Paladin: Reworking Niche Skills

[Mikey_R]

Ah I sometimes like it because it avoids more damage than most mitigation skills and it aborts all the spam AoE casts by trash mobs. But you're right of course in that it's only worth it for variety, both tank mitigation and healer oGCD output is too strong versus the incoming damage to truly care. That however is something that ought to be fixed regardless, independent of anything with Shield Bash.

I do think the skill would have more potential if it worked as a raise shield -> bash with shield 2 step move maybe, and was our form of active blocking not a 90s CD 10s duration selfbuff. Active blocking as a concept would be cool, regardless. But quite utopian.

I don't think it does. If we first compare it to Low Blow, it is only 1 second extra of a stun, you aren't going to notice that unless you go in-depth, but that also pales in comparison to the best way to avoid damage, which is to kill the thing first. Shield Bash has lower potency (100) than Total Eclipse (120), which means more time in combat with an enemy. Just to make a simple comparison, 3 Shield Bash is 300 potency over 3 GCDs, Total Eclipse > Prominence > Holy Circle is 590, almost twice the potency, which means, you can save 3 GCDs worth of damage, this is before we take into account Fight or Flight, Imperator and the blade combo, which will just massively cut the time engaged down massively. Even Blade of Faith, the weakest blade at 760 potency, gains over 6 GCDs worth of damage mitigation over Shield Bash and we haven't looked at single target yet either.

Even if we look at stunning 2 or more targets quickly, the enemies need to be using something threatening for you to need to stun them all and have things like Holy Sheltron, Rampart or Guardian cannot cover it, but, at that point, Hallowed Ground would be better. Whilst I do not have extensive knowledge on deep dungeons, I feel situations like that would be deliberately avoided and would come from a mistake, which would make them rare, so the cooldown on Hallowed Ground wouldn't even be an issue. Feel free to correct if wrong.

Shield Bash has so much against it that it just doesn't seem to have any redeeming qualities where something else couldn't do the job it was intended to do.

[Shurrikhan]

Would it be wrong to assume you were not here for ARR? That's what WAR's Defiance used to do and that style of tanking kept it on the bench in favor of two PLD.

It wasn't the HP increase that kept it benched. It was that WAR was simply undertuned for all but AoE damage and it was originally only as sustainable as a DPS because unlike Shield Oath, Defiance didn't increase the value of healing received (taking 20% less damage = 25% more eHP and 25% increased healing efficiency on it, while Defiance gave only the +25% HP but initially depended on Wrath stacks to even make healing more efficient, with said stacks spent whenever it used Inner Beast or Steel Cyclone). Once Defiance changed to increase relative healing received in itself instead of having to build up that capacity and losing it whenever one used their special, that part was actually fine.

Apart from that, it had less ST DPS than PLD despite having originally zero native defensives that would actually reduce healing requirements (all heal-efficiency increases outside of Wrath stacks' were from Gladiator).

But once instead tuned appropriately, lo and behold, WAR was far from benched.

Not a fundamental design issue, just a tuning one.

[Valence]

I'm just not sure that the change making heals get +25% to match the HP increase was the correct solution though, that was total homogenization before its time tbh. There is virtually little difference between a +25% HP +25% healing tank and a 20% mitigation tank tbh, it's just rescaling damage/healing at this point.
If WAR had actual mechanics revolving around HP (like in pvp), that would actually make sense though.

[Shurrikhan]

I'm just not sure that the change making heals get +25% to match the HP increase was the correct solution though, that was total homogenization before its time tbh. There is virtually little difference between a +25% HP +25% healing tank and a 20% mitigation tank tbh, it's just rescaling damage/healing at this point.
If WAR had actual mechanics revolving around HP (like in pvp), that would actually make sense though.

Agreed. The only difference then was the oversight in abilities and many parts of WAR self-healing not being affected, in exchange for bigger spread-Adlos.

The larger homogenization, still, though, was in giving Warrior any mit skills instead of remaining focused simply on healing from damage dealt. In either case, /sigh.

[Rithy255]

Agreed. The only difference then was the oversight in abilities and many parts of WAR self-healing not being affected, in exchange for bigger spread-Adlos.

The larger homogenization, still, though, was in giving Warrior any mit skills instead of remaining focused simply on healing from damage dealt. In either case, /sigh.

I don't think War simply would work without mitigations, Obviously a Larger default HP pool would offset this a bit I do think the Job would still need some Mitigations.

What I'd like to see from Warrior is going back to choose between your short self heal and your short mit, having that base Hp health increase, Having strong SELF healing options I think Life steal shouldn't be potency based again as that just leads to AOE being a mass benediction, War would be a reactive tank but with some proactive options where they need that extra Mitigation, which would give up self heal.

For Other tanks, I'd love it if Drk was more Shielding focused, Perhaps a way to augment between magic & Physical Defensives where you'd require some fight knowledge for more effective mitigations, slow life steal and drains over time.
For PLD, I think instead of having Healing tied to sheltrons and magic attacks, have MP spenders tied to your healing so you have to manage your self heal in a way that doesn't eat into your MP destroying your burst, it would add some skill expression to the job and let them still emergency help while costing MP, I think they should have pretty strong self mitigations and good utility.
For GNB, Not 100% but a jack of all trades high APM DPS tank direction seems good. Perhaps making it harder to execute but rewarding by being slightly more ahead would be nice.

[Shurrikhan]

I don't think War simply would work without mitigations, Obviously a Larger default HP pool would offset this a bit I do think the Job would still need some Mitigations.

Well, it needs max-eHP increases, in whatever form that may take, yes.

Mit increases max and current eHP and the value of heals' HP consumed over its duration of effect. Max-and-current HP increases like ToB increase only the first two. Heals increase only current, etc., etc.

But to be clear, I wasn't suggesting that Warrior should never have gotten mitigation, only that one supplying max eHP and healing-value separately via Defiance and together via Shield Oath's mit was much less homogenizing than just Warrior getting far more defensive CDs down the line, some almost identical to PLD's.

For my part, I just wanted to see more risk-reward stance-dancing that could amount to a slightly higher total output than most but with less security and a bit more accordant support required. E.g., Defiance and Deliverance might each have some benefit for gauge held and a different benefit briefly after spending gauge (on Inner Beast or Fell Cleave, Steel Cyclone or Decimate), with a higher chance of reactive (e.g., from Crit damage dealt or on damage taken) gauge generation while at low gauge. You'd ideally layer those buffs for big pay-offs at a specific time, smoothly but deliberately weaving a more offensive and defensive focus, where the offense can indirectly prep a stronger later defense (e.g., if Armor generated is based on damage dealt and Deliverance spenders build Crit chance) and vice versa (at least in the context of MTing).

[Carighan]

I don't think War simply would work without mitigations, Obviously a Larger default HP pool would offset this a bit I do think the Job would still need some Mitigations.

A 40% damage reduction skill allows you to exactly survive as much damage as a 66.6...% HP increase would. So if Damnation were changed to grant, say, a 70% max-HP increase and you start with that HP filled, that's the same effective survivability, a tad more in fact.

Reducing damage versus having more health and then re-healing it is a wash, balance wise. It's marginally worse against repeated fast hits, and moderately stronger against non-spike damage (assuming not all healing is active and on shared CDs). But the actual survivability against spike damage is the same.

[Valence]

If WAR had to be brought back to a pure HP based model they would need not to reintroduce the healing buff. They'd instead need to make the tank have its own self healing tools to use properly, to complement the healer. In short, instead of using defensive mitigation, the job would require an active self healing upkeep that would replace said mitigation.

[Carighan]

If WAR had to be brought back to a pure HP based model they would need not to reintroduce the healing buff. They'd instead need to make the tank have its own self healing tools to use properly, to complement the healer. In short, instead of using defensive mitigation, the job would require an active self healing upkeep that would replace said mitigation.

Exactly.

When a Gunbreaker presses a 40% mitigation to get +67% eHP and only need 60% of the normal amount of healing given their new eHP, that also gives the numbers for Warrior:
- Buff gives +67% max HP, starting as healed.
- Self-healing provides 40% of total healing needed given the new HP pool, so that healers have to cover the 60% as above.

It's not rocket science, and it's not like plenty games haven't provided self-healing based tanking, or even dodge tanking, or whatever.