After 1 (arguably 2) expansions what is square trying to achieve with WAR (and PLD)?

[TheOperator3712]

To tackle the problem, one must first correctly define it. It does not seem to me that the problem is tank self-sustain. Considering that the game is balanced for Savage, and that these abilities are mostly fine in Savage, I don't think the issue can solely be attributed to tank design. Rather I think this a compound issue of tank design, healer design, and fight design. So basically everything except DPS design.

Healers need a total redesign. Their design is completely backwards of what a new player would expect. Healing has other major issues, such as not having any healthy options for future ability additions. However the fact that it is so completely backwards of what you would expect is honestly enough to rework the entire role.

Fight design's problems stem from being too focused on large hits every minute or so, auto-centering, not enough damage to warrant healing outside of savage, etc. I think the biggest issue here actually is the gap between an expert dungeon and Savage in terms of difficulty. Obviously an expert shouldn't be as hard as Savage, but the gap shouldn't be so vast that abilities are massively over tuned for normal content either.

Tank design... Look, tank self-sustain is the least of the issues with tanks in my opinion. Ever since the removal of TP and Enmity, tanks have just been boring. Mitigation isn't fun, and rotations aren't fun. That didn't used to be an issue because you also had to watch enmity and TP, which was just enough to make it fun(especially in casual content where DPS never used enmity dumps). If your goal is to actually fix tank design, then you have to address the whole issue. Which probably means redesigning tanks so that their mitigation and rotation interact with each other.

If your whole goal is just to stop one or no healer runs in trials and raids, then the quick solution is to either increase the MP cost of Paladin's magic burst or put clemency on a CD. If you want to make WARs mortal in dungeons, then put a 5 target cap on BW/NF. Though those would just be band-aids on top of a stack of band-aids on top of an amputation at this point.

Looking at all of this, I can't honestly tell you what the heck SE is trying to do with this game. It looks to me that they have no idea what they are doing.

[Oizen]

5 Target cap would still make WAR immortal. It could honestly just heal once per gcd rather than per target and it still be fairly strong. Right now the per target healing is so overtuned that it honestly is mostly wasted, a single GCD takes you from 0 to max, even worse if you crit boost it.

Just making it heal once per GCD would make it a lot more manageable and not even impact its use in Raiding.

[TheOperator3712]

5 Target cap would still make WAR immortal. It could honestly just heal once per gcd rather than per target and it still be fairly strong. Right now the per target healing is so overtuned that it honestly is mostly wasted, a single GCD takes you from 0 to max, even worse if you crit boost it.

Just making it heal once per GCD would make it a lot more manageable and not even impact its use in Raiding.

Once per GCD is a target cap of 1, and would make the healing basically useless when pulling wall to wall.

[GoatOfWar]

Once per GCD is a target cap of 1, and would make the healing basically useless when pulling wall to wall.

Would it? I mean, you still get 20% mit, you still get a shield half as big as TBN and 1200-1600 potency worth of healing.

[Lyth]

This thread: 'The community is not part of the problem.'

WAR mains: 'Tank self-sustain is not part of the problem.'

Players aren't interested in balance. They're interested in maximizing their advantages over others. Balance is just a developer compromise on those demands. Sometimes that means ignoring the loudest voices and issuing nerfs.

[WantlessYoYo]

Man WAR discussion reminds me so much of ADCs on League where they either be the strongest role in the game or deep bottom of it

In both cases people won't stop crying about it until the first happens, then when doesn't returns to square 0

The cycle

[Rein_eon_Osborne]

Once per GCD is a target cap of 1, and would make the healing basically useless when pulling wall to wall.

Why would that be a problem? You're literally still packing with 1,600p heal + 400p shield + 10% mit on that one single button assuming they nerf it down proccing once per GCD. That is still stronger than Equilibrium in potency per minute. Why do you need more? That's totally not a 'useless healing'. All that does is they would bring WAR's sustenance down close to PLD's degree, which if anybody knows anything at all, is still arguably excess on the hands of capable PLDs.

Today's BW is 4 Benedictions with 17s downtime. You don't need ANY other cooldowns to be used in that 8s uptime unlike PLD's Holy Shelltron within the same situation.

[Reinhardt_Azureheim]

Warrior has always been about Damage to HP so as it is now I think it's in a great shape.

Personally I thought PLD was good until the recent change. I actually hate new PLD. You still need to drop Atonements so the rotation makes even less sense than it used to. Boring Blade is terrible, and we know its just going to get an aoe version in DT. Req Cast being a melee move still baffles me to this day. Cover is shocking. Clemency shouldn't exist or at least change it to an OGCD with a non spammable or lower potency.

The bolded part first - you do NOT drop Atonements in current PLD design, at all. When you complete a Royal Authority combo and are not inside your Fight or Flight window, you actually pre-load the next combo with Fast Blade -> Riot Blade, then spend all stacks of Sword Oath: Atonement and use your Divine Might: Holy Spirit. That way all your filler aside Goring Blade, Confiteor and Blade of Valor combo is still Holy Spirit, Atonement or Royal Authority.

Arguably this is one of the better versions of Paladin. The kicker here is that Holy Spirit and Holy Circle aren't purely relegated to Requiescat windows as before and are much more adjustable when to use them. I started playing slow PLD (~2.50s GCD) in 6.25, which played similarly and pretty much kept Goring Blade usage to about 1 per minute and I enjoyed that more.

As for things being a bit bland or having issues - I really hope they DON'T repeat the "this button but now AOE" or "this button but now Single Target and more potency". Goring Blade could simply be repurposed to a frontal cleave with say -60% falloff after the first target. Saves a button, makes Goring Blade not a lost button during AOE pulls. Requiescat could definitely be ranged, but honestly I'm not gonna lose sleep over it being melee since its' inception in Stormblood.

Cover has been nerfed into a borderline useless state by adding that gauge cost on top of dropping the mitigation back in Stormblood. It has been four years. Remove either the gauge cost OR return the Lv66 Cover Trait and keep the gauge cost. Recent buster designs also generally now favour Holy Sheltron + Intervention combos anyhow and even if there was a niche for Cover, we are unlikely to experiment with it because 50 Oath cost is simply too much for providing zero mitigation vs virtually having a Sentinel on a short cooldown.

Clemency is fine. What they could potentially do is give using Clemency an effect that benefits a cast of Holy Spirit / Holy Circle, like "next Holy Spirit/Circle gains +X potency" to mildly alleviate the public perception of this button (which likely would come at a greater MP cost - not like its an issue given how much MP we generate).

[Supersnow845]

Attaching a partial refund to clemency would just create tank freecure

Tanks who think they should be pressing it at 40% HP or so with the excuse “yeah but I get a partial refund for it”

Honestly with how much healing PLD now has on the oGCD clemency should just be deleted

[rawker]

A good compromise that I can see is that aside from limiting BW to 1 pulse of heal per GCD, make so that using an AoE GCD does more healing than using a single-target GCD.

Compromise my dear spoiled children of Hydaelyn.

Honestly with how much healing PLD now has on the oGCD clemency should just be deleted

Oh no. please don't delete Clemency. Just nerf PLD self-healing by a bit. Clemency, as niche as it is, has its uses.