Thanks for moving it, and thanks for firing the flare gun. It's been a war zone for 20 pages, the smoke is clearing and there's still a sun up there. Further feedback: I've been raiding with a different guild for a little over a week now, doing the most difficult content in the game that is accessible. It's been very rough. I'm currently forced to be tertiary tank, and not necessarily due to seniority. The issues repeated over and over again in this thread are as vibrant as ever. I can't live well enough to perform my duties. There have been a few situations over the past week that have called for me to step up and handle a situation that has gone awry. Sometimes all of my saves are up and I can click ALL THREE OF THEM and live. True story, I lived in a hard mode Drunder zone. Unfortunately, this means that I either A: need to save all my emergency survivability stuff for a rare and avoidable situation to be useful, or B: Use them often, try and take some heat off the other tanks, and prevent that situation from occurring. The problem with that is, and I speak from experience (I tried it), is a simple feeling of helplessness when everything isn't up. I really feel 100% helpless if I don't have anything up. I can't even go in on the mobs without dying to AOEs. If my DI is down, I am really at the mercy of luck unless I just stand back and do nothing. There's about a 50-50 chance I can do the job expected of me and survive it. The emergency, backup tank cannot be that inconsistent. That's the whole point of having a backup tank. Brawlers were better at this than Paladins are, and they got boosted through the roof. We're constantly being slammed with incapability and hopeless helplessness in important situations. We do not have the tools to be useful anymore. I saved the raid last night, and died three times in the process. Why can't I save the raid and not die? Since that's the only role I'm capable of fulfilling even slightly, with every other tank benefitting more from tank groups.
One of the main reasons I think paladins are so bad atm, is because no one plays the class, I can't name 5 paladins on crushbone, and ive been on crushbone for a few years now. I don't think theres even 3 paladins on the server doing content anywhere near top end. It's not that the class isn't fun, I have an absolute blast on my paladin, it's just that there's literally no reason to play a paladin, I mean, SK's do more dps, they have more snaps so obviously control mem wipes better, they have a few more saves, they give more utility, and they're class hat is cool. With the potency amounts as high as they are now, I wouldn't be suprised if SK's spec'd for reaver can outheal paladins while soloing now as well. Paladins and Troubadors have been pretty bad for quite a while now, but at least people still played troubs, troubs are awesome every guild has or is trying to have at least 1, most want 2. If you look at guilds looking for tanks, they're looking for brawlers or a guardian, maybe sometimes a shadowknight. With as few paladins as there are left in the game it's hard to bring these issues to the attention of the developers. So I, as any leader would, rallied my troops in the paladin channel, and convinced them to make this thread. I feel that paladins need a way to completely stop, or significantly lower damage from mob's aoe spells. Finnrdag hard mode is a pretty easy mob, and i've succesfully tanked it before, but his ae's hit me for a lot more hp than my character has, which is fine with a good shaman and a grp full of people jousting, But if I was a guardian or brawler, and could stoneskin his ae's and not have to use that much of the ward to stay alive, not only would it be a lot easier for me to stay alive, but it would be easier for the group to stay alive. Knowing that, why would any raid leader pick a paladin for a main tank role? There's a guild I know of that has a paladin main tank that's been working on Finnrdag for a while now, without killing it, It almost makes me feel bad for them, i'm sure with a brawler or a guardian they would have killed it by now. And being one of the defensive tanks, and sacrificing my dps potential of being a shadowknight, for what I thought would be a survivability increase as a paladin, it's pretty sad to know that I chose the wrong class. Would it really be over powered if paladins ( a defensive tank ) were equally defensive with guardians and brawlers? Idk if that's even readable, or has a solid point in it, its 4am, and im bored, and i wanted to try to add something to this thread =p
The only thing unsound about your post is the "rallied the troops" statement. Beyond that, I agree And by comparison, Finnrdag is nothing. The problems only spiral out of control from there. Survivability is a requirement for a capable tank, not a balanced tank. We still need utlity and more snap aggro. I suggest that, whichever red name shows up to this thread, you read as many of these posts as possible. Every single one of them offer valuable insight to the class and the issues, from every slice of this game's population.
Finnrdag is tbh a pretty easy kill; but only b/c most of the time I run with a warden to deal with curses easier, root immunity and a DI for when I need to move OOR of healers. it *is* possible without and I have done it without but only with the MT group working flawlessly together. Finnrdag reminds me a lot of XYZ in the hole where you had to time stoneskins and DI perfectly or die; that was then and a few thigns have changes since then: - Divine Favor only 1 trigger now (used to run with illy for 3 triggers) - LC stuck at 2min recast (3min for most of expantion) - previously with JC, 1m40s or 1m30s with 20s uptime was possible. - Brawlers gained an extra trigger on their death prevent and better duration (allowing them to be used a lot easier) - Warriors gained another stoneskin ability - Crusaders gained manawall... an ability useles sin a power drain fight (which most fights are) and not much good without one. Fact is I struggled BEFORE in Wing3 to survive against crippling AoEs... lets not even talk about Saalax, Theerax and Yael; and since that time we've had our survibility nerfed and warriors/brawlers have had a small increase in survibility. Not including recast timers or number of triggers here is the "list" of saves (I included Dragoons' Reflexes but not Eagles Patience or Divine Aura). When you consider that both manawall and LC have their limitations this is quite a frightning list to consider.... Guardian: 3 stoneskins, 1 death prevent, 2 melee block (one single charge, one duration), 5% DR proc Berserker: 2 stoneskin, 1 Stoneskin Proc, 2 death prevents, 2 melee block (one single charge, one duration), 5% DR Bruiser: 1 Stoneskin, 1 Magical Stoneskin, 1 physcial stoneskin, 1 Stoneskin proc, 2 melee block, 1 Death Prevent. 10% DR, 30% DR proc. Monk: 1 large Magical Ward, 1 melee block, 1 Stoneskin, 1 physcial Stoneskin, 1 Death Prevent, 25% DR (temp), 30% DR proc. SK: 2 Stoneskins, 1 Large Ward, 1 Death prevent, 1 melee Block, 40% Magcial DR (temp), 1 Manawall Pally: One small ward, 1 death prevent, 1 melee block, 40% Magcial DR (temp), 1 Manawall, 10% DR
Ufabao wrote: Yeah, it's quite funny. All posts about raid tanking are Bruiser, Monk, Guardian, SK, end of line. Noone bothers with Berserkers or Paladins. Sometimes they remember that Berserker exists and have 100 % AE attack (like any Fighter who wants to have it) and Paladins have Amends and that's it.
Using heals as a selling point to our class is like saying "They wear plate armor".. it's completely irrelevant. I hope you're trolling The problem is, everything everyone's pointing out about the paladin class is necessary to keep up with other classes, not an advantage over other classes. Amends is good, but we have it because we don't have any other hate tools. 10% myth DR is cool, but it's there because we get no passive survivability from AAs. These aren't things that make our class good. These are things that attempt make our class even. Unfortunately, they all fall short. Please, scrap our class focuses on gear and try again. They're all terrible.
Maergoth@Antonia Bayle wrote: I think Beiju was making a joke, since he has a Paladin icon under his name. I was just going along with it. Just clairying. I concur with everything else on your post, it may be hard for some people (non-paladins) to see that. Our class focuses do need lots of work. I am watching the Troub feedback thread to see how much the developers listen for feedback. This may be a good indicator on what happens for us, when we get our changes. I think we all need to be ready to jump on our future changes ASAP to accomplish what needs to be done, etc.
A "paladin heal" should never be a direct heal "tagged on"... but should be thought of and adjusted to the class of a tank. I remember when TSO came out and I really liked the way our health buff became a re-generating ward.... |I thought that was awesome and really fit with the idea of the class. I'm not saying everything should be a reenerative weard more that our healing power as in "pallys heal" should be in ways which fit our class as a tank and not obstcruct.
Maergoth@Antonia Bayle wrote: While i agree that the vast majority are terrible some some are not. Divine Favor, Ancient Wrath, and Refusal i would say are the best 3 Focus's we have. And the Divine Favor focus is pretty much mandatory now and days. Otherwise yes non-paladins keep harping on abilities like amends and our heals claiming paladin OP due to these abilities when it has been disputed (rightfully so) that these abilities in a raid setting are mediocer at best. Useful in that they give us a bit more flexability but useless when dealing with any sort of survivability or mem wiping which is all the rage.
Attempt to keep up is the key in all of the most recent posts. We are lacking in several areas and it may be more obviose in the hardest encounters but you can see where it hurts even as low as the static fight (HM) with all the memwipes and strike mages.
Except: The only useful half of Divine Favor is the boosted heal, which could easily be replaced by any of our other heals.. it just wastes them. The ancient wrath and Refusal are reuse time, which are wasted with either JCap, ROA or a lot of reuse gear (Which is necessary anyway). How about another DI trigger on Divine Favor? Nah, that's overpowered. How about adding something useful to sigil? Nah. Mages love armor effectiveness. Amends? Sure, you're already capped on transfer, here's more. The only useful one is our Rez, truth be told. I have rezzed more people in the past 2 days than everyone in my guild combined. Single target wise, anyway. The only bad part is, they're usually people I'm getting killed because my snaps are super wimpy and amends doesn't help the fact that every drunder trash mob memwipes.
Maergoth@Antonia Bayle wrote: Our snaps need some serious retooling. Considering you need be under a giants kilt to make sneering assault work, that's a problem in itself, but when you get two back to back memwipes and your like, "Sorry guys, my two snaps are down! Holy ground didn't get me to the top, so you're screwed for another 60 seconds!" is just pouring salt in the wound. For our DI trigger, I think the AA should remain as is and the focus effect should give a +self-regenerating ward upon activation equivelent to the amount of the heal. So, you get healed for 30k and then you get a ward for 30K with a 500 (or something) self regen for 20 seconds, two second tick.
Does the end guy in easy mode Temple of Rallos Zek do massive spike damage and/or have some sort of massive damage ability he uses on the tank? I've done the zone twice, so I haven't totally learned what this guy does. I need the answer to this question for my next post...
Lawrs@Permafrost wrote: If you refer to the Statue of Rallos Zek, then yes, it has an AE trauma dot hit - afaik, triggering twice and kills crusaders, especially Paladins, if there is no protection/DI from the healers running. That's why we are moving out on red message where every other tank class has something to click against (and keep staying there).
Cyrdemac wrote: Well, there ya go. But it stinks, I kept dying in that fight, probably a good 5 times. Hint hint, developers, hint hint.
That's something else that bothers me. It's not even necessary survivability that bothers me. It's the fact that other tanks have SO MUCH MORE THAN US, they can just ignore red text and failure effects. Taaltak, every tank but paladins stayed in. Brendegor, even at the beginning of the expansion, every tank but paladins stayed in. Rusty Bladed doom on Kraytoc? Same story, everyone else just tanks it. Red text on Statue? Same thing. Guy with the spammy bomb adds in Vallon's Tower? Yep. Red text owns me every time, monk, guard and even SK just laughs at it. I can't even survive regular effects and AOEs reliably. Every other tank takes those and failure effects without issue. How does this even make sense? Isn't a failure effect supposed to be a failure effect? It reminds me of the stupidity with reflect last expansion, minus me being able to do it.
Just thought I'll mention as pretty much as of this moment NO competative guild uses a pally MT, or regular OT; right now we are 3rd tanks to buff the mages when the SK isn't on..... and people consider us OPed and "fixed". Sure we do well enough on easier content and instance runs... but buff a scout and they'll do just as well so that is not a indicator of class health/balance. I only hope this feedback was read by people who could actually make some real changes and give the paladin class something is has never really had: a defensive edge. We have a slew of healing abilities which at best give us flavour or help us solo none of which realisitclaly helps us to tank; the the rougher the content the less and less these abilities matter. My own only hope is I manage to get into beta for this coming expansion to review and test pally changes (If any!... its not like the last few expansions have actually given us much!) My only fear right now is no real HC pally will get to review the tank changes meaning once again we are under-represented once again.
What a fight we had, changing Stonewall from One-block-and-done to a 8-sec 100% block duration, and then they let it being stroke through regularly..lol What a fight we had, changing our death prevent (Divine favor) to remove that 12-sec stiffle effect, until we got focus and AA choices to remove it ourself..until they introduced death-hits that trigger twice or more at once and bye bye divine favor. We lost the our high block, because it was overpowered, just to give it to other classes. We were buffed in our healing amounts with heavy recast timers, just to have our hit points doubled and tripled to be back with now mediocre heals (because they don't scale). Did I forget anything?
