Nerf Guard!

[Schoock]

That said, however, I respect rafis opinion. We are two of the few who actually try to play like tanks in pvp.

 

Too bad I seem to be the last one around to not only play like a tank, but actually play one.

[KendraP]

Too bad I seem to be the last one around to not only play like a tank, but actually play one.

 

Don't you play a healer?

 

And my days doing things in swtor out of idealistic nobility died 15 times in hypergates.

 

Rafi can make that comment, strangely we've been able to have intelligent discussions on the subject even though we disagree on gearing. It's why, despite disagreeing, I respect his opinion.

 

Make tank gear noticeably help me and I'll swap.

[Schoock]

Don't you play a healer?

 

Strange as it sounds, I try to play all roles. True enough, I play tank the least, but when I do, I do it as a tank.

 

And my days doing things in swtor out of idealistic nobility died 15 times in hypergates.

 

Please repeat that like 25 more times, I'm not sure I quite get that you got farmed once and since you went boohoo mode.

 

Rafi can make that comment, strangely we've been able to have intelligent discussions on the subject even though we disagree on gearing. It's why, despite disagreeing, I respect his opinion.

 

So if I'm nice and put a smiley at the end of every post, will you respect my opinion too? :cool:

 

Make tank gear noticeably help me and I'll swap.

 

No. Tanking is already strong enough when played in its intended setup. If you want to be even better than skanking "to be worth switching", you're out of your mind.

[KendraP]

Strange as it sounds, I try to play all roles. True enough, I play tank the least, but when I do, I do it as a tank.

I play all roles too. I play tank most, in pve or pvp.

Please repeat that like 25 more times, I'm not sure I quite get that you got farmed once and since you went boohoo mode.

well if you'd read my several other hundred posts on the subject you'd know it wasn't just once. In fact, I wouldn't talk about just once because it doesn't speak to a pattern

 

So if I'm nice and put a smiley at the end of every post, will you respect my opinion too? :cool:

That has nothing to do with why i respect rafi. We have disagreements, but we can talk about them reasonably.

 

No. Tanking is already strong enough when played in its intended setup. If you want to be even better than skanking "to be worth switching", you're out of your mind.

 

I want tank stats to be meaningful. So long as their effect is minimal or meaningless I have no reason to do anything other than maximize endurance and damage. Give me a reason to voluntarily reduce damage and I will. In the meantime, skanking is the best way to tank, however much I personally hate it.

[Schoock]

Give me a reason to ...

 

... I personally hate it.

 

There's your reason.

[KendraP]

There's your reason.

 

not good enough any more. I'm going to do what's best for my team, and not hamstring them out of nobility. Do I like tanking karagga in vigi? no. do i do it if the team is that bad? yes.

[Schoock]

not good enough any more. I'm going to do what's best for my team, and not hamstring them out of nobility. Do I like tanking karagga in vigi? no. do i do it if the team is that bad? yes.

 

I'm going to take this quote and post it in the Urban Dictionary under the term "FotM Tryhard".

 

Oh, well. Regs are serious business after all.

[KendraP]

I'm going to take this quote and post it in the Urban Dictionary under the term "FotM Tryhard".

 

Oh, well. Regs are serious business after all.

 

i've been a guardian tank main since pre 2.0 dude

I play regs because I enjoy it, but keep insulting me by all means, it contributes to your argument

[Rafiknoll]

So are you talking about damage reduction or shield chance, because you say damage reduction, but then later on talk about a 20% chance to reduce 24% damage, which is not at all how damage reduction works. Either way it seems like a bad idea to me to reduce damage reduction while guarding, that's very punishing to tanks, since damage reduction is your most reliable form of mitigation.

 

You misunderstand me (maybe I should have explained myself better), I meant that if damage reduction is down, all you are left with is the shield's chance of damage absorption, which means the total damage reduction (besides whatever left from the armor, in this example I considered it 0) would be (without tank stats as we are discussing full skank) approx 20% shield chance and 24% absorb. It means that skanks that rely mostly on their armor damage reduction lose almost the entire leverage they have other pure DPS, and tanks who rely on it much less because their shield means something lose less. When saying damage reduction is the most reliable form of mitigation, well, it is the only form of mitigation in common for skanks and real tanks, so that might cause the confusion. Tanks who have good shield and absorption rely less on the damage reduction. This change will nerf the real tanks too of course, but not too much. And if they need to add a defensive utility for it, rather than take 25% AoE increase, its a small cost to pay (and to be honest I already take the defensive anyway, because I usually prefer the sole node-captor or node-guard role).

 

His idea would work if shield works the way he says it does. The issue is this touches on an area we disagree on. I've tried what I think is the same or very similar gearing strategy to the one he uses in pvp and noticed no difference in survivability even under focus.

 

Odd, unless you happened to fight only DoTs and lightning specs or didn't balance the stats the same, the only reason I can think of is a major difference between assassins and juggs, or a major difference in our playstyle. If it is the 1st one, I might get to it when I eventually do a jugg tank (didn't in a long time, might return to it once I am satisfied with the operative). If it is the 2nd then it is simply the fair conclusion that there is no singular correct answer (though we both agree there SHOULD be, considering the current situation enables DPS who go skank, and not only tanks who go skank).

 

Too bad I seem to be the last one around to not only play like a tank, but actually play one.

 

In this long discussion, what made you think I don't play tank? Or do you truly play with the pure default 248 tank gear, using tank relics and tank mods and everyone who doesn't do that is not a "real" tank?

Well, even if this is the gear BioWare intended for tanks, I switched it out for the setup I currently have (lethal mods B, DPS relic, tank enhancements with high endurance) for PVE reasons, because it works there better, and then I use the same gear in PVP.

 

So if I'm nice and put a smiley at the end of every post, will you respect my opinion too? :cool:

Let me remove the unnecessary parts: "So if I'm nice and put a smiley at the end of every post, will you respect my opinion too?". Well, practically... yes? Is that a surprise that people respect the opinion of people they respect, and people respect people who respect them? (far more than they respect people who wave achievements or rating and demand respect for it *looks at rating farmers *)

 

The thing is that even when disagreeing with an opinion, in the worst case (if it is truly stupid) I will "attack" or "offend" the opinion and that I will do while not using adjectives that I think about it ("what you are saying is stupid"), but the reasons that I think them (Let the readers see his, see mine, and decide how stupid is which side. Declarations are unnecessary). Might involve some cynical humor, but that is the limit. And (that might be the most important part: ) I don't ever insult the man behind the opinion. It is amazing to see how few are the people who can separate a man from his opinion, who can think to themselves "His opinion in the matter might be stupid, but that doesn't make him stupid" and therefore don't say that, imply that, or even assume that when replying.

[in fact, not only do people consider others stupid for saying things that can be logically disproved (making them illogical), they also consider people stupid for having misinformation or not having all information. Well, knowledge doesn't work that way. A stupid man can know a fact if he is told it, and another smart guy will not know it because he didn't happen to learn it. As much as it would be totally dumb to call someone stupid for not knowing who the current president of Israel is, it is dumb to consider someone stupid if he doesn't know how exactly does the scoring in hypergate works.]

 

When people counter an opinion and not the guy behind them, it is up to the other side to be mature enough to see the separation has been made and not personally take offense on behalf of his opinions. KendraP understands this and therefore our disagreement is completely non-offensive and civil. Others might not understand it, be offended and then start "fighting back" offensively and directly against me as a human, and not impartially against my opinion, and this is where the insults go to the next level and the original argument lost the chance to ever progress. It is sad when it happens, but I know this is not my fault when it does [sometimes it ends with a report, and the thread loses 10 pages of conversation eventually]. If, however, I would give a guy the impression that he is stupid for having a stupid opinion, then I am responsible for the fight that is going to happen if he retaliates, even if he overdoes this.

 

The style of writing, number of smileys or number of grammatical or spelling errors has nothing to do with how seriously you are taken. The content does but is not the main factor. But if a post gives any of the following impressions: "I am superior to you in skill/knowledge and you talk nonsense"/ "You are totally dumb if you think so"/ "I may not be so good but you are the definition of bad"/ "I am the only one whose opinion matters" (disclaimer, all the above are extreme exaggerations, rarely see people who truly sound like that. Just using extremes because it is the easiest way to describe the general theme), then you invite everyone who disagrees to take direct offense ("if you call him stupid for thinking XYZ, then you call me stupid as well because I think so too") and retaliate offensively, targeting your intelligence, sanity or skill in-game (The only one time that I directly offended someone's in-game skill was because it was an integral part of his argument, else it has no value in a conversation) rather than progressing the argument. This means that your argument gets less attention, therefore I suppose you could say it is taken less seriously.

 

From one adult to another, some of your posts give the impression of some superiority, and sometimes also involve the inferiority of the other side. And you give equal or greater weight to looking down at the opposition compared to the weight given to the actual arguments. Just for example, I will take post 278#:

Strange as it sounds, I try to play all roles. True enough, I play tank the least, but when I do, I do it as a tank.

 

Please repeat that like 25 more times, I'm not sure I quite get that you got farmed once and since you went boohoo mode.

 

So if I'm nice and put a smiley at the end of every post, will you respect my opinion too? :cool:

 

No. Tanking is already strong enough when played in its intended setup. If you want to be even better than skanking "to be worth switching", you're out of your mind.

 

Breakdown:

Casual answer to a question (though I personally smell a slight "I play tank right and no one else does")

Explicit or implicit insults of KendraP's forum behavior (specifically: repetitions), or KendraP's way of thinking (specifically: respecting me more than you) or KendraP's mind because of the opinion about tanks (which is the exact point where the 2 of us disagree, but none of us offended the other. And why couldn't it directly be against the opinion, why was the "you're out of your mind" necessary?).

An argument for the discussion in the thread which is maybe the most relevant piece of your post. But why does it get so little attention? Why not explain the argument and give reasons instead of dropping it just as a leverage for another explicit insult? The argument (and the answer to the question) could have been the entire post and then the conversation would be more civil and the important stuff would get all attention (because there is nothing else).

 

Again, from one adult to another. I am not saying anything about you, I am talking about the forum behavior. And I am seriously interested in hearing your reasons for why is "Tanking is already strong enough when played in its intended setup" because I think the same and was unable to convince KendraP by myself.

Edited February 5, 2018 by Rafiknoll

[Schoock]

And I am seriously interested in hearing your reasons for why is "Tanking is already strong enough when played in its intended setup"

 

Trinity:

Damage Dealer: Hurt enemies

Tank: Reduce incoming team damage, obstruct enemy damage dealers

Healer: Restore lost health

 

Two of the above three are played according to their role. Even if Operatives throw an offheal and healers help out with bursting every now and then, their contributions in this regard are, on an overall scale, minimal.

 

Tank specs in the current situations are not only able to do their supposed role properly, but their damage contribution is way more than minimal. Just in another thread a skank doing 9.8k damage got posted, which is ridiculous. (Not the player doing it ofc, but the system that allows that.) You can say it's just "AoE fluff", as many people do, but not only that "AoE fluff" does kill, it it also that when this place was ripe with the "nerf healers" threads, somehow nobody called those numbers "AoE fluff", when they just as much were.

 

Now, onto the topic of "Tanking is already strong enough when played in its intended setup".

 

If we accept that the purpose of a tank is to be able to take more of a beating and protect their mates, you can see from the current meta of skanking that almost none of that power comes from tank stats. What you wear is, from the point of tanking, unimportant; hence why everyone and their grandma puts on DPS gear nowadays.

 

Here's the part you were asking about: even though tank gear doesn't really help you in becoming a better tank, it also doesn't make it worse. So you might as well. Especially if you, like KendraP, repeatedly talk about how you hate skanking. (You said you run high endurance DPS gear, because HP helps with survivability. I'm not sure, maybe. But there's high HP tank gear too, so once again, this does not favor either gearing strategy.)

 

So why does everyone still run DPS gear? Because it allows you to take on an additional role, beyond being a tank. Why would you not be a 2 in 1 when you can, without any penalty? Being able to put pressure on the enemy team and do significant damage only helps your group, no doubt, but it's not part of tanking. It's what damage dealers do. (In turn, if you kill the reds or make them run, in the end you do reduce incoming damage, but that's not exactly the way how a tank should function.)

 

I really want tank stats to be useful (Defense work against F/T and Shield against crits), but that's not what we're talking about here. If anyone says that pure tanks should be buffed so hard that switching to them would make it worth even without reducing the effectiveness of skanking, I'm going to call that person being out of their mind. Period. (Also, I don't think tanking needs a buffing. All my experience says that, as far as team protection is concerned, I can function just as well as a skank on a pure tank. Sure I don't do nearly as much damage hence pressure as a skank, but once again, it's not (shouldn't be) my job. It's what we have damage dealers for. If you run tank geared tank and you experience difficulties keeping your mates alive, please speak up.)

 

Look, I really don't care how anyone plays their toons. Most people skank, simply because it's more effective. I despise that skanks can do multiple roles in one, so I don't skank. But I don't come to the forums telling everyone how I very very much hate skanking, really, very, but I still skank cuz that's FotM and what can I do, I must be FotM. I also don't tell people that once I got on the wrong end of the "getting farmed" stick and since I put that in every post of mine as a proof that skanking is the only way to play this game. While running with a pocket healer, possibly in double premades. In regs.

 

It's like condemning alcoholics while drunk. You can do it, but it has the word "hypocrisy" written all over it.

Edited February 5, 2018 by Schoock

[AdjeYo]

You misunderstand me (maybe I should have explained myself better), I meant that if damage reduction is down, all you are left with is the shield's chance of damage absorption, which means the total damage reduction (besides whatever left from the armor, in this example I considered it 0) would be (without tank stats as we are discussing full skank) approx 20% shield chance and 24% absorb. It means that skanks that rely mostly on their armor damage reduction lose almost the entire leverage they have other pure DPS, and tanks who rely on it much less because their shield means something lose less. When saying damage reduction is the most reliable form of mitigation, well, it is the only form of mitigation in common for skanks and real tanks, so that might cause the confusion. Tanks who have good shield and absorption rely less on the damage reduction. This change will nerf the real tanks too of course, but not too much. And if they need to add a defensive utility for it, rather than take 25% AoE increase, its a small cost to pay (and to be honest I already take the defensive anyway, because I usually prefer the sole node-captor or node-guard role).

Nerfing down damage reduction to dps levels while guarding is an absolutely enormous nerf. On top of taking 50% of the damage your guarded target is taking, all that damage is going to be hitting significanly harder too, that's ridiculous, might as well play vigi and slap on a shield generator at that point (okay slight hyperbole, but not that much even). I mean, why do you think Sins get a vastly higher shield and defense chance than the other tank, in addition to an hp buff? It's because their damage reduction is significantly lower (for instance my sin in 242 gear has about 46% DR with buffs rolling, while my jugg in mostly 248 gear gets about 54%). Now you're talking about bringing down that damage reduction to around 35% for my jugg, that's enormous, no amount of shield and defense you can currently get is going to make up for that. You do this and real tanks become less survivable than skanks are now.

[KendraP]

A. I'm the one who runs high endurance dps gear. Rafi runs his pve tank set. If you must attack someone stick to me. Rafi agrees with you far more than I do.

 

B. I could he completely off in my analysis of tank stats. That said I have tried it, and now in a manner that doesn't drop my health, and i almost always face an incredible amount of focus (my healer is good and quite hated on harby... um satele shan) and didn't notice a difference one way or another between the two. Believe me, I wish I could address why.

 

Before anyone tries to scream, yes I have play tested in both regs and ranked. Amazingly enough, this didn't make a difference.

 

Maybe I have some form of confirmation bias, but I did care enough to try. Therefore I wanted a fair opinion, not a validation of what I think (after all, if there's a way I can support my team more effectively that's my primary goal).

 

C. While I agree the DR reduction to dps levels would hurt, provided tank stats do as much as rafi claims I would accept the nerf to tanking. It's better than nerfing guard and taking our role away. That said, I feel more people have an issue with damage numbers from skanks, which complicates the analysis. A straight damage nerf would hurt pve, both aggro generation and damage dealt to bosses. This could force a rework of the entire Pve system, much like my request requires a rework of PvP. Unfortunately, I don't see either happening, meaning what we need is a solution that involves changing a number.

[AdjeYo]

A. I'm the one who runs high endurance dps gear. Rafi runs his pve tank set. If you must attack someone stick to me. Rafi agrees with you far more than I do.

I actually run my jugg tank in pvp with mostly high endurance crit/power gear, with shield implants/earpiece because those first couple hundred points in shield are pretty rewarding imo.

 

B. I could he completely off in my analysis of tank stats. That said I have tried it, and now in a manner that doesn't drop my health, and i almost always face an incredible amount of focus (my healer is good and quite hated on harby... um satele shan) and didn't notice a difference one way or another between the two. Believe me, I wish I could address why.

 

Before anyone tries to scream, yes I have play tested in both regs and ranked. Amazingly enough, this didn't make a difference.

 

Maybe I have some form of confirmation bias, but I did care enough to try. Therefore I wanted a fair opinion, not a validation of what I think (after all, if there's a way I can support my team more effectively that's my primary goal).

 

C. While I agree the DR reduction to dps levels would hurt, provided tank stats do as much as rafi claims I would accept the nerf to tanking. It's better than nerfing guard and taking our role away. That said, I feel more people have an issue with damage numbers from skanks, which complicates the analysis. A straight damage nerf would hurt pve, both aggro generation and damage dealt to bosses. This could force a rework of the entire Pve system, much like my request requires a rework of PvP. Unfortunately, I don't see either happening, meaning what we need is a solution that involves changing a number.

I understand he just wants to fix skanks and I think skanks should get nerfed. But a solution that makes a fully mitigation geared tank less survivable than a skank right now, is a solution I can't accept.

Edited February 5, 2018 by AdjeYo

[KendraP]

I actually run my jugg tank in pvp with mostly high endurance crit/power gear, with shield implants/earpiece because those first couple hundred points in shield are pretty rewarding imo.

So shield but no absorb? Interesting. Maybe I'll try it. The issue is I think I use at least one of those as absorb on my tank set... Oh well time to blow more credits play testing.

I understand he just wants to fix skanks and I think skanks should get nerfed. But a solution that makes a fully mitigation geared tank less survivable than a skank right now, is a solution I can't accept.

 

Well obviously I agree here. And since we gear pretty similarly as it is, we obviously have similar views on the situation. My preference would be for mitigation to be more obviously useful like it is in Pve. But unfortunately they probably aren't capable of reworking the system at this stage

[Schoock]

A. I'm the one who runs high endurance dps gear. Rafi runs his pve tank set. If you must attack someone stick to me. Rafi agrees with you far more than I do.

 

I'm pretty sure he said he runs high endurance DPS mods. And if he's running a PvE tank set, then he's not a skank, so there's nothing to attack about it.

 

Not that I attack skanks. I attack people who talk down skanks while still doing it themselves. You've stated your reasons, no need to repeat. I think we've discussed it in greater length than it deserves.

 

C. While I agree the DR reduction to dps levels would hurt, provided tank stats do as much as rafi claims I would accept the nerf to tanking. It's better than nerfing guard and taking our role away. That said, I feel more people have an issue with damage numbers from skanks, which complicates the analysis. A straight damage nerf would hurt pve, both aggro generation and damage dealt to bosses. This could force a rework of the entire Pve system, much like my request requires a rework of PvP. Unfortunately, I don't see either happening, meaning what we need is a solution that involves changing a number.

 

If you're saying that to me, you won't find a quote from me saying tanks are overtuned defensively and that they should be nerfed. I could even live with a slight buff to tank survivability as long as they stick to tank gear. I said skanks need a damage reduction, and I'll stick to this.

 

PvE aggro generated is really just a multiplier, they can change it to be any multiple of the damage dealt, I don't understand why you're bringing it up so much. As for PvE DPS I don't know how much leeway there is with the introduction of the new augments.

[KendraP]

I'm pretty sure he said he runs high endurance DPS mods. And if he's running a PvE tank set, then he's not a skank, so there's nothing to attack about it.

 

Not that I attack skanks. I attack people who talk down skanks while still doing it themselves. You've stated your reasons, no need to repeat. I think we've discussed it in greater length than it deserves.

 

Given how high defense rating tank gear is, plenty of people are running lethal B mods for pve. I've actually been told I didn't know what I was doing for running warding b mods (note for my play test I did a bunch of swapping around between gear sets trying to get it identical to rafis) . The same goes for the dps relics, it's incredibly common for tanks to do this in Pve as it helps with damage and aggro at little to no cost to survivability.

 

Short version: If someone is running shield/absorb rather than crit/alacrity, they're not a skank.

If you're saying that to me, you won't find a quote from me saying tanks are overtuned defensively and that they should be nerfed. I could even live with a slight buff to tank survivability as long as they stick to tank gear. I said skanks need a damage reduction, and I'll stick to this.

 

PvE aggro generated is really just a multiplier, they can change it to be any multiple of the damage dealt, I don't understand why you're bringing it up so much. As for PvE DPS I don't know how much leeway there is with the introduction of the new augments.

 

The slight buff to stick to tank gear is really all I'm asking for.

 

I bring up pve aggro generation because, unfortunately, that is the primary purpose of tanking in pve, and since pve and PvP are inevitably linked it is relevant to both discussions.

 

The fact that you agree with me on skanking needing DR shows that, fundamentally we agree on the issue of tank gear as well. The issue with straight DR is somehow nerfing so thst it only affects skanks, not mitigation tanks. Keeping in mind they run the same spec. So nerfing DCDs, passives, etc, affects both, not just one.

 

That's why I prefer they address the difference in mitigation between pve and PvP. What's different? Why is mitigation more effective in Pve? Would this working the same or similar result in ridiculous ttk in pvp? These are all questions that must be considered and for which there isn't, necessarily, an easy answer.

[Schoock]

I bring up pve aggro generation because, unfortunately, that is the primary purpose of tanking in pve, and since pve and PvP are inevitably linked it is relevant to both discussions.

 

Aggro generation is one of the few points where PvE and PvP have absolutely nothing to do with each other. You can halve the damage and double the threat generated by it, ending up with everything being the same as now.

 

The issue with straight DR is somehow nerfing so thst it only affects skanks, not mitigation tanks. Keeping in mind they run the same spec. So nerfing DCDs, passives, etc, affects both, not just one.

 

Juggs have 3 specs: 2 damage, 1 tank. If the tank one has too high damage and survivability at the same time (note the use of and), I really don't understand why you're talking about reducing the DR of skanks. Tank trees should have their DR left intact and their damage done reduced. Wanna do damage? There's 2 other specs for that.

 

That's why I prefer they address the difference in mitigation between pve and PvP. What's different? Why is mitigation more effective in Pve? Would this working the same or similar result in ridiculous ttk in pvp? These are all questions that must be considered and for which there isn't, necessarily, an easy answer.

 

AFAIK bosses don't crit and their M/R vs. F/T ratio is vastly different. They also don't mez your healer and burst you down, don't change their attacks based on what defensives you have (well, your average PuG doesn't do that either, but still), they don't wait out your defensives etc.

 

Would it result in some ridiculous ttk? No idea. That's what BW had a PTS for.

[KendraP]

Aggro generation is one of the few points where PvE and PvP have absolutely nothing to do with each other. You can halve the damage and double the threat generated by it, ending up with everything being the same as now.

 

My point was merely that damage and aggro are linked and that what affects PvP does in general also affect pve. While in theory this could work, they would probably then need to reanalyze every boss encounter for enrage timers, which they don't seem to be capable of.

 

And primarily it probably wouldn't encourage the skanks to swap because it doesn't address the issue of mitigation and shield/absorb gearing.

Juggs have 3 specs: 2 damage, 1 tank. If the tank one has too high damage and survivability at the same time (note the use of and), I really don't understand why you're talking about reducing the DR of skanks. Tank trees should have their DR left intact and their damage done reduced. Wanna do damage? There's 2 other specs for that.

Um obviously I know that guardians have 3 specs since I play 2/3 of them.

 

The issue in pvp is not from the spec doing too much damage: it's from tanks running dps gear. I was merely addressing someone else's idea in that comment, and it wasn't even really directed at you.

 

There's a reason no one runs a tank spec as a dps in ops. If it truly did the same damage for more survivability they would. As I showed with karagga numbers skanks do not in fact pull the same dps as a dps. Even in aoe situations dps wise vigi is vastly superior.

 

AFAIK bosses don't crit and their M/R vs. F/T ratio is vastly different. They also don't mez your healer and burst you down, don't change their attacks based on what defensives you have (well, your average PuG doesn't do that either, but still), they don't wait out your defensives etc.

 

Would it result in some ridiculous ttk? No idea. That's what BW had a PTS for.

 

Ok that's what I've read elsewhere for explanations on tank gear in pve as well. And yeah, point 2 is fairly obvious, that us after all one of the advantages of guard that the people in this thread want nerfed, it's ability to cooperate with a healer.

 

I agree it's something they'd need to test and ideally let us test on PTS, but to my knowledge they have a rather poor history at using PTS to test major changes.

[Elusive_Thing]

C. While I agree the DR reduction to dps levels would hurt, provided tank stats do as much as rafi claims I would accept the nerf to tanking. It's better than nerfing guard and taking our role away. That said, I feel more people have an issue with damage numbers from skanks, which complicates the analysis. A straight damage nerf would hurt pve, both aggro generation and damage dealt to bosses. This could force a rework of the entire Pve system, much like my request requires a rework of PvP. Unfortunately, I don't see either happening, meaning what we need is a solution that involves changing a number.

Enrage timers might be an issue, aggro generation is not, because the extra aggro granted by the tank stance could just be increased correspondingly without any impact on PvP whatsoever.

 

Edit: Nvm, this was already addressed.

Edited February 5, 2018 by Elusive_Thing

[Schoock]

The issue in pvp is not from the spec doing too much damage: it's from tanks running dps gear.

 

So make them unequip their gosh darn DPS gear already. If needed, by giving them a stacking debuff that reduces damage done by 50% for every non-tank mod equipped.

 

There's a reason no one runs a tank spec as a dps in ops. If it truly did the same damage for more survivability they would. As I showed with karagga numbers skanks do not in fact pull the same dps as a dps. Even in aoe situations dps wise vigi is vastly superior.

 

In PvE you rarely have a boss focusing a DPS, even rarer you have them mezzing the tanks/healers and hardswapping to a DPS. In PvE DPS also do not spend a considerable time out of fight running back, kiting, LoSing. In PvE you also often have close to perfect uptime, where in PvP you do not.

 

Even if dummy parses show a big difference between DPS of skanks and real DPS, the scoreboards at the end of matches say otherwise.

[KendraP]

So make them unequip their gosh darn DPS gear already. If needed, by giving them a stacking debuff that reduces damage done by 50% for every non-tank mod equipped.

What's wrong with giving them a slight benefit for using tank gear rather than adding in a nerf hammer? Either way this is a major change that requires play testing.

 

Are we including lethal b mods that pve tanks use? Dps relics that pve tanks also use?

 

Basically tank gear needs to be useful.

 

In PvE you rarely have a boss focusing a DPS, even rarer you have them mezzing the tanks/healers and hardswapping to a DPS. In PvE DPS also do not spend a considerable time out of fight running back, kiting, LoSing. In PvE you also often have close to perfect uptime, where in PvP you do not.

 

Even if dummy parses show a big difference between DPS of skanks and real DPS, the scoreboards at the end of matches say otherwise.

 

Even you explained to someone in a different thread thst dps on the board at the end of the match was calculated as damage done / match length. Since the match length is the same for everyone, it obviously benefits whoever has greater survivability. The karagga enrage timer with thst horrendous pug gave me an awesome chance to throw numbers around, all high because of reflect, but still numbers that are far more representative of dps potential than a WZ damage board.

 

I agree it shouldn't be theoretically possible, but the gearing issue addresses this point too.

Edited February 5, 2018 by KendraP

[Schoock]

What's wrong with giving them a slight benefit for using tank gear rather than adding in a nerf hammer? Either way this is a major change that requires play testing.

 

Are we including lethal b mods that pve tanks use? Dps relics that pve tanks also use?

 

Basically tank gear needs to be useful.

 

So fix tank gear, I'm all for it. But that alone won't fix the problem of skanks. It will still be rofl mode damage.

 

The 50% reduction was not really a serious idea, more just to illustrate the point that the skank damage nerf should be severe. Just like healer/damage specs don't gain any advantage from putting on tank gear, tanks shouldn't gain any advantages from damage gear.

 

The karagga enrage timer with thst horrendous pug gave me an awesome chance to throw numbers around, all high because of reflect, but still numbers that are far more representative of dps potential than a WZ damage board.

 

The scoreboard numbers are representative of the amount of each character does during a warzone. Those numbers either have to be healed up or they kill enemies. If a skank does as well as a dd in that regard, they've been equally effective. Just like you don't compare melee/ranged DPS at the end of the match based on their uptime.

[Rafiknoll]

KendraP answered quite well to most of the things directed at me, so I will not respond in a similar manner because it would simply be a repetition. Thanks KendraP

 

I will just repeat my gear in order to make sure there is no mistake here: I use tank armoring, lethal mod B (the total defense loss compared to warding mod B is 7%, total uselessness, I swapped to lethal to have easier aggro in PVE ), and steadfast and vigilant enhancements (which are high endurance TANK mods). I use mostly tank augments but spared some augs for crit because I was other-tanky and got diminishing returns.

My final defensive stats are (with class buff and stim and without rotational boosts such as dark ward): 151k endu, 30% def, 42% shield (I don't take more because it becomes 60% with dark ward which is already diminished by the majority of the 42% crit guys) and 50% absorb (goes up to 60% with dark bulwark, and can get +30% for 20 secs with recklessness). This is why I think I deserve the title "tanky". I use the same gear for any PvE content without switching a single thing and it works great.

 

Now, one thing that was not addressed is Schook's view of tanking. While I agree that tank's role is reducing the damage that the team takes, if he cannot be more nuisance than stuns, taunts and guard, he will not be worth attacking, he will be worth only CCing because he is extra-defensive and does little more than make other friends (who are more important because they actually heal or damage) half defensive as he is. He would be a form of lesser healer because the healer can react to burst and proact to sustained and burst, and the tank can only do the proacting part. The tank must also be fairly competitive versus a DPS when doing 1v1, as much as a healer and a DPS have a fair 1v1 and neither can squash the other.

 

Therefore, in order to be a nuisance worth attacking and have a 1v1 chance a tank must have the same D/DT as a DPS, and currently a fully 248 tank geared warding modded tank deals much much less damage than a DPS. Say that a tank takes 40% less damage, he will still die far sooner if he deals 60% less damage. D/DT (DT calculations include the self-healing capability) is too low for them. As I currently play my D/DT when fighting solo versus a DPS is quite equal to his unless he is a sorc, jugg or another of those who probably need some defense buff for the DPS specs. I deal 40% less than him, I take 40% less than him, fair duel. I have next to no chance to solo a healer, and he can't solo me, also fair

 

On the other hand skanks must not be able to reach the DPS potential of the DPS because some of the DR is on the armor which is not stat-consuming. Therefore balance is required, I don't know about a DR nerf, because that would force tanks to pick the utterly useless defense rating (really not worth the mod slot, even in PVE), but a cap on the offensive stat (cap crit at 33%, cap alac, then see if we need to cap power and mastery too), might be a solution to make skank simply not worth playing, making room for either real tanks or real DPS.

[Schoock]

snip

 

I can mostly agree with this. There's one small thing I wanna point out, namely

 

While I agree that tank's role is reducing the damage that the team takes, if he cannot be more nuisance than stuns, taunts and guard, he will not be worth attacking, he will be worth only CCing because he is extra-defensive and does little more than make other friends (who are more important because they actually heal or damage) half defensive as he is.

 

CC'ing support and blowing a dd/healer up is exactly what hardswitch is already about.

Edited February 5, 2018 by Schoock

[KendraP]

So fix tank gear, I'm all for it. But that alone won't fix the problem of skanks. It will still be rofl mode damage.

 

The 50% reduction was not really a serious idea, more just to illustrate the point that the skank damage nerf should be severe. Just like healer/damage specs don't gain any advantage from putting on tank gear, tanks shouldn't gain any advantages from damage gear.

 

See we can agree on some things! Here again, despite doing it, I agree 100%.

 

The scoreboard numbers are representative of the amount of each character does during a warzone. Those numbers either have to be healed up or they kill enemies. If a skank does as well as a dd in that regard, they've been equally effective. Just like you don't compare melee/ranged DPS at the end of the match based on their uptime.

 

Part of the issue is the way the dps is calculated, as I said. However, as I also just said, I agree it shouldn't be possible. If you account for actual combat time my vigi guardian pulls drastically better numbers every time (this is again, why I threw numbers out there).

 

As I've said here before and in the jugg forum more recently, my ideal solution is two fold: for the tanks improve tank stats usefulness in pvp. For the wannabee dps: equalize the survivability playing field a bit more.

 

Provided these were done, and we still think there's an issue, take rafis above suggestion on capping crit/alacrity. But I do not want this done without an improvement in the current usefulness of tank gear.

 

I also agree with rafis analysis on the functions of tanks in pvp. We are there to both protect and be a nuisance. One of the things I miss most in pvp going vigi is my hilt bash.