Rest in peace War dps

[Februs]

In fact, now that I think of it, its the same flavor of shit as DRG's arbitrarily lower magic defense back in the day. Not implemented for any reason, just... uh... yeah, you just die more easily no matter what you do.

I remember this. Dying to magical dmg as a Drg went something along the lines of:

Drg: "Why am I the only one who died??"
Healer: "Cuz' you're a Drg."
Drg: "... whut? -_-' "

The current imbalance between the three tanks is the same. It is most certainly a problem. The bottom line is that no one should feel like their being punished for simply playing their preferred job, but that's exactly what happens whenever a Tank chooses to go as anything other than War. SE seems to have missed that memo, because they implemented a series of Tank adjustments that failed, yet again, to address any of the real issues that are currently plaguing the tanking community.

[Lucke]

I don't feel Royal Authority should have extra aggro generation, since, ideally, I'd like for Paladin to be able to, at some point, become a viable off tank (I want the same for DRK) and stealing aggro constantly with your monstrous 350 potency aggro boosted combo doesn't seem very fun. PLD probably needs Halone to have its potency boosted to 290-300 and its aggro modifier increased so you use it less often and its less of a DPS loss. I'm not sure what I'd do with Power Slash, though, since while its a relatively small DPS loss on the combo its biggest issue is that using it slows down your MP regeneration, which is a long term DPS loss due to less Dark Arts.

How about RA being part of 2 combos? Using it after RoH will grant enmity, using after Riot would have increased potency. SE already did this with other jobs, like NIN's ninjitsu. RA could then be used by both MT for aggro and OT for loldmg.

[Duelle]

Yeah, this is incredibly shitty. WARs design enables a style of play that every tank should be entitled to while DRK/PLD are given this arbitrary hurdle to jump that is independent of proper play or skill. You can say what you want about balancing tank mitigation or DPS or utility, but we should all be able to stance-dance either without penalty, or with the same penalty. WAR having this privilege is like giving a DRG the ability to live without dodging AoEs while telling NIN/MNK "tough shit, git gud and learn to dodge". In fact, now that I think of it, its the same flavor of shit as DRG's arbitrarily lower magic defense back in the day. Not implemented for any reason, just... uh... yeah, you just die more easily no matter what you do. DRK/PLD, you just have to gimp your DPS to hold aggro, sorry. Its a fundamental imbalance that arbitrarily punishes DRK/PLD for maximizing performance while handing the ability to do so to WAR on a platinum platter.

Well, let's take a couple of things into account. First that as much as I would want them to, the devs making major mechanic and design changes to jobs mid-expansion is unlikely. Hell, the WAR revamp was the product of extreme circumstances as it was, and I'm sure someone on the dev team said "never again".

Second, the damage is sort of done. Knowing the devs, they'll probably refrain from changing WAR because a) they don't want to make people mad (funny they decided to ignore this when they changed BRD), b) because it was a "clever" idea to make their design "unique" despite coming from an oversight that other dev teams would have squashed within the first couple of weeks of being discovered, and c) some people have grown used to it to the point they feel WAR should play that way.

The best the devs can do would be to retool the three tanks going into the next expansion and make things even. This is provided they stop with the "DPS = utility" bullshit and their other shenanigans. Ideally, leave swaps as part of WAR gameplay but tune things so that DPS output and utility is equal to that of PLD and DRK.

[Shurrikhan]

I still feel like WAR does at least have some built-in penalties in its stances (namely Defiance) that the others wouldn't if they were to get the same instant swapping, but I'm not sure it'd be unfair even then, especially if Grit continues to cost mana and Rage of Halone enmity remains poor. Defiance still has its Unchained, giving by leagues the best burst enmity (without zero'ing one's mana, at least), and Deliverance still delivers instant benefits. I'd gladly trade my combo for it as well, as long as we aren't locked into the stance (just unable to recast it or the opposite Oath for 10s, so that we can still drop oath, finish the combo, do another combo, and then swap again, etc).

Though giving them all 10s CD ability-based swaps isn't the solution I'd look forward to, what we've been given did next to nothing to deal with the clunkiness of the non-WARs. Have healing received buffs affect all heals, not just spells, drop Equilibrium to 900 potency to compensate, and call it a day. If that still doesn't do it, change the %parry on Defiance stacks to %healing received; now they waste as few abilities against magic as a DRK does.

[Ragology]

You can say what you want about balancing tank mitigation or DPS or utility, but we should all be able to stance-dance either without penalty, or with the same penalty. WAR having this privilege is like giving a DRG the ability to live without dodging AoEs while telling NIN/MNK "tough shit, git gud and learn to dodge".


Fix it SE.

DRK and PLD have a penalty for stance dancing because their stances activate immediately while WAR's does not.

First I'll explain how the stances work (for those who don't know)

DRK and PLD get a 20% incoming damage reduction while WAR gets 25% more hp. Lets say that all three tanks have 100 base HP and then turn on their tank stances.

PLD 100 HP
WAR 125 HP
DRK 100 HP

And now a mob throws 5 rocks at them, doing 25 damage each.

Since PLD and DRK get damage reduced, the rocks only do 20 damage to them. They will be killed in exactly 5 hits. (20 x 5 = 100)

WAR takes the full 25 Damage, also dying in 5 hits. (25 x 5 = 125)

In this case, the stances are equal.

Now lets say all three tanks were fighting as off tanks but have decided to provoke and tank swap.

PLD and DRK are at their 100 HP base and ready to to go already. WAR on the other hand is stuck at 100 until it gets a heal since switching to tank stance increases the health pool without filling it.

If the same mob decides to hurl 25 damage rocks at them, PLD and DRK can take 5 hits before dying while WAR would be killed by the 4th rock. (25 x 4= 100)

In short, making sheild oath and Grit as convenient as Defiance would turn it into an extra 20% damage reduction ability with unlimited uptime and short cooldown.

[Syzygian]

stuff

Yes, these are all things that I know.

Read my post again; .. When i was referring to ease of stance dancing i was talking about the ability to continue to use your optimal rotation regardless of stance, (which WAR can, the other two can't), not whether the stances are oGCD or not.

[Ragology]

Yes, these are all things that I know.

Read my post again; .. When i was referring to ease of stance dancing i was talking about the ability to continue to use your optimal rotation regardless of stance, (which WAR can, the other two can't), not whether the stances are oGCD or not.

Oh that's different, my mistake.

I'm not sure how to fix that one.

[bounddreamer]

Sorry, I'm a few days into the patch and I still feel like Warrior is doing fine. The insane dps is gone - but a 4500k fell cleave instead of a 7k fell cleave is still pretty darned good. And the equilibrium self heals are no longer insane but they're still good. My personal opinion is this brought warrior into balance where a lot of people are seeing it as nerfed.

[Merkava]

Sorry, I'm a few days into the patch and I still feel like Warrior is doing fine. The insane dps is gone - but a 4500k fell cleave instead of a 7k fell cleave is still pretty darned good. And the equilibrium self heals are no longer insane but they're still good. My personal opinion is this brought warrior into balance where a lot of people are seeing it as nerfed.

All this patch ultimately did is cement WARs position as the top tank even further, sure they got the nerf bat but so did every other tank and the impact this has had on them is far greater than on Warrior. As a WAR nothing has really changed for me, I simply do 800-950 DPS instead of 1100-1200. I can still open with Unchained and Berserk, and never loose enmity to DPS for the entire fight in Deliverance.

PLD ultimately have the same issues they always had, you buffed Gorian and Royal Authority? YAY but guess what! You can't use it for crap because your enmity now sucks oh and your DPS sucks even MORE now because of the global tank nerf so that buff is pretty much irrelevant.

SE, GG no re.

DRK? God they have it even worse, Every Syphon Strike they can't do is a long term DPS loos due to the lack of MP return not to mention how impractical it might be to use Blood Weapon since turning Grit off and then on right back has a sizable MP cost. So I heard people where complaining about PLD sucking and DRK being outright superior MT choice, so why don't be screw them both up and make it all equal!?

SE, GG no re.

This post might sound like its full of salt but it's just that I am not a big fan of nerfs and nobody really ever benefits from it (except people who hate because reasons), I would have rather seen PLD buffed rather than everyone nerfed. But whatever, as a WAR very little has ultimately changed. It's just sad when people focus so much on the WAR hate that they forget that the nerf hammer is hitting them even harder, I might give it a shot to see how bad it is (still getting used to some changes as WAR) but I don't think ill be playing DRK much anymore (my second favorite tank class). I'm not very keen in the idea of staying in tank stance 24/7 and pushing my 1-2-3 combo 70% of the time.

I'm not sure what I'd do with Power Slash, though, since while its a relatively small DPS loss on the combo its biggest issue is that using it slows down your MP regeneration, which is a long term DPS loss due to less Dark Arts.

Change the AP distribution to 70/20 (VIT/STR), boost the base enmity of every tanks enmity combo and increase pressure on tanks in raids via mechanics or damage intake in order to force them more often into tank stance. You nerf a tanks damage via mechanics rather than a straight out DPS nerf. But people wanted a WAR nerf, because they where clearing old content solo, so badly they got it I guess, hope all the other tanks enjoy it =/

I apologize for the rant xD

[Dante_V]

So why do you need to stay in tank stance longer as drk and do the 1-2-3 combo over and over?
I main the class and have not had to do this at all in any duty so far. In fact the increase in vit has allowed me to stay out of tanks stance longer rotating cooldowns. DRK imo is by far the easiest tank to hold aggro with so long as you can maintain a basic supply of MP. the class seems exactly the same to me outside of a bit more tp up time and the proportional dps cut across the board. But mechanically ive been playing it exactly the same with no issue.