Dark Knight and Incoming Live Letter 4.2 on 12/15/17

[Launched]

despite already basically being the strongest tank

No, that's PLD.

[Cabalabob]

This is getting beyond a joke, I was reading it “BLM dps...ok and adjustments to....warriors usability?!?! WHAT?!” It genuinely feels like SE is trolling DRK at this point.

I was seriously refreshing the page to see if it was a typo and they’d change it to say DRK...

[347SPECTRE]

Not sure how they could improve the usability of WAR. Personally I find it pretty easy to get into. Takes a little practice, just like any job.

[Crater]

No, that's PLD.

PLD does not have the highest tank DPS; WAR does.
PLD does not do the highest burst damage; WAR does.
PLD does not have the strongest personal mitigation; WAR does - and that's Deliverance vs Sword Oath. Shield Oath Paladin folds like wet tissue paper compared to a Defiance Warrior.
PLD does not have the best enmity generation; WAR does.
PLD has the worst mobility of all the tanks; WAR has the best.
PLD doesn't have costless, off-GCD stance swaps; WAR does.

There is exactly one arena in which PLD is stronger than WAR - party mitigation - and even there, WAR's party mitigation tool (Shake it Off) is at least as strong as the strongest party mitigation tool PLD has (Divine Veil), and the usefulness of PLD's party mitigation kit falls off a cliff once you get past DV and Sentinel/Rampart-buffed Intervention.


PLD has weaknesses; WAR does not.

[Aana]

Just to be clear before the rage overtakes the tank forums:

They are specifically looking at Blm DAMAGE.
They are specifically looking at War USABILITY.

Wtf that even means? Could be a lot of things really. Usability updates have historically been things like upping drg potency and nerfing heavy thrust. Increasing BotD duration. Increasing duration of upkeep skills or lowering their impact so mistakes are less punishing, but usually not affecting people that already play it properly. Those types of changes just shifted of damage to make it less punishing. Not a buff. Max damage didn't change. An analogy might be increasing damage of base combos but nerfing eye buff for example.

Its vague. Its unknown. But they explicitly did not say damage while they did for blm. Based on what we actually know at this moment and historical uses of that term, theres no reason to think war will get some mega boost. Just some type of shuffle within their current parameters.

Its been 5 min and there are already multiple posts whining about war getting BUFFED AGAIN!!!! So before everyone looses their shit just remember Usability=/=damage. Blm is looking at a straight buff. War is looking at a shuffle within its existing parameters. Read the actual words they say. Will become clearer with a full translation instead of bullet points we have now.

[konpachizaraki]

No, that's PLD.

don't bother dude
that guy is the number 1 warrior hater in this forum, he will say every nonsense there is to overrate warrior and underrate other tank(paladin) to make warrior look like they need to be a nerfed even though they clearly don't
and i have to say i am enjoying his anguish right now(or any warrior hater in particular)

[Crater]

Its been 5 min and there are already multiple posts whining about war getting BUFFED AGAIN!!!! So before everyone looses their shit just remember Usability=/=damage.

SE uses pretty simple coded language to talk about stuff like this.

In 2.00, Unchained was on a 180s cooldown. They lowered that cooldown to 120s, stating that the change was intended to increase the usability of the skill.
The same reasoning was cited in early 4.x when they removed the BG cost of IR/Unchained and the BG cost of stance-swapping.

These are not "shuffles". This is simply the language that SE uses to talk about class buffs that come in the form of things like cost/cooldown reductions rather than boosts to raw potency.


I guess I'm not surprised I had to make this clarification though; it's not like I didn't see it coming:

I'm sure we're also going to get a ton of people trotting out the old classic "It says Warrior usability is being adjusted! That could mean they're getting nerfed!!" from people who have either never seen a Live Letter before or haven't acquired enough basic pattern recognition ability to realize that that's what SE says when they're planning a big buff.

[whiskeybravo]

Doesn't mean it's going to a big buff. Something as simple as detaching the CD from IR/Unchained would be "usability" related and wouldn't really effect average damage output.

The sad part is, if they were in fact working on adjustments to DRK, you think they'd mention that instead and leave the war updates for next letter. If for nothing more than for PR purposes.

[Claire_Pendragon]

It's code for CD reduction, or changes to abilities like shake it off.

Honestly the ONLY way this can make any sense, is that the new encounters needed a slight adjustment to some key abilities, which I assume is Shake it off, to fit inside the timers of the bosses mechanics better. (What ever they may be.)

But in the long run, it still equates to a WAR buff, and DRK getting shafted again, because "DRK could clear it, even if less optimally"

[Chrono_Rising]

The only thing I can think of is that inner release cooldown will be lowered. Or unchained and inner release will be separated.