Vanguard is getting better, but I don't notice any changes to Dig In ? (@asterdahl)
I apologize, the small changes I mentioned would be coming to Dig In should have made it into this week's build, I will check tomorrow and report back if the changes possibly made it in without the tooltip being updated, or whether they didn't make it in at all. Thank you for your patience.
Apologies for the delayed update, yesterday I had to assist with some dungeon related fixes and didn't have time to investigate this. It looks like the dig-in changes narrowly missed the cutoff for last week's build. They should be in this week's build!
(I apologize that I do not have time to reply to other posts on this thread at the moment, I just wanted to pop-in to give a follow up on this. I will be catching up on this thread as soon as I am able. Thank you for your patience!)
tried so many times asking them if they would give knights valor a chance but so far i have seen nothing for how i see they dont care caused if they did this would of went into partie already witch i dont see happening
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dread4moorMember, NW M9 PlaytestPosts: 1,154Arc User
edited March 2019
Struggling Vanguard update: Threat greatly improved since update.
Ran half a dozen 3:1:1 T2s today on Vanguard paying close attention to @Asterdahl's "Jane Equation". Definitely "feeling more Jane" today then before the preview update. Loadout: Played with all threat feats, defensive boons. 19k campaign/Spy gear only, no broken OP pets or artifacts. Rank 14 lightning Line Breaker- Great opener and grabs aggro well. Enforced threat- MUCH better at regaining aggro. Very different then on initial open preview. Slow cooldown lessens it's value. Tremor- Nice AoE "Pay attention to me!" (thanks to @wilbur626 for the advice). Good to fill in while waiting for ET to cooldown. Slap some bonus threat on that bad boy and it's a must-have. Threatening Rush- Welcome back, old friend. I missed TRush from my old IV days. Great for large pack aggro, pin-balling around like Sheriff ["Ping, ping PING!"] Ricochet Rabbit. (No one will get this reference.) TRush almost makes up for the Terrapin speed of Vanguard and lack of ranged taunts. Dig-In- - Nope. Disabled my tab. I know you are still working on DigIn, so will not beat that dead horse.
TLDR: it is clear you have been listening to us, @asterdahl. I am now a Believer in The Jane Equation. The meaningful threat changes you are making are indeed moving Vanguard from "pfffft" toward "yeah, this might actually work." Will keep practicing. Thanks.
Edit: Wish there was some easier way to measure threat and see who has aggro. Ditto @gripnir78 's request for more specifics on the Jane Equation.
Post edited by dread4moor on
I am Took.
"Full plate and packing steel" in NW since 2013.
Any chance you can provide us a full formula of threat generation? I doubt that, but then keep in mind that it can end up with no Fighters picking tank spec or that it will be just one rotation to keep aggro or its gona be vary dependant on companions,enchantments and so on. And that way its gona end up with one vanilla build/rotation/gear setup. Sure, sure we are tanks I know...but we are no bots.
Seconding this.
I'd also specifically like to know what abilities have what aggro multipliers, as I am not entirely sure where the 2x and 5x come from.
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dread4moorMember, NW M9 PlaytestPosts: 1,154Arc User
Vanguard is getting better, but I don't notice any changes to Dig In ? (@asterdahl)
I apologize, the small changes I mentioned would be coming to Dig In should have made it into this week's build, I will check tomorrow and report back if the changes possibly made it in without the tooltip being updated, or whether they didn't make it in at all. Thank you for your patience.
Apologies for the delayed update, yesterday I had to assist with some dungeon related fixes and didn't have time to investigate this. It looks like the dig-in changes narrowly missed the cutoff for last week's build. They should be in this week's build!
(I apologize that I do not have time to reply to other posts on this thread at the moment, I just wanted to pop-in to give a follow up on this. I will be catching up on this thread as soon as I am able. Thank you for your patience!)
No apologies needed @asterdahl . This is the best Dev response I've seen in 5 1/2 years in NW. Your patience and optimism are the main reasons I'm sticking around and giving the new NW a chance. The Tooks approve.
I am Took.
"Full plate and packing steel" in NW since 2013.
Seeing as you gave the Barbarian a full overhaul, I was actually wondering was how much you intend to adapt from the Fighter's section of a 5e handbook?
I know that NW's Fighter is a mix between 4e and 5e, in addition to already having some 5e adaptations (ex: Fighter's Recovery to Second Wind).
Since there seems to be a lot plain or useless feats/passives/powers, I think that adapting some of the ideas from the handbook might flesh out the class while helping the DnD junkies get into the adventuring mood by seeing names and effects from the handbook.
Dreadnought:
Change the path's name to "Battle Master"
I'm usually not one to nitpick names, but Dreadnought seems like a silly name, to be honest. I think of a battleship, amongst other definitions when I see the word. Am I supposed to get a railgun with the dreadnought spec?
Seeing as Mod 16's Fighter borrows a lot from the Battle Master anyways, why not just give it the Battle Master title and get rid of the silly name?
Change Vengeance to "Combat Superiority" and leave effect as is.
If you plan to give Fighters an option where they don't need to get hit to build Vengeance, I think the Vengeance sounds a little silly. What are you planning to get revenge on the enemies for? Smelling awful?
I don't tabletop at all, but from what I understood, spending superiority die for maneuvers sounds similar to how we currently spend Vengeance to power up some encounters. Again, why not change the name to bring the class closer to its namesake?
Change Seethe to "Know Your Enemy". Let it restore the Combat Superiority resource as Seethe currently restores Vengeance, but also give it the effect of increasing your damage by 5% and reducing the damage that enemies deal to you by 5% if you sit still for 5 seconds.
Again, changing the name to fit the theme. Also changing the mechanic to sort of see how you could adapt the tabletop mechanic to the video game.
The reason I didn't list Dig In is because I'm seriously hoping you scrap the mechanic. I think this thread has made it very clear that no matter how much you buff Dig In, nobody is going to use it on tanking unless you make us flat out invincible while using it. The mechanic is redundant and impractical compared to the basic Guard.
We're all hoping you give us some ranged aggro option as our tank spec mechanic. That would make the tank spec unique amongst tanks by giving you the option to bring the enemies to where you want to fight them (possibly to an area where you have more room to move and dodge), rather than having to run towards the enemies as the other classes have to.
Rename Vengeful Blade to "Extra Attack" and move to universal in place of the current Combat Superiority class feature. I'd also change the effect to "your At-wills strike twice for 4 seconds after Guarding an attack" rather than adding 50 magnitude damage on a Crit.
The current Combat Superiority class feature is just not worth using, I'd hope for a more useful universal offensive class feature.
Extra Attack sounds perfect because it wasn't locked to any of the specific archetypes. Additionally, the effect of Extra Attack described in the book (you can attack multiple times on your turn) sort of sounds similar to Vengeful Blade, which should make it somewhat easier to tweak.
I didn't know how you would adapt the whole "turn" thing. I only suggested after Guarding an attack due to my original idea (your At-wills strike twice for 4 seconds after using an Encounter or daily) sounded too much like a Blade Hurricane ripoff, and I want to keep the mechanics of the different classes unique.
Move the Combat Superiority class feature to the spot Vengeful Blade occupies. Change to "Improved Combat Superiority". Change effect to: Having 50% or more Combat Superiority grants you 15% bonus damage rather than 10%.
Increasing the damage bonus of the Combat Superiority resource was about as close as I could think of for adapting the better dice you get for higher levels. I admit it's a little uninspired as far as class features go, but I wasn't sure how to make a more creative adaptation.
Also, the current Combat Superiority's effect is just not very useful. The bonus is too small (3%???) and not up for enough time (barring bugged ITF) for players to consider it as a useful part of their toolkit. Reworking it to something more consistent would be far more helpful.
I know I didn't give a suggestion for everything, but these were just the ideas I had in mind after giving the handbook a read while considering some of the Fighter's current problems (bad class features and not as much incentive to use Seethe).
If the dev team planned to implement some of these ideas, I'm sure I or other people more acquainted with tabletop could try their hand at adapting more of the tabletop mechanics into NW.
Any chance you can provide us a full formula of threat generation? I doubt that, but then keep in mind that it can end up with no Fighters picking tank spec or that it will be just one rotation to keep aggro or its gona be vary dependant on companions,enchantments and so on. And that way its gona end up with one vanilla build/rotation/gear setup. Sure, sure we are tanks I know...but we are no bots.
Seconding this.
I'd also specifically like to know what abilities have what aggro multipliers, as I am not entirely sure where the 2x and 5x come from.
This should be clear for all of us - I even think it would be good as a part of tooltip. And since on Paladins section I found this:
On the other hand, against groups, oath strike is the clear winner, because at 4 targets you're talking breakeven damage, and currently the threat bonus is 700%, so it's a threat increase even against a single enemy.
Well why not give us a full info about real threat modifiers on our class/skills?
how are powers with no damage like come and get it works out then?
Instead of getting threat based on damage, they look at the monster's aggro table, and set your current aggro to "the same as the top aggro-haver, plus a little extra".
So your at-will might generate 10000 Threat, but if the GWF has generated 1,000,000 threat you're going to spend all day and not get aggro back. One of the "taunt" powers will see that the GWF has 1,000,000 Threat and set you directly to 1,025,000.
Please make us a skill that is actually worth using. Dig In is horrible.
At-Wills :
3 out for 4 At-Will powers are awesome as is. In testing I have been using Cleave/Threatening Rush for aoe fights, and Brazen Slash/Threatening Rush for boss fights. I cant find a single reason to use Tide of Iron in its current state. Threatening Rush does the job better + its a very good mobility skill in both trash aoe fights and boss + adds fights. Needs rework.
Encounters :
Vanguard encounters needs a lot of tweaking. The latest patch added Tremor to our list, and its an instant favorite of mine. This is my verdic of current encounter selection :
Shield Slam : This skill is just plain bad. I cant find a single fight in the current dungeons where the tank wants to stay ranged, thus I see no reason for this skill to exist.
Kneebreaker : I never liked to use kneebreaker in my tank builds, but it did serve well as a Crushing Pin applier. I would love if Dreadnaughts Commander's Strike took its place as an universal Fighter skill.
Bull Charge : We have both Bull Charge and Linebreaker in our skill selection. Why ? Linebreaker is a lot better for thrash mobs as an opener.
Tremor : Awesome AOE skill. This needs to make it to final build
Anvil of Doom : Awesome singletarget skill. Also a keeper.
Enforced Threat : Feels like a wasted encounter slot in its current state. In my opinion this should be reworked. I would take Into The Fray from Dreadnaught and mix the two skills into one good utility skill for Vanguard. +aggro and +movement would make a great battle cry.
Knights Challenge : This needs rework. I like the idea of it, but having a skill that deals damage when you block get cancelled by BLOCK ANIMATION is kinda silly :P
Linebreaker : Very good opener. This is the reason we dont need Bull Charge.
Iron Warrior : Horrible for endgame players, but may have a use for lower levels ?
Knights Valor : Useless in combat. Should be a radius skill including all allies. Bring back the old version or remake plz.
Daily powers :
Earthshaker : Looks cool, does damage. Keeper.
Second Wind : Awesome. The +% HP makes my tenebrous enchantments shine. Maybe make Vanguard Exclusive ?
Determination : Good stuff. Keep as is.
Bladed Rampart : Feels a little weak for a daily power. See feats section for suggestion for improvement.
Phalanx : Lifesaver in AOE/DOT heavy boss fights. Keep as is.
Class Features :
Out of the 8 class features, I can only find 3 that can be considered useable; Greater Endurance, Shield Talent and Anvil of Challenge. All the others can be deleted imho. @rjc9000 s post with the idea of Extra Attack feat would bring atleast 1 additional good feat to the Vanguard.
Feats :
Aggressive Guard : +aggro when shielding = good.
Threatening Slam : As Shield Slam is useless, so is this feat.
Cleaving Bull : Feat effect should be moved to the skill Linebreaker.
Brazen Thrust : After latest patch I cant find the skill Piercing Thrust. This would be a perfect spot to put a feat for Tremor, adding +aggro to it. (@dread4moor)
Swordbreaker : Get rid of Kneebreaker, replace it with Commander's Strike and make this feat tie to that instead.
Sheltering Wind : This feat needs a buff, as the current healing pr dmg dealt by the Vanguard doesnt give the party much.
Stronghold/Deep breath : No. No. No.
Determined Defense : As we already have 2 daily powers that grants us -% dmg taken, this is overkill. Change this to a feat that buffs Phalanx or Bladed Rampart. Bladed Rampart could use a damage over time feat!
Elite Whaleboy
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dread4moorMember, NW M9 PlaytestPosts: 1,154Arc User
Harrumph! Harrumph! Hear him! Hear him! You've won a Took ally, Wilbur. You hit on all of my thoughts plus a few I never considered. Seconded.
Allow Took to comment:
>Tab-mechaninc : Nuff said. Make it a hard ranged taunt or make it disappear.
> At-Wills : Cleave- Only good for mobs/aoe. Fine at that. 2.5/4 stars
Threatening Rush- Arguably the most universally effective Fighter power @asterdahl included in Mod16. Threat+Mobility= good tanking. 4.5/5
Brazen Slash- The Threat "Jane Equation" tells us that, all modifiers equal, DPS=NonDPS Threat. Brazen boosts threat. Fine. 2.5/5.
Encounters
Tremor- Great. 4/5
Shield Slam- AKA "When Captain America throws his mighty shiiiiieeeld!"
If this were an AT WILL or TAB, it would be BiS and I would disagree with Wilbur. But as an encounter with 20 sec cooldown? Nope. 1/5
Kneebreaker - For DPS/ Sure. for tank? Meh except boss battle.
Bull Charge : Meh. Single target, sure. Mobs? nah. Linebreaker is more useful. 2/5
Anvil of Doom : Single target? Yes. "Jane" approves. Mobs? Nope. 2/5
Enforced Threat : Not your GrandDad's enforced Threat. Good. Better with wider AoE and shorter cooldown. 3/5.
Knights Challenge : B+ for concept. D- for execution and usefulness. 1.5/5
Linebreaker : Great. Leave it as is. 4/5
Iron Warrior: Know what's better then "keep me alive"? Keep my party alive by using an encounter that builds aggro. That's what we need. Functionally low-tier. 1.5/5
Knights Valor: How far the great have fallen. KV was the single BEST tanking skill for a GF, arguably among the best in the game. This is a watered-down over-the-counter facsimile of a main tanking skill.
Daily powers Earthshaker : Great for tanking and solo. 4/5
Second Wind: If not broken and about to be neutered, I love it. 4/5
Class Features : > > Out of the 8 class features, I can only find 3 that can be considered useable; Greater Endurance, Shield Talent and Anvil of Challenge. All the others can be deleted imho. @rjc9000 s post with the idea of Extra Attack feat would bring atleast 1 additional good feat to the Vanguard.
> Feats : Does Vanguard have Piercing thrust and ITF? If not, why do we feats for them?
Overall, good progress @asterdahl . You have kept at least one long-time player in the game.
I am Took.
"Full plate and packing steel" in NW since 2013.
Nuff said. Make it a hard ranged taunt or make it disappear.
They're SPECIFICALLY not doing hard-taunts.
But a soft-taunt Mark? "tag an enemy, continuously build threat on that enemy even if you do nothing else"? That's a good tab skill. Dig In is.... not fun. Forget "good" or "bad" for a second, Dig In is simply a power that makes being a GF less fun to play when using it. It could be a perfect immortality shield, where a Fighter using it simply could not be killed and would aggro literally everything forever... and it still wouldn't be fun to use.
I cant find a single reason to use Tide of Iron in its current state. Threatening Rush does the job better + its a very good mobility skill in both trash aoe fights and boss + adds fights. Needs rework.
I personally would kill off the bonus aggro and give it the effect of restoring your Stamina by 7.5% if it connects.
While this does sort of encroach on Brazen Slash's utility on Vanguard, I think the difference is that Tide of Iron restores Stamina all at once, while Brazen Slash restores it per hit (ie, need to stay out of shield more often and take higher risk). Also, as stated, no reason to use Tide if Threatening Rush has more utility as a gapcloser and does the +aggro thing.
Even if Tide has a higher aggro multiplier, unless it is *far*, *far* higher than Threatening Rush, I wouldn't want to dedicate two of my At-wills to just aggro bonuses.
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dread4moorMember, NW M9 PlaytestPosts: 1,154Arc User
Nuff said. Make it a hard ranged taunt or make it disappear.
They're SPECIFICALLY not doing hard-taunts.
But a soft-taunt Mark? "tag an enemy, continuously build threat on that enemy even if you do nothing else"? That's a good tab skill. Dig In is.... not fun. Forget "good" or "bad" for a second, Dig In is simply a power that makes being a GF less fun to play when using it. It could be a perfect immortality shield, where a Fighter using it simply could not be killed and would aggro literally everything forever... and it still wouldn't be fun to use.
"Theyre SPECIFICALLY not doing hard-taunts."
Aren't they? What is "Enforced Threat"? What is "put on the top of the threat meter" (used on 3 different Mod 16 powers) mean if not "hard taunt"? Pick a lane. Either the "Jane Equation" is the new rule, or it isn't. The Jane Equation puts threat building as a seperate quantification from DPS, but DPS contributes to it. The Jane Equation accepts hard taunts. Hard taunts exist in Mod 16. Commit one way or the other.
I am Took.
"Full plate and packing steel" in NW since 2013.
Nuff said. Make it a hard ranged taunt or make it disappear.
They're SPECIFICALLY not doing hard-taunts.
But a soft-taunt Mark? "tag an enemy, continuously build threat on that enemy even if you do nothing else"? That's a good tab skill. Dig In is.... not fun. Forget "good" or "bad" for a second, Dig In is simply a power that makes being a GF less fun to play when using it. It could be a perfect immortality shield, where a Fighter using it simply could not be killed and would aggro literally everything forever... and it still wouldn't be fun to use.
"Theyre SPECIFICALLY not doing hard-taunts."
Aren't they? What is "Enforced Threat"? What is "put on the top of the threat meter" (used on 3 different Mod 16 powers) mean if not "hard taunt"? Pick a lane. Either the "Jane Equation" is the new rule, or it isn't. The Jane Equation puts threat building as a seperate quantification from DPS, but DPS contributes to it. The Jane Equation accepts hard taunts. Hard taunts exist in Mod 16. Commit one way or the other.
That is not a hard taunt. That is a soft taunt.
Hard taunt means the monster *cannot* target someone other than you, regardless of threat, until the taunt wears off - but after it wears off, you might still be fourth on the aggro chart.
Setting yourself to the top of the threat chart is a soft taunt. Someone can take aggro from you again, you've just jumped the queue to get to the top of the list.
Hey everyone! Sorry for the slow responses the last few days—spent the last few days burning down a pile of bugs and making as many adjustments as I could for this week's build. The big feat adjustments are going to have to wait for next week but this week will feature the aforementioned additions to dig in, a fix to Into the Fray's AP gain, and most significantly, a large adjustment to both block and "Path of the Vanguard."
Path of the Vanguard's reduction to damage dealt will be reduced to 10% (down from 30%) and it will now grant a 40% increase to maximum hit points. At the same time, the maximum amount of damage prevented by a full stamina bar will be reduced from 100% of maximum hit points to 50% of maximum hit points.
These changes mean more effective hit points at the start of a fight for any tank. E.g. If you have 100,000 HP, and you used to block for 100,000—you had a total of 200,000 effective hit points. Now you'll have 140,000 HP, and you will block for 70,000—for a total of 210,000 EHP.
Naturally, this means that your block is a little weaker, but it's still very powerful given how quickly stamina regenerates. We think these changes feel good, a bit more tank healing is required in group content, and tanks can't shield quite as much so often in PvP. However, we're absolutely still ironing out the details regarding tank durability, so these numbers could be reverted, or changed further, but we'd like to see how everyone feels about these changes. So please send your feedback once you've had a chance to check them out in this week's upcoming build.
Cos, well you can tank od Dreadnought as well...there is absolutely no reason to go Vanguard, not at eng game parties for sure
Have you tried that, or are you just saying that?
You cannot tank as Dreadnought end game. Not very well. The aggro mechanics are all wrong, you have no way to pull aggro from a squishy. You have those tools as Vanguard.
Additionally, you will die faster. I know everyone's been giving Dig In a lot of flak, and to be fair, it needs some work still (Asterdahl is working on it), it's not useless. And Dig in > Seethe for tanking by a lot.
My party did significantly better with me in Vanguard mode, and letting the 3 DPS do their thing, than with me as a terrible tank in Dreadnought providing a 4th DPS that was only about 30-40% more than my Vanguard.
I get that we're all very frustrated with where things are at right now. That doesn't excuse us from repeating other people's assumptions and fears without the data to back it up. Get a 5 man going and do CR, or TONG or FBI on Preview right now. Try and tank as Dreadnought. I found it to be incredibly frustrating. You can't keep people alive, and your healer runs around trying to heal everyone and yells at you for not holding aggro.
In Vanguard, the problems disappeared pretty quick.
There's still work that needs to be done, but your statement is just wrong. Demonstrably wrong.
He was indeed wrong that you could run party PvE content as Dread-Tank. He was correct in that Dread (based solely on my 2 week preview experience) appears to hold aggro better then Vanguard. Still testing the recent updates.
The aggro dependence on damage is crippling to the Vanguard imo. I get that Asterdahl wants active (instead of passive) threat generation. But threat can be active and NOT DPS based. Let Van be that exception. At least, Vanguard should have some supplement or base multiplier for the damage portion of the threat equation.
I do understand that there a lot of frustrating elements at play right now, with various bugs, and with the damage of various classes in flux, but I would like to clarify some things about "damage based threat." I believe you may be getting caught up on the wrong part of threat being damage based, threat being damage based does not mean that you need to eclipse your DPS's damage in order to hold threat. I do not believe that damage based threat is at the core of any of the problems or issues currently present in preview.
I've been trying to explain the way that damage based threat works for those struggling, and I apologize that I've repeatedly failed to convey the concept clearly. So I'd like to make another attempt! (Please note, I'm using hypothetical numbers for this example.)
Sally the DPS and Jane the Tank are both in a level 30 dungeon fighting an Orc.
>Sally hits the orc with a fireball for 500 damage. (She generates 500 threat) >Jane hits the orc with linebreaker for 100 damage. (But she generates 1000 threat because linebreaker generates "additional threat" and she has a passive threat bonus, so 100x5x2 = 1000.)
Jane has the enemy's attention.
Sally and Jane keep leveling up, and they both get stronger equipment, and soon they're in a level 80 dungeon fighting a Dragon.
>Sally hits the dragon with a fireball for 5000 damage. (She generates 5000 threat) >Jane hits the dragon with linebreaker for 1000 damage. (But she generates 10000 threat because linebreaker generates "additional threat" and she has a passive threat bonus, so 1000x5x2 = 100-0.)
Jane has the enemy's attention.
As you can see from the example, in both cases, Sally did much more damage, but Jane was able to keep the enemy's attention. Jane's ability to keep the enemy's attention increased as the base damage of her powers did, with her character's equipment getting better and better.
That's really the core concept of damage based threat, as opposed to hard taunts, as you get stronger, you get better at holding threat. So in order to hold threat off of a DPS, you just have to keep getting stronger along with them. You don't need to eclipse their damage or even come close, you just need to get better at a similar pace. Of course, how much leeway there is, or how much worse your equipment can be before you start struggling with threat, is something we are carefully watching. We definitely want to ensure that you can hold threat if you're very focused on it, even off of a much stronger DPS, but if you're very good, you can maybe focus more on pure damaging powers and still keep the enemy's attention.
1. Does Fighter self healing add to +aggro at all ? 2. Does passive damage dealt add to +aggro (Briartwine reflect, Tenebrous, Ferocious Reaction feat, Reflected dmg from master boon) ? 3. Does Fighter party heals from daily Second Wind (feated) add to +aggro ?
Thanks for the questions! The short answer is: they all add threat! Currently, every point of healing and every point of damage generate 1 threat, and then any multipliers are added on top of that. There may be a reduction to healing threat before Module 16 goes live, as currently healers tend to be the most likely to pull threat in group content. If that happens, the effectiveness of those self-heals for pulling threat will be somewhat diminished, but they will still add threat.
As Said before by several other player the The 30% damage reduction for Vanguard is at minimum strange. I understand the logic of a Tank class doing less dmg than a DPS, but if tank skills make less dmg by default why add 30% on top of it?
Other problem I see in the game, and find strange is the Cap on status being the same for all roles, in life server I play Tactic GF and my dmg output is high mainly cuz i have 100% crit thats the same CAP as other dps classes.
I would like to propose a Change to CAP's According to Role, a tank class "Fighter/barbarian/pally" should have higher caps in defensive status than other class.
exemple:
Tank - DR cap at 80% , Deflect cap at 70% DPS _ DR cap at 50%, deflect cap at 30%
This changes would make tank more important in group content, allowing us to survive longer than DPS classes specially in fighter's if both tank and dps fighter have block and block the same and both have the same cap's the difference between then is only the dmg, if both survive the same and 1 kills faster in long run DPS fighter survives longer.
Threat still a problem when my dps companion still get all the aggro away from me, I can see parties without tank using companions as main tank.
We are considering changes to damage resistance caps, including changes based on role. We are aware of issues related to maxing out DR and related to the difference in survivability between tanks and non-tanks. Though there will not be any changes in this week's build, it is something we are looking at closely and deliberating on how to proceed.
>Sally hits the dragon with a fireball for 5000 damage. (She generates 5000 threat) >Jane hits the dragon with linebreaker for 1000 damage. (But she generates 10000 threat because linebreaker generates "additional threat" and she has a passive threat bonus, so 1000x5x2 = 100-0.)
Jane has the enemy's attention.
OK, i think i get concept of threat. My question is, does that passive threat bonus constant value you're trying to set or is it related to some character statistic?
I'd suggest to make passive threat bonus combination od tank defensive statistic, that way even players that have their character focused on defensive stats should generate similar amount of threat to more damage oriented characters.
Someone might say "But these values caps at some point and there's no point to add mor into them". True but some ppl likes to put on gear that rise def statistics even if their caped and not gaining advantage from that ( well maybe it's just odd little me that do that ). With my idea even odd builds like that should be viable tanks having threat generation similar to others.
While I understand the idea you're proposing, the threat bonuses are static, we currently have no intention of changing that. You just need to increase your base damage if you want to increase your threat overall. Your base damage will increase naturally, because many equipment slots are guaranteed to have power, as well as combined rating which increases your offensive stats. (Not to mention weapon damage increasing when you obtain a new weapon.)
We're aiming for those bonuses to be such that, you can safely keep threat, without really diverting stats to offense. That being said, if you're struggling, and you have built every single optional stat into defense, you can probably afford to move a few points into offense and still survive. Of course it's a careful balancing act, so of course, let us know when you're struggling, what kind of powers you were running, what your item level and stats were, what class and item level the DPS were that were pulling off of you, etc.
The biggest challenge, I think, is learning when and how to use block. It may seem like you should turtle with how effective block is now, however, especially if you're losing threat because your DPS are pushing you, you should definitely not be turtling. In those cases, you should limit block to large attacks, or after you've established a good lead on threat. A decent healer should be able to keep you alive without a problem in those cases.
That being said, right now, in a lot of group content, DPS also aren't being punished enough for pulling threat, so we're looking into that very closely.
Cos, well you can tank od Dreadnought as well...there is absolutely no reason to go Vanguard, not at eng game parties for sure
Have you tried that, or are you just saying that?
You cannot tank as Dreadnought end game. Not very well. The aggro mechanics are all wrong, you have no way to pull aggro from a squishy. You have those tools as Vanguard.
Additionally, you will die faster. I know everyone's been giving Dig In a lot of flak, and to be fair, it needs some work still (Asterdahl is working on it), it's not useless. And Dig in > Seethe for tanking by a lot.
My party did significantly better with me in Vanguard mode, and letting the 3 DPS do their thing, than with me as a terrible tank in Dreadnought providing a 4th DPS that was only about 30-40% more than my Vanguard.
I get that we're all very frustrated with where things are at right now. That doesn't excuse us from repeating other people's assumptions and fears without the data to back it up. Get a 5 man going and do CR, or TONG or FBI on Preview right now. Try and tank as Dreadnought. I found it to be incredibly frustrating. You can't keep people alive, and your healer runs around trying to heal everyone and yells at you for not holding aggro.
In Vanguard, the problems disappeared pretty quick.
There's still work that needs to be done, but your statement is just wrong. Demonstrably wrong.
He was indeed wrong that you could run party PvE content as Dread-Tank. He was correct in that Dread (based solely on my 2 week preview experience) appears to hold aggro better then Vanguard. Still testing the recent updates.
The aggro dependence on damage is crippling to the Vanguard imo. I get that Asterdahl wants active (instead of passive) threat generation. But threat can be active and NOT DPS based. Let Van be that exception. At least, Vanguard should have some supplement or base multiplier for the damage portion of the threat equation.
I do understand that there a lot of frustrating elements at play right now, with various bugs, and with the damage of various classes in flux, but I would like to clarify some things about "damage based threat." I believe you may be getting caught up on the wrong part of threat being damage based, threat being damage based does not mean that you need to eclipse your DPS's damage in order to hold threat. I do not believe that damage based threat is at the core of any of the problems or issues currently present in preview.
I've been trying to explain the way that damage based threat works for those struggling, and I apologize that I've repeatedly failed to convey the concept clearly. So I'd like to make another attempt! (Please note, I'm using hypothetical numbers for this example.)
Sally the DPS and Jane the Tank are both in a level 30 dungeon fighting an Orc.
>Sally hits the orc with a fireball for 500 damage. (She generates 500 threat) >Jane hits the orc with linebreaker for 100 damage. (But she generates 1000 threat because linebreaker generates "additional threat" and she has a passive threat bonus, so 100x5x2 = 1000.)
Jane has the enemy's attention.
Sally and Jane keep leveling up, and they both get stronger equipment, and soon they're in a level 80 dungeon fighting a Dragon.
>Sally hits the dragon with a fireball for 5000 damage. (She generates 5000 threat) >Jane hits the dragon with linebreaker for 1000 damage. (But she generates 10000 threat because linebreaker generates "additional threat" and she has a passive threat bonus, so 1000x5x2 = 100-0.)
Jane has the enemy's attention.
As you can see from the example, in both cases, Sally did much more damage, but Jane was able to keep the enemy's attention. Jane's ability to keep the enemy's attention increased as the base damage of her powers did, with her character's equipment getting better and better.
That's really the core concept of damage based threat, as opposed to hard taunts, as you get stronger, you get better at holding threat. So in order to hold threat off of a DPS, you just have to keep getting stronger along with them. You don't need to eclipse their damage or even come close, you just need to get better at a similar pace. Of course, how much leeway there is, or how much worse your equipment can be before you start struggling with threat, is something we are carefully watching. We definitely want to ensure that you can hold threat if you're very focused on it, even off of a much stronger DPS, but if you're very good, you can maybe focus more on pure damaging powers and still keep the enemy's attention.
Nice, except it doesnt work like that. Or your description is very very limited here. Of course you can grab aggro on Vanguard - trouble is with holding it.
To the point - previously you claimed that you want to avoid hard taunts, and that threat menagement should be damage dependant. OK but such skills putting you on top of threat list are in fact hard taunts - am I correct here? Now you giving an example with basic threat generation formula, and it should be fine but its definietly not working like intended. I am putting aside that this example of yours shows ideal situation with tank being on same level then dps in terms of IL etc. Problem is how long such hard tunt works? If its effect is "on use only" or there is some growing threat pool , and as long tank is able to get it filled faster then dpses he holds aggro? Because so far there is a problem - despite using all passives etc, a dps can take aggro back 1 sec after you used such skill. So its all about bad timing, or there is some kind of internall issue here?
And on top of that - to the damage/threat model. Somehow enforced threat do no damage at all, still it grabes aggro, and it actually do not fit to your description at all.
Any chance you can provide us a full formula of threat generation? I doubt that, but then keep in mind that it can end up with no Fighters picking tank spec or that it will be just one rotation to keep aggro or its gona be vary dependant on companions,enchantments and so on. And that way its gona end up with one vanilla build/rotation/gear setup. Sure, sure we are tanks I know...but we are no bots.
Hi Gripnir! I'm sorry that you feel I have deceived you in some way, but I assure you, what I described is exactly what happens. The numbers were hypothetical examples. To be clear, the current numbers are: all tanks generate 200% more threat than their damage thanks to their passive class mechanics. Powers that state they generate additional threat almost all generate 700% more threat than their base damage.
Of course those numbers will potentially change—though I understand many may disagree with this choice—we would rather not display these percentages, and increased threat is not something we would like to give out in many places, so that granular comparisons almost never need to be made. (If we do end up doing that, we will almost certainly expose the values.)
Vanguard certainly has the ability to hold threat after establishing it, but you do need to keep applying damage, you can't rest on your laurels unless you generate a major lead, which is certainly possible, particularly on single targets.
In regards to whether or not enforced threat is a "Hard Taunt," the Oxford English Dictionary defines hard taunt as—well, it doesn't define it as anything! So really we simply have an agreed upon working definition of what "hard taunt" means. Since we internally use the term "hard taunt" to refer to the old style of taunting, and many of those powers featured the text "taunt," and none of the new powers do, it seems simplest to agree to refer to the old behavior by that name.
Going off of that working definition, enforced threat is not a hard taunt, because it does not force the enemy to attack you for any amount of time at all. The old style of taunt literally overrode the target's AI and forced it to attack you for a specific duration. You could use enforced threat, and another player could immediately follow it with a daily, pulling the enemy back before it struck you even a single time. With a hard taunt, you could have done 0 damage to the enemy, and just continually taunt it while another player does millions, and it would never look away from you.
"being more or less required to use the Lightning enchant to get decent AoE for aggro generation",
In my experiments I found it to be possible to hold aggro with both Vorpal and Plaguefire enchantments. Lightning is just a very easy way of maintaining aggro on groups. If you use any other enchant, you just have to use some of the awesome mobility skills at our disposal and get ready for your healer to get grumpy
Edit : I agree 110% that dig-in is horrible and that we need a new and or improved tab-mechanic
Just so we're all on the same page, when I reference internal playtesting, I have not been using lightning for AoE threat situations, that being said, it's certainly a boost if you're struggling keeping threat on groups of enemies.
on console(ps4) block is on L3, which is a movement stick. it requires to push L3 to go in block and again to push to leave block.
on pc u hit tab and are in block as long as u hold tab.
will this change i cant test how layout will be 4 console on pc preview.
if we would have keybinds like pc it wouldnt be a problem but otherwise could u consider putting block on R1 and have it in the same fashion as the tab on pc?
@dread4moor , you should try this setup if having aggro issues in multitarget fights
I can't help but note that the majority of the things on that chart are not, in fact, fighter powers.
More than half of the damage by the numbers is from base class powers, however. That being said, yes, weapon enchants remain strong, and damaging artifacts now deal decent damage as well.
@dread4moor , you should try this setup if having aggro issues in multitarget fights
I can't help but note that the majority of the things on that chart are not, in fact, fighter powers.
That is correct. The lightning enchant deals a lot of damage (at least my tests show that, feel free to disprove) in my Vanguard loadout. Tenebrous enchants are also dealing a lot more than I expected. Also note that feated Cleave (Cleave+Cleaving Bull) beats Linebreaker and is close to Bull Charge in dmg dealt. Maybe our encounters needs a little tweaking ?
The relationship you describe between the damage of your at-will and encounters are basically by design. That being said, any changes that tilt encounters up over at-wills would be counter to the vast majority of player feedback which is that at-wills feel too weak. So more than likely, if we were to make changes, at-wills would take up a larger percentage of your chart.
Of course, you could say "why not buff both?" But in reality, if we were to do that, we'd just be buffing enemy health as well, and at-wills would still take up more of the chart.
There is still something that makes you do extremely little or no damage when you use anvil in dreadnought build.
BUGG Activating Anvil reduces the damage from activation until end of animation.
[Combat (Self)] Critical Hit! Your Vorpal Weapon deals 5 Arcane Damage to Savage.
[Combat (Self)] Critical Hit! Your Anvil of Doom deals 106 Physical Damage to Savage. Best
Thanks for the report! I'll look into this as soon as I am able.
Update on this subject...
Running Hr Pal Justice and Dreadnought all have the same issues FIRST hit on mobs seem to do no damage like they have a shield absorbing damage.
This is non consistant and sometimes Anvil or Smite can do intended damage but 9/10 times first Smite and Anvils damage are reduced to almost nothing making first hit on Smite wasted and making Anvil more or less totally useless.
Best
Hey Marnival, thanks for following up! What zones were you in when you ran into this issue? And could you let me know what your character's name who was encountering this issue is? I apologize if I've already asked for that information—I was finally investigating this issue earlier today, but didn't have anything about your character name in my notes.
tried so many times asking them if they would give knights valor a chance but so far i have seen nothing for how i see they dont care caused if they did this would of went into partie already witch i dont see happening
Hi Teamstephon! Thanks for checking out the changes on preview! I apologize that you feel like you're not being heard. Can you try explaining your feedback again? I'm not certain I am following along with what you're asking about, sorry!
Am I supposed to get a railgun with the dreadnought spec?
Hmmm... You won't miss Mow Down will you?
Kidding! But seriously, thank you for the suggestions and feedback on the various passives and power naming vis-a-vis 5E. Obviously, we have a lot of room to take liberties and create powers that fit into the MMO environment, as opposed to just lifting material directly from pen and paper D&D, but we do try to keep the basic flavor there, so I'll definitely keep your feedback in mind as I wrestle with the feats and class features.
In regards to Dreadnought, I chose the name based on the intended design of the paragon path. We were looking to make the DPS fighter into a fearless avenger type. Dreadnought means "fearless," and historically was used to refer to a thick overcoat that protected the wearer against a storm. It could also be used to describe a fearless individual, and this was the case hundreds of years before its use in reference to warships.
That being said, the modern definition was also considered, as of course, we exist in modern times. Evoking images of a durable and dangerous battleship, was ultimately something I did not consider to be a negative. That being said, I can understand if you have a very defined word association, it can probably feel a bit awkward. While it's not impossible that we'd rename the paragon path, we're generally aiming to avoid two word names.
how are powers with no damage like come and get it works out then?
Instead of getting threat based on damage, they look at the monster's aggro table, and set your current aggro to "the same as the top aggro-haver, plus a little extra".
So your at-will might generate 10000 Threat, but if the GWF has generated 1,000,000 threat you're going to spend all day and not get aggro back. One of the "taunt" powers will see that the GWF has 1,000,000 Threat and set you directly to 1,025,000.
Thanks for taking the time to reply to questions about how these powers work, for those who may be skeptical—Lowjohn's explanation is spot on.
I cant find a single reason to use Tide of Iron in its current state. Threatening Rush does the job better + its a very good mobility skill in both trash aoe fights and boss + adds fights. Needs rework.
I personally would kill off the bonus aggro and give it the effect of restoring your Stamina by 7.5% if it connects.
While this does sort of encroach on Brazen Slash's utility on Vanguard, I think the difference is that Tide of Iron restores Stamina all at once, while Brazen Slash restores it per hit (ie, need to stay out of shield more often and take higher risk). Also, as stated, no reason to use Tide if Threatening Rush has more utility as a gapcloser and does the +aggro thing.
Even if Tide has a higher aggro multiplier, unless it is *far*, *far* higher than Threatening Rush, I wouldn't want to dedicate two of my At-wills to just aggro bonuses.
To be clear, Tide of Iron does not "Generate additional threat," it 'Increases threat generation,' and that effect has a duration. (I apologize, I believe the text in the second example is not exactly what is printed on Tide of Iron but I don't have it in front of me.)
It is actually quite a boon to keeping threat when you keep the effect running. That being said, it's certainly not locked in stone.
Comments
(I apologize that I do not have time to reply to other posts on this thread at the moment, I just wanted to pop-in to give a follow up on this. I will be catching up on this thread as soon as I am able. Thank you for your patience!)
Ran half a dozen 3:1:1 T2s today on Vanguard paying close attention to @Asterdahl's "Jane Equation".
Definitely "feeling more Jane" today then before the preview update.
Loadout:
Played with all threat feats, defensive boons.
19k campaign/Spy gear only, no broken OP pets or artifacts.
Rank 14 lightning
Line Breaker-
Great opener and grabs aggro well.
Enforced threat-
MUCH better at regaining aggro. Very different then on initial open preview. Slow cooldown lessens it's value.
Tremor-
Nice AoE "Pay attention to me!" (thanks to @wilbur626 for the advice).
Good to fill in while waiting for ET to cooldown.
Slap some bonus threat on that bad boy and it's a must-have.
Threatening Rush-
Welcome back, old friend. I missed TRush from my old IV days.
Great for large pack aggro, pin-balling around like Sheriff ["Ping, ping PING!"] Ricochet Rabbit.
(No one will get this reference.)
TRush almost makes up for the Terrapin speed of Vanguard and lack of ranged taunts.
Dig-In- -
Nope. Disabled my tab.
I know you are still working on DigIn, so will not beat that dead horse.
TLDR: it is clear you have been listening to us, @asterdahl. I am now a Believer in The Jane Equation.
The meaningful threat changes you are making are indeed moving Vanguard from "pfffft" toward "yeah, this might actually work."
Will keep practicing.
Thanks.
Edit:
Wish there was some easier way to measure threat and see who has aggro.
Ditto @gripnir78 's request for more specifics on the Jane Equation.
I am Took.
"Full plate and packing steel" in NW since 2013.
I'd also specifically like to know what abilities have what aggro multipliers, as I am not entirely sure where the 2x and 5x come from.
This is the best Dev response I've seen in 5 1/2 years in NW.
Your patience and optimism are the main reasons I'm sticking around and giving the new NW a chance.
The Tooks approve.
I am Took.
"Full plate and packing steel" in NW since 2013.
I know that NW's Fighter is a mix between 4e and 5e, in addition to already having some 5e adaptations (ex: Fighter's Recovery to Second Wind).
Since there seems to be a lot plain or useless feats/passives/powers, I think that adapting some of the ideas from the handbook might flesh out the class while helping the DnD junkies get into the adventuring mood by seeing names and effects from the handbook.
Dreadnought:
Change the path's name to "Battle Master"
I'm usually not one to nitpick names, but Dreadnought seems like a silly name, to be honest. I think of a battleship, amongst other definitions when I see the word. Am I supposed to get a railgun with the dreadnought spec?
Seeing as Mod 16's Fighter borrows a lot from the Battle Master anyways, why not just give it the Battle Master title and get rid of the silly name?
Change Vengeance to "Combat Superiority" and leave effect as is.
If you plan to give Fighters an option where they don't need to get hit to build Vengeance, I think the Vengeance sounds a little silly. What are you planning to get revenge on the enemies for? Smelling awful?
I don't tabletop at all, but from what I understood, spending superiority die for maneuvers sounds similar to how we currently spend Vengeance to power up some encounters. Again, why not change the name to bring the class closer to its namesake?
Change Seethe to "Know Your Enemy".
Let it restore the Combat Superiority resource as Seethe currently restores Vengeance, but also give it the effect of increasing your damage by 5% and reducing the damage that enemies deal to you by 5% if you sit still for 5 seconds.
Again, changing the name to fit the theme. Also changing the mechanic to sort of see how you could adapt the tabletop mechanic to the video game.
The reason I didn't list Dig In is because I'm seriously hoping you scrap the mechanic. I think this thread has made it very clear that no matter how much you buff Dig In, nobody is going to use it on tanking unless you make us flat out invincible while using it. The mechanic is redundant and impractical compared to the basic Guard.
We're all hoping you give us some ranged aggro option as our tank spec mechanic. That would make the tank spec unique amongst tanks by giving you the option to bring the enemies to where you want to fight them (possibly to an area where you have more room to move and dodge), rather than having to run towards the enemies as the other classes have to.
Rename Vengeful Blade to "Extra Attack" and move to universal in place of the current Combat Superiority class feature. I'd also change the effect to "your At-wills strike twice for 4 seconds after Guarding an attack" rather than adding 50 magnitude damage on a Crit.
The current Combat Superiority class feature is just not worth using, I'd hope for a more useful universal offensive class feature.
Extra Attack sounds perfect because it wasn't locked to any of the specific archetypes. Additionally, the effect of Extra Attack described in the book (you can attack multiple times on your turn) sort of sounds similar to Vengeful Blade, which should make it somewhat easier to tweak.
I didn't know how you would adapt the whole "turn" thing. I only suggested after Guarding an attack due to my original idea (your At-wills strike twice for 4 seconds after using an Encounter or daily) sounded too much like a Blade Hurricane ripoff, and I want to keep the mechanics of the different classes unique.
Move the Combat Superiority class feature to the spot Vengeful Blade occupies.
Change to "Improved Combat Superiority".
Change effect to: Having 50% or more Combat Superiority grants you 15% bonus damage rather than 10%.
Increasing the damage bonus of the Combat Superiority resource was about as close as I could think of for adapting the better dice you get for higher levels. I admit it's a little uninspired as far as class features go, but I wasn't sure how to make a more creative adaptation.
Also, the current Combat Superiority's effect is just not very useful. The bonus is too small (3%???) and not up for enough time (barring bugged ITF) for players to consider it as a useful part of their toolkit. Reworking it to something more consistent would be far more helpful.
I know I didn't give a suggestion for everything, but these were just the ideas I had in mind after giving the handbook a read while considering some of the Fighter's current problems (bad class features and not as much incentive to use Seethe).
If the dev team planned to implement some of these ideas, I'm sure I or other people more acquainted with tabletop could try their hand at adapting more of the tabletop mechanics into NW.
And since on Paladins section I found this: Well why not give us a full info about real threat modifiers on our class/skills?
So your at-will might generate 10000 Threat, but if the GWF has generated 1,000,000 threat you're going to spend all day and not get aggro back. One of the "taunt" powers will see that the GWF has 1,000,000 Threat and set you directly to 1,025,000.
Tab-mechaninc :
Please make us a skill that is actually worth using. Dig In is horrible.
At-Wills :
3 out for 4 At-Will powers are awesome as is. In testing I have been using Cleave/Threatening Rush for aoe fights, and Brazen Slash/Threatening Rush for boss fights.
I cant find a single reason to use Tide of Iron in its current state. Threatening Rush does the job better + its a very good mobility skill in both trash aoe fights and boss + adds fights. Needs rework.
Encounters :
Vanguard encounters needs a lot of tweaking. The latest patch added Tremor to our list, and its an instant favorite of mine. This is my verdic of current encounter selection :
Shield Slam : This skill is just plain bad. I cant find a single fight in the current dungeons where the tank wants to stay ranged, thus I see no reason for this skill to exist.
Kneebreaker : I never liked to use kneebreaker in my tank builds, but it did serve well as a Crushing Pin applier. I would love if Dreadnaughts Commander's Strike took its place as an universal Fighter skill.
Bull Charge : We have both Bull Charge and Linebreaker in our skill selection. Why ? Linebreaker is a lot better for thrash mobs as an opener.
Tremor : Awesome AOE skill. This needs to make it to final build
Anvil of Doom : Awesome singletarget skill. Also a keeper.
Enforced Threat : Feels like a wasted encounter slot in its current state. In my opinion this should be reworked. I would take Into The Fray from Dreadnaught and mix the two skills into one good utility skill for Vanguard. +aggro and +movement would make a great battle cry.
Knights Challenge : This needs rework. I like the idea of it, but having a skill that deals damage when you block get cancelled by BLOCK ANIMATION is kinda silly :P
Linebreaker : Very good opener. This is the reason we dont need Bull Charge.
Iron Warrior : Horrible for endgame players, but may have a use for lower levels ?
Knights Valor : Useless in combat. Should be a radius skill including all allies. Bring back the old version or remake plz.
Daily powers :
Earthshaker : Looks cool, does damage. Keeper.
Second Wind : Awesome. The +% HP makes my tenebrous enchantments shine. Maybe make Vanguard Exclusive ?
Determination : Good stuff. Keep as is.
Bladed Rampart : Feels a little weak for a daily power. See feats section for suggestion for improvement.
Phalanx : Lifesaver in AOE/DOT heavy boss fights. Keep as is.
Class Features :
Out of the 8 class features, I can only find 3 that can be considered useable; Greater Endurance, Shield Talent and Anvil of Challenge. All the others can be deleted imho. @rjc9000 s post with the idea of Extra Attack feat would bring atleast 1 additional good feat to the Vanguard.
Feats :
Aggressive Guard : +aggro when shielding = good.
Threatening Slam : As Shield Slam is useless, so is this feat.
Cleaving Bull : Feat effect should be moved to the skill Linebreaker.
Brazen Thrust : After latest patch I cant find the skill Piercing Thrust. This would be a perfect spot to put a feat for Tremor, adding +aggro to it. (@dread4moor)
Swordbreaker : Get rid of Kneebreaker, replace it with Commander's Strike and make this feat tie to that instead.
Sheltering Wind : This feat needs a buff, as the current healing pr dmg dealt by the Vanguard doesnt give the party much.
Stronghold/Deep breath : No. No. No.
Determined Defense : As we already have 2 daily powers that grants us -% dmg taken, this is overkill. Change this to a feat that buffs Phalanx or Bladed Rampart. Bladed Rampart could use a damage over time feat!
Hear him! Hear him!
You've won a Took ally, Wilbur.
You hit on all of my thoughts plus a few I never considered.
Seconded.
Allow Took to comment:
>Tab-mechaninc :
Nuff said. Make it a hard ranged taunt or make it disappear.
> At-Wills :
Cleave-
Only good for mobs/aoe. Fine at that. 2.5/4 stars
Threatening Rush-
Arguably the most universally effective Fighter power @asterdahl included in Mod16.
Threat+Mobility= good tanking.
4.5/5
Brazen Slash-
The Threat "Jane Equation" tells us that, all modifiers equal, DPS=NonDPS Threat.
Brazen boosts threat. Fine. 2.5/5.
Encounters
Tremor-
Great. 4/5
Shield Slam-
AKA "When Captain America throws his mighty shiiiiieeeld!"
If this were an AT WILL or TAB, it would be BiS and I would disagree with Wilbur.
But as an encounter with 20 sec cooldown?
Nope. 1/5
Kneebreaker -
For DPS/ Sure. for tank? Meh except boss battle.
Bull Charge :
Meh.
Single target, sure. Mobs? nah. Linebreaker is more useful.
2/5
Anvil of Doom :
Single target? Yes. "Jane" approves. Mobs? Nope.
2/5
Enforced Threat :
Not your GrandDad's enforced Threat.
Good. Better with wider AoE and shorter cooldown.
3/5.
Knights Challenge :
B+ for concept. D- for execution and usefulness.
1.5/5
Linebreaker :
Great. Leave it as is.
4/5
Iron Warrior:
Know what's better then "keep me alive"?
Keep my party alive by using an encounter that builds aggro. That's what we need. Functionally low-tier.
1.5/5
Knights Valor:
How far the great have fallen.
KV was the single BEST tanking skill for a GF, arguably among the best in the game.
This is a watered-down over-the-counter facsimile of a main tanking skill.
Daily powers
Earthshaker :
Great for tanking and solo. 4/5
Second Wind:
If not broken and about to be neutered, I love it.
4/5
Class Features :
>
> Out of the 8 class features, I can only find 3 that can be considered useable; Greater Endurance, Shield Talent and Anvil of Challenge. All the others can be deleted imho. @rjc9000 s post with the idea of Extra Attack feat would bring atleast 1 additional good feat to the Vanguard.
> Feats :
Does Vanguard have Piercing thrust and ITF?
If not, why do we feats for them?
Overall, good progress @asterdahl .
You have kept at least one long-time player in the game.
I am Took.
"Full plate and packing steel" in NW since 2013.
But a soft-taunt Mark? "tag an enemy, continuously build threat on that enemy even if you do nothing else"? That's a good tab skill. Dig In is.... not fun. Forget "good" or "bad" for a second, Dig In is simply a power that makes being a GF less fun to play when using it. It could be a perfect immortality shield, where a Fighter using it simply could not be killed and would aggro literally everything forever... and it still wouldn't be fun to use.
While this does sort of encroach on Brazen Slash's utility on Vanguard, I think the difference is that Tide of Iron restores Stamina all at once, while Brazen Slash restores it per hit (ie, need to stay out of shield more often and take higher risk). Also, as stated, no reason to use Tide if Threatening Rush has more utility as a gapcloser and does the +aggro thing.
Even if Tide has a higher aggro multiplier, unless it is *far*, *far* higher than Threatening Rush, I wouldn't want to dedicate two of my At-wills to just aggro bonuses.
Aren't they?
What is "Enforced Threat"?
What is "put on the top of the threat meter" (used on 3 different Mod 16 powers) mean if not "hard taunt"?
Pick a lane.
Either the "Jane Equation" is the new rule, or it isn't.
The Jane Equation puts threat building as a seperate quantification from DPS, but DPS contributes to it.
The Jane Equation accepts hard taunts.
Hard taunts exist in Mod 16.
Commit one way or the other.
I am Took.
"Full plate and packing steel" in NW since 2013.
Hard taunt means the monster *cannot* target someone other than you, regardless of threat, until the taunt wears off - but after it wears off, you might still be fourth on the aggro chart.
Setting yourself to the top of the threat chart is a soft taunt. Someone can take aggro from you again, you've just jumped the queue to get to the top of the list.
Path of the Vanguard's reduction to damage dealt will be reduced to 10% (down from 30%) and it will now grant a 40% increase to maximum hit points. At the same time, the maximum amount of damage prevented by a full stamina bar will be reduced from 100% of maximum hit points to 50% of maximum hit points.
These changes mean more effective hit points at the start of a fight for any tank. E.g. If you have 100,000 HP, and you used to block for 100,000—you had a total of 200,000 effective hit points. Now you'll have 140,000 HP, and you will block for 70,000—for a total of 210,000 EHP.
Naturally, this means that your block is a little weaker, but it's still very powerful given how quickly stamina regenerates. We think these changes feel good, a bit more tank healing is required in group content, and tanks can't shield quite as much so often in PvP. However, we're absolutely still ironing out the details regarding tank durability, so these numbers could be reverted, or changed further, but we'd like to see how everyone feels about these changes. So please send your feedback once you've had a chance to check them out in this week's upcoming build.
We're aiming for those bonuses to be such that, you can safely keep threat, without really diverting stats to offense. That being said, if you're struggling, and you have built every single optional stat into defense, you can probably afford to move a few points into offense and still survive. Of course it's a careful balancing act, so of course, let us know when you're struggling, what kind of powers you were running, what your item level and stats were, what class and item level the DPS were that were pulling off of you, etc.
The biggest challenge, I think, is learning when and how to use block. It may seem like you should turtle with how effective block is now, however, especially if you're losing threat because your DPS are pushing you, you should definitely not be turtling. In those cases, you should limit block to large attacks, or after you've established a good lead on threat. A decent healer should be able to keep you alive without a problem in those cases.
That being said, right now, in a lot of group content, DPS also aren't being punished enough for pulling threat, so we're looking into that very closely.
Of course those numbers will potentially change—though I understand many may disagree with this choice—we would rather not display these percentages, and increased threat is not something we would like to give out in many places, so that granular comparisons almost never need to be made. (If we do end up doing that, we will almost certainly expose the values.)
Vanguard certainly has the ability to hold threat after establishing it, but you do need to keep applying damage, you can't rest on your laurels unless you generate a major lead, which is certainly possible, particularly on single targets.
In regards to whether or not enforced threat is a "Hard Taunt," the Oxford English Dictionary defines hard taunt as—well, it doesn't define it as anything! So really we simply have an agreed upon working definition of what "hard taunt" means. Since we internally use the term "hard taunt" to refer to the old style of taunting, and many of those powers featured the text "taunt," and none of the new powers do, it seems simplest to agree to refer to the old behavior by that name.
Going off of that working definition, enforced threat is not a hard taunt, because it does not force the enemy to attack you for any amount of time at all. The old style of taunt literally overrode the target's AI and forced it to attack you for a specific duration. You could use enforced threat, and another player could immediately follow it with a daily, pulling the enemy back before it struck you even a single time. With a hard taunt, you could have done 0 damage to the enemy, and just continually taunt it while another player does millions, and it would never look away from you.
I hope that clarifies some of your concerns!
on console(ps4) block is on L3, which is a movement stick.
it requires to push L3 to go in block and again to push to leave block.
on pc u hit tab and are in block as long as u hold tab.
will this change i cant test how layout will be 4 console on pc preview.
if we would have keybinds like pc it wouldnt be a problem but otherwise could u consider putting block on R1 and have it in the same fashion as the tab on pc?
Of course, you could say "why not buff both?" But in reality, if we were to do that, we'd just be buffing enemy health as well, and at-wills would still take up more of the chart.
Hey Marnival, thanks for following up! What zones were you in when you ran into this issue? And could you let me know what your character's name who was encountering this issue is? I apologize if I've already asked for that information—I was finally investigating this issue earlier today, but didn't have anything about your character name in my notes.
Kidding! But seriously, thank you for the suggestions and feedback on the various passives and power naming vis-a-vis 5E. Obviously, we have a lot of room to take liberties and create powers that fit into the MMO environment, as opposed to just lifting material directly from pen and paper D&D, but we do try to keep the basic flavor there, so I'll definitely keep your feedback in mind as I wrestle with the feats and class features.
In regards to Dreadnought, I chose the name based on the intended design of the paragon path. We were looking to make the DPS fighter into a fearless avenger type. Dreadnought means "fearless," and historically was used to refer to a thick overcoat that protected the wearer against a storm. It could also be used to describe a fearless individual, and this was the case hundreds of years before its use in reference to warships.
That being said, the modern definition was also considered, as of course, we exist in modern times. Evoking images of a durable and dangerous battleship, was ultimately something I did not consider to be a negative. That being said, I can understand if you have a very defined word association, it can probably feel a bit awkward. While it's not impossible that we'd rename the paragon path, we're generally aiming to avoid two word names.
It is actually quite a boon to keeping threat when you keep the effect running. That being said, it's certainly not locked in stone.