Making Jobs Rotationally Easier in 4.0

[Ilan]

I think tank jobs should lose tank and dps stances, and rely on actually needing to keep enmity rather than being a dps (like PLD, NIN, and WAR in FFXI).

And if that happens most Tanks will not play Tanks anymore because the classes will become boring as hell. Not to mention that Fates and Beast Tribes will be even more annoying then.

[Duelle]

And if that happens most Tanks will not play Tanks anymore because the classes will become boring as hell. Not to mention that Fates and Beast Tribes will be even more annoying then.

As I've said before, that depends on how everything else is tuned. If you take away stances, you have to adjust every other ability because you're likely to bake in enmity from your tank stance to certain skills and the damage from your DPS stance in other skills. You'd also have to introduce some way of increasing mitigation (assuming the increase is not passive), which in practical terms means Halone/Delirium/Storm's Path would definitely have to be equalized (tank gameplay would have to point to "use this combo to increase your mitigation" instead of each having a different debuff attached).

Really? So an augmentable drain ST attack, a drain AoE, a drain ST attack with an attached mitigation duration, and a physical-damage drain duration buff are EVERY POSSIBLE variant by which a drain might be used in a job?...
Haven't you seen at least that many player-made suggestions for new and unique drain ideas just across the posts you've frequented over the last couple years?

I can give you two that I suggested in a thread a while ago: A skill that restores HP whenever you take damage, and a skill that converts damage taken from the next hit into HP. Problem is, and I suspect I'm right on this one, those weren't given to DRK because of the overlap between WAR and DRK when it comes to drains. And the devs were too busy hitting CTRL+C => CTRL+V while tabbing between DRK and PLD. In fact, if WAR ends up getting a version of Umbral Shield (the first of my examples) in 4.0, I'm going to laugh and somehow not be surprised.

I have no idea know what intent you think that "poorly implemented system" pointed at though. Was it poorly implemented because it took longer to regenerate full effectiveness, despite already having a cooldown, and because it forced a restart on every use?

A tank that increases their EHP via increased health pool and increased healing received shouldn't have half of that system (the increased healing received part) sine wave with resource consumption. Sure, some might find it thrilling to have their chances of survival go down the toilet with some bad luck or missed timing between themselves and the healer, but tanking and healing hinge on reliability. This is also why some but not all RNG-dependent mechanics work for either.

Or is it just a "poorly implemented system" whose intent you applaud on the assumption that it kept Warriors from leaving tank stance as often? (It didn't. It did the opposite.)

I can admit I looked at the design on paper back then. I didn't bother to finish leveling MRD => WAR until after 2.2. And all your comment here tells me is that the problems were already brewing if that was indeed the case.

I get that, but... If the PLD is hiding behind his shield, the DRK behind his sword, and the WAR behind his 'manliness' for all the same sort of mitigation and eHP, what if any difference in playstyle does that really create?

The way you worded this is giving me flashbacks of the blood tank vs blink tank thing from FFXI. A tank is there to take damage, and even if all tanks take damage, you can still make them different from each other with how the damage is handled.

PLD is currently designed around shield blocks with cooldowns that reduce damage taken.

WAR, IMO, could focus on actions reducing damage taken (the beast within sort of numbing the WAR to pain) and Wrath should play a bigger role than it currently does; right now it's a build-consume resource where 5 stacks is the only thing that matters. Assuming I were to put others through something I wouldn't inflict myself with (because I hate what I'm about to suggest), I'd consider pushing WAR towards active mitigation with things like temporary damage reductions or mini-stoneskins (because the beast doesn't feel pain). Inner Beast already somewhat leans in that direction, and I feel WAR needs more things like it.

DRK is where things get murky. Right now they're an edgy PLD with an extra button to push (Dark Arts). This is where the drain theme would help them stand out in exchange for their parry focus, with skills that instead of mitigating damage restore some HP when damage is taken. You could throw in a skill that negates damage taken from the next attack to restore a capped amount of HP. Passive mitigation to offer synergy with healers would probably also help. Then it's be a matter of turning Dark Dance's effect into either a full parry buff or a full evasion buff (or neither and have it do something completely different).

[Shurrikhan]

As I've said before, that depends on how everything else is tuned. If you take away stances, you have to adjust every other ability because you're likely to bake in enmity from your tank stance to certain skills and the damage from your DPS stance in other skills. You'd also have to introduce some way of increasing mitigation (assuming the increase is not passive), which in practical terms means Halone/Delirium/Storm's Path would definitely have to be equalized (tank gameplay would have to point to "use this combo to increase your mitigation" instead of each having a different debuff attached).

But it will absolutely mean that your decisions are more heavily made for you. You can no longer open with a weakened Goring Blade, because all your enmity is in the Rage of Halone combo. Unless Savage Blade is heavily up-tuned, the same will be true of Royal Authority. And all the while enmity has zero impact on anything you do when you're not MTing, nor (to be clear) soloing. If you don't have that mitigation coming into combat (it's no longer given by stance, and hasn't all been given passively either), then you're going to take a lot more damage until your first mitigating skill, which could be a while for mitigating weaponskills, which thus far are all at combo-ends. Further, should mitigation be moved in part to mitigating weaponskills, buffing them in turn, then OT support (and those of other DPS jobs if they are to have any sense of balance with tank debuff categories) becomes more impactful unless you go the WoW route and make your debuffs affect only damage against you. That dependence would further force more obvious homogeneity on our tanks.

That's a long string of compromises necessary just to remove one mechanic that honestly does not seem broken. Unimaginative, sure, but at least it allows freer and to a degree more creative gameplay because it's there.

[Ilan]

As I've said before, that depends on how everything else is tuned. If you take away stances, you have to adjust every other ability because you're likely to bake in enmity from your tank stance to certain skills and the damage from your DPS stance in other skills. You'd also have to introduce some way of increasing mitigation (assuming the increase is not passive), which in practical terms means Halone/Delirium/Storm's Path would definitely have to be equalized (tank gameplay would have to point to "use this combo to increase your mitigation" instead of each having a different debuff attached).

It would still cut the option completly down and would make tanking even more boring as it is already. Tanks are fine as they are and don't need to be changed just because people don't read what their skills can do and what they can't do. To be honest i don't like your idea because it could totaly ruin tank classes and make it in the end harder for players who start because they can't decide which combo they'll take.

[Shurrikhan]

As I've said before, that depends on how everything else is tuned. If you take away stances, you have to adjust every other ability because you're likely to bake in enmity from your tank stance to certain skills and the damage from your DPS stance in other skills. You'd also have to introduce some way of increasing mitigation (assuming the increase is not passive), which in practical terms means Halone/Delirium/Storm's Path would definitely have to be equalized (tank gameplay would have to point to "use this combo to increase your mitigation" instead of each having a different debuff attached).
I can give you two that I suggested in a thread a while ago: A skill that restores HP whenever you take damage, and a skill that converts damage taken from the next hit into HP. Problem is, and I suspect I'm right on this one, those weren't given to DRK because of the overlap between WAR and DRK when it comes to drains. And the devs were too busy hitting CTRL+C => CTRL+V while tabbing between DRK and PLD. In fact, if WAR ends up getting a version of Umbral Shield (the first of my examples) in 4.0, I'm going to laugh and somehow not be surprised.

I don't honestly see how either of those differ from general mitigation or self-healing except unlike mitigation it doesn't increase your eHP, as you'd have to survive the initial blow for some of its damage to be reverted/refunded. At least there'd be healing threat generated? Though that could always end up applied eventually to all mitigation tanks do...

A tank that increases their EHP via increased health pool and increased healing received shouldn't have half of that system (the increased healing received part) sine wave with resource consumption. Sure, some might find it thrilling to have their chances of survival go down the toilet with some bad luck or missed timing between themselves and the healer, but tanking and healing hinge on reliability. This is why some but not all RNG-dependent mechanics work for either.
I can admit I looked at the design on paper back then. I didn't bother to finish leveling MRD => WAR until after 2.2. And all your comment here tells me is that the problems were already brewing if that was indeed the case.

I definitely see what you mean there. I could have gone either way on the change myself, but only if 2.0 base was buffed, e.g. had a larger % healing taken increase at maximum and Inner Beast itself were stronger to compensate (such as by the critical chance and healing received bonuses being tripled on Wrath skills themselves), or it rebuilt to 5 stacks more quickly.

The way you worded this is giving me flashbacks of the blood tank vs blink tank thing from FFXI. A tank is there to take damage, and even if all tanks take damage, you can still make them different from each other with how the damage is handled.

Except (and you can blame WoW for my thoughts on the first) I'd imagine those two concepts are much more distinct than our three tanks. Heck, it sounds like one's a meat-shield and the others a kiter, which would have very real scaling differences, differences in how the tank MUST be played, and more. Putting similar mitigation systems on each under different guises that do not bring out different gameplay—the Paladin's shield, which is *presently* RNG but CD enhanceable, the DRK's sword, which is also *presently* RNG and CD enhanceable but with some reverse-synergy to affect it perhaps, and the WAR's passive chest-hair / inner beast armor (which I can only hope is different enough to at least be more largely output-based)—don't sound nearly so distinct.

Does the rate of damage taken force a difference in healer play? How do I level out that damage differently? Do my offensive efforts ever have significant defensive returns? As any of these tanks, what would determine my gameplay, rather than just my aesthetic?

PLD is currently designed around shield blocks with cooldowns that reduce damage taken.

Which, then, is about as barebones as you can get. A iconic tank, who would need to uniquely be the only tank to feel any heft of identity from. Just... given what you've written there.

WAR, IMO, could focus on actions reducing damage taken (the beast within sort of numbing the WAR to pain) and Wrath should play a bigger role than it currently does; right now it's a build-consume resource where 5 stacks is the only thing that matters. Assuming I were to put others through something I wouldn't inflict myself with (because I hate what I'm about to suggest), I'd consider pushing WAR towards active mitigation with things like temporary damage reductions or mini-stoneskins (because the beast doesn't feel pain). Inner Beast already somewhat leans in that direction, and I feel WAR needs more things like it.

I'd largely be fine with that. It's just an output based version of Inner Beast. Of course, complete output scaling tends to be overpowered where overgeared and underpowered where undergeared, so it couldn't be a pure scalar unless its power source was somehow input-based as well (similar to how Ignore Pain ignores a set, output-based amount of damage, but its resource, rage, is at least as input-based as output-. That would make Warrior less healer dependent in fights that wouldn't necessarily overwhelm him, which *to me* is in keeping with a certain part of the Warrior idea.

DRK is where things get murky. Right now they're an edgy PLD with an extra button to push (Dark Arts). This is where the drain theme would help them stand out in exchange for their parry focus, with skills that instead of mitigating damage restore some HP when damage is taken. You could throw in a skill that negates damage taken from the next attack to restore a capped amount of HP. Passive mitigation to offer synergy with healers would probably also help. Then it's be a matter of turning Dark Dance's effect into either a full parry buff or a full evasion buff (or neither and have it do something completely different).

I feel like I get what you mean, but again, I just don't think Drains are going to be the way out, especially not standard ones. Nor refunders/reactive drains.

[Duelle]

Except I'd imagine those two concepts are much more distinct than our three tanks.

I don't want to go into this much, but suffice to say I'm glad Utsusemi tanking doesn't exist here and will likely never darken our doorstep. Trust me, you do not want that garbage messing with balance and design here like it did in FFXI.

Heck, it sounds like one's a meat-shield and the others a kiter, which would have very real scaling differences, differences in how the tank MUST be played, and more.

Grr...okay fine.

Nonsequitur:

The reason they called it blink tanking was because Ninja in FFXI had a skill called Utsusemi that gave them stacks of invulnerability (WHM and RDM had a spell called BLink that did the same thing, except the proc was not guaranteed and the cast time was long). The ability was meant for self-preservation, but players, being players, used it as a way to tank mobs.

So while a PLD or WAR would get their faces bashed in and require lots of constant healing (because exp parties LOVED going after the equivalent of skull-level mobs because said mobs gave 200 exp per kill, ignoring that to kill these mobs it took forever and required you abusing the stat system to get around level correction), a NIN spamming Utsusemi would hold aggro via Provoke + whatever damage they were dealing and require little to no healing at all (a really big deal because not having to wait for healer MP between pulls meant you could kill more mobs without rest).

Players eventually kicked WAR to the curb from tanking (and so did the devs, which is why they later gave it more damage-oriented skills), and decided PLD was a blood tank (took damage), and NIN was a blink tank (took no damage from most attacks, including spells).

The devs eventually got around to tweaking Utsusemi a bit and started giving mobs abilities that stripped all invulnerability stacks, but it was still a broken ability that messed with a LOT of aspects of class design and player dynamics. It was basically as if WoW's devs had never nerfed Reckoning Bomb under the excuse that it made paladins unique or some nonsense.

Putting similar mitigation systems on each under different guises that do not bring out different gameplay

I'm not sure how you're equating pushing a button to reduce damage (PLD), stacking additional effects with on-demand mitigation (WAR), and negating damage while recovering HP (DRK) into similar mitigation systems.

I won't deny that tanks should have common denominators (an invincibility, a strong flat percent mitigation cooldown and the ability to taunt mobs), nor that all tanks should have some baseline mitigation before getting into the gameplay and mechanics of each.

I feel like I get what you mean, but again, I just don't think Drains are going to be the way out, especially not standard ones. Nor refunders/reactive drains.

I wouldn't limit DRK entirely to drains. They'd just be a more noticeable aspect of how they mitigate damage. I mean, comparatively speaking it's not like Death Knights had only Death Strike+Blood Shield to mitigate damage. It was a combination of those mechanics plus Icebound Fortitude, Bone Shield, and inherently superior parries. The same principle would sort of apply here.

[ADVSS]

DRK is where things get murky. Right now they're an edgy PLD with an extra button to push (Dark Arts). This is where the drain theme would help them stand out in exchange for their parry focus, with skills that instead of mitigating damage restore] some HP when damage is taken. You could throw in a skill that negates damage taken from the next attack to restore a capped amount of HP. Passive mitigation to offer synergy with healers would probably also help. Then it's be a matter of turning Dark Dance's effect into either a full parry buff or a full evasion buff (or neither and have it do something completely different).

I agree. I feel like they took bad design ideas to heart when drain tank 2.0 warrior had to be revised. DRK imo would feel better and be more thematically if it had more lifetaps, not to mention it lacks any burst restore close to what warrior or pld have On paper, and overtime, it looks fantastic but it would only be fantastic if bosses did nothing but auto attack with static damage. I wont even get into living dead, another ability that looks wonderful on paper, but in practice....