Holmgang is way too strong for how short the CD is and needs to be nerfed.

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Originally Posted by whiskeybravo

What I meant was Warrior could not take them all without swap. I can take all Hyperdrives without a swap no problem. That's a difference in content design that has nothing to do with abilities.

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That sounds like a huge problem in terms of efficiency since you are not using your abilities and your co-tanks abilities optimally. There is no advantage to using all of your tank CD's on tank busters over invul especially when your tank CD's can be used on auto attacks instead.

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Originally Posted by Reynhart

But if we go into that logic...
...as long as the tank meta favors doing as much DPS as possible, Clemency is irrelevant and might as well not exist :p

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Also DRK would have no self-healing capability in most trials/boss fights since Soul Eater's heal is Grit locked, Abyssal Drain would be a huge DPS loss against a single target and so you would never use it and many, if not most, fights don't have anything to potentially get the measly amount of healing Sole Survivor would provide.

People can't just selectively wave away acknowledging abilities and what they bring to the table because of a meta while ignoring how adhering to that meta would also negatively effect the other jobs.

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Originally Posted by TouchandFeel

Also DRK would have no self-healing capability in most trials/boss fights since Soul Eater's heal is Grit locked, Abyssal Drain would be a huge DPS loss against a single target and so you would never use it and many, if not most, fights don't have anything to potentially get the measly amount of healing Sole Survivor would provide.

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Yeah, DRK is atrocious on the self-healing department...which also serve making LD much worse than Holmgang (And Hallowed Ground), since DRK is the only tank that can't recover on its own after using its "I won't die" skill.

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Originally Posted by Saeno

That sounds like a huge problem in terms of efficiency since you are not using your abilities and your co-tanks abilities optimally. There is no advantage to using all of your tank CD's on tank busters over invul especially when your tank CD's can be used on auto attacks instead.

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I didn't claim it was efficient nor that it's our usual strategy, but I have had to do it out of necessity a few times - my point was mainly it would've been impossible to do the same on ExDeath. In this case the difference is not Holmgang but rather the way the fight is designed.

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Originally Posted by whiskeybravo

I didn't claim it was efficient nor that it's our usual strategy, but I have had to do it out of necessity a few times - my point was mainly it would've been impossible to do the same on ExDeath. In this case the difference is not Holmgang but rather the way the fight is designed.

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I see your point. And you are correct that in several cases, the issue comes from the fight itself. Dualcast Thunder lll or Delta attack are perfect examples and Holmgang just happens to be perfect for those skills. And that's ok, Holmgang in this case serves as a full fledged "oh shit" button as intended. Again, the issue comes from how often you can do abuse this. I really do not see why ANY tank in this game needs an "oh shit" every 3 minutes especially when it creates the dynamic of "how often can we use tank invul for these busters". It also eliminates the aspect of stacking strong CD's like Vengeance and Rampart together for certain busters since you will be better off using invul as many times as possible. Why is this an issue? Because I would like to put more thought into my CD mapping than "Holmgang as much as possible".

https://i.imgur.com/lXMGWJF.jpg

Here is a simple tank CD rotation of O8S with a PLD+WAR comp. As you can see, 4 out of 5 Ultimate Embrace are taken with a tank invul. The one Ultimate Embrace (second one) that is taken without an Invul is taken with three CD's on both tanks. While that is fantastic, you're still taking 80% of the hardest hitting tank busters with tank invuls. It's a bit... excessive.

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Originally Posted by Saeno

Here is a simple tank CD rotation of O8S with a PLD+WAR comp. As you can see, 4 out of 5 Ultimate Embrace are taken with a tank invul. The one Ultimate Embrace (second one) that is taken without an Invul is taken with three CD's on both tanks. While that is fantastic, you're still taking 80% of the hardest hitting tank busters with tank invuls. It's a bit... excessive.

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I mean, I don't disagree with your sentiment. I can sort of relate it to the knockback situation, everyone has an antiknock back except poor BRD/MCH so why do we even have knockbacks.. At least is a similar kind of problem, why do we have these "scary" tankbusters when we can just swap invulns and ignore them?

Personally I don't like using Holmgang except for oh shit moments, simply because it can leave you extremely vulnerable if healers aren't prepared (not much different than LD in this regard). And it makes me feel like I'm wasting Vengeance (most powerful mitigation ability used for 5 or 6 auto attacks?) I was actually going to make a clip from last night, but I did my usual Holmgang for 2nd Head On and got rooted at the edge of where the front ghost box spawns, I couldn't get out of it in time and died as soon as Holmgang fell off. Yea that's all my fault but wouldn't have had that problem with the LD or Hallowed. It may be the only time that's happened but my point is it's not always a guaranteed "win" button, it does have drawbacks. I also remember back when Shinryu came out I had to adjust for the 2nd TB I holmganged because sometimes the heart would die and I'd lose the target causing me to mistime Holmgang, so I just started never leaving Shinryu lol. Again, it's all on me, but not problems that occur with the other invulns.

There's another solution too and it's right on the tooltips: "most attacks can not kill you". There have certainly been mechanics in the past which could not be invuln'd. So if they are going to design something like a "shared" tankbuster it should be basic routine to make it kill you through an invuln if solo, otherwise what's the point? It's basic design decisions like this that allow Warrior to seem so powerful compared to the other tanks.

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Originally Posted by whiskeybravo

it makes me feel like I'm wasting Vengeance (most powerful mitigation ability used for 5 or 6 auto attacks?)

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In fairness, that's kind of what WAR's are suppose to do. You have so many CD's that you should be putting them on autos, and vengeance DOES have the reflect damage for autos if the autos are physical so it isn't a complete waste.

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Originally Posted by whiskeybravo

There's another solution too and it's right on the tooltips: "most attacks can not kill you". There have certainly been mechanics in the past which could not be invuln'd. So if they are going to design something like a "shared" tankbuster it should be basic routine to make it kill you through an invuln if solo, otherwise what's the point? It's basic design decisions like this that allow Warrior to seem so powerful compared to the other tanks.

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That would have to apply for all tank invuls and, if Hallowed gets slapped with that, then you "nerf" holmgang by nerfing ALL of the tank invuls including the one that is somewhat balanced. I'm not sure if I like that, though I do get the idea of enforcing this hidden downside of all tank invuls.

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Originally Posted by Reynhart

You can't say that PLD and DRK's mitigation is more powerful if you decide on your own to ignore the most powerful mitigation skill of WAR.

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Inner Beast hasn't been a core part of WAR's mitigation kit since Fell Cleave unlocked at level 54. It's avoided as much as possible even in progression by a ton of WAR players, not specifically me.

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Originally Posted by Reynhart

...as long as the tank meta favors doing as much DPS as possible, Clemency is irrelevant and might as well not exist :p

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Originally Posted by Saeno

How do you say this and also mention Clemency and Passage of arms as upsides to PLD? Those skills dont do damage, so according to you they may as well not exist.

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If Clemency and PoA are irrelevant (and a lot of people think that), so is WAR's sustain because it's almost completely limited to Defiance. Thrill is on a 2 minute cooldown and Path's healing is pathetic. Anyone that's going to claim WAR's sustain is good and completely ignore PLD's is biased.

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Originally Posted by Saeno

Warrior now and always has been an insanely powerful job since 2.1. The fact that people have been asking for other tanks to be buffed for over 4 years to be on the same level as WAR should say just how powerful WAR has been. There isn't bias towards WAR as much as it is people being tired of everyone always asking other tanks to be buffed. it's been the same song and dance for a very, very long time.

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PLD already got huge buffs in 4.0 and became the best tank, and even after it got a few nerfs and WAR got a few buffs/changes it's still the most played tank in Savage. PLD is still the best tank in my opinion (which is why I'm raiding as it), so seeing people ask for nerfs on WAR seems stupid.

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Originally Posted by Launched

Inner Beast hasn't been a core part of WAR's mitigation kit since Fell Cleave unlocked at level 54. It's avoided as much as possible even in progression by a ton of WAR players, not specifically me.

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Farm? maybe. Progression? hell no.

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Originally Posted by Launched

If Clemency and PoA are irrelevant (and a lot of people think that), so is WAR's sustain because it's almost completely limited to Defiance. Thrill is on a 2 minute cooldown and Path's healing is pathetic. Anyone that's going to claim WAR's sustain is good and completely ignore PLD's is biased.

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one cooldown being locked behind Defiance does not mean WAR's sustain is limited to it's stance. The cooldowns WAR has access to outside of Defiance are what gave WAR the title of most tankiest tank. Inner beast is excess mitigation.

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Originally Posted by Launched

PLD already got huge buffs in 4.0 and became the best tank, and even after it got a few nerfs and WAR got a few buffs/changes it's still the most played tank in Savage. PLD is still the best tank in my opinion (which is why I'm raiding as it), so seeing people ask for nerfs on WAR seems stupid.

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Again, I stated living dead would need to be looked at since the tank invul meta isnt enabled just on WAR. However, Holmgang is the biggest culprit and ultimately 3 minutes for a tank invul is just way too short when other mitigating cooldowns like Sentinel and Shadow wall share that recast. WAR could have a 5 minute recast on Holmgang and all it would change is 60% of all high tank damage being invul instead of 80%. WAR would still be an amazing pick in content because it has so many strengths with little to no downsides.

This thread is worth it just for the salt.

Any true tank plays all 3 at the end game and knows they have their strengths and weaknesses. WAR is strong sure, but need I remind people that JP world first O8S clear was a DRK mt? Apparently I do.

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Originally Posted by Quor

This thread is worth it just for the salt.

Any true tank plays all 3 at the end game and knows they have their strengths and weaknesses. WAR is strong sure, but need I remind people that JP world first O8S clear was a DRK mt? Apparently I do.

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I guess the actual world first of warrior/paladin no longer matters, only JP world first does now.

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Originally Posted by Quor

This thread is worth it just for the salt.

Any true tank plays all 3 at the end game and knows they have their strengths and weaknesses. WAR is strong sure, but need I remind people that JP world first O8S clear was a DRK mt? Apparently I do.

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This doesn't actually mean anything, all jobs are viable. The world first of ultimate coil had a DRK, and he openly stated that PLD/WAR would have been better and he just wanted to play DRK.

Viability =/= Good Balance

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Originally Posted by Chrono_Rising

I guess the actual world first of warrior/paladin no longer matters, only JP world first does now.

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Yeah man, cause world first for a tier easier than deltascape and doesn't even compare to ultimate is a valid point.

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Originally Posted by Hierro

Yeah man, cause world first for a tier easier than deltascape and doesn't even compare to ultimate is a valid point.

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I guess the only metrics that matter in designing any content is which caliber of players can clear the content first and before anyone else.

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Originally Posted by Hierro

Yeah man, cause world first for a tier easier than deltascape and doesn't even compare to ultimate is a valid point.

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They are arguing for balance based on composition of who cleared o8s on the Japanese data centers, and I am point out how ridiculous this sounds. They are not talking about Ultimate, not even sigmascape, we are talking o8s. Again this makes me feel like these types of arguments aren't based on any sort of internal consistency. World first in deltascape was important because it helped wars make a point "Warrior wasn't world first" Buffed. Ultimate was important because again "Warrior wasn't world first" Buffed. Now Warrior is in world first, and its not valid because we are going to call the tier easy. Lets not even bring up how subjective the difficulty of a tier is, just think about how the world first on o8s doesn't matter, but the JP datacenter world first of o8s does. Do you see how ridiculous this is?

Lets not forget that Warrior has since seen several large buffs since that time, and isn't even really comparable to what is was in v4s pre 4.1.

And As WhyAmIHere points out, world first race is about viability of a class and the skill level of the players, not the extent of how it feels to play, and whether it feels valuable compared to the other tanks, which I would argue "#worldfirst" isn't measuring these variables.

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Originally Posted by Chrono_Rising

And As WhyAmIHere points out, world first race is about viability of a class and the skill level of the players, not the extent of how it feels to play, and whether it feels valuable compared to the other tanks, which I would argue "#worldfirst" isn't measuring these variables.

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Maybe I worded myself poorly? Maybe I misunderstood what you're saying? IDK I ain't that bright.
What I meant to imply was "World first doesn't matter except for e-pride." Balance shouldn't be determined on who clears content, but what. UCoB is the gold standard for that I feel. "DRK World First UCoB so it's fine it don't need buffs" nonsense. Disregarding the context that the DRK in that group was skilled n his own merit, had the team cohesion to make the setup work, and chose to use DRK for his own personal enjoyment... this tangent's been beaten like a dead horse enough.

On topic: As far as holmgang goes: It's both fine, too good, and too weak I feel. (Disclaimer: I am not a WAR main, haven't taken WAR into savage / any high-end content, and personally don't enjoy how it feels to play) It's fine in that, for 6s you know what you're getting, unkillability. Sure, you're rooted in place, and that's supposed to be a negative, but any skilled player of any class should be able to turn a negative point into either a positive, or know how to minimize the negative impact of [thing]. It's too good because of how often you can use it; though that has more to do with how the developers design the encounters in the game, so it's less a fault of WAR's having a skill being too good, but that the game allows it to be so impactful. Lastly, it's too weak in that you still take damage, and if you screw up the placement of yourself when you use it, and you root yourself in an AoE or something, and your healer isn't ready for when 6s elapse, well... bye.

In that sense, I'd say when compared to Hallowed and Walking, Holmgang is the one area where WAR is between the two tanks.
HG is just flat out great in-that (when it works) you take 0 damage for 10s. pure and simple, sweet and to the point.
WD is a catch-22. Yes, for 10s* you can't be killed, like holmgang, but it carries the punishment of death if the status isn't removed at the end of those 10s. (*: WD lasts anywhere from 1-10 seconds, so you can have anywhere in that window of time where you can't die. great when you have >6s of use out of it, lesser than Holm if you have ≤6s out of it.)
I'd honestly like to see Holm upped to 7s, but with a longer recast. It'd still achieve the same effect, but it'd give you/your healers more time to adjust to it, and (IMO) it'd be more healthy to have it's use be more carefully planned around.

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Originally Posted by WhyAmIHere

Maybe I worded myself poorly? Maybe I misunderstood what you're saying? IDK I ain't that bright.
What I meant to imply was "World first doesn't matter except for e-pride." Balance shouldn't be determined on who clears content, but what. UCoB is the gold standard for that I feel. "DRK World First UCoB so it's fine it don't need buffs" nonsense. Disregarding the context that the DRK in that group was skilled n his own merit, had the team cohesion to make the setup work, and chose to use DRK for his own personal enjoyment... this tangent's been beaten like a dead horse enough.

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Yeah, this is what I thought you meant, and my response (I hope) comes off as clearly agreeing with you. IMO world first is much more an indication of a talented group of players. World first is an incredible achievement but as far as telling how well jobs are performing gives too little information, mainly because there is only one instance of something happening. It proves dark knight is viable, but anyone who cleared with any class proves that class is viable.

Dark Knights complain their DPS is too low for what they bring to a party: Is that measured in World First? No.

Dark Knights complain the animation lock is too long on skills is too long: Is that measured by world first? No.

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Originally Posted by Quor

This thread is worth it just for the salt.

Any true tank plays all 3 at the end game and knows they have their strengths and weaknesses. WAR is strong sure, but need I remind people that JP world first O8S clear was a DRK mt? Apparently I do.

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Lmao, everyone joked about it, but I guess there really are people who thought "well they cleared Ultimate so they must be good".

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Originally Posted by Exiled_Tonberry

Lmao, everyone joked about it, but I guess there really are people who thought "well they cleared Ultimate so they must be good".

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Poe's Law is great.

Regardless Holmgang still superior to living dead

I think that if you want to evaluate the relative strength of a tank cooldown, you need to ask yourself a few questions:
1) Can you mitigate a given tankbuster with just the one ability, or do you need to stack cooldowns?
2) How many tankbusters can you mitigate per use?
3) How many uses do you get per fight?

As a general rule of thumb, resource-based cooldowns like TBN are not enough to mitigate tankbusters in isolation. Instead, they're meant to be used in combination with long-recast cooldowns to reach the required mitigation threshold.

What makes cooldowns like Holmgang and Vengeance so powerful is the fact that you can mitigate tankbusters in isolation with them. Invulnerabilities are especially powerful. Not only do they allow you to save cooldowns, but in the case of shared tankbusters, they allow your co-tank to save them as well.

Having shorter recasts on your more powerful mitigation cooldowns also has the consequence of inflating tankbuster damage. If a tank is going to just invuln every second tankbuster, you have to put more pressure on to force them to expend more cooldowns. This in turn devalues weaker mitigation moves. 20% isn't worth nearly as much now as it was in ARR.

Historically, the one thing that would have offset WAR having access to double the number of invulnerability uses that PLD does was the power of Hallowed. It's not just an issue of healer attention. Negating damage used to mean that you wouldn't gain associated vulnerability stacks, in some cases resulting in a complete reset. This used to allow you to solo tank content and cheese mechanics that you wouldn't ordinarily be able to.

We've seen a steady shift away from this in fight design. Vulnerability stacks and knockbacks are often applied independently of damage received. This reduces the benefit of Hallowed. The power balance has changed, and I don't think that you can justify one tank having access to double the amount of invulnerability uses on Hallowed any longer.

This doesn't address the design issues with Living Dead, of course, but I don't think the solution is to also reduce its recast to three minutes. No tank should have an invulnerability recast that short. There are two independent problems here.

Unless Holmgang lets you do something the other tanks can't do period I really don't see there being that much of an issue with its existence. Holmgang as of this tier breaks nothing, as its main purposes are either knockback avoidance in 5s or handling ultimate embraces in 8s. In either case I'd be hard pressed to believe either is particularly OP when the former is also handled by standing behind some squares and the latter by having the two tanks stack. Holmgang makes UE easier but it by no means really ignores the mechanic.

The last time Holm did something really remarkable was taking first and third dualcast thunder during exfaust and that wasn't exactly game-changing when you could skip that cast entirely or do it legitimately without much trouble. In fact, since Midas I can think of only a couple examples where holmgang really makes a mechanic any more trivial than any other immunity any more effectively. I might be wrong but I'm really scratching my head here.

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Originally Posted by Lyth

As a general rule of thumb, resource-based cooldowns like TBN are not enough to mitigate tankbusters in isolation. Instead, they're meant to be used in combination with long-recast cooldowns to reach the required mitigation threshold.

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You raise a couple good points, but this in particular feels somewhat flawed concerning TBN. If vengeance's mitigation is abusable enough with it's 30% mitigation, there's no reason why we cannot suggest TBN+DM, even un-darkarts'd, is just as effective if not more so given that most of the tier (and previous tier) deals magic damage for tank busters and mechanic damage.

That said, TBN allows the same thing as vengeance and ultimately saves cooldowns. If all your tank busters are being dealt with comfortably with DM+TBN, this frees up the other cooldowns for other uses.

On another note, calling TBN resource-based feels somewhat inaccurate. It pays for itself. The name of the game for DRK isn't worrying about bottoming out on mana, but making sure you never cap out on resources. There's no reason to think why there should be a situation where you would like to use TBN, but can't. It's nothing a bit foresight can't handle. I feel it's more accurate to call it FREE mitigation.

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Originally Posted by Hierro

The name of the game for DRK isn't worrying about bottoming out on mana, but making sure you never cap out on resources. There's no reason to think why there should be a situation where you would like to use TBN, but can't.

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I couldn't have said this any better. Thank you.

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Originally Posted by DaulBan

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Holmgang is on the same recast as Shadow Wall and Sentinel. That means that any time either of the other tanks are using their 30-40% cooldowns on a tankbuster, you can just invuln it. If you're scratching your head on how to use Holmgang effectively, then it means that you simply aren't taking full advantage of it.

Players tend to fixate on the big, end of tier, split tankbusters because they're memorable, but you can and should incorporate invulns into any tankbuster rotation.

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Originally Posted by Hierro

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TBN doesn't save cooldowns. You're not going to take a tankbuster with TBN in isolation, any more than you would take a tankbuster with Thrill in isolation. It's always used in conjunction with something else. The reason why Holmgang saves cooldowns is because you don't actually pair it up with anything else. It's a faulty comparison.

DA + TBN is very good at handling smaller magical tankbusters, which frees up Rampart and Shadow Wall for harder hitting ones. It offers no benefit against physical damage, however, and there has always been at least one fight every tier, if not more, which predominantly uses physical damage.

TBN interacts with DM to raise it to functional status. Put two half-cooldowns together, get one full cooldown out. Meanwhile, WAR alternates between invuln and supercooldown on their tankbusters, without missing a beat.

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Originally Posted by Lyth

Holmgang is on the same recast as Shadow Wall and Sentinel. That means that any time either of the other tanks are using their 30-40% cooldowns on a tankbuster, you can just invuln it. If you're scratching your head on how to use Holmgang effectively, then it means that you simply aren't taking full advantage of it.

Players tend to fixate on the big, end of tier, split tankbusters because they're memorable, but you can and should incorporate invulns into any tankbuster rotation.

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To quote myself...

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Originally Posted by DaulBan

Holmgang as of this tier breaks nothing, as its main purposes are either knockback avoidance in 5s or handling ultimate embraces in 8s. In either case I'd be hard pressed to believe either is particularly OP when the former is also handled by standing behind some squares and the latter by having the two tanks stack. Holmgang makes UE easier but it by no means really ignores the mechanic.

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What you're saying about maximizing the number of invulns you use is true, but only if it's more efficient for your healers than just mitigating properly with regular CDs. Furthermore as Ultimate Embrace is the single hardest hitting TB in the tier it makes sense to focus on it as a usage of immunities over other TBs, as its where you're going to notice the most difference in cooldown availability, particularly in a fight with a lot of stuff to mitigate.

Uses for Holm exist outside of 8S (I didn't talk about clownka but it's a similar case to godka, just more strict) but are significantly weaker and accomplish little other than letting you go down to 1 for fun when you could have just mitigated properly and had more HP to work with after a hit anyways. Holmgang's effect in those fights is minimal at best or functionally pointless compared to proper mitigation at worst. Saying

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Originally Posted by Lyth

If you're scratching your head on how to use Holmgang effectively, then it means that you simply aren't taking full advantage of it.

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is just silly and playing to the meme of Holmg is too good and ignores the actual state of tanking in this game. In Chadarnook and Phantom Train there is no 'effective' use of it that isn't covered by just mitigating properly. In Guardian there is if you really want to do it though you're likely just under-utilizing other cooldowns. In Godka it's useful but doesn't break anything.

In Deltascape the primary use was Lightnings in 4S, and you could do some fun stuff with using it on every other TB as MT on WAR for 3S but then you were forcing your non-WAR cotank to pick up most the adds or do confusing and awkward strategies that could be made easier by just swapping to use Awareness and leaving the healers with an even better health state to work with. In 2S Holm didn't do much without incredibly awkward timings, in 1S you could use it to handle a knockback if you wanted to I guess.

In Creator it... Hm. Well, as I was a WAR OT the entire time I'm not sure but going out on a limb 9S just mitigate since you should be overflowing with cooldowns, 10S just mitigate/swap because Lamebricks has a lot of tank busters, 11S it's useful for the double X sword, 12S... Well if you had a DRK then WAR mitigation sort of wasn't even a consideration until you got to the last 2 TBs of the game in which case Holmgang was a detriment to the group.

What I'm getting at here is that saying 'well if you aren't using Holmgang you aren't thinking of the right use for it' is veeery similar in my eyes to saying 'create a situation in which to use an immunity when you don't need to'. Holmgang's best use is to allow multiple people to avoid using cooldowns so that they have them for other parts of the fight. That's why there's a focus on Ultimate embrace. Actually looking back at the last three raid tiers this supposed fixation on shared TBs seems to be kinda made up given that there are 3, and nobody ever seems to talk about 11s when talking about tank balance. In o4s it's not a concern either because any tank could do the double strike (or whatever it was called) solo too.

And going back through these fights I'm still not seeing the one critical fight where WAR well and truly destroyed it by having Holmgang. This is what I was 'scratching my head' over. O4S is the best example I can think of with Exfaust where it allowed you to truly cheese a mechanic that's difficult enough that having a WAR made a significant difference between life and death for the raid.That's going back 2 years worth of raid content with no evidence that Holmgang itself is somehow destroying content. Every TB that I've taken with Holmgang in the last 2 years I've taken with regular mitigation and with only one example (being Exfaust) there's not been any significant issues.

My original post in this thread and my posts in other threads about holmgang aren't that it isn't powerful, it is, with very few limitations it is the most powerful defensive cooldown in the game with only minor drawbacks. But Holmgang does not substantially break fights or trivialize them more than they already are with the current state of personal mitigation. The cooldown is good, but not 'use as much as possible' to the point of making up reasons to use it good. Immunities are only that good if the fight naturally has substantial opportunities to use them, and in the case of Holm that means saving cooldowns for yourself and your cotank or making a mechanic substantially easier.

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Originally Posted by DaulBan

Uses for Holm exist outside of 8S (I didn't talk about clownka but it's a similar case to godka, just more strict) but are significantly weaker and accomplish little other than letting you go down to 1 for fun when you could have just mitigated properly and had more HP to work with after a hit anyways. Holmgang's effect in those fights is minimal at best or functionally pointless compared to proper mitigation at worst.

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I agree with this. Most of the time when I've tried to use it in 5/6/7 the busters don't even take me to 1 HP. Now, I probably have shields and possibly intervention at times, but there's really nothing worse than using it and not even getting to 1 HP lol

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Originally Posted by whiskeybravo

I agree with this. Most of the time when I've tried to use it in 5/6/7 the busters don't even take me to 1 HP. Now, I probably have shields and possibly intervention at times, but there's really nothing worse than using it and not even getting to 1 HP lol

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If you are not hitting 1 after a tank buster with no mitigation, then you must be at or near full health. If you are in a static with people you trust you could always suggest your healers heal less in the time leading up to your Holmgang use, then there might be more benefit to the skill, and the healers might save resources going into it.

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Originally Posted by Lyth

TBN doesn't save cooldowns. You're not going to take a tankbuster with TBN in isolation, any more than you would take a tankbuster with Thrill in isolation.

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What is this faulty assumption that TBN is sufficient in isolation? Where did it come from, but more importantly, why should I take issue with pairing said mitigation with another cooldown? Why should ANYONE take issue with it? It's FREE mitigation that comes with no diminishing returns. Do you not want to press your buttons or something? Is there a reason you want to let DM sit off cooldown? TBN saves cooldowns by being paired with the other mitigation on a 1 minute CD. Somehow, that combination deals with most of the threatening outgoing damage in savage. Yet, you claim it somehow doesn't save cooldowns? :thinking:

TBN interacts with any cooldown and raises it to awesome status. Don't pretend otherwise. I don't understand the logic behind "TBN offers no benefit for physical damage!" Might as well say the same for Thrill of Battle, and we all know the reaction you'd get if you did.

And really, the whole argument about physical damage fights in a tier is currently irrelevent. in O7S, if dadaluma spawns first, you can literally use a combination of only TBN+SW or LD to cover every single Arm&Hammer. If biblio first, only one tank busters has to be covered by TBN rampart, but even that is sufficient to tank comfortably. If we're talking o3s, the same thing was available. you could awarenss+TBN+rampart/shadow wall, or LD all of those critical hits.

Saying TBN doesn't save CDs doesn't make it true.

I think as pure tool to denial dommage, holmgang is way better than living death and HG (even if HG also protect from debuff like Susano's one).

However, this is true then the fight is mastered without mistakes. When something go wrong (when learning fight), holmgang fall far far behind the two others, as it hardly protect the war from dying after the effect went off. And it last for 6s, and considering he must be used before dying, we can hardly say WAR can get more than 4s immunity from it.

Maybe i'm wrong but i'm not sure tanks defensive cd can really be compared one by one, as they are part of a full tool kit.

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Originally Posted by Sparkthor

However, this is true then the fight is mastered without mistakes. When something go wrong (when learning fight), holmgang fall far far behind the two others, as it hardly protect the war from dying after the effect went off. And it last for 6s, and considering he must be used before dying, we can hardly say WAR can get more than 4s immunity from it.

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You don't exactly need more than one healer, as you can heal yourself as a WAR. if both healers are down then it might be more efficient to wipe and start again. Living dead is also much worse than holmgang in that scenario and hallowed is the only good one and even then, PLD could use either Living dead or Holmgang because the PLD can heal itself to full so it's moreso the PLD job than hallowed ground. So really I dont think its fair to say holmgang is "far behind" the others when in reality it isn't.

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Originally Posted by Sparkthor

Maybe i'm wrong but i'm not sure tanks defensive cd can really be compared one by one, as they are part of a full tool kit.

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Holmgang when compared to the rest of the WAR's kit makes even less sense. When you have a tank invul on a 3 minute CD, you would think that means you don't have a lot of other CD's and your tank would then be reliant on that 3 minute invul. However, WAR has a LOT of CD's, moreso than the other tanks when including inner beast, and all of them are just as strong as other tank CD's that are on a longer recast (vengenace compared to Sentinel/Shadow wall for example, or even Holmgang compared to Sentinel/Shadow wall).

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Originally Posted by Saeno

You don't exactly need more than one healer, as you can heal yourself as a WAR.

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Once, for a fraction of your HP. Not even enough to cover an auto attack unless Eq crits. You could perhaps count TOB, but not really, since it's either used for Upheaval damage increase or regularly as a CD. Or I guess you could count spamming IR+IB.. which again wouldn't be happening if you're using it like it should be used.

But alas, DRK can't do any of those things, so it must continue to mean that War is broken.

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Originally Posted by ManuelBravo

Holmgang....never really had a need for it unless it's in PvP or front line otherwise it's pretty much useless if you know how to tank with a WAR properly The whole binding is over rated and only real draw back is if your stuck in a mayor aoe or conal attack that can be avoided. .

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You're playing WAR wrong. Holmgang is insanely good especially when paired with benediction or really any competent healer.

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Originally Posted by Saeno

In my 4 years of playing this game, I have never had an issue timing holmgang. The effect speed of Holmgang is much faster than Hallowed or Benediction, near instant if I could put it one way. You also don't need to be healed much at all with Holmgang. A simple oGCD heal will take care of the WAR once Holmgang nearly expires.

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There are timing issues with gang, but they're not really that bad. When you're trying to time a last-second gang so you can get off an onslaught or cover the buster and follow-up raid-wide or auto-attack damage for example; if your timing isn't right you can have it go on CD but miss the effect and die (not nearly as bad as hallowed last-second usage though; I think it's likely due to the invuln triggering at cast time for gang and during/after animation for hallowed). Most of the timing issues with gang are when your team is trying to optimize; like gang to cover a buster and raid-wide, tank swap, no heal left at 1hp for 2 more GCDs etc.

I agree, holmgang is insanely powerful and would be insanely powerful on any tank. The drawbacks to using gang are very few. If you're keeping the boss after you gang or there will be raid-wide damage coming out you'll need a heal; but benediction or an excog + essential dignity will take care of that. The biggest issue I see with holmgang (or any invulns) is that tank damage is really REALLY low. Being able to use gang for every odd buster on o7s for example; using invulns for all but the last buster on clown kefka; using invulns for every buster except 1 or 2 (depending on how you tank swap) on god kefka is kinda broken. (although, god kefka's double-drill does tend to force usage of invulns since we're using our other CDs for the wings double-drill so kudos to SE for the damage on that fight). If autos were more punishing and busters were more frequent, your tank toolkit would suddenly look sparse. When you can cheese an entire fight just using invulns, the fight isn't really well thought-out (outside of rampart and sentinel for dadaluma and bibiliotaph before you activate hallowed, every tankbuster except 1 can be mitigated with invulns). I really don't want gang nerfed; I absolutely love it. What I want is more punishing tank damage so that you're required to have more tank swaps; you're required to have people bring palisade, feint, apocatastasis AND even stance dance. Even without holmgang it's just too easy to survive as a tank while being in DPS stance 100% of the fight.

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Originally Posted by WhyAmIHere

Poe's Law is great.

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Poe's law *is* indeed great. Not as great as the irony in this thread by any means, but still great.

Anyway, more on point, I (and many others here) have made suggestions about how to improve DRK. Most of those are ignored or denigrated by the same peanut gallery who somehow think nerfing another job will improve "their" job. They say this while missing the point that "their" job is actually everyone's job, since that's the nature of this game. I'm a pretty hardcore tank in the sense that I enjoy all three, although WAR is my most comfy tank as far "let's do something difficult today" goes. But it's always been that way for me, even in 2.0 when WAR was seen as a liability due to having no invincibility CD and no damage reduction CD's at all. I have my bear mount from 2.0 and 3.0, as well as my armored bear mount from 4.0. I have my panther mount from 3.0, and I'm about 2/3 of the way to the armored panther mount in 4.0. I almost have the lion mount from 2.0 and 3.0, and I've got about 60 or so towards the armored lion mount in 4.0. I've used all three tanks extensively in almost all of the content currently in game. So when I come and see yet another "nerf other tank plz" thread I just have to shake my head at the inexperience and shortsightedness of it all.

I can't even be bothered to suggest anything on the forums here anymore. I get a more productive response on other sites than I do here, and near enough as I can tell, that's because people generally just like to complain, almost like some kind of victim culture but for FF14. God forbid someone comes in and suggest a change that doesn't also involve nerfing something on another job. So please, continue your self-pitying circle jerk. Lash out at all those PLD's and WAR's even harder. Drag everyone down to your level, cause that'll show 'em! Or something. Just, whatever you do, don't think about the consequences of your actions, especially about how they will affect other players. Oh, and never suggest anything that's a complete positive for your class unless you tie it into complaining about another class. Treat the game like it's zero-sum even though it isn't.

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Originally Posted by whiskeybravo

Once, for a fraction of your HP. Not even enough to cover an auto attack unless Eq crits. You could perhaps count TOB, but not really, since it's either used for Upheaval damage increase or regularly as a CD. Or I guess you could count spamming IR+IB.. which again wouldn't be happening if you're using it like it should be used.

But alas, DRK can't do any of those things, so it must continue to mean that War is broken.

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Hmmm not really because in this scenario PLD is the clear winner. WAR does have options to self heal and while some of them are good, they dont compare to Clemency. However, comparing Holmgang to only PLD and not DRK, I still seriously don't think you can justify a tank invul on a 3 minute CD when you have so many CD's or when that is the same CD is Sentinel.

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Originally Posted by Llus

I agree, holmgang is insanely powerful and would be insanely powerful on any tank. The drawbacks to using gang are very few. If you're keeping the boss after you gang or there will be raid-wide damage coming out you'll need a heal; but benediction or an excog + essential dignity will take care of that. The biggest issue I see with holmgang (or any invulns) is that tank damage is really REALLY low. Being able to use gang for every odd buster on o7s for example; using invulns for all but the last buster on clown kefka; using invulns for every buster except 1 or 2 (depending on how you tank swap) on god kefka is kinda broken.

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I dont want to say having a lot of tank invuls up for a fight is broken because at that point you're saying that WE the player are too strong for PvE, and that's a bold statement. However, the tank CD line up that I mention of super CD->holmgang->super CD->cotank invul is always prevelant and to me that's so boring. I want to cleverly line up my CDs instead of relying on this very strong and very obvious CD rotation for every fight.

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Originally Posted by Llus

I really don't want gang nerfed; I absolutely love it. What I want is more punishing tank damage so that you're required to have more tank swaps; you're required to have people bring palisade, feint, apocatastasis AND even stance dance. Even without holmgang it's just too easy to survive as a tank while being in DPS stance 100% of the fight.

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That would be excellent. It would address another issue with this game but I think the issue really lies with the lower difficulty of savage now.

In don't think savage are easy. A lot of people never succeed in them. I also don't think they are easier than before, but better balanced (it's my point of view).

Also, bosses in FF are way more about mechanics than about stuff and continuous pressure. And with a good team, after some runs, you only got no to few mistake, and savage is not about "one mistake = wipe" (at least now).
Also savage are somehow "low retriction access" : you only need ilvl 350 for o8 when max ilvl is 370. I don't think a lot of people succeed in o8 the first week with crafted gear and few 370 drops.

And the new top top end content is fatals raids, which are insanely difficult considering top raiders need about 2 weeks to complete the first one.

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Originally Posted by DaulBan

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Invulns remove the entrance HP threshold for tankbusters. If you're getting hit by a proper tankbuster (i.e. something that will one-shot you unmitigated), you need to be topped off beforehand, and you'll still need some healing afterwards. With an invuln, you just need a bit of healing afterwards.

If your healers know your cooldown rotation (which they should), using an invuln in place of multiple cooldowns works to their advantage (in every case except for LD, of course). It requires that the tank get over their anxiety of hitting 1 HP, of course.

Of course, you can always cite cases in which you overgear content, at which point it doesn't really matter what your mitigation strategy is. I think the assertion that "Holmgang is extremely powerful, but I can't be bothered to use it most of the time because of how powerful the rest of my kit is", while probably accurate, doesn't really address the claim in the OP.