emphasis on "Enraged Defense." In the Vengeance Tree "Enraged Defense" is arguably one of the best cooldowns for dps juggernauts. In the rage tree however it is almost useless when fighting 1v1 and incredibly useless when being focused by multiple enemies. A solution to the Rage Tree "Enraged Defense" would be to increase the amount of healing received by the skill or to make it similar to the Vengeance Tree "Enraged Defense." Also it will be extremely important to remove the resource cost of the skill and the resource cost while the skill is active in both trees. As it stands by using "Enraged Defense" for both trees you are inhibiting your ability to put out dps. We understand that in PvP scenarios rage juggernauts put out an incredible amount of pressure and damage, but the damage to survivability ratio is severely imbalanced. We also understand that juggernauts have the utility to taunt and mitigate damage to other players, but you can't taunt if you cannot survive.

 

Question: What solutions/thoughts does the combat development team have regarding the above issue?

 

PvE

Outside of an armor debuff, which can be applied by multiple other classes/role assignments, Juggernaut DPS has very limited group utility. Off-tanking or emergency tanking is not encouraged by any mechanics at end-game, and is not practical without sacrificing competency in our primary role as damage dealers. Similarly, abilities such as Enraged Defense and Intercede, will providing increased survivability, detract from our primary function as damage dealers (Intercede for using a global to do something other than damage and ED for the Rage cost), causing our already unimpressive damage potential to dip even further; they are also completely unneeded in end-game PvE.

 

With the current state of affairs with regards to class balance, a group would be better served bringing a Juggernaut tank, a Sniper, or a Mercenary for their armor debuff, due to other benefits provided by those classes/roles in addition to the armor debuff. This leaves Juggernaut DPS players without something that they can offer a group as far as utility abilities are concerned. Further, Juggernaut DPS is woefully lacking with the exception of one specific spec in one specific fight in the current tier of content.

 

Question: Is it intended that Juggernauts' damage output and group utility while using either of the DPS trees be sub-par due to the fact that we have the option of fulfilling the tank role?

 

General

Vengeance currently suffers from two distinctive problems which affect its performance in both PvP and PvE.

 

First is the dependency on the Rampage proc to refresh Ravage. Unlike many other specs, Vengeance can not refresh Ravage through ability spam, as both Impale and Shatter have significant cooldowns accompanied with a comparatively low proc chance of similar abilities (30%). Given the long 30 sec cooldown on Ravage, this creates great variance in damage performance when DPS and rage generation dip down due to a 'no proc' scenario.

 

Second is the fact that Ravage is a melee channel, and suffers from all the vulnerabilities that go with these types of abilities. Much of its damage can be avoided simply with movement (which leaves the Juggernaut outside of melee range) and it can be be shut down with mezzes, stuns, knockbacks, etc. This is a significant issue due to how little damage our filler abilities deal, leaving Vengeance at great risk of being shut down completely in group PvP environments after the initial Ravage (from unstoppable).

 

To be clear, the community enjoys Ravage and considers it the cornerstone of the spec.

 

Question: With this in mind, would the combat team consider making some changes to ensure Vengeance can more easily deal reliable and consistent single target damage in PvE and PvP?

 

 

Let these badboys loose.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Having been thinking about Vengeance the last couple of nights, I almost think we would have been better off asking for an increase in our 3 bleeds in order for us to be more DPS capable. The reason I say that is even if you ask for the devs to revisit Rampage proc, Vengeance is still terrible if we have to move which is just about every boss fight. If you increase the bleed dmgs then you allow Vengeance to be more capable in overall dps but we then become a dps class that can dps on the move and not rely on standing still for ravage.
Link to comment
Share on other sites

Having been thinking about Vengeance the last couple of nights, I almost think we would have been better off asking for an increase in our 3 bleeds in order for us to be more DPS capable. The reason I say that is even if you ask for the devs to revisit Rampage proc, Vengeance is still terrible if we have to move which is just about every boss fight. If you increase the bleed dmgs then you allow Vengeance to be more capable in overall dps but we then become a dps class that can dps on the move and not rely on standing still for ravage.

 

 

Only bleeds that need a buff are Scream and Eviscerate. They scale quite poorly with gear. Tier difference is about 8 damage for them. I still think it would be best to make Draining scream a stacked debuff that increases the damage of the next X amount of Bleeds like Death Mark or Weakening Blast.

Edited by Luckygunslinger
Link to comment
Share on other sites

Only bleeds that need a buff are Scream and Eviscerate. They scale quite poorly with gear. Tier difference is about 8 damage for them. I still think it would be best to make Draining scream a stacked debuff that increases the damage of the next X amount of Bleeds like Death Mark or Weakening Blast.

 

I'm not necessarily concerned with how it's achieved, but I believe that increasing the bleeds is Veng best way to keep up with other dps classes.

Edited by metaIsaber
Link to comment
Share on other sites

I'm not necessarily concerned with how it's achieved, but I believe that increasing the bleeds is Veng best way to keep up with other dps classes.

 

 

I would disagree to be honest. Vengeance's bleeds feel like they were thrown in for the hell of it. It'll be better if they focus on pure straight up damage rather than DoT's.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Based on the answers given to sorcs, the simplest response to your #2 is "yes." The devs hybrid tax, as is apparent with every class that can fulfill two roles. Sorcs' damage is decrease because we can heal to full; operative and sin DPS specs are garbage and juggernauts can tank so Vengeance and Rage suffer in pve, while Rage is OP in pvp because marauders get it, too.
Link to comment
Share on other sites

×
×
  • Create New...