Vet gamer returning and would like some insight please

[Launched]

Hahahahahahahaha! Oh my god!

Haha... Oh wait. You are serious...

Umm. Well besides the fact that WAR is borderline, if not completely, overpowered SCH itself was a terrible idea and a game's balance nightmare. If you truly think they are the most well done jobs in the game I can't help but think you are clueless to how a game's actual balance works and re blind to how much problems both jobs have caused with their screwy kits and power. Being overpowered is NOT the same as being well designed.

This is coming from someone who mained SCH.

WAR is the standard every other job should live up to. Being well designed is what makes it strong. WAR doesn't have any useless skills, so of course it's going to be better than the ones that have skillslots wasted on trash like Cover and Tempered Will, or duplicate skills like Abyssal Drain, or procs that pidgeonhole them into the MT role instead of letting them work anywhere. DRK and PLD are pretty far from being well designed, and the patch/expansion where they nerf WAR instead of fixing PLD's/DRK's flaws (and you can fix those flaws while still leaving weaknesses, WAR has some) is the patch/expansion where I quit tanking.

[shao32]

wait we going again to WAR vs PLD/DRK performance war again..... sigh.

"WAR is the standard every other job should live up to" thats make me laugh, all jobs have flaws all of then except the mighty WAR, and the job dont have any weaknes in any field, the only weaknes is the "dps loose" the main WARs are using like a excuse, defiance and WAR skill set is the best mitigation set of the game plus self heals, have the best suppot and best dps, but yeah we live in the DPS era so if you loose dps then hey you have a flaw of the job even if you compared to the other tanks you still have the best dps except vs DRK on MT on same conditions.

[aleph_null]

Personally I don't think it matters much whether the devs choose to nerf war or buff pld and drk, people will simply figure out the new best compositions and optimize around them. If somehow in a later patch/expansion the new optimal raid composition uses drk/pld then I'll just move on and level and gear up both.

[Vicus]

Thanks for all the assistance. Randomly I went and leveled a black mage and I am having a blast. Go Figure.

[Lyth]

WAR is the standard every other job should live up to. Being well designed is what makes it strong. WAR doesn't have any useless skills, so of course it's going to be better than the ones that have skillslots wasted on trash like Cover and Tempered Will, or duplicate skills like Abyssal Drain, or procs that pidgeonhole them into the MT role instead of letting them work anywhere. DRK and PLD are pretty far from being well designed, and the patch/expansion where they nerf WAR instead of fixing PLD's/DRK's flaws (and you can fix those flaws while still leaving weaknesses, WAR has some) is the patch/expansion where I quit tanking.

The devs disagree with you, if the Famitsu interviews are to be believed. There are a lot of "get out of jail free" cards in WAR's kit like IB and Equilibrium that allow even mediocre WARs to slip through situations reactively, instead of needing to use their knowledge of the fight to play proactively. When you optimise the job gains more depth and you lose the crutches, but you still have a pretty big safety net. WAR isn't popular because it's super demanding and brutally unforgiving. That's rarely what draws people to jobs - it's generally the exact opposite. WAR is popular because it makes you feel good about yourself and feel like you're doing a lot of damage, even if you aren't the best player (and aren't actually doing all that much damage for the job).

I know some people may not be fond of Cover or TW, but playing PLD optimally often requires you to make find uses for these "niche" skills when the advantage presents itself. If you're unsure of the benefit of having a knockback negation move, best to stay away from the job. It's not for everyone.

PLD and DRK aren't "pidgeonholed" into the MT role. If you're stuck playing with a more closed-minded co-tank for whatever reason you may not get many opportunities to actively tank, but if you're playing with a good group the MT/OT delineation isn't really important and you'll each be playing to your strengths anyways. Don't hate the job, hate the player. We're not all big meanies who don't let our WARs tank. But you will be missed. Perhaps.

[Llus]

Be careful if you're looking for end-game raids because PLD doesn't synergize as well with DRK. PLD/DRK combo is almost never wanted because DRK as MT procs more damage (and defense - reprisal, 20% damage down + 210 potency attack after parrying a blow, low blow 30% chance of reset after a parry) and PLD in an OT role paried with DRK vs WAR as OT paired with DRK is a raid DPS 101 mistake. At this point, WAR is a no-brainer OT everyone wants and DRK is the MT everyone wants (there are situations where this is reversed though). DRK is much harder to play very well vs PLD or WAR; and MP isn't a huge issue once you know the rotations. Their defensive CDs are on-par with both WAR and PLD and bring a huge DPS boost to overall raid damage. If you're choosing between PLD and WAR; go WAR - but do some research on DRK. I suspect SE will do something about the imbalance with PLD in an OT role pairing with DRK; but don't expect anything any time soon.

[Brian_]

The devs disagree with you, if the Famitsu interviews are to be believed. There are a lot of "get out of jail free" cards in WAR's kit like IB and Equilibrium that allow even mediocre WARs to slip through situations reactively, instead of needing to use their knowledge of the fight to play proactively. When you optimise the job gains more depth and you lose the crutches, but you still have a pretty big safety net. WAR isn't popular because it's super demanding and brutally unforgiving. That's rarely what draws people to jobs - it's generally the exact opposite. WAR is popular because it makes you feel good about yourself and feel like you're doing a lot of damage, even if you aren't the best player (and aren't actually doing all that much damage for the job).

How are Equilibrium and IB reactive? IB requires you to have 5 Stacks to use and Equilibrium requires you to double weave it with an oGCD with heavy animation lock to use it as a reactive heal. If you are blowing Infuriate to IB, that's a big loss (especially if you are wasting stacks while doing so). If you were implying they could just Defiance + Equilibrium ahead of a tank buster, that's the same as just turning on ShO or Grit as Equilibrium will only just top off the health gap from switching to Defiance. I seriously don't get how PLD or DRK are any more proactive to play when both those are much more reliant on vanilla dCDs and WAR has the largest gains from actually knowing a fight through and through. At worst, DRK has to sit at maybe half MP instead of dipping down to almost none and loses a few DASEs when they are learning a fight and playing conservatively. A WAR might be saving stacks to IB something, holding RI and Vengeance and thus losing out on triple FCs, prioritizing Path over Eye, or holding Berserk because of a bad pacification timing or an issue with up-time windows. Nevermind that of all the immunities, Holmgang is the least forgiving.

The Famitsu interview was about versatility and utility and the resulting representation of WAR and SCH in content. Not about this made up stuff about "get out of jail free" cards. They said that there are concerns with adjusting SCH and WAR because of the large skill range of the jobs and that they aren't looking to single out WAR and SCH and are going to look more at an overall skill adjustment for all jobs.

WAR is popular because DPS tanks are more popular and people love riding that OP bandwagon. I played WoW during the vanilla / BC era of DPS Warriors and every Warrior just wanted to DPS. Tanking is not a popular role and WAR is the tank job that bridges the gap for many DPS players. If anything, as we frequently see in complaint topics about tanks, WAR seems to be constantly singled out in these topics about DPS obsessed squishy paper tanks.

[Brian_]

wait we going again to WAR vs PLD/DRK performance war again..... sigh.

Except his post wasn't about performance, it was about design. And regardless of performance, WAR is better designed than DRK and PLD and should be the standard for tank design.

Having proc based skills / conditions like Reprisal, Shield Swipe, Low Blow in a game that splits MT up-time and doesn't offer alternative means of activation is bad design. Having tanks that rely on Parry / Block for optimization when those stats are complete dead weight outside of when they're taking hits is bad design.

With WAR, their conditional benefits / CDs like Vengeance and RI have an important usage outside of when they're getting hit because they enable your triple FC rotation and at least give a stack. Equilibrium has a function both in Defiance and in Deliverance that is relevant to the purpose of each stance (more sustain = better survivability, more TP = more DPS). You have actual options for how you spend your resources that again has synergy with your stance rather than just spend MP = DPS. Your CDs have actual synergy like Berserk buffing the healing factor of Blood Bath, Equilibrium, and Second Wind rather than the counter synergy of Dark Dance / DADP and Blood Price or the complete lack of cohesive design with FoF and Flash / Clemency. You have one defensive kit that works well regardless of damage type rather than this forced physical / magic BS that has MTs juggling two jobs for progression. You have innate TP sustain from 0 TP GCDs and Equilibrium rather than the suggestion that you beg for Goad or bribe your BRD / MCH when you bottom out on TP.

WAR should be the standard for tank design. Maybe you enjoy playing poorly designed jobs for the challenge but PvE shouldn't be about you trying to fight against crappy job design.

[shao32]

snip

so you idea of the tank future is make PLD and DRK one man army too? PLD and DRK work pretty well in the rolethey sets and desing have nothing to do, most of the WAR power (for not say all) is about numbers, DPS, they mitigation and they recast and they self heals, they can make PLD like WAR by only changing ftf to be a AP% increse, reducing the coldowns of rampath and sentinel a lot and making clemency instan cast, change divine veil or reduce recast a lot and some damage aoe on flash, booom there PLD at level of a war and i dont touch cover.

what i want to say the job desing no mather, WAR desing can be call trash the moment another tank do the same or more with more or less the same effort ergo what it was doing WAR this expansion, nothing more.

[Brian_]

My idea of the future of PLD and DRK is one where they're equally capable as MTs and OTs, synergistic with various comps, have no dead skills, have utility that is always relevant even if it's sometimes quite marginal, no counter synergy or lack of synergy between their skills, are fluid and intuitive to play, and are thematically consistent. Because that's what WAR is right now. I don't see how any reasonable person could disagree with wanting that for all tanks.

Again, you are fixated on performance. The original post was not about performance, it was about design. Even if you buff PLD and DRK numbers to imbalanced levels and flush WAR out of the meta, the fact that WAR has better design doesn't change.