Is The Warrior Class Dead?

With the latest changes to the Paladin and SK classes I have been struggling to find a reason to take a warrior as the first choice for tank; in the group game or the raid game. I have recent first hand experience with the guild leaders of several top, and I mean top guilds no longer recruiting warriors while actively seeking Paladins. For the group game it is obvious on its face that the Warrior is 3rd choice.

Has the Warrior class, at long last, been relegated to the bench?

No, still need raiding warriors. Knight classes can do more than they used to be able to though.

Warriors are dead.

I disagree with noob. After this release we switched our rotations to war knight war knight. The funny thing is the knights don't die and last way longer than the warriors. It's pathetic.

Maybe 5th choice if you count pets and mercs, or even further down when doing content easy enough for other classes to tank.

On the raid side - I'm not sure what else you're looking for. Warriors getting benched on raids?

tank mercs are dreadful.
The only reason people use them is that they don't need to spend time looking for a tank, and they don't have to share loot with another player if they use a merc.

And neither of those can be changed by improving warriors.

#1 reason to take a warrior into your group or raid - They are a good player and know their class.

Knights can do it too, shrug. That doesn't mean warriors can't. If they are a good player, and know how to equip and play their class.. then they are invaluable.

All three tanks are viable in the group game (though warriors could use a bone or two).

In the raid game, each has their role (with some overlap).

Warriors spend their entire career working on being exceptional main tanks, and that single-focus devotion is what makes them the best at that role. It's similar to Monks and pulling. It's not so much a matter of the mechanics of which class *can* do something as it is a matter of mindset.

its simply like this warriors are the distant 3de group tank

warriors are now equal with main tanking big baddie number1 in raids with shadowknights, paladins are atm the best main tank for the boss mob cuz they get some many + healing they can space and stack out when they get healed that they can more or less make clerics feel like they are criting more heals then ever ever did b4 even if they dont crit so they are pretty much allways topping paladins off on top of that pallys self heal for a ridiculas amount as well just like shadowknights do . even if many heals DuDs out its that one importent heal where you whould of died that counts, not all the duds that dident heal for jack

warriors are still tanks main raid bosses cuz thats the only thing we are decent at for 3 minutes and 12 seconds after that most of us fully accept the fact after def is down we live on borrowed time and we are soon gonna die. and we are subpar at add tanking snap aggro + maintaining it. and kicker is most clerics are healing the main tank and we dont fair well on our own we need more healers focusing on us wile knights are more adapt at helping them self with just 1 or so healers looking out for them

the warriors that have been wit their guild for along time are not gonna be benched most of us have been in guilds for a long time and ppl know they can count on us to play our class effectly enough to get the job done like i said we can tank most things for 3 minutes and 12 seconds then we rezz us we hit rest and wait 7 minutes untill its out turn in the rotation again

dead, no...dying, rapdily

/sadpanda

Razzak probably put it better than I did. I should say existing warriors who are well established in their guilds will remain on habit and skill. Knights will replace them as they leave or retire. Many will re-roll another class over the next year or so. New warriors to the game will be shunned, give up, or will be pushed down the path to main change before they ever see the ranks of raiding guild.

Could the developers save the class? Yes, it would be pretty easy. However, they have proven the past couple beta to ignore our key issues, farm out warrior tools without providing anything in return. We are probably already off the cliff at this point. I fear we are nearing the point of being un-savable in the context of the game given the developments response, their views on the class, and raid design decisions.

Maybe it is better for the game for the class to die, but they should be honest about it.

Give knights (SKs really) that 3 minute tanking buff and it is over for warriors. Pally's indeed are better suited for raid tanking than SKs even with the most recent disc pally/sk were given...

Group tanking...agreed...knights make it easier. Goes back to the whole complaint of warriors not duel wielding anymore cuz they can't tank things without a shield? Didn't that start this mess?

Still, having a stable of warriors to toss at a raid mob for 3 minutes each isn't a bad thing...even if you do toss in knights to help with the tanking transition...less healers/dps die on transition is always good. So, having just knights tanking raid mobs...doable...but probably not the long term raid solution.

Points about folks not wanting to make/play a warrior are valid it would seem...and needs to be addressed. It is much like the clerics vs merc healers. Mass exodus of clerics to other toons at first...but raiding clerics are needed still. Group healers? Droods and shammy's work fine with a merc healer in the mix...so less clerics needed. What is going to bring warriors back to the table...raid tanking is a small sliver for someone to level up and maintain a toon...need more than just that it would seem...

Luckily...warriors have Champions of the People mission...(and knights of course) because pet tanking or merc tanking that mission is a pita. So...be happy you have a mission to tank...and lets see if the devs can make more tanking missions. PoS #2 (forget name) would seem to be a mage pet-able tank mission...sorry warriors.

This is the big ISSUE, and the PRIMARY concern leaving ROF beta. Warriors lost our final advantage over knights. Prior to ROF, even in spite of the knights two defensive discs, we still had a slight edge on raid boss tanking. Now this ROF expansion gives them another. The new knight defensive disc is 36% raw mitigation for fix time with no damage cap, and also gives them a healing bonus. The fact of the matter is that this new 36% knight defensive, on top of their prior two defensive's which can be chained back to back, allows them closer to 4-5 minutes of very high mitigation (generous minimum 36%) without factoring their stack-able mitigation tools, incoming healing bonus's, and the fact they are healing/tap, curing and so forth.

It is easy to say well warriors have 10% on knights (defensive/final stand is 46%). So we do it at face value have a SLIGHTLY better mitigation for about half the time. YET, you would be a fool to say that the knights don't more than make up for that 10% difference with all of their other tools. Don't forget that warriors should have a 10% innate bonus, but that does not stack with our defensive so our actual return gained from Final stand is 36%, which is the same returns knights see. We could say at a minimum their abilities are designed to account for 10%. Thus, being super generous, we are at best on equal playing fields in this regard.

BUT, why wouldn't you want to synergize the tank groups with more group healing and shadow knight epics at this point? Lets assume your old mold of 4 warriors in 2-3 tank group made up your defensive rotation. In removing 3 of the 4 warriors (3 being the warriors not tanking) and instead you add in 3 more knights who will positively impact the MAIN TANK through synergy healing etc (warriors add nothing there). Knights (paladins) are often higher than healers on tank parses....Lets not forget their large DPS advantage right now. Lets not forget the fact that knights can fill a lot of other roles to add flexibility....The list goes on forever.

Before the Shadow Knights nerd rage again. Yes we all know paladins are much better than you in the raid game. Not everything I said applies to shadow knights, we know you cant heal others.

It is hard not to be melodramatic at this point to be honest. I wish the knights well of course, and know many of them did not even ask for the third defensive discipline. Its a development problem. The point is, we can continue to go through motions and use warriors, but we will be doing it at a large performance cost. There is not really a warrior advantage. There is just pity for those of us who have stuck it out as long as we have.

And the 3rd defensive disc nerfs a key healing element for SKs.

I dunno about other SKs, but ive found myself dying a lot under our new 3rd defensive disc. Our two old discs? Not as much. I only use our 3rd defensive disc for a DPS means. I click it for the proc buff and then click the disc off, LOL. Not kidding. Its honestly garbage for SKs.

Does the DPS reduction impacts some health leech from melee tool or something? I mean 36% mitigation is 36% mitigation of damage you are not taking from a raid boss. Your personal DPS for that short window boss tanking is not that critical unless your actually gaining mitigation from it some how.

I bet that 6 minute buff rocks for both classes though.

Its a 60% melee nerf to SKs. That in turn nerfs our leeching ability, which in all honesty, is what makes the SK class survive where others cant.

In short, it nerfs us hard on self healing and gets us killed.

Yeah, we didnt ask for the disc as mentioned, however, I find it comical that SKs are going to be using this as a part of their DPS burn instead of using it as a tank disc, LOL.

Every single time ive used this disc during a situation that requires a tanking disc to survive, I have died. When I used our two older tanking discs, I didnt die.

Its honestly a bad implementation for SKs. The devs can trashcan the disc for all I care

Wait so your saying SK's already boss tanked better than 36% mitigation? Well... No surprise here to me, but it is nice to see a SK finally admit it. Nice to hear someone admit that your leeching tools have more value than simple raw mitigation. Especially given the synergy factors.

Just an idea, a bone of sorts.. what if a warrior who dual wielded, got the benfits of that weapon as both a weapon and a shield.. I mean they are the master of weapons. Make it that the offhand weapon work as a shield for warriors only. In fact, make it so that they get both the AC and the damage as AC, and then get the extra dps for aggro, and still get all the benefits of sword and board.

so say you were wielding slaughter.. that's 92 ac + 140 damage(ac) = 232 AC + all the benefits of dualwielding and sword and boarding. Wouldn't that fix warriors? Now that's slightly less than the shield that Lanthor is wearing.. but you get all the benefits of both..

A plausible bone?

We asked for something similar a while back and got told "No" straight out so unlikely to happen.

It truly varies on what you are doing honestly Lanthor, the extra melee healing is nice sometimes, but it isn't really that noticeable on raid bosses except for when you are say using visage. The mitigation will be a lot more beneficial against especially hard hitting raid mobs, say aaryonar/vyemm, as a 1 rounded tank isn't going to be self healing too much. I really don't get the whole issue with it personally, for super hard hitters can do 36 % then 35 % w/ visage/2.0, for not so hard hitters can stretch it out further, do 36 % then 20 % + visage/2.0 then 35 % + whatever else you'd like to use at that time.

The bottom line comes down to this, can you survive 1 round of combat against a raid boss or not. The new disc makes that statement a yes for knights more often now.