Ideas for Warrior Skill Changes

[Therion]

I actually think scaling most of our abilities to HP % seems to fit the warriors kit more. High HP tank with self heals, and self heals rewarding high HP. We dont do that much more damage than paladins, so the whole 'warriors are high damage tanks' is kinda moot. The bloodbath thing could be tied to the trait, and the normal one would remain unchanged. Same with Foresight, and Fracture. I agree that we kinda need Keen Flurry since Parry is all we got, and would be a welcome addition. Some of the abilit changes I dont agree with, but most I like. Id change fracture though, something more like:

Fracture (trait)
Delivers an attack with a potency of 100. When used after Parrying an attack, half TP cost and delivers an attack with a Potency of 170 and additional enmity (Ala shield swipe)
Additional Effect: Damage over time.
Potency: 20. Duration 30s

[Gamemako]

High HP tank with self heals, and self heals rewarding high HP.

Same eHP as PLD, self-heals unaffected by HP.

The bloodbath thing could be tied to the trait, and the normal one would remain unchanged.

Mechanically unlikely. You are suggesting that an effect be removed by a trait, and that ain't gonna happen.

Fracture (trait)

I don't think it's feasible to force TP cost reduction on proc for anything, let alone for a 30s DoT. You haven't added any reason to use the ability. If you're so concerned about DPS that you're adding Fracture to your rotation, you aren't waiting for a random effect to show up and interrupt your combo.

[Einheri]

Character caps are my nemesis. I actually have read your post before writing this, you did a great job and I look forward to a good discussion.

As for the heal portion, what if we changed it to being a heal spell equal to the % of max the skill provides? You attack and gain a heal = 5/10/20% of your max health, this heal could be crit'ed as if it were a cure. This would add in the synergy with +crit and +healing received.

Wrath was the first skill I looked at. I started with the % based on crit damage and later changed it to work like the rest of the self heals I proposed. My thoughts here were with Wrath up you would receive small heals through out a fight effectively being a block in line with our class self healing mechanic.

Secondly I feel the trade off of spending wrath is what makes our class so fun. With wrath up you get sustainability or you can spend it on Inner Beast for Burst Mitigation (reactive), Unchained burst mitigation (proactive), Steel Cyclone (+threat).

[Kitru]

Character caps are my nemesis.

You can edit a post to break the 1000 character cap. Just type up whatever you need to, cut all but the first paragraph/sentence or so, and then edit to paste back in the cut portion after posting it. Makes it *much* easier to read.

[Einheri]

From what I have been able to read most people are only doing 1000-1500 healing from Inner Beast so the 20% should be pretty close to existing numbers. I haven't done the math. The other idea I see floating around Would be to make the heal based on damage taken. What are your thoughts on turning our skills from what we put out to what we take in? Something like *Inner beats: You rage and receive 25% of the damaged received in the Last 5s as healing*

[Einheri]

Yeah basically. Unchained is very lackluster. It cost 5 wrath and is essentially a 25% damage buff with a 180s cool down. I like your idea from your graphs post about taking it off wrath. However, I like the idea of wrath consumers and some trade offs. So I was trying to figure out how to make this a mitigation buff. My first idea tied back into making parry more appealing and having the skill increase parry rate, this would stack with my proposed foresight. But I felt the flavor of 25% more damage dealt and 25% less damage taken was more Warrior-y. Sorta like a adrenaline filled fury you feel no pain while raging out.

My problem with fracture it is a talented ability that we have very little reason to use. I felt adding a beneficial buff would make using it worth while. My first though was to make it Increase damage taken, seems more inline with the name of the skill. Then I was thinking we like mitigation so change from 3% taken to -3% dealt. What would you add to fracture to make it a worthwhile?

[Einheri]

My idea with foresight was to boost another lackluster skill and keep the class flavor. Our armor comes with a lot of +parry, and I wanted to promote that form of mitigation. Again having more cross class benefits are fine by me but this is another trait'ed skill and should really shine. My hopes of promoting parry would make STR sought after. So if you like the parry mitigation stacking STR, if you like the self heals stack VIT, if you like the sustained heals stack +crit. Having more then one way to play a class just makes it better for me. I would love to see more variety between different warriors.

[Einheri]

Blood Bath is another lackluster traited skill. I assumed each tick of a DoT it not a successful attack, and it would have an internal cool down (2s?), that's something I'm used to from other games. The other idea I like is to add a buff stack like +parry chance for 15s for each successful attack. Thoughts?

Storms Path was one of the skills I had the hardest time with. I like the idea that instead of doing 50% of damage done, it added a blood bath like buff for 12s. (1.0?) You would have trade offs. Storms Path has a high Tp cost and does less damage then either Storms Eye or Butcher block with out providing their Enmity or resistance debuff. This skill can get OP really quick or be very weak. 10% Hp seemed decent for a situational skill with out adding a cool down. What if we scrapped the Heal and added a damage shield akin to Stoneskin?

[Therion]

I don't think you understand where we are coming from? Same eHP yes, same mitigation not quite. Granting a % life gain on some abilities helps scaling, since as a tank we will always want more HP, paladins too. To counter paladins flat % damage reduction, it just seems to me flat % self healing is a decent match. On bloodbath, who knows? You cant say with absolute certainty it cant happen. This is all just speculation and dreaming from those of us who would like a little love on war. We aren't out on some jihad to get the dev's attention to change the class, so please don't rain on our parade

On the fracture thing, I'm not concerned about DPS. As fracture is, its largely ignored and unused. Due to not being a threat increase, and marginal DPS increase, and too high TP cost. Making it reactive similar to paladins shield swipe would allow us to gain 20 TP when using it (sorta, due to TP regen) and allow it to give additional enmity. Hell, instead of increasing potency or decreasing TP cost, maybe increase parry chance by 5% or something for like, 15 secs? Would be cool.

[Gamemako]

If you train in the ways of a marauder, being able learn the ways of a lancer seems more in line than learning how to be fluid enough to dodge in heavy plate armor with a giant axe. May just be the roleplayer in me.

Given the release-the-beast mantra of the WAR story, I think PGL abilities actually make a lot more sense. It's not just about swinging an axe.

Also you do not spend 100% of your time as a warrior tanking. Skills like Blood for Blood and invigorate would add some utility.

Long story short, WAR and PLD do nearly identical damage when not tanking (non-Defiance vs. Sword Oath). This is how the game was designed. Adding more non-tank damage to WAR in the form of Blood for Blood and reducing tanking damage by taking away Inner Beast would actually cut mitigation slightly and unbalance PLD and WAR. All tanking jobs need to have similar utility and damage when not tanking so that none are preferred and none are pushed into non-tanking role due to relative ability. This is also part of why Brutal Swing is being changed.

I am under the impression after Yoshi-P live letter that the +healing bonus of Wrath will be rolled into the passive bonus of Defiance in 2.1

It definitely did seem that way based on his comments about Inner Beast. That will help but not fix the scaling problem alone -- remember that Shield Oath is at least 25% effective healing increase and it scales with all healing. Regardless, the goal should be to push as much scaled healing as possible to limit the effect of content scaling. If Crystal Tower affords any situation where 3 healers are on one tank, then WAR is certain to be hopeless with its reliance on flat healing.

As for the heal portion, what if we changed it to being a heal spell equal to the % of max the skill provides? You attack and gain a heal = 5/10/20% of your max health, this heal could be crit'ed as if it were a cure. This would add in the synergy with +crit and +healing received.

% heals also aren't boosted by +healing bonuses. Doing a mechanic on crit would be possible (e.g. base 20%, additional 10% on ability crit), but I'm not sure what the benefit is except making one stat build preferred over another.

My thoughts here were with Wrath up you would receive small heals through out a fight effectively being a block in line with our class self healing mechanic.

It's still a flat heal that doesn't scale to enemy damage, though. Inner Beast isn't so bad in that it's burst mitigation -- it should (theoretically) at least give you what you need to survive in all but the most extreme of cases. Focusing more on flat healing for continuous mitigation doesn't make much sense. WAR needs more scaled healing.

Secondly I feel the trade off of spending wrath is what makes our class so fun. With wrath up you get sustainability or you can spend it on Inner Beast for Burst Mitigation (reactive), Unchained burst mitigation (proactive), Steel Cyclone (+threat).

Steel Cyclone as a threat gen just feels out-of-place. Most of us aren't hurting for enmity, so it generally feels superfluous. Since you're trading Inner Beast, I still think all Wrath abilities need to be defensive in nature. Steel Cyclone could (in theory) be a better choice for AoE situations. At the very least, it should be comparable to Inner Beast (say, 100% of damage absorbed -- need 4 targets before it's advantageous there), but I think a unique mechanic would be preferable (AoE damage debuff, paralysis, silence, whatever).

From what I have been able to read most people are only doing 1000-1500 healing from Inner Beast so the 20% should be pretty close to existing numbers.

That's about right -- 1100 is pretty much where you'd be for a Garuda-equipped WAR (assuming 320 strength) after Maim and Storm's Eye.

The other idea I see floating around Would be to make the heal based on damage taken. What are your thoughts on turning our skills from what we put out to what we take in? Something like *Inner beats: You rage and receive 25% of the damaged received in the Last 5s as healing*

While it works, you'd have to spam the heck out of it to match as continuous mitigation (compare to Shield Oath, blocking) -- you may take as much as 100% of your HP pool per 5s or so, so if you can only use it every 20s, you're going to run into your max HP as a limiter. As burst mitigation (compare to Rampart, Sentinel), it would help scaling to scale it to enemy damage, but burst mitigation isn't really the problem to begin with.

Yeah basically. Unchained is very lackluster. It cost 5 wrath and is essentially a 25% damage buff with a 180s cool down.

Yeah, it's terrible. I made the suggestion of removing it from Wrath just as an off-hand sort of comment on the nature of the ability -- it's not really a solution, just a point that it has no place on Wrath if it's not boosting your tanking ability. Like I said, your idea would work, it's just a bit PLD-like.

My first though was to make it Increase damage taken, seems more inline with the name of the skill.

Shield Swipe now is what Fracture in 1.0 was. Pacification effect from a parry proc, hence the name.

My idea with foresight was to boost another lackluster skill and keep the class flavor. Our armor comes with a lot of +parry, and I wanted to promote that form of mitigation.

That's because WAR and PLD gear is identical. When you compare all 3 ilvl90 chestpieces, they have the same VIT, STR, and Parry bonuses.

Blood Bath is another lackluster traited skill. I assumed each tick of a DoT it not a successful attack, and it would have an internal cool down (2s?), that's something I'm used to from other games.

Right now, it ticks all DoTs and has no time limitations. It's entirely based on DPS. Player time limitations don't work well in ARR because various weapons have different autoattack speeds, so there's no reliable interval. You could probably disable DoT ticks from it, but you'd still have multi-target focus if it is scaled to max HP (i.e. per-hit healing) and not damage.

What if we scrapped the Heal and added a damage shield akin to Stoneskin?

Functionally no different -- flat heal for X amount (scaled to player damage or player health rather than enemy damage). At least amount-healed ones can lose overheal amounts.

I personally view Storm's Path as a lost cause. It's hard to work into a proper rotation -- it has to replace Storm's Eye in a rotation to be used at all, and if any changes are made to Fracture, you'd have one more reason not to use it. I still think Storm's Path may be more about the second MRD job.

I don't think you understand where we are coming from? Same eHP yes, same mitigation not quite. Granting a % life gain on some abilities helps scaling, since as a tank we will always want more HP, paladins too.

It's not about how it scales to the player, it's about scaling to the player at all. When there are two healers on one tank, there is twice as much damage coming to the tank. A PLD's reduction effectively doubles -- 20% of 500 DPS is 100 DPS reduced; 20% of 1000 DPS is 200 DPS reduced. A WAR's reduction doesn't scale with content, so if it's balanced with PLD in single-healer content (in this example, 100 DPS reduced), it's half as effective in two-healer content (still only 100 DPS reduced, or effectively 10%).