Focused Feedback: Tank Updates for January 6, 2020

[Haijinx]

1 minute ago, sacredlunatic said:

The enhancements are on a different schedule.  In both cases it's 3 SOs worth.

Yeah.  But the reason they are on different schedules probably should have carried over to IOs.

[Captain Citadel]

Hopefully the individual Tanker sets will be reviewed quickly after this patch goes live. I'm still not happy about Bruising being gone, but the AoE buffs will be nice. I just liked the thematic feel of Bruising and feel like it could have been buffed to increase the team support capability of Tankers. It doesn't seem like these changes are enough to fully close the gap between Tankers and Brutes. Brutes will still do more damage against single targets while retaining equivalent defenses to Tankers.

Playing Super Strength just feels very...not super. I don't like dealing with the debuffs attached to Rage, so I removed it from my build, but without it the set may as well be called Impotent Nerd Rage. And Hurl's interaction with flight powers is still broken. It should be able to be used while flying at surface height, like Foot Stomp and Mighty Judgment.

[Myrmidon]

3 hours ago, Captain Citadel said:

Hopefully the individual Tanker sets will be reviewed quickly after this patch goes live. I'm still not happy about Bruising being gone, but the AoE buffs will be nice. I just liked the thematic feel of Bruising and feel like it could have been buffed to increase the team support capability of Tankers. It doesn't seem like these changes are enough to fully close the gap between Tankers and Brutes. Brutes will still do more damage against single targets while retaining equivalent defenses to Tankers.

Playing Super Strength just feels very...not super. I don't like dealing with the debuffs attached to Rage, so I removed it from my build, but without it the set may as well be called Impotent Nerd Rage. And Hurl's interaction with flight powers is still broken. It should be able to be used while flying at surface height, like Foot Stomp and Mighty Judgment.

I motion to calling Super Strength “Impotent Nerd Rage” until it receives a proper powerset pass.

Edited January 16, 2020 by Myrmidon

[Wavicle]

4 hours ago, Haijinx said:

Yeah.  But the reason they are on different schedules probably should have carried over to IOs.

There are.  You can't have more than 5 of any one bonus.  I don't see the problem, honestly.  We are MEANT to be able to become super powerful at high level.  That's the design of the game and it's fine.  There is certainly room for more difficult content to be made, that's true, and I support that idea.  Content that makes Tankers, Controllers, and Dominators shine.

[Haijinx]

8 minutes ago, Myrmidon said:

I motion to calling Super Strength “Impotent Nerd Rage” until it receives a proper powerset pass.

kinda fits.  Since the way to make it good is to Nerd build to perma-hasten, perma-double rage. 

[Haijinx]

7 minutes ago, sacredlunatic said:

There are.  You can't have more than 5 of any one bonus.  I don't see the problem, honestly.  We are MEANT to be able to become super powerful at high level.  That's the design of the game and it's fine.  There is certainly room for more difficult content to be made, that's true, and I support that idea.  Content that makes Tankers, Controllers, and Dominators shine.

i could have 5 +10% Recharges, 5 +8.75% Recharges, 5 +7.5% Recharges, 5 +5% Recharges though.   

So really its not the limit that it seems to be.

[Wavicle]

17 minutes ago, Haijinx said:

i could have 5 +10% Recharges, 5 +8.75% Recharges, 5 +7.5% Recharges, 5 +5% Recharges though.   

So really its not the limit that it seems to be.

You're always limited by animation times and base damage.  I still don't see the problem.

[Wavicle]

and you only have so many powers and slots.  you have to choose which bonuses are most important to you.

[Wavicle]

and with that many bonuses of that size you're talking about an extremely expense high end build.  why SHOULDN'T the top end builds with the best enhancements be super ridiculously powerful?

[Haijinx]

6 minutes ago, sacredlunatic said:

and with that many bonuses of that size you're talking about an extremely expense high end build.  why SHOULDN'T the top end builds with the best enhancements be super ridiculously powerful?

Because it completely changed the balance of the game.  That was Myrmidon's point, that started this tangent. 

 

The best IO builds don't just make you a lot better,  they make you massively better.  You can outshine the rest of your whole team easily.  

 

And there is nothing you can do about it now.  They should have thought about limits back when they first proposed them.  Since no one had them to be removed back then.  

Edited January 16, 2020 by Haijinx

[Wavicle]

Again, I don't see the problem.  First off, IO builds are available to everyone, so the idea that they let you outshine your team is silly.

Second, the game WAS designed with this in mind.  Before ED people were six slotting stuff and the game worked Mostly fine.  IO builds let you get back to that level and power and then some.  ED was instituted specifically to make room for IOs.

 

The game was shut down before they got to take the Incarnate system where they wanted.  There was going to be considerably harder content, with more emphasis on movement and avoiding otherwise undefendable and unresistable damage.  Leagues full of IOd Incarnates would still be challenged by that.

[Haijinx]

14 minutes ago, sacredlunatic said:

Second, the game WAS designed with this in mind.  Before ED people were six slotting stuff and the game worked Mostly fine.  IO builds let you get back to that level and power and then some.  ED was instituted specifically to make room for IOs.

 

Whoa.  That sounds like Revisionist history. 

 

There was a LONG time between ED and IOs.  Like years.  

 

Can anyone confirm that IO's were in alpha or something when ED hit? 

[Wavicle]

1 minute ago, Haijinx said:

Whoa.  That sounds like Revisionist history. 

 

There was a LONG time between ED and IOs.  Like years.  

 

Can anyone confirm that IO's were in alpha or something when ED hit? 

Please don't put words in my mouth.

When ED was instituted we were specifically told it was done in order to allow for Later buffs they were going to make available.  Eventually IOs and later Incarnates filled that promise.  There is no revisionist history involved.

[Wavicle]

The invention system was added in issue 9.  ED was issue 6.

[Haijinx]

1 minute ago, sacredlunatic said:

Please don't put words in my mouth.

 

 

Where'd I do that? 

[Wavicle]

1 minute ago, Haijinx said:

 

Where'd I do that? 

Perhaps I overreacted.

It was about a year and a half between ED and Inventions.

[Haijinx]

1 minute ago, sacredlunatic said:

Perhaps I overreacted.

It was about a year and a half between ED and Inventions.

Its cool.  No one is coming for anyone's IOs. 

 

I'm just saying they should have had harder limits set back in the day.  It would have made balance much easier.  We all know its too late now.

 

If they had this whole Brute / Tanker Overlap wouldn't even exist.    

[skoryy]

3 hours ago, sacredlunatic said:

There are.  You can't have more than 5 of any one bonus.  I don't see the problem, honestly.  We are MEANT to be able to become super powerful at high level.  That's the design of the game and it's fine.  There is certainly room for more difficult content to be made, that's true, and I support that idea.  Content that makes Tankers, Controllers, and Dominators shine.

I'll believe this game needs more difficult content when I hear more incarnate raids and Dark Astoria teams forming over LFG.

[siolfir]

 

4 hours ago, sacredlunatic said:

4 hours ago, Haijinx said:

i could have 5 +10% Recharges, 5 +8.75% Recharges, 5 +7.5% Recharges, 5 +5% Recharges though.   

So really its not the limit that it seems to be.

 

You're always limited by animation times and base damage.  I still don't see the problem.

In addition to the hard limit of animation time, plus the investment cost in the total number of slots you have available, the recharge formula itself has diminishing returns as recharge increases.

 

9 hours ago, Captain Citadel said:

Hopefully the individual Tanker sets will be reviewed quickly after this patch goes live. I'm still not happy about Bruising being gone, but the AoE buffs will be nice. I just liked the thematic feel of Bruising and feel like it could have been buffed to increase the team support capability of Tankers. It doesn't seem like these changes are enough to fully close the gap between Tankers and Brutes. Brutes will still do more damage against single targets while retaining equivalent defenses to Tankers.

They won't be equivalent without much more investment in getting there for the Brute, while the Tanker can focus on other items (procs and global recharge, for example); even with the same defense and resistance the Tanker will have more hit points.

Edited January 16, 2020 by siolfir

[Captain Citadel]

I fail to see the relevance of increased hit points when a Tanker and Brute have both achieved def/res caps and the Brute deals more damage. HP is basically irrelevant if you're only getting hit 5% of the time and resisting 90% of the hits you do take. Barring extreme edge cases like Hamidon where your defensive stats are purposefully invalidated, the Brute will consistently outperform the Tanker at their stated group role. The fact remains that Brutes and Tankers were never balanced to coexist. Homecoming has inadvertently shone a bright light on these imbalances because of how much easier it is to put together top-tier builds here than it ever was on Live. Just buffing Tanker AoE and calling it a day isn't going to fix the problem.

[Infinitum]

7 hours ago, Haijinx said:

i could have 5 +10% Recharges, 5 +8.75% Recharges, 5 +7.5% Recharges, 5 +5% Recharges though.   

So really its not the limit that it seems to be.

You are kinda limiting yourself in other areas though usually recharge bonuses dont have good defense bonuses or resistance bonuses you already have.

 

I like building for a little of everything depending on what set I'm slotting already provides.  I go for incarnate defense caps first on defense builds, resistance caps on resistance builds, defense soft caps on squishy builds first.

 

Then I start rounding everything else out, damage, recharge, regen, recovery.  This balances the build out nicely IMO.

 

But if you focus on one set bonus you are almost self nerfing your builds balance anyway.

[Infinitum]

26 minutes ago, Captain Citadel said:

I fail to see the relevance of increased hit points when a Tanker and Brute have both achieved def/res caps and the Brute deals more damage. HP is basically irrelevant if you're only getting hit 5% of the time and resisting 90% of the hits you do take. Barring extreme edge cases like Hamidon where your defensive stats are purposefully invalidated, the Brute will consistently outperform the Tanker at their stated group role. The fact remains that Brutes and Tankers were never balanced to coexist. Homecoming has inadvertently shone a bright light on these imbalances because of how much easier it is to put together top-tier builds here than it ever was on Live. Just buffing Tanker AoE and calling it a day isn't going to fix the problem.

Seriously though why does it need to be a problem?  I play my tanks more than brutes now, and enjoy them more.

 

Ive never seen anyone get offended that more than one tank is on the team.

 

And personally I could care less that more people are playing brutes than tanks also - that's mainly because of ae farming anyway.   

 

Ive played a lot of tanks and I wouldn't call any of them boring to play, and its not like its hard to level up in homecoming too.

 

I just dont see any reason why the two cant share the same space.  Who cares what anyone else chooses, if its fun play it.  If its not don't.  Dont worry about what it's title is, play it enjoy it.

[Troo]

8 hours ago, Haijinx said:

Can anyone confirm that IO's were in alpha or something when ED hit? 

sort of but not exactly.

  

1 hour ago, Captain Citadel said:

HP is basically irrelevant if you're only getting hit 5% of the time

I have many toons that wish this was the case. 

Edited January 16, 2020 by Troo

[SwitchFade]

17 hours ago, Myrmidon said:

Funny. Despite the fact that I make liberal use of it, I would say the Invention System was a much greater mistake.

Only eclipsed by AE, the gobstopper whale of a blunder.

[Captain Citadel]

30 minutes ago, Troo said:

I have many toons that wish this was the case. 

If your characters have 90% damage resistance and a 5% chance to be hit, you shouldn't be worried about their HP. If they don't have both of those things, then you're cherry-picking my post. 45% defense (or 65% for Incarnate content) isn't enough to make you invincible, but combined with capped resistance it is. Extra HP is just padding out your stats at that point. It's silly to harp on HP as the defining advantage Tankers have over Brutes when other stats diminish the actual effectiveness of that sole advantage. If you're hitting harder than a Tanker and not taking any appreciable level of increased damage in return, you're objectively better than a Tanker in any way that really matters.

Buffing AoE is a good start, but eliminating Bruising in favor of a purely selfish damage increase doesn't make a Tanker more attractive in a group setting. And the buffs to support abilities like the Leadership pool are negligible, especially considering you'll find Leadership buffs more commonly used by ATs that aren't Tankers. Using my own builds as an example, I have a Dominator that runs all 3 toggles plus Vengeance. My Tanker can't fit anything past Maneuvers in his build.