Current power situation and a suggestion for a tweek to Trolls

Current situation:
DPS is likely only role that has sufficient power due to the combination of Might/Power in the SP tree. Likely done because they were the biggest drain to Trolls and the Dps player base at times has tunnel vision as far as stats are concerned where the only thing useful to put points into is something that causes dmg.

Tanks/Heals/Trolls however are much less likely to significantly spec into Might/Power depending upon the specific power type of course. This is largely due to the fact that to be effective in a support role requires the majority of their sp to go to other places (Res/Health/Dom/Vit). As such they are the ones having significant power issues with the nerf to Trolls ability to supply Power.

Trolls are expected to be a role for stunning and debuffing the enemy mainly now. Yes they do still have the ability to give power over time and instant power but that capacity seems to have nerfed to the point where it's hard to see any significant power gains even with good high SP players who know their role well. Also while the Trolls themselves might see the difference in what happens for a round when Debuffs are applied and when they are not to a boss or mob, I don't think it is significant enough for the group to see the use of having a Troll in most instances vs having the spot filled by another DPS.

Current Raid feel: (please don't actually do this in a raid it's really mean)
If your only Healer in a raid dies the team will likely wipe. If your only Tank goes down in a raid the team will likely wipe. If your only Troll goes gets knocked out in a raid...well someone might go pick them up but if you're busy in a good rotation or doing some mechanic for the fight it's not really vital if they don't get picked up.

Since I can't see the Devs undoing what has been done to trolls completely with how entwined it is in the revamp of skill points overall I was pondering fixes that would work with the new direction while still satisfying the player base's outlook on the roles use.

Suggestion: Have the Controller Instant Power apply only to Non-DPS.
Why?:
Since the DPS's power pool is largely self supported now they probably don't really need power from trolls at all to maintain their rotations. The POT helps a bit but they are not dependent upon it. Instants really shouldn't ever be necessary for players that have the minimum SP for their CR and content.

The other rolles do still need that POT and are hurting at the current Instant output rate unless the Troll is significantly OP.

If they POT still applied to everyone DPS would still get aid with power if they need it but instants would be able to be dispersed more reliably to the players who don't just want power. They need it to keep the group up. Tanks go down without power for their shields. The group gets overwhelmed when they don't have the power to do pulls to gather adds. Healers require power to maintain HoT for the Tanks while supplying instants for the group. Many also require power for group shields.

Suggestion: Increase debuff and stun effectiveness a bit.
Why?
Personally i'm not seeing a significant enough effect of the stuns and debuffs supplied by Trolls to justify the shift in thinking from 'Trolls #1 priority and use is Group Power' to 'Trolls don't need to be batteries that's just a side benefit to their real function' How much the ability's effectiveness should be increased I couldn't tell you. The players who are dedicated to that role would be in a better place to give that feedback.

Stuns on mobs on the way to the boss's could be useful if they were a bit more reliable to work at level. I could totally be wrong on this one I don't spend much time at all on my Troll since revamp and can only really speak on what I'm seeing in raids.

Debuffs need to be upped. You can't tell a boss has been defence debuffed unless you can see the symbol i've not noticed an increase in the groups speed at taking down his health with the debuff present. The Healing debuff needs to be better able to prevent the boss from healing not just slow the boss' ability to heal. And the attack debuff again even as the healer spending the match staring at the group's health bars I couldn't tell you when this debuff was in effect based upon the dmg the group is taking.


All in all. The decision was made to take the responsibility of being a battery for the groups power consumption away from the role. However I don't think any significant additions were given to it in exchange that make it more beneficial to the group's success than having an additional Tank, Heal, or DPS. Trolls were highly valued before the revamp. They shouldn't be the least valuable now.

I can only agree with the debuffs part. They do need to either lower the power of debuffs or make them more meaningful.

Trolls were not highly valued before revamp. In fact, you only needed them in raids, and only one at that. Sorry, but the easy days are over. I know trolling isn't fun, but neither is watching a troll waste a bunch of power on stunning things and annoying the tank more than helping.

Tanks don't have power issues, so not sure where that came from.

Your premise is off. Trolls are supposed to provide power. That is what the role is. Only weak adds will not breakout. If they let you CC bosses, the game would be too easy. The role is never going to be mainly about CC despite the role description.

If you don't want your main job to be providing power, pick a different role.

This whole revamp needs a rework!!! Tanks, DPS and Healers needs higher power regen....

Sadly it isn't my premise that is off, I chose to create a troll because I wanted to provide power to the group. Which is why I don't play that character anymore despite just getting it to the top tier a few weeks before revamp.

However the devs have repeatedly stated that the changes to trolls were made so they wouldn't be 'batteries' anymore...not that they didn't have to be but that they would not be. So my only conclusion is they think CC is the main purpose of the role now. And since there is an overwhelming number of threads about how trolling should go back to what it was without any sign of agreement or acceptance by the devs, I just wanted to go the other way and try to work with their changes to compromise between the point of trolls before and the direction they tried to change the role to now in the hopes of getting some use that is meaningful to the group to justify having trolls in a raid group currently.

Well, Avair's first post on stats revamp indicated that they regarded providing power as one of the three central aspects of the role. Then they said they were doubling the CC duration, but of course the problem is that stuff breaks out before that duration is ever met. The central problem with crowd control is that they can't figure out how to make CC matter without making the game stupid easy. And debuffs they indicated that they had largely left alone. So regardless of what they say, they haven't really done anything to make trolls non-batteries.

I also don't think the devs ever said trolls wouldn't be batteries (i.e., power providers). I think people made that conclusion and then the "echo chamber" effect took over.

"Good" tanks dont have power issues*

They said wouldnt exclusively be batteries, because before revamp a troll could literally never have to debuff or never cc and raid would go smooth. And the only way the made cc more needed by a troll now is removing cc from other roles ie. Nature harvest was best stun in the game. Never was it said they wouldnt be batteries.

Really hate what they have done with fire. It feels like there was really no effort put into it, it'seems shield and self heal have the exact same animation not to mention that they are just a recolor of reflect. Theven dps is abysmal and has complete reliance on iconic powers. Burning determination and stoke flames need to go back to the pre-revamp animations, volcanic calamity meteor shower and meteor should all just be replaced, I mean those would be earth abilities anyways.

You got it backwards, a troll main job is to cc, hence it's name, its this community that believes that a troll should mainly give power in return the dev's focus more on power giving than cc it self, which is false, and if you really want to start making sense, last I check, isn't restoring power a form of healing?

Healers should be giving power and health, make sense?

It does make sense that Controllers main role should be CC I'm not arguing that. However, the debuffs and stuns the Trolls seem capable of right now don't seem to outway the value of having another DPS in their spot instead. That was kind of the point of my original post which no one seems to want to discuss. If they are trying to shift the main function of a Controller from giving out power like it used to be, to mainly CC what changes would need to be made to ensure people don't prefer to give that spot in a raid or alert to a DPS vs a Troll?
Currently what i'm seeing when I random que into raids is that the group doesn't see value in the debuff capabilities of Trolls and don't care if they have a troll or not for regular run. In alerts it is just hands down better to not have a troll, the power back buff is good and the boss' go down just as quickly with the extra dmg as with the debuffs, and the mobs definitely go down quicker with more dps than what a troll can help with.
What can be done to fix it so CC is more valuable and Trolls are worth playing?

No restoring power is not a part of healing other than a side benefit of 1 supercharge on Sorcery at least. There is nothing in the powerset that affects group power, and since we don't have the extra skill points to put significantly into Vit you don't even see power levels flicker in the group since the revamp. Though before the revamp I used to be able to give say 10% power back to the group with that same supercharge.

You miss understood what I wrote, when I said restoring power is a form of healing, I was not talking about the current healing powers we have in game, I was speaking hypothetically in general that power restoring is a form of healing no matter how you look at, so in that regards you can heal damage and heal the emptiness of the power bar.

I think the game just doesn't represent the dominance stats like it should for controllers, stuns, juggling needs to get a boost, and give controllers the an aura presence of restoring power not manually that way controllers don't have to feel dedicated to the power bar, and depending on your stats will result in how much power your aura grants to the team.

That will solve most problems concering the controller role.

If you want healers to give power as well as heal, that would be super. We could just get rid of the troll role since you can easily do without crowd control or debuffs. Since the troll powers are the least popular powers after revamp, it would make putting a group together a lot easier.

I said hypothetically what will makes sense is that healers heal both our health and power bar, that was used to counter those that believe that the troll role main function should be to give power.

FPS is responsible for blocking on skull, move out of fire etc. In essence helping out healers by watching their own health. Why should they not be responsible for conserving some power to help trolls? Instead of using only power thirsty loadouts with no spammable power to ease some of the load for trolls if they are struggling at all if there is not a second one.

DPS tend to have more of the 'pew pew' 'the strategy is hit it till it dies' players. If the forums were a voice chat I would have destroyed my voice box by now trying to convince many of them that they should spec into health with their extra SP instead of just complain that there is nothing to do with their SP after they fully specced into dmg.
Good DPS players do exist mind you, who know how not to be a burden on the other roles but they wouldn't have had to combine Might & Power in the first place if there wasn't an overwhelming number of bad DPS players.

That makes me feel good. About the only time I use my weapon is to "lunge" across vast distances faster. So I never really put any SP into precision and put it into health. Oddly though I do not DPS anymore unless I am running open worlds or have to because there is another healer.

just get away with power replenish as the trolls job and let them focus on debuff and stunning. thats all.

No, i am using HP generator mods cause i am also tanking and i am strugling with power already with 1 troll in the group when iam switching to dps , having instant power only apply to non-dps would kill playing both roles for me since i am already using a rotation with lower powercost abilities like 1x100, 3x200,1x300, just cant go lower and still stay competitive.

Well they could also allow double POT if you have more than one Troll but the low VIT rate and lack of instants really makes it impossible for Trolls to currently keep 7 other players out of the red in power.

I feel you on the generator situation though it sucks for those of us that play two roles. Like that row of RES is totally useful to my DPS really :/