Will KoS address Berserkers as Tanks vs Melee DPS for raids? 2 Possible Specialization Routes?

I have been wondering and hope there are some class defining changes in the upcoming expansion in the way berserkers current roles have been for raids. As melee dps goes, we do decent but Melee ingeneral struggles with any kind of AOEs and at the end of the day, we do maybe half the damage of a ranged DPS. Some will say, but that's how it should be, you could be a main tank or an off-tank as a berserker. However, in reality, unless you are buffed to do that, which isn't necessary very often, you will still die in just a couple of hits compared to a fully buffed main raid tank.

So what I hope happens in this expansion...

They allow a berserker to make a choice, major increase to dps with a major decrease to tanking ability. Or a medium hit to DPS for a medium increase to tanking ability. A berserker is supposed to be, by definition, awesome melee dps. We are not that currently, instead a hybrid tank / dpser. Instead of nerfing berserkers in one way or another, which I doubt could happen because we aren't the 'power' class like everybody thinks we are, I propose letting the berserker decide with the new achievements system. Major increase to DPS to put us on par with ranged DPS, or specification for tanking to keep us competitive with guardians for that role.

i dont get it.. after LU13 your quite able to be raid MT, its just gear that makes or breakes a raid MT. We have a pally we equiped as a MT, he does great. I've seen monks, bruisers etc etc Tank.

Just be thankful you have something to contribute when your not tanking. You could be a Guardian and have nothing to do add to the raid force.

MT is a state of mind first ost, and a state of equipment secondly. All fighter classes can tank just about anything with the right equipment and right group.

if i read what your saying correctly your upset because if your not the MT, your not "buff'd".. and die easily to AE's etc etc? Well guess what, so does everyone else. A Guardian who sint the MT, and not raid buff'd will last as long as you do.

I'm not talking about being HP buffed for AoEs. My guild does ins and outs and death is pretty rare. What I'm referring to is that fact that when I can stay in the entire fight I do half the DPS off a caster. I didn't die, the caster didn't die. So why is my dps so much the suck? Because if the caster gets hit, he will die? Well if I get hit, I will die too... So that argument won't hold water with me.

ahh.. so your line of thinking is if your not tanking.. you should be able to do comparable DPS to a caster ?

Zerkers do good DPS for a tak class, especially in AE. If you wanted to be a DPS toon on a raid, you should have rolled one of them. You do alot of things a caster cant, so I dont think you should have that, and his DPS levels too.

Hmm i think all tanks do well now but i have to say a Guardian is hands down THE best tank around to hold aggro and take a beating.
now that being said. i only have the experiance of a 38 SK as my melee class and he tanks well to.
if the Zerk's want to be extreme dps i say let em .... but make em wear cloth and when they rage .... its AoE .. like in Erik the Viking .. they attack anything even friends that are close by.
maybe that would shut em up.
-Dax

You have to have some limites. If you could tank and while not tanking do just as much DPS as a caster why would anyone play a caster?

As for getting one shotted, well that doesn't mean you should do as much DPS as a caster. Casters get one shotted ALL the time not just against a mob that does 7k AoE damage.

I disagree. Guardians are not the best at holding agro. Pallies are, followed by bruisers/monks/Zerkers. Guards have to spend ALOT of power to hold agro. Their hold the line ability procs less the higher their avoidance is... so the more they are buff'd, the less agro they generate.

Take my reply with a grain of salt BUT ...

The Original Poster - Take a pill, then relax ... then slit your wrists because you didn't pay attention for 60 levels.

Anyone who thinks Guardians are the best at holding agro - You're wrong, we are. Have adept 3's and do some offense from time to time and nothing can pull agro from you ... cept a god [expletive haxx0red by Raijinn] Conj Pet. They do with me all the time...but usually its just them and Warlocks ... (And no i'm not saying to nerf either.)

Ok maybe the first part was a bit 'overzealous' but come on, i'm sick of people complaining about Zerker DPS. I Wouldnt mind higher single target DPS but give us a group and we are GODLY.

JUST LAST NIGHT I was in a raid in the Gates of Akhet Akan and with my cobalt dual wields (piercing/slashing and occasionally switching in ironwood crushing) I was able to crack the top 5 DPS in more than 50% of the encounters...as a GOD [expletive haxx0red by Raijinn] TANK!!

If I threw up Rampage and Open Wounds um ... ouchies. I was doing over 1k dps (my highest was 1,457) for a fight.

If you want to say you can only use those every 3 minutes, ok thats two spells split em up (besides if you use them at the same time in a fight and you ARENT the MT, you WILL pull agro ... because our DPS is too much to handle ;-) ). Besides those, up your Vanquish and Frenzied blows, i have my Vanquish at master 2 and frenized blows at adept 3, why? Because i would prefer to have more DPS than anything else.

You know what else? Bump your strength through gear and increase your buff (I forgot the name) to adept 3. I am self buffed over 350 now (not insane but still, keeping in mind i'm not in full fabled and not a full time 'raider' i have decent gear). I actually had higher strength before i started getting some fabled gear, but i have since sacrificed SOME str for some other stats. You can get great things for your class really cheap if you just think smart (Lion Emblazoned Barbute, Kromiter Gauntlets or however they are spelled etc) that increase Str more than Cobalt and offer comparable Mitigation. The key is knowing your class. I actually had a zerker tell me he didnt know what Open Wounds did ... and he was a level 60 with more fabled than me and a 'end game' player/raider for a while now.

Zerkers are AOE DPS Machines.
What do i have? These are just our AOE's.

Slaughter - Adept 3
Berserker Barrage (or whatever the upgrade is now, i forget) - Adept 3
Stunning Howl - Adept 3
Rampage - Master 1
Open Wounds - Adept 3
Unbridled Fury - Adept 3

If you are the TANK and want to do more damage, up your Taunting Defense (mine is Master 1), and Weapon Aegis (getting adept 3 on that today actually). It's all in how you set yourself up.

The only thing i WISH we had was some kind of agro DEBUFF because i'm sick of using Rampage or Open Wounds (even seperately) and pulling agro on the raid just because i'm trying to do some good damage. Although the problem could be that its usually Guardians who are the MT. Sure they might hold one mob better, but can they hold a group (or multiple groups) half as easy as a zerker can? Get me three indepenant groups of mobs (figure you pull one and say you get two sets of adds), just position them infront of you (relatively easily), group taunt each once (as the groups come in), then just hit open wounds, taunting defense and you won't lose agro period.

In closing, we're fine, I wish we had more single target DPS but I can't complain considering how good we are against groups. I once thought similarly, but after taking a look at parsing from multi mob encounters I realize we own. We just have to live with less utility like heals/rezzes/evacs/feign death/invis like other tanks get, in exchange for our uberness.

I'm not really sure about this, first I'm being told to slit my wrists by a berserker who can't even self buff into the 400s... Then I'm also told I must not know my class, once again by a berserker who can't self buff his str to a decent level... Then I realize this cat's tank can't hold agro when he uses open wounds and rampage... Maybe if your tank is a guardian or a pally or something other than a berserker... and you cast them within the first 10 seconds of an epic x 4 fight....


Putting all these points aside. I agree we are awesome group encounter dps, but only raid zone like that is Gates so far... Most are single target or single target with 2 adds. Also even when we are Gods of group mobs, warlocks should and will still hand our @$$es to us on the parse.


Finally, you actually are coming from the stance that we are 'intended' to be raid tanks along with practically any other class... I'm slightly confused on this, because #1 this was not to be the case per the manual, and secondly, if this is intended how come devs on test have actually considered nerfing berserkers back to leather for the expansion... Obviously I can't post this conversation for all to see, but I can say it is being abandoned now but this is why all the berserker screenies and art show them in leather armor and some show them in chain, but none in plate.

So, since we are still going to continue being a tankable class from all suggestions, I ask SOE, 'Let us specialize into DPS or Tanking' Make us choose one or the other, and those who love being raid main tanks can continue to be so, but those who like being just a good group tank but most importantly like that DPS for raids, let us come up to say 80% of range DPS instead of the 50% dps we are at now.

IMHO I wish that they would have made berserkers a DPS type and not a plate/tank wearer. I , personally, just don't see 'berserkers' as plate wearing meat shields. I see them more like the barbarian class in 3.5 D & D, a chaotic warrior that is capable of huge amounts of damage BUT can not take a licking like a fighter. Of course, that is just my personal opinion.

"What I'm referring to is that fact that when I can stay in the entire fight I do half the DPS off a caster. I didn't die, the caster didn't die. So why is my dps so much the suck? Because if the caster gets hit, he will die? Well if I get hit, I will die too.."

Be glad we can do almost half the DPS of a caster. That is a gift for any heavy armor tank. BTW we are not a DPS class. We are tanks. Get used to it. Casters can never tank so they will always be able to do more DPS than we can. That is a given.

"Casters get one shotted ALL the time not just against a mob that does 7k AoE damage."

Good point.

"Guards have to spend ALOT of power to hold agro."
So do we.

"Their hold the line ability procs less the higher their avoidance is... so the more they are buff'd, the less agro they generate."
We have an HTL thing too called Taunting Defense and it has the same problem. Plus ours only has a 20% chance to proc where yours has a 50% chance.

"The only thing i WISH we had was some kind of agro DEBUFF because i'm sick of using Rampage or Open Wounds (even seperately) and pulling agro on the raid just because i'm trying to do some good damage."

Na I disagree with that. No other tank gets an aggro debuff and I don't think we need one either. That would just reinforce the false idea in some people's minds that we are intended to be a DPS class rather than a tank.

"Although the problem could be that its usually Guardians who are the MT. Sure they might hold one mob better, but can they hold a group (or multiple groups) half as easy as a zerker can?"

Maybe that should tell you something. That maybe you should be the MT rather than the Guardian for grouped encounters.

"Finally, you actually are coming from the stance that we are 'intended' to be raid tanks along with practically any other class... I'm slightly confused on this, because #1 this was not to be the case per the manual"

Where did you read in the "manual" that we are not supposed to be able to tank raids?

"how come devs on test have actually considered nerfing berserkers back to leather for the expansion... Obviously I can't post this conversation for all to see, but I can say it is being abandoned now but this is why all the berserker screenies and art show them in leather armor and some show them in chain, but none in plate."

I don't know but it's a [expletive haxx0red by Raijinn] good thing they scrapped that idea. Because since the game's launch, which has been for over a year now, we have been a plate-wearing tank class that's fully capable of tanking raids. In fact many guilds have been using a Zerker as their guild MT for a while now. How do you think the majority of the Berserkers in the game right now along with all the people who rely on them to tank would feel about having our class nerfed down to leather after all this time of wearing plate? Especially those of us who are level 60 and have been in the game for a while and are happy with our class the way it is? They can't just go and do things like that and expect people to just take it. I guarantee at least 75% of the Zerker population on all servers would be screaming for a class respec if they did something stupid like that or just flat quit the game. Furthermore we already have 2 classes of fighters that wear leather. Why do we need another one?

"I ask SOE, 'Let us specialize into DPS or Tanking'"

The only problem with that is then you would actually have 2 totally different classes walking around in the game with the same name. And that will create problems for everyone. Right now when someone sees a Zerker LFG they think tank and if a tank is what they are looking for they will likely send that Zerker an invite and just expect him to tank as soon as he joins the group, it won't even be asked if he wants to tank or not. Trust me on that. To most non-tanks a tank is just a tank. And Zerkers have a good reputation right now for being great tanks. Personally I would rather it stay that way. But no, you want people to have to ask a Zerker if they are a tanking Zerker or not in order to determine if they want him in the group or not. Don't you think that is just a bit silly? And then what happens when one of these non-tanking Zerkers accidentally gets invited to a group to be a tank? When he finds out what he is being expected to do then he is going to have to admit that he is not good enough for the job because he is just a DPS Zerker. Then people are going to get confused about our class and then maybe no one will want to even bother getting a Zerker for anything at that point and we may find ourselves getting ignored altogether to avoid confusion. Really, what is the point of that? Is that really what you want? If you wanted to be a leather-wearing DPS fighter why didn't you just make a Brawler? Quit trying to change my class into something it's not and was never meant to be.
Message Edited by infernus006 on 01-23-200607:02 PM

I think with the removal of the 0-20 class system you might just see them realign some of the classes..

LOL, the threats to quit the game go over like a rock in water to SOE. I'm thinking you must be new to the MMO scene and never played EQ1 or SWG and make a foolish comment like that and actually believe it. SOE will do whatever they want to fix the game into their vision, and if they choose to set us on the path to DPS, you should be ready for it.

Oh and here comes 2 really nice quotes from the EQ2 Class website.

'Berserkers are chaotic warriors who inflict heavy damage with all manner of weapons. Their furious attacks overwhelm their opponents, to whom they show no mercy.'

'Guardians don heavy armor to protect themselves in combat and aid in the defense of their allies. They will stand firm against any threat and lead their party to victory.'

Appears you forgot to read about your class before picking it. You prolly should of been a guardian, the definitions here are obvious, guardians are to be the preferred group tank and raid tank.

Now from your comments, I need to let ya know a few things. First, pre-lu13 Guardians were the premier raid tank for all uber guilds. Post LU-13, Berserkers filled that role. All those guardians have either quit, rerolled, or adapted. These changes occurred 11 months after development and virtually all agree they need to be fixed, what do you want berserkers to be in this next expansion? Secondary main tanks with little other abilities to offer like Pallies, SKs, etc. I want our secondary abilities to be much higher DPS.

I'm not requesting they 'change your class' I'm asking for it to be put back to where the original intentions are. Barely out dpsing a pally in single encounters is not inflicting heavy damage. All I want is for us to be able to specialize into one or the other.

i'm with you Sil, I have 5 tanks, Pally, Guard, Zerker and monk/bruiser. I dont want them to be all the same. I want some diversity.

I'd really love my Zerker to be the Mellee DPS juggernaut I thought he was when i made him.. i actually rerolled to a Ranger because I wanted more DPS.

kfizzle: ...then slit your wrists because you didn't pay attention for 60 levels... blah, blah... Sure they might hold one mob better, but can they hold a group (or multiple groups) half as easy as a zerker can? Get me three indepenant groups of mobs (figure you pull one and say you get two sets of adds), just position them infront of you (relatively easily), group taunt each once (as the groups come in), then just hit open wounds, taunting defense and you won't lose agro period.
Ha! And you're telling people they didn't pay attention for 60 levels? How exactly do you go about group taunting each group in a matter of seconds, exactly? You are aware on the timer of our group taunt aren't you? Maybe you should learn about a little ability called Insolent Gibe? You know, that true AE taunt that WILL lock down all three groups?
Oh, and if you think that Guardians can't hold the aggro of multiple groups then you need to go and play one. Either that, or stop playing with the crap one you're playing with if you think thats the case.
Message Edited by scl on 01-24-200610:23 AM
Message Edited by scl on 01-24-200610:24 AM

I do play one and Zerkers hold agro on groups, and mulit encounter much much easier. Guardian can do it, but costs all of his power to do so.

I play a 60 zerker in an end-game raiding guild--fully decked out (prismatic 2.0 2-hander, most gear tier 6 end-game fabled, all important CA's at Master). I also have a few other trinkets I've collected that boost DPS. Add all this together and I can tell you this, for large-group fights under 1 minute, no one in my guild can outdamage me. Open wounds for 30 seconds brings up damage well over 2k dps. The guild usually piles as many procs on me as possible as well. Add an enchanter with his prismatic proc buff and the damage a berzerker can deal out in short bursts is staggering. If I take credit for the procs, the damage can exceed 3 or even 4k in short fights. Our usual parser wasn't on last night, but I'll get some hard numbers. I was parsing out at over 1700 dps a month ago and my gear has been heavily upgraded since then.
And when the mobs turn on you from the massive damage your dealing... you can take it as long as you have semi-alert healers.
My setup isn't exactly the norm for most berserkers but it illustrates our potential. A well geared Berserker can outdamage any other well-geared class in certain situations. Can't ask for more than that. No one should be the best all the time at everything.
For individual end-game Boss mobs, no, we're aren't the tank of choice. Last night I was buffed to over 10,400 hps though, so I'm sure I could tank most mobs if we didn't have a supremely geared Guardian who does it better.
Where we shine is clearing out all the trash on the way to the Boss mobs. We can make raids move along much faster. We can fill in as main tank if needed. In exp-group situations, there is no better tank than a berzerker. Our mix of tanking ability andh damage dealing is unmatched.
All around I love the class--always have. I'd never want to be a Guadian. They seem so boring.

I make my berserker to be a tank that can dish out AOE damage, period. Doing less than 50% damage on single raid target is irrelevant. The ability to tank on raid should be the primary concern of the berserker class, not dps. Berserker already has his own unique skills when compared to other tank. Fighting against group mobs is the strength of the berserker class. What other tank class has as many ae combat arts as a berserker? Even if 90% of the raid encounters are single target cannot take away the fact that a berserker is very good at tanking group encounter. I would rather see more ae combat arts added instead of a single target. Bruiser and Monk are already doing great dps on single target encounter. Why would a berserker need to be changed to compete with them? If you are asking for berserker to do 80% of a caster/scout damage, then I' pretty sure that caster/scout will ask to have 80% tanking ability. That will make the game looks pretty silly. If you like to solo single target encounter, play a mage/scout/bruiser or whatever you like. I play berserker as a tank that can solo group encounter(non heroic). It puzzles me that a raiding level 60 berserker will ask for the class to be turned into a dps class. Really makes me wonder what you have been playing.

Oooooooo Goodie i caused all kinds of complaining and arguing and no one actually listened to what i said.

Let me paraphrase my entire arguement to this ... "We are Great Tanks, Great DPS, so Shaddup."

Whats the recast on Fearsome Shout? If I'm tanking a mob, even with pathing as it is and even if the entire group is paying half ***** attention It wont be immedeately before the first 'add' is encountered, but then when it is i hit it with outrage, then fearsome shout if its back up, turn back to the original mob hit brutal pledge or whatever, then go about business on the main mob, if more come rinse and repeat with that, with sprinklings of Insolent Gibe in between (also adept 3 which i forgot to mention).
As for my not being able to self buff at over 400 oooo sorry i dont have any fabled +20 something str pieces but I do things OTHER than play EQ2 (although sometimes I doubt that statement myself ;-) ). My point is that you cant do great DPS against Singles AND Groups AND expect to be able to tank (or even take a hit). Basically what the OP is asking for is the ability to DPS AND take a hit, but not have taunts or whatever so hes not a tank.
Everyone taking offense at what i said, step back and think, do you really disagree with what i said or perhaps how i said it.
I'm not denegrating Guardians, just stating SOE's obvious intent, we are I would say better meant to tank 'groups' of mobs. The simple fact that alot of our agro is gained from our DPS, and our DPS is geared towards Groups ... our group taunt rocks and we have the AOE Taunt Insolent Gibe (which god forbid i forgot to mention in my post so it means i don't know what it is apparently, and not instead that i am merely at work trying to not do work).
Us not being the "MT" on raids? Might not be a bad idea to switch in a zerker to fight mobs that do alot of cold damage, because I know other's probably have their cold higher than me and i have self buffed over 3200 (i forgot the exact number). The Zerker class really needs no 'revamp'...ALTHOUGH The OP's idea of a pick what you want to do 'Tank' or 'DPS' thing wouldn't be too bad to me (hell i'd probably pick DPS), I hope it doesnt happen because I personally LIKE being able to do all the things we can do.
My point basically is that we are 'uber' if you just know your strengths.
Stun/Interrupts ... god it's easier tanking some of those harder heroic mobs when you can stun/interrupt them over and over and disrupt their AOEs and hard hitting spells before they can cast them.
Group stuff, we're BUILT for group encounters. I wouldnt mind more single target DPS but take that with a grain of salt, you have to lose out somewhere. Our Group DPS Is sick, our group taunts are nice, and yes again im throwing the name Insolent Gibe out, is amazing (hell works like rescue alot of times, so its like having multiple ticks on that, and it reticks quicker too).
Our defense is second only to Guardians if you ask me. I think MOST People prefer mitigation tanking to avoidance tanking (No brawlers comming here and screaming at me, im not saying anythings wrong with it, just that its a different style and most healers i've seen prefer mit, and most others i've grouped with prefer mit), and I don't know about you guys BUT more often than not I get picked to be Main Tank over other tank classes (ie Crusaders and Brawlers).
I'm rambling now, because i keep getting interrupted (again i'm trying not to work, at work...how dare they), but my main point is if you want better DPS pick a DPS character. Sure they said in the book that we'd do massive damage or whatever (don't quote me because i forgot what the exact line was), and to be honest that fooled me, because i never played EQ1 and didnt know what a 'MT' was till i was already a warrior ... But I like our current role and think if people only thought about all the things we're good at rather than the things we're not, you'd realize we're in pretty [expletive haxx0red by Raijinn] good shape.
Ok im gunna stop typing and hit send now, time to go ramble at work.

Anyone thats Honestly whineing about how much DPS a berserker can put out doesn't have the first clue how to play his own class.

I'm set up gear wise as a MT Can check my Gear here. http://eq2players.station.sony.com/en/pplayer.vm?characterId=221698206

Shield / Weapon = Protector of the Midnight Sun, Morning Star of the Guard.

I've tanked Alot of the T6 End game Encounters.

And still can Put out Parses as Such..

Attack Start End Duration Dmg Dmg% DPS Hit Miss
Flametongue 23:23:43 23:23:46 00:00:04 735 1,9% 183,75 22
Strike of the e 23:23:43 23:23:46 00:00:04 1Â 630 4,2% 407,50 5 2
Slaughter 23:23:46 23:23:46 00:00:01 2Â 533 6,5% 2533,00 8
Furious assault 23:23:43 23:23:46 00:00:04 4Â 249 10,9% 1062,25 15
Stunning howl 23:23:43 23:23:43 00:00:01 5Â 686 14,6% 5686,00 8
Rampaging blow 23:23:43 23:23:46 00:00:04 24Â 049 61,9% 6012,25 85 10
Total: 23:23:43 23:23:46 00:00:04 38Â 882 100,0% 9720,50 143 12

Those that don't know how to read the Parse.

Thats 38,882 Dmg in 4 Secs.. translating into 9,720.5 DPS.

Sure You'll say its just showing a 4 Sec burst, and you can only go off like that once every 3 mins. Along with only being able to do so on Multiple mob Encounters.
I'll tell you Big deal.

You'll say Zerks still don't tank as well as a Guadian, I'll say That depends on how goofy your Raid leader is.

Why in the world would you say you want to tank.. then whine cause someone doesnt have 400Str. You can take that str and shove it somewhere before it will help you Tank better. Might help you hold agro a bit. But then again, you clearly dont know what your role is.
Message Edited by tages on 01-24-200606:52 AM