Can only DPS at about 40% of normal with new pet aggro changes

Discussion in 'The Veterans' Lounge' started by Danille, Jan 29, 2016.

  1. Matari Augur

    I'm tired of pet upgrades and then following nerfs. Much more efficient to update something else, such as spell damage, that can easily be fixed if it's not correct with less customer impact. After several 10+ pages threads you can see the customer impact for this change was huge.
  2. Benzarden Augur

    Actually, I just see the same few mages repeating themselves in each thread.
    Silv likes this.
  3. Mintalie Augur

    Replace "mages" with pretty much any class and you've nailed it. This community is pretty small and the same people love to overpost their thoughts and feelings.
    Mayfaire, Zeiss and Silv like this.
  4. Silv Augur

    I still like cats.

    And let's all remember the 30+ page Necro epic or whatever change thread that got the results completely reversed or at least semi-fixed. Overposting works whether people like it or not unfortunately.
  5. Sheex Goodnight, Springton. There will be no encores.

    They're night and day different in terms of ease of use, complexity and effect. One requires a rear end load of button management, stacking knowledge, situational awareness, as well as simple things like channeling luck (Knights). Another requires a few button presses at the start of the fight that don't even require switching targets and a few similarly functioning discs/spells during the fight. Pet classes just don't have *that* many impactful pet tanking tools, especially if not a Mage.

    Not necessarily saying it's right or wrong currently, but from a balance perspective pet tanking is infinitely simpler than PC tanking, hence the mitigation advantage to offset the lack of tools.

    I have a max ish aa Mage alt as well. Compared to a sk it's not even remotely close. I'd love to see pets flavored with some activated buttons based on their type - earth pet AE taunt/defensive, water pet backstab/frenzied stabbing disc, fire pet silent casting/frenzied devastation, Nec pet leech curse disc and or lifetap disc casts, etcetc. The key though would be having these improvements require significant attention from the owner.
    Silv likes this.
  6. Benzarden Augur

    That would not be well received by Mages. They don't want to play a tank and have to make tanking decisions. They just want a pocket Warrior while they play Wizard. Beasts would probably be more in favor, as long as they can melee next to their pet again.
    Beimeith likes this.
  7. Voxynn Elder

    your in inverse logic .. mages are not that good skill wise in that guild at all .. They are all in officer / leadership roles, so they on /lax play style..

    You are using sub playing mages to prove a point, which is a fallacy considering the mages in your guild.
  8. Mintalie Augur

    ... I realized after I posted that you might think I meant you, Silv. Nothing could be further from the truth! There are a couple of regulars who I completely dig... even if they don't like me back. In fact, I quite like most of you guys! ;)
    Silv likes this.
  9. Silv Augur

    [IMG]

    /derail done.
    beryon, Spellfire, Sancus and 2 others like this.
  10. Triconix Augur

    Actually I was trying to say that those Wizzies aren't good in that parse :)

    And regardless of our mages, they wouldn't beat our necros or Wizzies who are good. Or our rogues.
  11. segap Augur



    Have you played warrior in the group game? On my warrior, for a named, I can click one macro that sets a few defensive abilities and one that pretty much locks aggro for the duration. I don't even really have to touch any button for the rest of the fight. Fights don't last long enough to require a second defensive set. It's about as passive as it can get to tank the toughest mobs in the group game. Yes, you can do more than that, but it's not required.

    Aggro is more active for trash that dies really fast as I then use short term instant aggro abilities, but also do not have to worry about any defensive stuff. You can get away with one mash button to keep aggro from anyone in your group. If there are adds, you click a couple ae aggro abilities, and perhaps move a bit to position things.

    Situational awareness? A mage has to be just as aware of adds as a warrior if tanking. You still have to pick them up. A warrior doesn't need to target them, but does need to know if they're close enough to hit with short range ae. A mage has to switch targets and know if they're in line of sight. That's about the difference there. Yes, things can get messy if a group member decides to attack an add and it needs to be ripped off them.

    Tanks and mages are different classes. People play them for different reasons. If you start making a mage work like a warrior (or other tank class) does in the raid game (where you do have to work more) for group content, you change the class and those that enjoy playing it likely won't enjoy the class any more. How's that good for the game?
    Danille likes this.
  12. Dre. Altoholic

    I wouldn't mind a pocket Wizard while I play Warrior. And not one of those pesky caster mercs. You know... the ones that take up a group slot and do bad DPS. And not a box where I have to run two accounts and level/gear up or heaven forbid actually play another character. No thanks. What I really mean is a 'Wizard pet' where I can push one button and basically add a ton of DPS while I'm soloing with my cleric merc.

    And if it didn't generate too much agro that would be most convenient. But I can see how Wizards might have a problem with that, so I guess Mage-level DPS would be okay.

    Except, oh wait... silly me! I forgot that instead of basing class balance on any form of fairness or logic, we're using vague interpretations of class descriptions aimed at helping new players to the game choose their class. Oh well. One can dream.
  13. jiri_ Augur

    It works sometimes; let's also remember on the subject of Necros the 50+ page Death Bloom thread that had no effect on the nerf. That said, making reasoned, calm arguments is better than not doing so. It's when representatives of other classes get involved with protecting (or trying to expand) their turf that things get sticky, I think. I don't intend to comment on the results of the changes, how it affects pet classes or what ought to be done going forward as I don't play one actively on either Live or TLP (I do occasionally play a Necromancer where I mostly use the pet as an extra layer of insurance if a root breaks badly or something, and I box a BST/Mage duo when things are slow and I'm bored).
    Silv likes this.
  14. Hostility Elder

    [IMG]
  15. Igniz Augur

    Actually, I would not mind being able to control my pet better, e.g. when it casts its root spell (if it's an earthpet) to get its defensive recourse, intelligent aggro grabbing off a player, easier positioning of the mob etc., I wouldn't mind having a boatload of Aggro or Survivability Discs for my pet and having to use them.

    Alas, magicians DON'T HAVE THEM. And I am pretty sure, if we did, warriors would argue we don't need them so pls nerf mages remove the archetype foreign discs from that class.

    Many people seem to also think that a pet is a fire-and-forget. I urge you to go out and try that class. One time with a good group of your choice, and another time with the following random PUG:

    - The 105 WAR with Elegant Defiant Plate and 3K AA but who taunts whenever the button comes up again to "learn how to tank"
    - The Ninja-AFK CLR, standing near the mob with his healing hammer because "the procs usually are enough to keep good tanks alive"
    - The Who-needs-Spell-casting-subtlety-it-does-not-improve-my-damage WIZ
    - The CHAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAARGE!!!!(TM)!!!-BER
    - And the "where did you guys run to?" puller ranger, who misses the camp EVERY single time, despite the group being camped at the same spot for nearly three hours now

    You may freely substitute any of the above with the "whoops, I clicked Virulent Paralysis instead of slow"-SHM.


    About "balance" ... a magician+pet runs at ~65%-80% of a wizard's DPS, if he has his DPS pet out, depending on mob lifespan, pull speed, camp volume while grouping, respectively event architecture during raids. Or he could unpack his "Tankpet", thereby sacrificing 3/4 of his pet's DPS to be able to tank at around 70% of a real tanks (WAR, PAL, SK) without the brains of a warrior (yes! they do exist, rarely), little possibilities of positioning, zero AoE aggro and exponentially rising risk for each mob after the first one. Pets take hits well from a single mob, but take a rather sharp incline in damage for every mob after. Three is normally a death sentance, even with a real cleric in group. Especially now that the pet's aggro is not sufficient by any means to effectively protect it's owner or group. Yet - both wizards and warriors want to see us nerfed - warriors because "they should not be able to tank" and wizards because "they have that 1337 tankpet".
    Drayze, Mayfaire and Danille like this.
  16. Gnomeland Augur

    I'd love to agree with you here but they never reverted all the changes. Pets tank a lot worse today than they did in early 2014. Parses were done after the changes validating this and it never changed from there until recently on TLP, when there was a massive nerf to pet mitigation that had all the pet classes up in arms. But that change didn't make it to live because it was designed to simply make pet classes less capable in classic content due to all the mage groups running around.
  17. Gnomeland Augur


    Why don't you post a few parses of Warrior sustained DPS while using 2h + 2h proficiency first? And before "but Warriors can't tank with 2h," we all know that to be false. Mage sustained DPS is not as high as people think they are while pet tanking and is a lot worse now due to the aggro change. Mage burn DPS is, obviously, a lot higher than Warriors. But so is Warrior tanking when they have defensive cool downs running, so I'd say the "class balance" is about even, actually - both Mages and Warriors can tank and DPS for groups, except Warriors can't burn, while Mages can't /defensive.

    But this is ignoring the larger picture, which is that these roles don't have the same value. Mercenary wizards can easily replace DPS in Warrior tank groups at a tolerable loss to efficiency on current content. Mercenary tanks, on the other hand, are garbage and cannot replace Warriors in any tolerable capacity. Thus, having a player tank in your group > having a player DPS in net value, except when pet tanks are viable. Funny how that is never brought up.
  18. Benzarden Augur

    There's a big difference between wanting you nerfed and not wanting you buffed to the level that you think you should be.
    Sheex likes this.
  19. Danille Augur

    No. But water pets tanks for sh*t. There is no way that happened. Mage beams were nerfed to high heaven. They are presently bugged too. But for the sake of keeping this thread about the aggro changes, please post in a different thread about pet's tanking issues.

    Thanks....
  20. Danille Augur

    It is really no bother to keep Calm Demeanor up as it is a perm buff AA. It could be a solution if the math was tweaked correctly. All the mage would have to do is click it on during raids and traditional groups and click "Companion's Provocative Demeanor" when soloing/moloing.

    That would only leave the RS pet not being able to gain aggro issue to be resolved.
    Goranothos, Dre., Sheex and 1 other person like this.