Focused Feedback: Tanker - Archetype Inherent Changes

[The Curator]

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 Tankers

• Self damage buff lowered from 1.0x to 0.875x.
• -Res modifiers lowered to match other melee ATs.
• Diminishing returns:
  • In powers that had their target cap increased from 10 to 16, each target above 10 will take 25% less damage than the previous target
  • In powers that had their target cap increased from 5 to 10, each target above 5 will take 44% less damage than the previous target
  • Gauntlet is immune to these diminishing returns
• Removed passive global Arc/Radius buff
• Increased the radius and range of all tanker Primary and Secondary Cones by 50%
  • Cones no longer have their arc boosted
• Increased the radius of all tanker Primary and Secondary Sphere AoEs by 50%
  • The increase wont push radius above 15ft

 

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[skoryy]

On 5/26/2025 at 7:53 AM, The Curator said:

Self damage buff lowered from 1.0x to 0.875x.

 

Is this the damage co-efficient going back down or a nerf to Assault, Rage, and the like?

[Player-1]

10 minutes ago, skoryy said:

 

Is this the damage co-efficient going back down or a nerf to Assault, Rage, and the like?

 

This lowers the value of damage self-buff powers like Build Up, Rage, and so on. 

 

Where Build Up gave 100% damage before, it will now grant 87.5%.

[Vanden]

19 minutes ago, Player-1 said:

 

This lowers the value of damage self-buff powers like Build Up, Rage, and so on. 

 

Where Build Up gave 100% damage before, it will now grant 87.5%.

 

On Tankers it was 80% though, so now it's 70%

[macskull]

Since this isn’t immediately obvious from the patch notes, I’ll add a note for anyone who happens to read this: in addition to the overcap mechanic and damage buff scale reduction, the changes to arc and radius do two things:

1. Lower AoE proc rates.
2. Lower all AoE damage, since damage scale of AoEs is tied directly to areafactor.

No, this change doesn’t magically make Brutes relevant again, unfortunately.

[arcane]

9 minutes ago, macskull said:

Since this isn’t immediately obvious from the patch notes, I’ll add a note for anyone who happens to read this: in addition to the overcap mechanic and damage buff scale reduction, the changes to arc and radius do two things:

1. Lower AoE proc rates.
2. Lower all AoE damage, since damage scale of AoEs is tied directly to areafactor.

No, this change doesn’t magically make Brutes relevant again, unfortunately.

I was wondering. Isn’t increasing the “radius” on a cone without changing the “range” doing absolutely nothing BUT nerfing the proc rates? 

[macskull]

1 hour ago, arcane said:

I was wondering. Isn’t increasing the “radius” on a cone without changing the “range” doing absolutely nothing BUT nerfing the proc rates? 

I’d have to do some digging at the proc formulas and damage formulas to be sure but it wouldn’t surprise me.

[Player-1]

To clarify, these changes boost both the range and radius of cones as they are tied together.

[Jacke]

28 minutes ago, macskull said:

I’d have to do some digging at the proc formulas and damage formulas to be sure but it wouldn’t surprise me.

 

Increasing the arc of a PBAoE also increases the area factor.  Details in this post:
 

 

 

[macskull]

17 minutes ago, Jacke said:

 

Increasing the arc of a PBAoE also increases the area factor.  Details in this post:
 

 

 

The discussion is about cones, not PBAoEs.

[Jacke]

1 hour ago, macskull said:

The discussion is about cones, not PBAoEs.

 

Cones, whether melee or ranged. are similar to PBAoEs with less than 360° arc.  They all have a radius rather than a range.  Look at the article I posted above.

[nyttyn]

Since there weren't dev notes on this, I'd like to ask what the purpose of the damage nerfs are.

 

Not trying to screech at the changes out of hand, this is just something I'd like to get insight on. I'm not very great as a player or builder so I couldn't really tell you if it was warranted or not, so not here to debate that or nothin', it's just nice seeing the developer reasoning, especially for a pretty big nerf.

[icesphere]

Not a dev, but appears to align more that tankers are heavy duty tankers that can also be DPS monsters with the right build. This nerfs the proc rates for a lot of their aoe, so makes them fit the role of their namesake.

Edited May 27 by icesphere

[Ratch_]

On 5/26/2025 at 7:53 AM, The Curator said:

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 Tankers

• Removed arc/radius buff restrictions from powers.

Throw Spines and Shockwave are still getting the restrictions.

 

[Ratch_]

2 hours ago, Ratch_ said:

Throw Spines and Shockwave are still getting the restrictions.

 

I stand corrected on this, it is not being ignored - i just goofed 😅

[Ratch_]

For tankers, shouldn't this power be 12ft radius?

Ditto for aura of insanity?

Edited May 27 by Ratch_

[PeregrineFalcon]

8 hours ago, Player-1 said:

This lowers the value of damage self-buff powers like Build Up, Rage, and so on.

Wait. So you nerfed Rage?

 

I'm going to seal myself into my escape pod now. I'll monitor the situation from there.

[ShardWarrior]

Thank you for the disincentives to play my tankers.

[Realitycheck]

Good going Devs, You just F_cked the Tank AE farmers. Instead of playing around why not just get rid of AE altogether. Then you can put the tanks back to the way they were. 

[macskull]

These changes make very little difference in an AE farming scenario, and Tankers are still a better choice than Brutes for farming.

 

EDIT: I'm coming back to edit this post a week later to give some more information: I was one of the people who initially was saying these changes made little difference compared to live performance, but that was before I fully understood the changes. Also, the testing I was doing was entirely AFK farming, not active farming, and since I don't have any active farming builds on the live servers I'm unable to make a direct comparison, and the focus of my testing was more towards a different set of changes that ultimately didn't make it into this update.

Edited yesterday at 05:36 PM by macskull

[Troo]

On 5/26/2025 at 4:53 AM, The Curator said:

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 Tankers

• Self damage buff lowered from 1.0x to 0.875x.
• -Res modifiers lowered to match other melee ATs.
• OverCap mechanic implemented (foes hit above the standard target cap will see diminishing effectiveness on those additional targets).
• Removed arc/radius buff restrictions from powers.
• Increased the radius and range of all tanker Primary and Secondary AoEs to a max of 15ft radius.
• Cones no longer have an increase in arc, instead they get increased radius.
• Adjusted the bonus on cones to add +50% radius instead of +50% arc.

 

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To quote another poster: "wonderful bit of bait and switch"

[ScarySai]

On 5/26/2025 at 6:53 AM, The Curator said:

Self damage buff lowered from 1.0x to 0.875x

I hate this one in particular because it's a veiled rage nerf. Just nerf tanker rage, this is a dumb change for the bulk of tanker sets.

 

I always preferred brutes and would rather they got something than we try to bring tankers down.

[Kai Moon]

Quote

OverCap mechanic implemented (foes hit above the standard target cap will see diminishing effectiveness on those additional targets).

To illustrate this, I used Claws Eviscerate on a tanker. The standard target cap is 5, the tanker target cap is 10. Tanker now deals:

• 100% (normal) damage to 5 targets
• 56% damage to a 6th target
• (56%)² ≈ 31% damage to a 7th target
• (56%)³ ≈ 18% damage to an 8th target

Presumably continue exponential decay for each additional "over cap" target.

[Auroxis]

@Kai Moon

Thanks for testing! I think the OverCap damage reduction numbers are a tad too high, as essentially damage past the first target over the cap is fairly meaningless. I believe proc chance is also impacted.

[twozerofoxtrot]

Yeah that practical example with both numbers and screenshot was really helpful for understanding what that particular patch note was identifying.

 

So to continue the trend of rending garments and gnashing teeth over Tanker Super Strength getting nerfs:

 

✔️Rage by nerfed by damage buff reduction.

✔️Foot Stomp indirectly nerfed by all other AoEs getting a 15ft radii to reduce its uniqueness further (separate discussion on this increases areafactor and reduces procs on other sets)
✔️Foot Stomp directly nerfed by OverCap now doing less damage on targets 11-16.

Mm Mm Mm. 
Of course these changes hurt all tankers, not just SS tankers. I just have an investment bias.

I will give the HC Dev team credit here, though. They found a way to shave off some tanker damage performance without hurting their ability to tank or affecting procs writ large across all ATs.