In Light of the WAR 2.1 Adjustments, Can We Expect Tweaks to PLD as Well? My Thoughts

[Phreak]

No, they dont.
PLD doesnt need any fix... like at all.
On PLD i can do stuff in i70 gear that puts my i90 WAR in slight danger.

Just because you can do stuff in i70 as a PLD doesn't mean there's 3-4 abilities on your bar that see very little use and could use some touching up which is exactly what they did for WAR.

Storm's Path was useless --> Gave it a damage reduction debuff and reduced the cost for more frequent use.

Holmgang had 2-3 moments of gimmicky boss fights in trivial content --> Turned it into a small range pull and gave it functionality similar to HG.

Vengeance was generally just used as a Wrath builder --> Applied a worth while damage reduction to it turning it into more than just a button you weave in on CD.

Our stun hand a stupid long CD compared to PLDs and had a long animation before being applied making it pointless for us to be on any sort of reliable stun duty
--> Reduced the cooldown and shortened the animation delay

[Maqaqa]

Just because you can do stuff in i70 as a PLD doesn't mean there's 3-4 abilities on your bar that see very little use and could use some touching up which is exactly what they did for WAR.

You mean like Foresight? Oh wait nevermind, thats WAR stuff, still useless, nobody complains.

[Phreak]

You mean like Foresight? Oh wait nevermind, thats WAR stuff, still useless, nobody complains.

Plenty of people complain about Foresight when ever WAR's CD suite is brought up.

[Maqaqa]

Plenty of people complain about Foresight when ever WAR's CD suite is brought up.

Where? Because all i see lately on this forum is PLDs complaining about not getting buffed beyond OPness...

[Kitru]

"and has lower end performance" is the crux of the issue here though. Designing a class to be out and out inferior to another is simply a terrible idea, especially when class choice is significantly more complex than simply deciding between arbitrarily defined "hard" vs "easy".

Lower *top end* performance. If you're going to quote me *quote me properly*. All that it means is that a perfectly played version of one class performs slightly better than the perfectly played version of another class. It does not mean "we designed you to suck", which you seem to take it as. It also means that it's perfectly fine for one class to have different levels of performance when played horribly, which is just as true.

Also, it's not as if it's an arbitrary assignment of "hard v. easy". PLD has an easy mitigation construct: they just turn on an ability and equip a shield. WAR has a mitigation construct that actually requires some degree of work and/or skill to use properly: generating Wrath stacks and using them to fuel your survivability with a limited uptime ability. That's not arbitrary. That's pretty damned obvious.

No it isn't, because such a design direction alienates everyone who wants to favor the "faceroll" class for any other reason from cutting edge content.

How does it alienate people any more than *any* difference in performance does? There's even more DPS options than there are tank options and there is more variability in *those* than you would experience between two tanks which causes there to be a dramatic difference in performance on cutting edge content. There will *always* be differences in performance. The point is that the differences in performance should err on the side of favoring those classes that require *skill* to play rather than favoring those classes that can be played effectively by anyone that wants to smash their face into the keyboard. As long as the assumed (i.e. not perfect but some level of average) performance of both classes is capable of completing the content, no one is being excluded except by the most discriminating groups which are *always* going to capitalize upon any difference in performance to optimize likelihood of success.

Personal preference or intangible benefits, which should ideally be a player's reason for picking any class.

In a perfect world, yes, the only reason you'd play a WAR is because you prefer to wield an axe rather than a sword and board. This doesn't actually turn out to be true all that often because we don't live in one. Class design and balance has to be made upon practical considerations.

Most players will choose their *first* class based upon arbitrary selection, but as soon as they get past the first few levels or start leveling more than one class so that they have actually *experienced* more than one class, the decision becomes less about the intangibles and more about the playstyle. A player that doesn't like the skill oriented approach to combat that a WAR requires isn't likely to play one and, if they really want to tank, will start looking at other options unless they're willing to overcome that dislike, nor will a player that dislikes the micromanagement implicit in playing a SCH effectively continue to play one for the exact same reasons.

Players almost always make their initial choice on a purely arbitrary basis because they don't have enough information. How do you know you'll enjoy playing a PLD when you haven't played the game at all? Do you just want to play a guy with a sword? They're making completely uneducated guesses. When they've actually *experienced* the game, unless they've found a class that fits them perfectly, they'll either change their class or change their expectations.

Classes are all different and not just based upon aesthetics or other intangible values, which the devs have no real control over in any real sense (they can change the aesthetic, but it doesn't guarantee that it will make anyone like it). The differences in the classes are dependent upon playstyle and performance and *that* is what the devs have to focus upon. Some people are going to want to play a class that they don't have to work at. Some people *are* going to enjoy playing a class that requires more work *but there isn't an impetus too do so if they don't get something out of that extra work*. The people that enjoy skill tanks are those people that enjoy getting every little bit of performance out of them. No one is going to want to put in more work to get the same performance that they could get by putting in less work unless they're either masochistic or just taking the hard route because they want the bragging rights. We're not talking intangibles here. We're talking explicit tangible benefits derived from effort expended into effort rewarded.

Though on that same note, you're posting on a level 50 marauder while begging the developers to make marauders intrinsically superior to the competition

I'm not saying, nor have I ever *said*, that WAR should be intrinsically superior (nor am I "begging"; I am explaining the justifications of allowing WAR to have superior top end performance). You're putting those words in my mouth because they support your worldview and ignore everything else that I've been saying (not to mention going with the terms that are most connotatively advantageous for yourself rather than actually speaking from an even *remotely* neutral viewpoint). Performance for a class is *never* going to be completely static. Player skill will always have some effect upon it, and you explicitly choose to ignore it. You will never have a situation where a perfectly played PLD performs equally well as a perfectly played WAR *and* a poorly played PLD performs equally well as a poorly played WAR. The effects of player skill upon the two classes *always* prevents that variability from reaching the exact same top and bottom end performance. The best you can hope for is to have the *median* performance of the two classes be equal and allow for the class with the higher skill requirements (i.e. player skill has greater impact upon that class than on the other) to achieve greater performance as a *reward* for putting forth greater effort *because they're putting forth greater effort*.

The reward structure of *every* MMO is based upon effort and reward. If you do harder content, you get better gear. If you spend more time playing, you level up faster. The *same* effort and reward structure has to be applied to the classes. As long as the average level of performance is sufficient, there's no issue.

Except suggesting that Warriors be out and out superior to the competition unless poor play is taken into account is exactly what you suggested, so there's no strawman at all.

No, because I never said "out and out superior". If you want to break it down to the fundamental argument, I said "conditionally superior". "Out and out superior" would mean that I'm claiming that WAR is *always* better than PLD, regardless of every other factor, which I have *never* supported. No class should *always* be better than any other class. That's the reason why you are using a strawman argument: you're interpreting my support of conditional superiority as support of universal superiority because you're electing to use the condition of perfect play as the universal condition, which is completely unrealistic. Ergo, strawman.

And if you ignore poor play you're ignoring a huge part of the player base. I have seen some monumentally dumb PLDs progress through all manner of content because PLD is ridiculously good and requires almost no thought. I have yet to see a monumentally dumb WAR progress through the same content because WAR actually requires you to know what you're doing. If you ignore the fact that a poorly played PLD is going to do better than a poorly played WAR or operated under the *explicit* assumption that both classes will *always* be played absolutely perfectly, you're *always* going to end up with the class that requires more skill performing worse *because no one can play it perfectly on a consistent basis*.

You *have* to factor in the inevitable factor that players are human and cannot *always* perform perfectly. This is the entire crux of the design concept: you have to design around the *average* level of performance, not around perfect performance. This does mean that a *perfectly* played skill tank is going to do better than a *perfectly* played faceroll tank, but it also means that a poorly played faceroll tank is still going to be able to perform roughly as well as 99% of the tanks in the world whereas a poorly played skill tank is going to perform worse than pretty much everyone else they run across.

[Kitru]

I've asked before, but can someone name a scenario where that actually holds true though? It usually ends up that the simple tanks, by intention or by circumstance, ends up the better tank.

Actually, in most MMOs I've played, this actually ends up being true.

In TOR, Shadow tanks required explicitly more skill to play properly than Guardian or Vanguard tanks: Shadows had to watch their buffs and debuffs to maximize performance, pay attention to procs, and manage a CD suite that was specific to certain attack types rather than globally applicable. VGs watched next to nothing and had a small CD suite that was comparatively small. Guardians existed in a middle ground with universally applicable CDs on longer CDs and slightly more to pay attention to than a VG but substantially less than a Shadow. Shadows also ended up with a much spikier incoming damage profile such that the Shadow had to pay a *lot* more attention to their hp and be ready to use their CDs instead of just waiting for specific burst scenarios (since they were on a lower CD, you would actually be encouraged to use them outside of burst scenarios since, if you did it right, they would be up again for those burst scenarios). The spectrum of tanks really was Good Shadow>Good Guardian>Vanguard>Bad Guardian>Bad Shadow. The difference wasn't so massive that people simply stopped playing tanks other than Shadows but it explicitly rewarded those players that could manage to play a Shadow *well* by providing them with slightly better overall performance.

It's been a while since I played WoW, but, when I did, DKs and warriors were the skill tanks because you had to know how to leverage their CD suites, procs, and other mechanics while druids and paladins were really just using the same abilities over and over again with really obvious CD suites. Properly played, DKs and Warriors performed better than druids and paladins but, if you didn't know how to leverage the mechanics that DKs and warriors used, you're perform worse than a paladin or druid.

Simple tanks tend to be more *popular* and have the popular conception of being better tanks because there are more people that can play them at a level that people expect. When you start getting to the top end of performance, however, in virtually every game I've played, the skill tank/class ends up doing better than the bottom tier ones. Hell, even in fighting games, barring the cheesey characters designed to be monumentally overpowered and existing in their very own tier, the characters that require the most skill to play effectively are almost *always* the best. In MOBAs, skill shots are *designed* to do more damage (and a crapton more, generally) than normal abilities. It's a design construct that almost every game follows when you start looking at them at multiple levels of play.

[Obsidian]

You *have* to factor in the inevitable factor that players are human and cannot *always* perform perfectly. This is the entire crux of the design concept: you have to design around the *average* level of performance, not around perfect performance. This does mean that a *perfectly* played skill tank is going to do better than a *perfectly* played faceroll tank, but it also means that a poorly played faceroll tank is still going to be able to perform roughly as well as 99% of the tanks in the world whereas a poorly played skill tank is going to perform worse than pretty much everyone else they run across.

If skilled players have no use for a job/class in top-tier content you've failed to properly balance that job/class, period. The idea that such an imbalance is okay because one requires more skill than the is a ridiculous one, because people often get better at a game as time goes on. Very rarely do they get worse.

[TouchandFeel]

snip

While some of the points you make I agree with such as the easier class tends to be more popular, and that the classes/fighters/whatever that tend to be more complex/more difficult result in those that play and get good at them to be better than those that play the easier classes for the most part.

However, I feel that there are fallacies in the logic of your argument.

I see it that the main factor that makes players that play the "skill" classes better is the same reason that they chose to play the more complex class, they want to challenge and push themselves which tends to result in them being more skilled and better than those that find comfort in the easier class and don't push themselves.
Therefore players that tend to play the skill class tend to be better players and more skilled, skill class leads to skilled player. By designing the skill class so that its top level of performance is better you are widening the gap by making the players that will most likely already be more skilled and therefore better, even better.
How the classes' performance scales along with skill can of course vary and it should, but the built in performance ceiling should be the same for both. If the skill class is better in top end performance it should solely be because the players are more skilled.

Then again I am against the whole concept of easy classes and hard classes in a game that requires classes to be balanced. IMO classes shouldn't have overarching difficulty differences but should have differing aspects that are easier and harder than the other classes, drawing in players with different play style preferences such as combo management vs resource management or what have you. So depending on your play style and what you are good at a class could b easy or hard for you. To me that is good class design, not building in a class performance glass ceiling.

[Zohnax]

Repetition doesn't make the claim any more true, however.

Whoosh. I like how you're the OP of this topic and know what his intention was.

No, they dont.
PLD doesnt need any fix... like at all.

I like how you still can't read and take in a post as a whole but rather only see what you want to see. Nor can you listen to advice to go back and read what -is- broken with Awareness and how Tempered Will is 99% useless. The only time I ever Sword Oath is on Demon Wall or if I'm secondary tanking, but the thing is, we have no DPS combos, so we end up tanking anyways and can actually bypass a Shield Oath PLD because of the DPS.

I had to work 3 months on the WAR to make it really effective; on PLD i click on rampart/sentinel and i can go afk.

No, you can't. PLD has to work just as much as WAR to hold hate on multiple mobs and Rampart will be down in 20seconds, sooo, come up with better solid points for an argument. Also, wow at taking 3 months. Just like uh... every other job in the game that was focused on? Also, today I learned iLv70 gear has more m./defense on PLD than WARs iLv90 gear.

The truth is that it could have used a nerf, and you should take war buff as a blessing because its the reason they are not nerfing PLDs to normality.

Did you really only read the first line of my post and then decided to reply? Don't respond to me again until you can take in a whole post.

[Exstal]

While some of the points you make I agree with such as the easier class tends to be more popular, and that the classes/fighters/whatever that tend to be more complex/more difficult result in those that play and get good at them to be better than those that play the easier classes for the most part.

However, I feel that there are fallacies in the logic of your argument.

I see it that the main factor that makes players that play the "skill" classes better is the same reason that they chose to play the more complex class, they want to challenge and push themselves which tends to result in them being more skilled and better than those that find comfort in the easier class and don't push themselves.
Therefore players that tend to play the skill class tend to be better players and more skilled, skill class leads to skilled player. By designing the skill class so that its top level of performance is better you are widening the gap by making the players that will most likely already be more skilled and therefore better, even better.
How the classes' performance scales along with skill can of course vary and it should, but the built in performance ceiling should be the same for both. If the skill class is better in top end performance it should solely be because the players are more skilled.

Then again I am against the whole concept of easy classes and hard classes in a game that requires classes to be balanced. IMO classes shouldn't have overarching difficulty differences but should have differing aspects that are easier and harder than the other classes, drawing in players with different play style preferences such as combo management vs resource management or what have you. So depending on your play style and what you are good at a class could b easy or hard for you. To me that is good class design, not building in a class performance glass ceiling.

Really, this how it is:

If you don't like a class that requires a lot of skill, you won't play it. If you like it, you'll get better at it to a degree that you'll be pretty damn good. Otherwise, you're trash tier and should go with the easier class because of your lack of skill.