Work In Progress GU103: Tank Balance

Discussion in 'Concluded' started by Batuba, Mar 6, 2020.

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  1. Batuba Developer

    Hello everyone!

    With Game Update 103, we plan to do a general balance pass on Tank powersets. Today, we would like to get your feedback on the changes as they stand now, before we move them to the public test server.

    We intend these changes to be as non-invasive as possible. That means we want to adjust a few critical pieces in some of the powersets, but not rebuild anything fundamentally.

    TL;DR
    • Ice and Earth are generally where we want them. Minor to no changes planned.
      • Suggestions welcome.
    • Rage is slightly too good. Minor changes.
    • Atomic is slightly struggling. Minor changes.
    • Fire lags behind noticeably. Moderate changes.

    Ice
    • No major changes planned, but suggestions welcome.
    Developer Notes: Ice has strong advantages and some disadvantages that put them in line with where we want all tanks to be. That said, we are open to (smaller) suggestions for these powersets.


    Earth
    • No major changes planned, but suggestions welcome.
    • Fortify Golem now provides a heal over time for Brick.
    • Increased healing from Totem.
    Developer Notes: Earth is scaling very well, however maintaining Brick becomes very difficult in higher content. As part of maintaining Brick is one of the "risks vs rewards" of this tank specialty, we want to maintain the threat to Brick being destroyed. That being said, we also want to increase the player's ability to keep Brick alive if they actively try to do so, so we've increased the players healing potential towards brick to help him last as long as possible.


    Rage
    • Fervor grants 45% defense bonus (down from 50%).
    • Scar Tissue grants max 50% of dominance as health at 15 hit counter (down from 100% at 30 hit counter).
    Developer Notes: Rage tanks benefit from being the best of all worlds when it comes to health vs mitigation, being able to increase both their defense and health significantly, which puts them ahead of other tanks. These changes will mainly affect players at high end content and it should place them in line with other tanks.


    Atomic
    • Quark-Gluon Aura now lasts 14 seconds (up from 12 seconds).
    • Quark-Gluon Aura now 35% control resistance (up from 15%)
    Developer Notes: Atomic is in a strong spot defensively. However, due to the amount of crowd control in the game, it is very difficult to properly finish Atomic combos in order to maintain their aura and realize that strong defense. These changes will help Atomic tanks maintain their aura a little easier.


    Fire
    • Fire Soul Base Defense increased to 35% (up from 30%).
    • Fire Soul stack counts have been reduced to requiring 5 (down from 20) to get max defense bonus.
      • (Stack count increases each time you hit a burning target.)
    • Fire Soul max stack defense bonus increased to 25% (up from 20%).
    • Fire Soul buff reduces power costs of abilities by 30%.
    Developer Notes: Fire is the health and healing tank, but even in that niche it has lagged behind the other tanks in effectiveness. Fire Soul's stacks take too long to build and fall off too fast (before they could ever reach max...), meaning Fire tanks run with less than optimal defense most of the time.

    Also, because Fire tanks require the constant casting of abilities to survive, and their main healing abilities are so high in power cost, they would find themselves out of power too quickly and at the mercy of their healers and their enemies. These changes will help create smoother and stronger gameplay for Fire tanks.
    • Immolation shield in Tank role now grants nearly double shield value, however only absorbs 35% of damage taken (down from 100%). Tank Role only, DPS role remains unchanged.
    Developer Notes: Immolation shield was also changed to reflect that Fire healing niche more. This will shift Immolation from being an up-front, weakish shield to a damage mitigation over time ability more in line with Fire.

    Immolation as a shield that negates all damage also negates Fire's main strength, healing. Immolation as a shield that reduces damage for a longer period of time allows and invites Fire tanks to take more advantage of their strong self heals and better control their situation.


    ---

    On a larger design note, it is important that we don't always only buff classes. It is sometimes more important for the overall health of the game to bring certain powers down to be in line with everyone else. Should we always only look to buff, we will only create a larger gap between how difficult content is vs how difficult it really should be.

    We look forward to players testing these changes in a few weeks (details and dates soon) and will continue to adjust numbers as needed. Your feedback is extremely valuable to us and we hope together we can make a more enjoyable tank experience for everyone.

    Thanks!
    Batuba
    • Like x 17
  2. 9001BPM Steadfast Player

    I make a fire tank every time there’s a CR skip, and end up abandoning it because it just takes too much work to get it ready for any kind of end game. Even events can be difficult. Of course with events you can continually respawn and repeatedly kamikaze the boss but it doesn’t exactly make for satisfying gameplay. Hopefully this will help.

    The fire soul tweaks sound great on paper, especially the increased speed at which it reaches full power and I like your out of the box thinking on Immolation. It was a bit anticlimactic to hit that power and not get to have any fun with the regeneration mechanics until it wears off. Does that make fire the first power after water to have a partial shield?
  3. Batuba Developer

    Event mode will also be updated to make clamped tanks be more "tanky" in GU 103
    • Like x 5
  4. hoaxone Committed Player

    If pvp is a dead horse, why can't ice have its actual shields back before the nerf?
    • Like x 2
  5. nawanda Loyal Player

    Even though I tank with rage, I approve of these changes and it’s great to see this being looked at. Fire tanking has been a poor relation for a very long time now. This gives me hope that some love for sorcery DPS might be in the pipeline further along.
    • Like x 4
  6. 9001BPM Steadfast Player

    Sounds like you guys took pity on me specifically. ;) It is much appreciated. Maybe I’ll go undelete the last one I made. :D
  7. The Swish New Player

    Hello, ive been an ice tank since beta version i just would like 2 minor fixes for ice “inescapable storm” the group it doesnt effectively pulls ads i cant undestand how a power like Ice fails on this, Ice doesnt have a proper “jugg” power to knockback n render helpless like atomic rage n earth does please its just minor things ice doesnt need stats it just need to power set to be fixed
  8. Ekart Committed Player

    Ice
    Frost snipe in tank mode should be categorized as a pull, since it is one. If you want to use Dilustel Refractor and need a ST pull, as Ice you need to use the lasso instead of snipe for the artifact bonus. This is a small change. :)
    • Like x 5
  9. spack2k Steadfast Player

    I have to say that nerfing Rage as a Tank is the wrong move to do, one should buff other tank powers to get on rage tanking level else the player base will always have to struggle to find players playing the tank role on end game, especially Elite/SM etc... the direction u want to go will probably have the opposite effect, will lead to more players abandoning tanking.

    I believe for tanks in general the combo meter which comes with power specific buffs should be able to build on dots(=damage over time) as a passive while the player is busy doing the role tasks for example fire dots on main target should buff the defence of a fire tank while the fire tank is moving in the other corner of the map collecting the adds.
    • Like x 1
  10. RunfromDanger Man Dedicated Player

  11. Arqueiro Robusto Well-Known Player

    Batuba, can you tone down these changes for arena pvp? Atomic is already very unbalanced in arenas it does a lot of damage in tank role and a ton of healing. Can you please make sure you tone this down for arena?
    • Like x 1
  12. Maxwill Committed Player

    They will just balance them, not nerf them . :)
  13. Arqueiro Robusto Well-Known Player

    Earth's Brick needs a health boost. It simply dies too easily.
    • Like x 7
  14. AV Loyal Player

    This is overall a well thought out change but I have the following feedback:

    - It would be more appropriate for Fire Soul's base defense to remain at 30 and for the max stack bonus to be increased from 20 to 30. We shouldn't be tankier when not doing Fire Soul, but max combined Fire Soul def buff at ~10% sounds appropriate. Increasing the base Fire Soul to 35% just promotes turtle tanking, esp with the stack req and shield adjustments, which isn't what Fire should be about.

    - Stack reduction too extreme. 10-15 would be sufficient. At 5, combined with the shield changes, turtle tanking will be too easy to pull off. It's already not hard at all to achieve max stacks as it is. We should not be allowed to spend the majority of flights blocking and still effortlessly maintain Fire Soul.

    - The power cost reduction is a good idea, as we were a bit too susceptible to bad trolls and it's critical we be able to maintain PI + healing.

    - Regarding the Immolation adjustments:
    - A portion of overall damage prevented should be at 100% absorption, otherwise we can't pop a shield to res or interact with a cog.
    - 2x potency, even at only 25% absorption, seems overpowered to me. However, it's hard to say because in fights where we can't use Absorb Heat (due to either the cancel bug or not being able to lunge cancel it) we are completely dependent on the shield. Overall, this feels like a balanced change but I do strongly encourage an initial portion (~30-50%) of damage absorbed be at 100% absorption, then dropping to 35% absorption for the remainder of the shield).

    - Absorb Heat cancellation still needs to be fixed. It's by far our most potent (and fun) tanking power but being at the mercy of an intermittent cancellation bug is nerve racking.

    - (I may be blind but) Didn't see mention of any adjustment to the Fire Soul fall-off rate when all targets stop burning but, when all the PIs go out, Fire Soul should fall-off a bit slower than it does. A parabolic curve would make the most sense here, because we shouldn't have to eat a major def loss when dealing with mechanics that prevent PI application but we should still be punished if we just let fires go out for too long.
  15. August Moon Well-Known Player

    i know you said earth is where you want it but it wold be more than helpfull to fix that brick bug that causes his health bar to visually freeze or vanish from site . despite the bar being gone he still dies the same and helas himself every once in a while but that bug definitly makes it a bit harder to plan around his death
    • Like x 6
  16. NoNameFound EU New Player

    @Batuba is the boy! This change on the Fire tank is absolutly necessary,previously was too weak compared to other tank powersets. Ok aswell for rage, down to 50% instead of 100% of the dom converted in HP still good anyway,previouly was too high.

    Good job Batuba! /dance
    • Like x 1
  17. Zamara Dedicated Player

    I don't know if it's related but is there any chance fire could get an accelerated mod for immolation? i always thought it was weird that it doesn't have one for it considering it's the 1 shield we have on the powerset and most if not all of the other powersets have one for at least one of their shield abilities.
    • Like x 2
  18. Black Jaq Devoted Player


    Single target taunts don't activate Dilustel. It's the same for all the other tank powers.
    • Like x 1
  19. Rayray27 New Player

    I'm kinda ok with the changes with rage im a rage main and I would say we do also need a buff change we really do depend on good healers I got in a few duty missions that went left real fast cause no healer had my back as in was pulling in rage mode so I would like to see a change where we don't have to fully depend on healers and just enjoy ourselves going wild in rage mode
  20. August Moon Well-Known Player

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