Let's talk about Holmgang, is it stronger, as strong, or...

[mosaicex]

Since we've finally got 4th tank (Gunbreaker), it also means we've finally got the 4th super (death) mitigation cooldown (Superbolide), which has sparked some debates within the community regarding its strength.
But for this thread, I want to mostly talk about Holmgang.

I think most people would agree that Holmgang is indeed one of the strongest tank ability in this game, due to its low cooldown and death prevention effect, and has been utilized to great affect from ARR to Stormblood.

One of the reason Holmgang is/was heavily utilized, is the fact that WAR is 'lacking' in 'damage' mitigation skills. Their tank stance doesn't actually mitigate damage (not that most people use it anyway), in ARR and HW, WAR didn't have Rampart's equivalent (Foresight was very weak due to its scaling and being physical only), in SB, it still doesn't have short CD mitigation skill like Sheltron or TBN. So instead of just mitigating damage, they simply just mitigated dead using Holmgang, and Holmgang short cooldown compared to other tank's played large role in this. Of course Vengeance's low cooldown also help (but that's also being adjusted in 5.0).

But now that we've reached the 3rd expansion I think everyone has noticed a very strong attempt from SE at 'standardizing' (or homogenizing, as some people would like to call it) tank's toolkit.

Every tank now also has what I consider micro damage mitigation skill (Sheltron, The Blackest Night, Heart of Stone, and re-designed Raw Intuition)

Every tank now has passive 20% mitigation from Tank Mastery trait.

Warrior is no longer lacking in this regard.

So I would like to ask, should Holmgang retain its 180 seconds cooldown?



The cooldown itself aside, will it see as frequent utilization as in previous expansions? Is it actually STILL as strong?
Not mitigating the damage mean the healers 'might' have to heal more.
And now that WAR has more actual damage mitigation, will it still be used as often?

SE themselves can also design encounter to circumvent Holmgang strength (but not LD, Superbolide, and Hallowed) by making a chain tankbuster (such as 3rd Ahk Morn and onward in T13, Hyperdrive and Ultimate Embrace wombo combo in O8S, or cursekeeper in Seriyuu EX, where simply just mitigating dead isn't enough (just a general idea since the tankbuster itself comes after)).

What do tank players think?
What do WAR mains think?

SHOULD there be anything done about Holmgang?
WHAT should be done with it?

[NyneSwordz]

I dunno. I felt that Wars had plenty of "damage mitigation skills" in Stormblood, and while tank stance didn't mitigate damage, it increased healing by 20% - which is basically the same thing. At any rate...

I think the better question is, is the duration of the immunity action worth the higher recast time?

Holmgang only lasts 6 seconds. Living Dead lasts 10. 6/10 X 300 = 180. So... obviously the developers think so...

I don't know if this really plays out in practice.

But if you look at Superbolide, lol, it is basically Living Dead but with a shorter duration but with the SAME cooldown.

With Living Dead the Dark dies if he isn't healed 100%.

But is SuperBolide reducing HP to 1 really any different? Gunbreaker gonna die if you don't heal him just like a Dark. And do healers really have a problem topping off a tank after a tank buster? If they do, it's more a healer problem than a problem with the tank's immunity action. And although Holmgang doesn't reduce your hp to 0, you would only ever use it when you expect your hp to be reduced to zero---so in that sense it's not any different either.


But... Hallowed Ground IS different because it just plain makes you immune. Is that worth the extra 2 minutes of cooldown compared to Living Dead? Depends I guess. Pld could use it well before the tank buster, and if timed right, take it while he's at full health, eliminating the need for healers to top him off. Which frees up the healer and which, because he's at full health and totally immune, may allow for some cheating of mechanics maybe? I dunno.

Holmgang versus everything else, I can see some kind of logic to it - but I question if that logic plays out in practice. Hallowed Ground may be okay because Pld is totally immune. Living Dead seems kinda weak because the extra long duration doesn't seem to be worth having a proportionately longer cooldown than Holmgang. But SuperBolide has to be the worst of the four - at least on paper. In practice it probably is as good (or bad depending on how you look at it) as Living Dead.

But eh... on the whole... probably doesn't make much of a difference in clearing content...

But I guess if it bothers people so much, they could increase Holmgang cooldown to 5 minutes, and increase it's duration to 10 seconds - then functionally, it'll be same as Living Dead.

Or they could decrease the healing requirement and duration of Living Dead by 40% and decrease its cooldown to 3 minutes. Of course this would make it even better than SuperBolide than it already is...

As for SuperBolide, I'd just increase the duration to 10 seconds and make it the same as Living Dead. Or... you could decrease the cooldown by 20% to match the proportion of its duration to Living Dead's duration. But since duration is not as valuable as cooldown, this would effectively make SuperBolide better than Living Dead. So I dunno... this change could really trigger Darks and make them even more emo than they already are...

Sooooo....

I like your idea of changing the mechanics of the fight to value duration more than cooldown... and I'm totally okay with it. They can tune it so it's doable with a War if that War has perfect timing, and easier with everyone else. And this would be fine. I guess it depends on how they tune it. If it's too hard on a War to do it, or if it's practically impossible with lag and stuff, then you can really see some backlash to a fight having a mechanic that effectively bars a job...

This is a hard one. I don't know what they're gonna do. Probably keep it as is imo for fear of making it worse.

[Lyth]

SHOULD there be anything done about Holmgang?

WHAT should be done with it?

NERF IT TO THE GROUND.

[Duskane]

apparently holmgang is 6 minutes at the e3 titania fight
but now they can move freely with it up

I think it was a really good move as it basically was a second knock back resistances on warrior with a short recast timer
but it was only the silver medal compared to hollowed ground but the CD nerf was expected(if its like that in final game or true to begin with)

its good but only because of its 180 recast imo

[Kalise]

Holmgang is still by far the strongest CD in the game. Since it outright enables twice (Or more) the number of Tankbusters to be completely negated with a single button press. The "Downside" is also heavily negated by the fact that healing is so OP that healing a tank from 1HP to 100% is super easy.

What should be done with it? Simply increase its CD to at least 240s if not 300s. So it has less obnoxiously low CD compared to other skills.

Ideally though, they should just delete all these invulnerability skills.

Not only are they a balance problem (As we've seen with Holmgang for many years now. As well as the Developers themselves admitting that Hallowed Ground is OP). But they're not particularly interesting design and lead to really dumb Tankbuster mechanics, since it comes down to "Use invulnerability skill" or "Pop literally everything else" with TB's being absurdly high damage in order to scratch these responses...

Instead, these skills should be replaced with another CD skill that has a reuse of 90-120s, with Tankbusters being altered to do less damage but happen more frequently, so that the idea is to have a good rotation of CD's between Rampart/30%/this new CD along with ensuring you're stacking enough things to survive the damage (Such as using Active Mitigation skills or getting support from your co-tank from the new OT skills).

[fumofu]

NERF IT TO THE GROUND.

It doesn't need to be nerfed. It's already a pathetic skill only useful in some very specific raid and ex trial situations. 'Low' cd doesn't make it any more better. Absolutely useless in dungeons. Doesn't even compare with Hallowed Ground which actually helps you to survive, all Holmgang does is kill you in 6sec cos you can't move and end up standing in aoe when skill duration ends. Not to mention that you have to have supermen reflexes to time it, cos it's only 'saves' you if your hp is almost empty, and to make things worse there's that delay between pressing skill and it being actualy activated, which leads to absurd situation when 'immortality' skill is used but you're already dead.

Living Dead at least let's you move and give healer more time to bring your hp up. And Superbolide is even better. You're not rooted in place and you are not dead if healer fails you to bring your hp to 100%. That leaves Holmgang as it is now - trash skill.

[Lyth]

Those "raid situations" are really the only place where any of these balance discussions matter. What are you optimising for, Sastasha?

[Fluffernuff]

It doesn't need to be nerfed. It's already a trash skill only useful in some very specific raid and ex trial situations. 'Low' cd doesn't make it any more better. Absolutely useless in dungeons. Doesn't even compare with Hallowed Ground which actually helps you to survive, all Holmgang does is kill you in 6sec cos you can't move and end up standing in aoe when skill duration ends. Not to mention that you have to have supermen reflexes to time it, cos it's only 'saves' you if your hp is almost empty, and to make things worse there's that delay between pressing skill and it being actualy activated, which leads to absurd situation when 'immortality' skill is used but you're already dead.

Living Dead at least let's you move and give healer more time to bring your hp up. And Superbolide is even better. You're not rooted in place and you are not dead if healer fails you to bring your hp to 100%. That leaves Holmgang as it is now - trash skill.

These points are all objectively false. Very first point... you seem to be under the impression Holmgang sets your HP to 1. it does not. it prevents you from being reduced below 1. you can still keep your tank stance thrill of battle 14k HP. unlike GNB.

Very specific EX and Raid fights? you mean like... all of them?
with DRKs lopsided kit forcing DRK to use LD as a standard cooldown? Where the power of hallowed is relegated to niche and specific strats for specific and niche fights? PLD is the specific and niche. DRK isnt even in the race. Holmgang is the gold standard.

Low cooldown doesnt make it better?
Holmgang's low CD makes it the best tank invuln by a country mile in all the ways that matters for an invuln. This is almost purely because of it's short CD. This isnt a matter of simple opinion. this has been the literal reasoning for raiding and EX for years now since HW. This isnt a mentality. this isnt a playstyle. this has objective data and is empirical fact at this point. It's low cooldown is so powerful that is ceases to compete with the other invulns. it's competing with abilities that have the same cooldown; shadow wall and sentinel. Is holmgang better or worse than those for mitigation?

Holmgang fails to keep you alive and hallowed helps you survive?
You're still not going to 1 hp, and even if you were, youre immune to death and can still be healed. if it takes your healer 6s to fail to notice you at 1 HP and theres an AoE under you, thats not a failing of WAR. Even in this worst case scenario, youre still alive for 6s longer than you otherwise would have. it helped you survive.
(Small edit after the fact i failed to add to this specific point: very few great WARs will do this because of DPS among other things, but if you have no incoming heals for 6s, WAR can swap to defiance, equib/thrill, inner release inner beast/steel cyclone spam, and probably wont need the heal in a dungeon setting. this isnt innate to holmgang, but just to emphasize how little being at 1 HP really matters.)

you need superman reflexes to activate it skillfully and 6sec fails to do anything meaningful?
first of all, and a major point here, Hallowed and LD both have "delay" in activating their effect. they go on cooldown, wait for a tick, and then activate. you can actually die during both effects. Holmgang, since it has a debuff element, bypasses ticks and activates immediately. you need much LESS reflexes to activate it compared to the other 2. while 6s is the least amount the things Holmgang is used for and mitigating (like tankbusters), they all, without exception, have long cast times and can be activated mid-cast. There is very little downside to using holmgang- activation speed was never one of them. it's a strength.

The only true weakness to holmgang is being rooted and it leads to some awkward fun times when misused. you know what else has wonky effects when misused? hollowed having a 7 minute cooldown while youre still taking damage and die. LD lasting for near 20s and you still die because the healer didnt notice your buff and kept you at ~50% anyway.

At least holmgang has the decency to activate and be online immediately, will pull a target to you, and ignore knockbacks. Even if it's ever wasted, its actually back up again within a dungeon run, unlike the other 2.

[Rongway]

all Holmgang does is kill you in 6sec cos you can't move and end up standing in aoe when skill duration ends.

The only true weakness to holmgang is being rooted and it leads to some awkward fun times when misused.

When a target is selected, halts their movement with chains.

In ShB you can activate it without a target and get just the invincibility without binding yourself.

[Fluffernuff]

I was speaking on how things are now, which is why i wasnt including things like superblide. sorry about not making that clearer. i know the thread is more about the changes incoming, but we dont have the raids or hand-on to say much yet. I personally havent been keeping up with the news myself either. I have very little love or interest in WAR. I was just commenting on the specific post... which again, was about how things are now.

As things stand, I would like the other invulns to be brought to Holmgangs level, or for holmgang to be nerfed and brought in line with the others. My sick and sadistic hatred for WAR begs for them to be brought in line and not be doted hand over foot like they have been for several years now. WAR needs a leash.