Thread: How would they fix PLD 4.0?

Originally Posted by Sarcatica

Who knows if PLD getting another big hitting combo will solve PLD's damage output, even without other changes, if not enough they can afford to buff FoF. WAR is already known to be the best OT, so if SE wants to make WAR purely way better for OT, they can so choose to introduce another DPS combo instead of spamming BB combo which makes PLD/DRK life harder. DRK being the current best MT with the worst aggro generation definitely needs some fixing.

On another note, what if removing tank stance works? This will solve so many problems such as the damage output discrepancy or tanks unwilling to stance dance, reduces the gapskill etc. There are so many options SE can roll with.

To the first, SE could probably stand to revise the enmity system at some point in entire. One thing I've seen in other MMOs where tank threat is inflated as much as ours or beyond is that enmity has a semi-proportionate effect that allows for its output to vary indirectly with on conditions such as whether you are the current target, your health, etc. Others also bake in enmity bonuses into their Provoke-equivalent, such as granting bonus enmity to skills to a cap based on the amount of (bonus) threat increased on skill use, with that bonus draining over time, or holding attention for an additional amount of time. Certain simple quality of life changes or revisions might be more appropriate than removing a piece of existent Warrior identity and even further bloating their bars.

To the second, what would then replace the fun of stance dancing? Or if it's not to be considered an outlying mechanic, and is representative of the skill meant to be required for tanking, what would replace its functionality? As it is, stance-dancing is basically just taking off the training wheels that allows a large group of players to do what we do, merely at lesser damage, with far less effort or attention. Removing stance-dancing would sort of merge the tank paradigm into one solid whole, rather than a pre-game and real game of "enough" and "maximization" through dps, but if the skill-cap isn't to diminish (and likely thereby bore many tanks and/or healers) then that difficulty would take place in survival itself, where the skill-gap only becomes much more clear and dividing. That's not to say I'd personally mind this, but the skill-gap being placed where it is does at least allow less skilled tanks to be carried through things in a sense, where they'd likely be chewed up and frustrated if the gap wasn't only about dps.