Work In Progress GU103: Tank Balance

Sorcery has the identical pet problem. The power/life bars for the pet will disappear in some circumstances and never come back until you relog or at least change instances. It's not an earth problem; it's a general universal pet problem.

Often the power pet's missing bars will be replaced by power/life bars for a sidekick/backup, rather than both or more showing up. Let's not even discuss the bootility belt....

You're flatly contradicting yourself. Rage can either be changed, or left alone, but it can't BOTH BE CHANGED AND UNCHANGED. That literally does not make sense.

Either something, anything, changes, or it doesn't change. Nothing can do both at the same time. Pick one.

U kidding at the rage part right? Hit counter at 80???? Barely reach even 20 hit counter when tanking and kiting...the moment u start kiting and don't do a hit on boss,hit counter starts from 1 again. U have about 2-3 seconds to hit again so that your hit counter doesn't reset.Test it yourself and see if its good idea to make hit counter to 80.

Unless the hit counter duration before it resets is made to 10-15 seconds,why not.

Throughout this game's history, no power has been nerfed more than fire. Although, I appreciate the minimized power costs to help power rotations run smoother for optimal heal benefits, that's never been the problem. The problem has always been its lack of mitigation compared to other tank powers.

Sure, I see the notes towards emphasis of defensive boosts. Yet, I'm confused on the Immolation shield damage absorption drop. A percentage drop from 100 to 35 is pretty major and sounds dangerous. Especially, when you talk of key moments we rely on that ability to stay in the fight when a need for healing goes wrong. It's as if having to block more or becoming a complete turtle is what's being encouraged here. And, that's not the way to go if that's to be the case.

In this most recent DLC, I think a lot of us who tank can agree on the fact we don't really feel like true tanks this time around. The mechanics are forcing us to kite more, having lesser ability to withstand all of that damage coming our way. Which, is why a power such as Rage should be left untouched. Slightly too good compared to other tank powers? Why not get every other tank power on par with it?

Don't let this update become another round of unnecessary changes that cause more harm than good. I'm all for balance as long as it's done the RIGHT way. At the end of the day, I just want to feel like a real tank again. And, I hope that's what you DEVS are about to provide all of us.

It can be a combination of various things not really related to consumables and the like and generally speaking Brick only dies when you're having too much to tank the damage piles on, if you're two tanking things Brick's deaths are fewer and further between, its when you're solo tanking his fragility is sometimes more exposed.

Totem probably needs to be buffed to inspire people to take it in their loadout instead of just going straight to a full shield meta build at all cost, a little more importance could be placed on ensuring Brick is alive as much as possible but giving the players the tools to ensure that they keep him alive is equally important.

Healers obviously have a part in this too where they're not realising that a part of keeping an earth tank good is also keeping Brick good, its just similar to a good healer realising that fire tanks also need more heals, they're squishier that sort of thing.

I don't think any tweaking is necessary on the Jackhammer side of earth tanking.

Ice doesn't have much crowd control bc it can literally mitigate 100% of the damage it's taking.

better than the 50% they should keep the 100% there but it only applies if the hit counter is high maybe not 80 somewhere like 60??

So you want ice to have the same amount of defense as earth with aftershock but also have their shields? Why be earth then because ice has higher defense and can rotate shields

Please change Resonating Gale into a 360 AOE pull similar to Epicenter. Every tank powerset has a similar ability except Ice.

I dont know but im just looking at it from a SM point of view when bosses hit hard enough the shields get knocked out and the next hit your dead unless you kite, which goes for all tanks.

Rage at least has a health boost but from my understanding tanks are more on the kiting aspect of the game unless manacles saves you

You wont see these things on elite raids as much as SM, kiting is your friend which is why lunge spamming was a god send .

So as far as end game goes your basically in dps role tanking adds and bosses on stuns and running circles not saying higher rounds shouldn't be harder just saying the tank role itself wont "exist" sort of speak and ends up becoming a different role then what its intended as far as surviving in SM

U still missed the point.
Hit counter resets if you don't do a hit on boss or add within 2-3 seconds.In Elite Raids the moment you start kiting your hit counter resets by the time you get to hit again. If they intend to keep 2-3 seconds for hit counter to reset,it would be best if it was 15 hits to get full bonus of health.

Go and test hit counter.Do 1 attack on sparring target and then don't attack and count seconds until hit counter disappears (resets).

I have to admit i really do hate kite tanking but the only reason we are in that position is because of all the artifacts making us op and thats an easy way to make tanks challenging. When stats first started we didnt really have many one shots, every so often sure but not every raid. Now we have one shots, adds doing massive damage, and scripted damage - damage that will hit you for a percentage of your health no matter if you have a shield or your defense.

If all artifacts got a huge nerf(which i think they should) we wouldn't be in this position, however i dont think that is going to happen so we will just have to get used to it

The math was calculated a while ago that Brick is better for turtle tanking. That can be difficult though if Barbatos is just pulse beaming. But even years ago, there was a point where Brick just wasn't viable in SM and players had to switch to Aftershock.

Devs, please just leave Rage alone, if you feel like it overperforms, then buff the other powersets.

Tanks want to tank, NOT kite.

Exactly my point,rage doesn't need to be touched at all.

The only issue is with current Elite Raids and its mechanics that all tanks have to kite,there is no more face tanking unless you have a death wish.And the hit counter resets too quickly when you are kiting. 2-3 seconds and hit counter will reset.
I suggest making hit counter last 10-15 seconds before it resets which will help out the current kiting for tanks.

Just for the numerous people who are saying to buff underperforming tank powersets to bring them in line with overperforming powersets please do keep this part of Batuba's post in mind:

And more importantly for all those who actively tank in game, please take the time to test the changes on the test server if you can when they go up.

Before anyone comes at me - this isn't me saying anyone is right or wrong. The tanks will have a clearer idea on all of this once it goes on test. If you feel like something isn't working they do have time to change things before the changes hit the live server. I don't tank, so I have no hat to throw into this ring. I'm just pointing out what Batuba has said in case people skimmed the post.

Buffing things to the point that they are too powerful has not worked out well in the past. Just look at what happened with shields, and now we have tons of mechanics that completely bypass shields.

So buff the most powerful tank making the gap even bigger between it and others?

i think the problem is more so the content is catered to rage tanking. ever since the HIVE raid the content has often consisted of an army of adds. Rage is the one tank that can take an onslaught without needing to be as kitey to get the job done. its literally the easiest powerset to solo tank with in end game elite.

You guys made tanking look like a joke over the years and these are the changes you think to implement?Tanks were great ages ago until you guys nerfed then to the ground and then slightly improve them and artifacts helped them a bit.A question I want to ask is,Are you adjusting the tank powers with the artifacts buff in mind.If so then this ain’t not real buff but a way to appease the tanks who hate tanking in this mmo.You guys need to put tanking how it was when they each were at their prime.They are kitting dmg not tanking which makes tanks opposite of their role.What’s next?Tanking while running?

Can Fire’s absorb heat be returned to how it was after the stats revamp, before it got changed. It was like Rage’s channel hate and it was very useful and fun to use.