Work In Progress GU103: Tank Balance

Something you should not forget about healers/healing is, that you should Play the role from a safe distance if possible.
Most Pet healing abilities are Bound to a limited area. So do you really want an Electricity or Nature heal for example stay within a few meters - running behind the tank as he kites? Or even funnier Scenario, let the Tank kite around the heal as he Spams his pet heal in order to keep Brick alive?

So i'd say Bricks issues are on both Ends.

A solution could be, that all Healing done to you as an Earth Tank is copied on your Brick aswell. Since the big chunks of Damage are destroying shields and hitting your Health, your Brick will lose Health aswell (unless you used Fortify Golem). This would automatically help healers to heal Brick with all of their abilities when neccesary.
This would not help if the Golem sits in an AoE but you are at Full Health because you used a Shield for example.

That way it would still synergize nicely with the specialized Pet healing abilities and wont be too strong to outright replace the Jackhammer playstyle.

Probably greater healing numbers, but why choose lol, give us both

You've said Fire's main strength is healing. You've also said Fire is the "Health and Healing Tank."
All these changes mentioned seem to be upgrades to Defense, where its been lacking(since Revamp) as you've said. The amount of self healing done by Fire Tanks has been a common topic of discussion as well. Can you explain why changes to the Self Healing and Health ability were also NOT done or at least explain why you feel there was no need to.

An important topic here:
From players I've heard "I can self heal a lot with speccing all Restoration all over but I'm just really squishy"(Which personally I think is ridiculous. You see some awkward Augments consisting of "3 Dominance and 1 Restoration" or "2 Restoration and 2 Dominance.")
As a tank your augments should be all Dominance. If you're unable to tank optimally without that, there's something that needs to be fixed with the Power.

I've also heard "I survive the most by having more health and weak heals, and a lot of turtle-ing."
At that point is sounds like the strength is Health rather than Self Heals as being a huge factor. And you can't use a Fortified Assault/Active build as well as you could a Fortified Blocking/Turtle? That doesn't seem right either.

Compared to every other Tank power, Fire has been the MOST indecisive about specs. Spec more Dominance? More Health? More Restoration? What is Fire's Self Healing based on? Restoration Stats instead of Dominance?(Atomic's is Dominance based.)

So spec all 3 while other tanks are performing better speccing just 2 of those Stat categories? What is it exactly?
Its a lot simpler to spec every other Tank powerset and still perform better than Fire. This is extremely annoying and inconvenient. Can't blame players for Fire being one of the least played Tank Powers when after all that "trying what works" and "trying variety and different options" there's still no solid consensus on what really does work and actually works well.

Every other tank power seems to have a distinct mechanic behind how they work and a certain way to spec for their Stats. Some clarity would be great.

(Side Note: The older animation for Burning Determination with the Blue Flame during the Advanced Mechanic Era was a lot better)

With these new changes to immolation, will its cool down be reduced to 12 seconds?

Honestly thats something that i want to test out and see how fire performs because i think the changes arent enough and if thats the case id say buff health and heals next

Completely agree, i want to see blue flame returned in some way

I don't know how you can say Ice needs no adjustment when the shields after revamp simply don't cope with high level content anymore. Even stacking the shields only gives you a few extra seconds as they are teared down so quickly the only hope you have is a good healer to keep you alive. Ice was always designed to be 'true' tanking, not kiting but now this seems the only way you can survive is to kite and keep moving.

The basic idea of a tank is to sacrifice damage output in order to have high health, high aggro, and great shields in order to protect the other party members from taking too much damage/aggro. Kiting should only be necessary when the enemies outnumber the pull skills capacity. Pull a set to gain aggro, run to next set and pull again, etc. Kiting shouldn't be the main strategy for a tank through an entire battle. Tanks should be able to run in first, grab attention, and stand their ground, so that dps can do their job successfully. DPS is meant to do heavy damage and have agility to defend the healers on the outskirts if a rouge enemy heads their way, or to interact with items to pass a specific area. Tanks are supposed to be eager to get into the center of battle, not scared to throw themselves into harms way. Right now, tanks are hard to find in general, let alone a good one. That should tell you that tanks are in a bad place.

Changes I would like to see (but doubt they will ever happen) and apply only to Tank Mode. Please don't yell at me if you disagree.
Keep in mind I main a healer, not a tank, so these suggestions come from a healers perspective, and how improving a tank improves the chances your healer can do their job more efficiently and effectively.

Earth & Brick - the turtle tank - When you think of earth as a tank (stone/boulders) you think un-moving, blocking, hard to get past. Therefore, I think brick should be more of a fail safe pet. I think of brick as defense, like a brick wall. What is a brick wall good for, blocking damage. Brick should have a massive health pool, and should have a main purpose of absorb X% of incoming damage from the tank when tank is not in a blocking stance or in a shield. If the tank is in a blocking stance or in a shield, brick's purpose should shift from absorbing damage from the tank to that of the player with the least amount of health, or has taken the most amount of damage. Bricks extra special rare ability will be to sacrifice itself for the safety of the tank. If the tank takes a massive single hit that would otherwise kill the tank, tank will deflect that hit to brick and brick will die instantly instead of the tank. This way, the tank doesn't die unexpectedly and lose aggro. Which in turn prevents the enemies from bombarding the dps and healers - which often leads to a wipe. Summon brick, self shield, jack hammer, block (repeat).

Fire - the crowd control tank - the tank that consumes while it contains, think of a controlled burn. Fire, in general, is most devastating because it pushes you out of your comfort zone. Fire takes away your ability to control where you go, it blocks you in, and suffocates you rendering you helpless and on the floor gasping for air. Therefore, there are two skills that I think should be the main focus of a fire tank - the suck in and the knock back AOEs. They maintain aggro by forcing the enemy to go where they want, and never relenting until their flames are extinguished. The constant push and pull keeps the enemy focused on the tank, and away from the rest of the party, while regenerating health. This tank doesn't rely on shields they way other tanks do so it's health regen should be consistent and moderately high. This tank knocks you down and keeps you down.

Ice - the trap tank - the main focus here should be self shields and keeping enemies frozen in place. An ice tank should grab aggro, and trap the enemies to a place of fortification and lock them in place. When you think if a snow storm, and how people get lost in it, they can't find their way out and they slowly die exposed to the frigid elements that surround them. Ice tanks should lure enemies into the frozen tundra and trap them. The enemies movements should be slowed down or completely frozen. This gives the dps the freedom to pick off the enemies in order of need as they stay frozen longer. This lets the DPS focus on Bosses without having to worry about being swarmed by mobs, and giving more freedom to healers that may need to move around a lot for certain other dungeon mechanics.

Atomic - the group shield tank - This power set is based on a nuclear explosion with waves of radioactivity and matter manipulation. As such, Atomic should have a slightly higher damage output than fire, with a shorter DoT. To offset the shorter DoT, it generates supercharge the fastest, and has the largest AoE (equal to the size of water's solace of the seas). Self shield as well as attacks should generate supercharge, so the tank can utilize mass density more frequently.

Rage - the DPS tank - the crazy and wild aggro and dodge dance that confuses the enemies. Since the enemies are constantly chasing after the tank they don't seek out other targets. This lets the DPS pick them off one by one, and affords the healer more time to focus on keeping the suicidal tank alive. Since most people seem to want to keep Rage as it is, and my adjustments to the other tanks would make them more on the same level as the current Rage, idk what else to do/change here.

I know these might sound OP to some (or many), but to me that is the very point of a tank. They should be the OP center of attention that takes it all to protect everyone else. Also, these changes set each tank apart, and makes their skill set unique. It also offers players with different gaming styles a chance to find a tank that suits them. If more people find a tank they can enjoy, then there are more tanks in game that know what they are doing. Which in turn makes finding parties easier, and running dungeons more enjoyable.

Remember: a happy healer = a happy damage dealer.

About the changes:

Change for rage. I see two problems with these changes.

1. The idea of ​​rage in “big risk, big prize”, new changes introduce an additional risk ... but no prize (you rarely can keep your HC above 15 (what now is that after the changes it will be the same 50%), so the average rage tank won’t notice changes ... only those who are really good with the rage tank will notice (you removed the prize here for mastery; ()), and the decrease in defense will feel everone, more risk for everyone and zero prize.).
2. Rage tank is undoubtedly the best tank, the problem is that the place where the rage tank is, this is the place where all the tanks should be located.

Zero changes for Cold and Earth ....

I see several changes for the Cold, but these are the changes that are needed in general for all Tanks, so I will write about this later.

Earth ... the main problem of the earth is a too weak pet, increase the vitality of the pet and the earth will become a very good tank (even better than Rage).

Changes for the Atomic Tank.

This is a good start ... but it is a start, for completeness you need only one change, to strengthen the bass shield.

Fire Changes.

Since we will receive enhanced protection, the playability of the Fire Tank will undoubtedly increase, which is good. What I see as a dubious change is to change the mechanics of the shield, such a change will reduce the possibility of the tank interacting with any objects during the battle ...

I would like to draw the attention of developers to one problem, this is the weakness of the secondary mechanics of tanks:

In addition to Atom, all tanks supercharges are useless (in comparison with alternatives (Hardlight Shield, Amazonimn Deflection, Perfect Poise, Dash Attack) .

The secondary mechanics of tanks are weaker ("Density" for an atom, "Remorseless Recovery" for rage, additional shields for cold, etc.) than the alternatives in non-powersets (Hardlight Shield, Amazonium Deflection, Perfect Poise, Dash Attack).

Those need buff(no,no,not nerf of iconics and movement)....

Sorry but as a tank we should never need to kite damage...
Tank should be strong enough take every single add damage and boss damage and heal through it or damage absorb without the need to run around like a chicken... and then any we cannot heal through or damage absorb the healer should step in and take care of us..

instead of nerfing rage bring all the other power to rages level it is not hard... lol devs listen to the players who put money into the game cause right now you will or may loose them .

I find it funny how ppl come in here and say running away like a chicken is the new way of tanking and its here to stay from now on, adjust or pick another role while the player base for tanking gets smaller and smaller... especially on end game content like Elite/SM...its fine if u have only ~10 capable tanks on server, no need to change anything, get good or get out

less competition is never good for a game.

you need to buff him always in order for him to shield himself and heals. or use the totem

We need to get diversity into the tanking play style, running away is very tedious and doesnt reflect the tanking role for most of the player base... keep the kite(=running away) style if people want it but then add also the ability to counter again in the game and make the effort of countering worth by rewarding the tank with some major buffs which allows to keep face tanking aslong the player is skilled enough to keep the counter meter up!( former pvp players would love to get back at tanking in pve since the pvp scene is dead)


Make Tanking great again!

i believe the same. when i need to run from damage (boss big hits) as a tank when my shields are so weak and i need to drop them every 5 seconds i guess its uncomfortable. but we all know that tanks can´t be invincible right so, we just need some wise balance. make it like it was before back to the good old days. idk devs can check that.
good luck

Imo, the healing for fire feels slow. The numbers arent that big compared to what kind of health pool a tank has so as a healer I usually end up healing most of the damage they taken before the healing system of fire did anything relevant. From a healer perspective I would say, close to double the healing numbers so this tank mechanic gains actual relevance and I - as a healer - dont feel like doing the job of what the tank mechanic should do on its own.

The final decisions based on this feedback will determine whether I stay tank, or keep playing this game. I like how rage performs and every tank power should be at its level or ever higher. Tanks have been underperforming for years. Its about time we got what we've needed. I dont see a real way forward, as a tank at least, if the proposed changes for rage are implemented.

Look at my post again,it refers to leave rage tank as it is. I just suggested to change hit counter to 15 to get maximum heath bonus from scar tissue because the hit counter resets within 2-3 seconds and when you start kiting you start from 0 again with hit counter. So overall rage tanks never benefited from scar tissue anyway because of the kiting. If you can face tank then it is possible to keep hit counter up for sure.But in current elite raids you can't face tank.I believe other tanks should be brought on par with rage instead giving out nerfs.

Fortify Golem as Brick's buff only puts Gemstone Shield on it, it doesn't heal it. Now the problem with using Totem to heal Brick is its very small AOE heal radius and being stationary, so Totem isn't viable for kite-tanking scenario. Couple of ways to fix Brick is 1> To put healing mechanic on Fortify Golem to heal Brick alongside its Gemstone Shield mechanic, or 2> Increase the AOE healing radius of Totem for the Brick.

Atomic


Everything seems fine for Atomic right now with the exception of Density's durability. I see where you're going with the control resistance percentage and the fact that Density might be a weak shield now because of that 10% control resistance ''trade''. I am looking forward to test the new changes, nevertheless I think it's like gambling for resistance. I do see it will get to 45% resistance (if Density or Mass Density is up) almost a 50-50 chance of resisting a stun.

However, I would look at the bigger picture. Atomic and Fire were a no go for the last Survival Mode, you can't just combo and self heal in the face of a boss who hits you for 200k on a basic attack, same for Fire's mechanics. I would add 10% more damage absortion on aura (up to 35%), or cut off the 10% control resistance on Density but make it more durable to truly feel like a shield. That or, I really like what you're doing to Fire's Immolation, maybe Atomic can have a similar change on Density: more durability but only 35-40% damage absortion (+25% absortion from aura, effectively getting to 50-55% damage absortion, splitting the damage received in half basically, only while Density is up).

I don't feel like more control resistance is truly needed, currently you can get your aura back everytime you get stunned and breakout. The breakouts are many tiny windows to safely refresh the aura, believe it or not it's highly effective in PC(E) last boss when solo tanking. So that's the way to get aura back under high pressure of the stuns, it already has a solution, as for a single boss that barely stuns you like Hawkman in DM(E) that extra 20% control resistance and +2 sec on aura would totally go unnoticed. I feel like these changes I suggested above wouldn't turn Atomic into an overpowered and easy-to-go-with tank power, but would give it a chance in Survival Mode while remaining fairly balanced for everyday content.

Reading through all these posts its fairly obvious every single tank in the community hates all this kiting nonsense, time to step up Daybreak and buff all tanks tbh, tanking is single handedly the hardest role at true endgame now, #bringbackfacetanking, NOT turtle tanking, FACE tanking.

We wanna look that s.o.a.b in the eye and smash em!

At least I am not alone in thinking that the idea of Ice being at an ideal level is ludicrous. 3 or more adds in new content and shields are gone as they are so weak now. Devs you need to re-think what you are doing by bringing rage down to the level of ice and earth they are frankly not up for the job when the going gets tough. Make tanking viable without the need to kite to stay alive and we may get some more players wanting to tank again.