Gunbreaker gameplay hope and expectations

[Kalise]

-_-

Fell Cleave -can- hit harder than them too, so I guess we're just right back where we started.

If given equal stats, no it cannot.

That's how potency works.

It's a metric for the calculations for damage based on stats that is the exact same for all classes (Except Blue Mage).

[Kabooa]

If given equal stats, no it cannot.

That's how potency works.

It's a metric for the calculations for damage based on stats that is the exact same for all classes (Except Blue Mage).

Except Bloodspiller is 400. Dark Arts adds the same damage regardless, so Bloodspiller is -weaker-. If Syphon Crit but Bloodspiller didn't, then you should have DA'a Syphon. Of course you can't know this up front, ergo the damage bonus from Dark Arts -is separate- and cannot be considered in a direct comparison for "Hardest Hitting Skill". Bloodspiller is weaker.

Given that DoTs are difficult to compare due to less than reliable data collection, we're just going to take worst case in both scenarios. Using the top logs for Warrior and Paladin in Chaos, the lowest normal non-critical fellcleave is around 11,200.

The lowest Goring Blade hit is 4.4k + 7 ticks of 915. As damage tends to swing at +/- 5% values, when normalized, the 915 serving as the -5% means our +5% is probably closer to 1010, so the middle ground is 963. 4.4k + 7 ticks of 963 is 11,141.

[Kalise]

Except Bloodspiller is 400. Dark Arts adds the same damage regardless, so Bloodspiller is -weaker-. If Syphon Crit but Bloodspiller didn't, then you should have DA'a Syphon. Of course you can't know this up front, ergo the damage bonus from Dark Arts -is separate- and cannot be considered in a direct comparison for "Hardest Hitting Skill". Bloodspiller is weaker.

The damage is still applied from Bloodspiller, not Dark Arts.

It's like saying, "Oh, Fell Cleave is only 520 potency since 5% bonus is only from Deliverance not Fell Cleave and 10% bonus is only from Storm's Eye buff not Fell Cleave" or are you next going to argue that Storm's Eye is stronger than Storm's Path because if you crit with Storm's Eye you should have used that instead of Storm's Path?

In a single skill, Fell Cleave is a 520 potency skill, which will be amp'd by 5% from Deliverance and should be amp'd 10% by Storm'S Eye buff. WAR has no other damage boosts (Other than forced DCH from Inner Release, which doesn't change its potential damage, it just forces a DCH effect) so at most it is a 600 potency skill in a single hit.

In a single skill, Bloodspiller is a 400 potency skill, amp'd to 540 potency by Dark Arts and then amp'd by 20% by Darkside. So at most it is a 648 potency skill in a single hit.

In a single skill, Goring Blade is a 670 potency skill.

You might be able to argue that Goring Blade will lose potency because of temporary debuffs such as Trick Attack and... Well, that's about the only one for physical damage, given that Slashing debuff is 100% uptime. Which can be relevant for such comparisons, as only 3 of 7 total DoT ticks will happen during a Trick Attack, meaning that during Trick Attack, with FoF up it will be 591.25 potency during Trick Attack with the remaining 4 ticks outside it equating to 300 potency for a total of 891.25 potency (Compared to Fell Cleave and Blood Spiller during Trick Attack being 660.99 and 712.8 potency respectively)

With again, Goring Blade losing out when factoring in Crits/DH's since it would need to crit on each DoT tick, compared to FC/BS that just need one single Crit/DH to maximize their damage. But this merely serves to push Bloodspiller, not Fell Cleave, as most damaging single skill. Especially as you add in more buffs/debuffs as multipliers that take Bloodspiller's higher potency value further than Fell Cleave.

[Kabooa]

I think Dark Arts is just making Bloodspiller seem more potent than it really is.

[shao32]

snip

i no longer understand you, looks like you din't even touch PLD and DRK ever or compared they kits with WAR at all, WAR dont have any weaknes compared to the other 2 its just simple, they don't need they aoe shield being activated by other or yourself losing dps, they never have to dealt knockbacks with sprint, they dont have to eat the extra penaltys on tank stances, what is a weaknes for you then?.

well then i go to make a list of what PLD and DRK need to being comparable to WAR since you think is the best curse of action, ejem:

-shield oath/grit outside of GCD and remove complety the mp cost, its not fair they cost more for doing less that defiance right?
-divine veil healing requeriment removed, add a aoe shield to DRK bcs its not fair a job that offer similar dps that the other 2 have such low relevant utiliry in combat.
-slaishing for everyone!!! since better dont remove it from WAR or some ppl will rage about that nerf
-clemency oGCD and add a 1200 potency heal to DRK, ah and remove the grit requeriment of souleater healing
-increase plunge to 20 yalms and make it dps neutral
-what more what more oh yes, add 5 seconds more to shadow wall and sentinel so all of then are 15 seconds duration, meaby a counter attack too
-my favourite lets just reduce the coldown of living dead and hallowed so all tanks are able to land 3-4 uses of those skills like WAR in combat, lets avoid favoritism.
-and no less adds to grit and shield oath some kind of extra mitigation to equal WAR defensive power house and i almost forgot to buff PLD rage of halone.
-and a proper burst window for everyone since WAR its so good with sutained damage too.

its a pretty big list don't you think? i remember you WAR skip some mechanics making it brainless with this stuff so don't tell me again this will not lead to powercreep.

so again for 99999999999 time WAR is not OP in term of numbers, they mitigation is similar they dps too they utility is questionable but ok, but again for 99999999999 WAR have a level of usability that make it mandatory and holds every niche of the tank role while in the other roles you have jobs that can say well this job can't do this but can do that, or well my dps is low but i can bring some nice dps utility in the tank role is WAR do everything and then are the others with the exception of PLD cover, the only thing that WAR don't have and can't be the best on it, its not ok WAR have the best verions of everything, SIO, vengeance,holmgang, onslaught, defiance, deliverance, equilibrium, ect and thats needs to be fixed on shadowbringers, and you can't do that touching DRK, PLD and GUN and leaving WAR intact.

nobody ask about WAR being nerf now, its not worthy, we say WAR kit should be balanced better on Shadowbringers so we don't have 2 years more of WAR dominance for one thing or another simple than that.

[Phoenicia]

Snip.

Good post.

Snip.

No, we don't compare individual moves and ignore mechanics tied to them.

That is like saying SAM is the highest DPS in the game because Midare can have 1050 potency. Yet it is overshadowed by BLM and the gap is HUGE and MNK has nothing that comes close to high potency yet it deals similar DPS to SAM.

----------------------

The real problem here is people compare things in vacuum or inside a bubble. And there is apparent strong bias.

You can't. Fell Cleave does NOT follow all the same rules as Blood Spiller or Holy Spirit or Goring or w/e.

If I want to, I can go into Hallowed Ground and scream "OP, PLD is only tank with 100% immunity!" But we all know how ignorant that really is.

You need to compare how tool kits work together. Hallowed can only be used once or twice in a fight to tip its power down but it is balanced with having good auto-attack mitigation thanks to block, sheltron and other things in the PLD's kit. Whereas WAR and DRK's weaker AA mitigation is increased by having some healing or having Holmgang/LD free up some cooldowns to be used for fluff.

Fell Cleave looks strong because IR boosts the one hardest hitting GCD and allows it to be spammed for free. But then the rest of WAR's GCDs are really unimpressive. Non of them do over 300 potency. WAR has only 1 meaningful oGCD that is slightly "buffed" Spirits Within at the cost of 20 gauge while the other is free.

PLD on the other hand has Holy Spirit to act as a "Fell Cleave" with Requiescat being the "IR" of PLD. Heck, early Stormblood Holy Spirit "WAS" creeping the 35% of PLD's DPS with it having 435 potency. But since then it got 3 nerfs. PLD also boosts over half of its physical GCDs and Circle of Scorns, half its Spirits Within and, dependent on opener of choice, all its Requiscats by 25% using Fight or Flight. PLD autos hit "twice".

DRK converts every 2400 of its MP to 140 potency. CnS is a wooping 450. DRK has numerous GCDs that are 300~440 and BS is 400~540. All those numbers are boosted by 20%!

You don't go and account for Slashing only for WAR. Slashing is base-lined because PLD and DRK can access it by having WAR, NIN or SAM. With WAR and NIN so popular in Meta and there are more SAMs than NIN and WAR combined, it's hard not to have "slashing".

This is how you compare toolkits. It's not like Fell Cleave hits so much harder than the other tanks and yet manages to be only 20% of its total DPS because it's DPS is so strong. The truth is the rest of WAR's DPS is so low that Fell Cleave is actually 40% of its DPS. Let's look at the best parses of a WAR, a DRK and a PLD on Final Omega. Yes those are padded, but they are still playing near optimally and the fight has minimal downtime (no Fennek Strat of course) and the ratios should still be the same.

WAR:


PLD:


DRK:


See the diffence in contribution? PLD gets its damage from so many sources that there is not 1 move that draws attention. DRK is so much of its DPS coming from Souleater, Auto-attack, Syphon Strike and Dark Arts. But when you come to WAR you see that almost half its damage comes from Fell Cleave. These are parses with a 6510 DRK, 6270 WAR and 6194 PLD. (Buff PLD I Guess?)

Of course Fell Cleave looks over damn impressive. But it's the gem in the pile of trash.

In the end it is completely wrong and misleading to look at 1 move and go "This class OP because 1 move". Unless it's Ninja because &@#$ Trick Attack lol.

-shield oath/grit outside of GCD and remove complety the mp cost, its not fair they cost more for doing less that defiance right?
-divine veil healing requeriment removed, add a aoe shield to DRK bcs its not fair a job that offer similar dps that the other 2 have such low relevant utiliry in combat.
-slaishing for everyone!!! since better dont remove it from WAR or some ppl will rage about that nerf
-clemency oGCD and add a 1200 potency heal to DRK, ah and remove the grit requeriment of souleater healing
-increase plunge to 20 yalms and make it dps neutral
-what more what more oh yes, add 5 seconds more to shadow wall and sentinel so all of then are 15 seconds duration, meaby a counter attack too
-my favourite lets just reduce the coldown of living dead and hallowed so all tanks are able to land 3-4 uses of those skills like WAR in combat, lets avoid favoritism.
-and no less adds to grit and shield oath some kind of extra mitigation to equal WAR defensive power house and i almost forgot to buff PLD rage of halone.
-and a proper burst window for everyone since WAR its so good with sutained damage too.

First you need to understand I am NOT biased. WAR is my LEAST favorite tank to play. But I am not under any delusions that WAR is "taking my spot" and "stepping on my toes". I have an easy time joining parties as ANY tank. As a matter of fact, only Armored tank mount I have is the dark panther. Go figure.

- ShO and Grit can't get off GCD unless you make Defiance HEAL 25% of current HP upon entry. You can't "balance" by flipping the scales. You have to balance the scales.

- You can take Shake it Off. Delete it or put on Gunbreaker. Take Veil too. I hate that sh*t. Shields are too overrated. Unless your healers are utter garbage, you won't really need them. They do not save GCDs (healers end up healing anyways). Holy sh*t dude, read. what. we. post.

- Slashing is a bad mechanic. It exists just to exist. It doesn't add anything to the game other than "feelsbadman, half the classes that need it don't apply it". It should be dropped from the game along with piercing and blunt. Not added to every one. That's "buff bloat".

- Really? oGCD clemency? What are you on? Because I want some of that.
Why would you want that? So you want to have to stick it on a 1 min CD? You can't have oGCD, but have no CD and heal 50% more than WAR's Equilibrium (It heals 50% more than equilibrium). Again, can't "balance" the scale by just tipping it the opposite way. DRK needs a bit more self-healing since it is the only tank with a "heal me or I die" mechanic that it can't save itself from.

- No, you're saying WAR does more DPS. Why do you want to lose 200 potency from Plunge? Idm/care about the range.

- Vengeance, Shadow Wall and Sentinel are fine as they are. They are "different" enough. I don't want Rampart v2.0. No tank is dying because their buff is not 15 seconds. WAR's mitigation isn't strong because of Vengeance. Play WAR and you'll understand. Or just read what we posted. Just stop with the "his is bigger than mine, mom, I wanna grow mine like his."

- Ehm, so you want a move that lasts 6 seconds, doesn't "really" reduce damage, require a target, roots you in place, to have the same cooldown as 100% immnuty? Hallowed Ground is clearly so bad it doesn't deserve its 7 minute CD. Whatever you're on mate, I want some too. It looks really fun. lol

- PLD and DRK already have "extra mitigation" called Sheltron and TBN that's not even tied to ShO and Grit, but on top of those they have 4% more effective HPS from spells, and 25% from ability based heals. They don't need stance based added moves.

- WAR good with sustained damage? Good joke mate. I have another good one! 2 monkeys walk in a bar... oh wait...

Honestly, this is the last time I will read anything you post in this thread from now on and will just jump over it. I mean no offence and you are entitled to stick to your opinion, but it is clear that our discussion is not going any where as you are ignoring everything we say and just have some audio-clip on repeat.

[TouchandFeel]

snip

I feel like you may have jumped to a conclusion on what I was saying that was not actually part of what I was saying.
I was speaking specifically to the attempts at trying to directly compare Bloodspiller damage potential to Fell Cleave damage potential, simply pointing out that there was more too it than what was being argued by some.

It had nothing to do with the overall damage done by the tank jobs, nor about how the damage is distributed among the different abilities.
Anyone that has looked at the WAR job abilities can see that WAR is heavily weighted towards the majority of it's damage potential being contained within Fell Cleave, particularly Fell Cleave used under Inner Release, and that the damage potential then given to other abilities within WAR's kit are lower than other tank jobs to try and balance out Fell Cleave. There is no arguing that, it's pretty apparent and straight forward.

You are pretty much arguing a point, strangely at me, that I literally made in the very post you are referencing.

Seriously, let's not keep falling into "can't see the forest for the trees" pitfalls in these debates.

That includes not seeing how abilities like Blood Spiller, Fell Cleave, Holy Spirit, whatever play into the greater whole of how a job plays and functions.

As I said, Fell Cleave overall does more damage than Blood Spiller, however both of those abilities are of course only one aspect of the two tank's entire offensive kits.

[Izsha]

While I might not agree with all of your opinions on this, I do agree that your opinion of "buff other tanks" vs. "nerf WAR" is a valid argument and one that I feel is perhaps a good point of debate for people to have while separating themselves from the existing entanglements such as the idea of "WAR apologists" vs "WAR haters", instead looking at and comparing the base ideas of balancing by bringing jobs up to the performance of the one that surpasses the others, or nerfing the one in the lead to bring it back down to the level of the others.

I personally am incredibly wary of the powercreep that is inherent in balancing upwards; but I also understand the issues, such as pissing off players and making jobs feel "bad" in comparison, when balancing through nerfs.
In regards to this, I take my usual stance of not going the route of either/or but a carefully considered combination of both.
After all, sometimes buffs can make a job less interesting to play, as is the opinion of a good number of WAR players with the IR changes, a well designed "nerf" can actually be a boon to game-play.

As for the opinion of niches, whether or not they should exist or be enforced in job design and what the hell even constitutes a niche, I think that too is interesting and a worthy debate, but one that also needs to shed the burdens of personal favoritisms and be approached more objectively to really be productive.

Those two are things I would love to see some healthy conversation and debate over because they are really interesting from a design perspective.

Tbh, I just ignore the power creep problem at this late stage. Balancing to the highest common denominator (for damage and mitigation specifically) does definitely create power creep. But that is utterly irrelevant when were talking about gun and shadowbringers.

SE is going to reset all gear, all tanks, delete skills, add skills, change potencies, tp/mp, is reviewing tank stances, etc. What damage and mitigation tanks do now means exactly nothing to what they will do in 5.0.

SE will create a new baseline for tanks in 5.0 and it will be whatever se wants it to be. Then, and only then does the balance through nerfs or balance through buffs matter at all and war may or may not be at the top of that pile then, so, bluntly, the vitriol around wars current status or "war has been op for years" means jack squat because we are staring down an entire tank reset. SE will decide the tank baseline and we as players then voice opinions of tanks are op or UP vs party dynamics and that should decide if we buff up or nerf down. Tanks balanced 1st and foremost. Power level as a role is relative to the party, and subjective. But balanced tanks is a tangible goal. Power of tank role is a can of worms.

That is why I am emphasizing that all tanks should just be capable tanks woith similar dps, mitigation, and party support but in whatever flavor their job has. Theres bo point in debating the nuance of fell cleave vs BS vs HS because we may not even have those actions in 5.0, and they certainly wont be identical with identical kits backing them up.

At this stage before an utter and total reset we should be pushing se to setup the next tier with the right philosophy, not getting drowned in the nuance of now. And I REALLY dont want se to look at all 4 tanks and give them some of the 'niches' I see bandied around here like reducing war damage but maintain their aggro so gun can have a niche implies wars niche is snap. That's utterly ridiculous imo.

Se should create 4 tanks that can tank. Generate aggro, mitigate damage, deal damage, support the party and be fun to play. Put them all in the same ballpark on those and do some fine tuning after release when the players start making the meta. Then we can debate power creep.

There are plenty of pitfalls to avoid we can discuss, like how war defense will never be properly balanced as long as other tanks have on demand free mit tbn/shell and wars is better but stance locked. War will either be op in defiance from additional CDs out of defiance, or UP in deliverance if you remove those cds and has been leaning on holmgang yo bridge the gap which is just bad for tanks, for example. But people are to busy QQing about fell cleave and exaggerating current issues to look down the road that will reset everything we know about tanks now. It's to late for 4.x. and, it's not even that bad. Drk has been consistently buffed all expac and is now competitive, pld was brought down a peg from4.0. War was redesigned (which I still resent tbh). But tanks are literally the most balanced they have been in the games 5 year life right now. We need to look forward instead of picking at all the minor issues right before a reset.

[shao32]

First you need to understand I am NOT biased. WAR is my LEAST favorite tank to play. But I am not under any delusions that WAR is "taking my spot" and "stepping on my toes". I have an easy time joining parties as ANY tank. As a matter of fact, only Armored tank mount I have is the dark panther. Go figure.

- ShO and Grit can't get off GCD unless you make Defiance HEAL 25% of current HP upon entry. You can't "balance" by flipping the scales. You have to balance the scales.

- You can take Shake it Off. Delete it or put on Gunbreaker. Take Veil too. I hate that sh*t. Shields are too overrated. Unless your healers are utter garbage, you won't really need them. They do not save GCDs (healers end up healing anyways). Holy sh*t dude, read. what. we. post.

- Slashing is a bad mechanic. It exists just to exist. It doesn't add anything to the game other than "feelsbadman, half the classes that need it don't apply it". It should be dropped from the game along with piercing and blunt. Not added to every one. That's "buff bloat".

- Really? oGCD clemency? What are you on? Because I want some of that.
Why would you want that? So you want to have to stick it on a 1 min CD? You can't have oGCD, but have no CD and heal 50% more than WAR's Equilibrium (It heals 50% more than equilibrium). Again, can't "balance" the scale by just tipping it the opposite way. DRK needs a bit more self-healing since it is the only tank with a "heal me or I die" mechanic that it can't save itself from.

- No, you're saying WAR does more DPS. Why do you want to lose 200 potency from Plunge? Idm/care about the range.

- Vengeance, Shadow Wall and Sentinel are fine as they are. They are "different" enough. I don't want Rampart v2.0. No tank is dying because their buff is not 15 seconds. WAR's mitigation isn't strong because of Vengeance. Play WAR and you'll understand. Or just read what we posted. Just stop with the "his is bigger than mine, mom, I wanna grow mine like his."

- Ehm, so you want a move that lasts 6 seconds, doesn't "really" reduce damage, require a target, roots you in place, to have the same cooldown as 100% immnuty? Hallowed Ground is clearly so bad it doesn't deserve its 7 minute CD. Whatever you're on mate, I want some too. It looks really fun. lol

- PLD and DRK already have "extra mitigation" called Sheltron and TBN that's not even tied to ShO and Grit, but on top of those they have 4% more effective HPS from spells, and 25% from ability based heals. They don't need stance based added moves.

- WAR good with sustained damage? Good joke mate. I have another good one! 2 monkeys walk in a bar... oh wait...

Honestly, this is the last time I will read anything you post in this thread from now on and will just jump over it. I mean no offence and you are entitled to stick to your opinion, but it is clear that our discussion is not going any where as you are ignoring everything we say and just have some audio-clip on repeat.

¿can you calm down a second?, all that list is not oviously a serious petition to make anything in the first place, but a list of hipotetical changes need to make DRK and PLD being able to do the same with the same efectivity of WAR since kalise come with don't nerf WAR buff the rest argument to his level.

now by parts:

-Defiance with equilibrium, problem solved, have to press 2 oGCD instead of 1, WAR can bypass the Defiance stuff like that by his own hand, don't act like they can't and DRK and PLD can't do that.

-shields overrated? are you even heard about the LB cheese with those overated shields? those shiels are extremly good for progresion too since everything is filled with big raid aoes.

-agreed with slashing only makes some compositions worse for that thing.

-it was a exageration, clemency cost DPS in any situation, equilibrium not by himself, PLD on shield will still suffer the penalty while WAR get it for free in defiance, that was the point.

.-i preffer a dps neutral plunge with better range that i can use with every knock-back, but aging it was at the point of make DRK movility equal to WAR ovbiously will need adjustments.

-vengeance is better that shadow wall and sentinel, its mitigates not only the big hit but 5s of AA more that the other 2.

-have a skill that will make my co-tank works more easily saving a lot of team logistic? of course i want it , its way better that living dead by a mile.

-its not about stance based moved, it was put PLD and DRK mitigation and selfhealing levels on tank stance equal to WAR defiance without details so you can use you imagination.

-WAR dealt a high sustained dps with his regular spikes of damage where his damage just go pretty high during that window, its not the best but is pretty decent on it.

so i will remember you again, the list wasn't mean to be taken seriously and calm down.

[TouchandFeel]

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I agree that in the context of balancing the tank jobs for an expansion that actual direct nerfs to WAR could be circumvented since all tanks jobs will have to scaled upwards anyways for the new level cap, so then it just falls to how much each job needs to be scaled upwards to then arrive at an overall balanced power level between the tanks at lvl.80.
So that is definitely a good point to make that I don't think has really been factored in much in these balance discussions.

However I could definitely see some players viewing such an approach as a "conceptual" nerf to WAR under the premise that the other tanks got more than it with the expansion. It's really tough to say how people would paint it overall.

Mainly I am only against upwards balancing as a continuous and consistent approach, particularly in the middle of a period of supposed stable balance like in the middle of an expansion. Towards the very end, like where we are *meh* yeah, not really a big deal to argue the minutia of something that is basically already outdated.

I honestly think that many of the players that fall on the side for "nerfing" WAR are more along the conceptual bent where they more want WAR's position within the tank balance meta to be "nerfed" and not necessarily literal ability nerfs, though some do make that argument too.

That is why I am emphasizing that all tanks should just be capable tanks woith similar dps, mitigation, and party support but in whatever flavor their job has.

That is a very valid position to have and one I can get on board with, although I could also be good with the idea of "niches" depending on how they are implemented.
It's really hard to even begin discussing whether "niches" should exist or not when there are so many differing ideas being tossed around of how to define "niches". One could define how a job goes about accomplishing a goal, for example DRK being an OGCD attack focused tank could be defined as a "niche", or it could be defined as some do where "niche" is a much broader aspect, like "the utility tank", "the offensive tank".
Those broad kind of definitions of "niches" I feel are inherently problematic since, like you pointed out, those are more foundational aspects of the tank role as a whole.