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Should I just ditch my GF?
wikkedjr
Member, Neverwinter Beta Users Posts: 0 Arc User
I've played a tank in several MMOs and enjoyed it. I had fun leveling my GF and running T1 dungeons at 60. Then I hit a brick wall. I'm using Rok's hybrid dps/tank build to the letter. My GS is 12.5-13k depending on a couple pieces I have the option of swapping out. I have a full suit of stalwart bulwarks (out of date, I know) and the chest for timeless hero. Level 25 stone of allure. I suck at T2 dungeons. Gathering up piles and piles of adds is just not something I'm good at apparenty....I understand the concept of kiting and have done so successfully in other games, but here, good luck Charley! Of course, this makes people in the group angry, they leave, I feel like HAMSTER and no longer want to play the game.
I hear you now...Hey, quit crying, we aren't here to be your emotional crutch!
I know! That's not what I'm asking you to be, just venting....anyway....so, can anyone tell me an effective way to do what I need to do or should I just level a CW like everyone else? I'm really at a loss and ready to throw in the towel here.
I hear you now...Hey, quit crying, we aren't here to be your emotional crutch!
I know! That's not what I'm asking you to be, just venting....anyway....so, can anyone tell me an effective way to do what I need to do or should I just level a CW like everyone else? I'm really at a loss and ready to throw in the towel here.
[SIGPIC][/SIGPIC]
Post edited by wikkedjr on
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Important, buy a bunch of greater stones of health now theyre ultra cheap, because theyre awesome for tanks, and if you have 50-60k to spare, also a few scrolls of mass rez, and you will do great in all dungeons...
Hrimnir is the big problem....I've yet to successfully down him on epic. The mobs are so spread out and I can't get to them all quickly enough.
So at this point it looks like in order to change anything I'm looking at dumping lots of AD, which I don't have...and the differences don't look all that big to me.
http://nw-forum.perfectworld.com/showthread.php?176972-Rokuthy-s-Hybrid-Tanking-Build-%28GF%29-for-End-Game-PvE-%28and-PvP%29-content is what I started using...again, this is a little outdated, but is close to scroto's info...maybe I'm wrong, but that's what I mean when I say it doesn't look like a huge change...
Mark them with your tab skill.
Stack HP in defensive slots. HP is 3~4 times as good as defense. I stack armor penetration in my Ioun Stone of Allure. For my armor, I stack power in the offensive slots. For my build, I have a pretty standard conqueror build although I take the 5% deflection feat, which I don't see a lot of people using it. I have 37.5k HP, almost 9k power with reckless attack, and with my stone, I have 24% armor penetration.
I think it's a ton of fun to play. You stay in the center of the action, chopping away, and putting up big numbers. But you have pretty unrivaled the survivability, so you can handle staying in there. And when you get into T2s, you can take a full-on smash to the back of your head by some of the harder hitting mobs that would one-shot other tanks.
I have a Timeless Hero set, which is all the rage right now. It's good and gives you the most dps, but I prefer playing with the Indomitable Champion set because it is more fun for me. That's my 2 cents, anyway.
Stacking HP after 3500 defense is also a good choice that also will help you if you are playing PvP... im on 32k and now im gelly of your gear
To figure this out, we can compare HP vs Defense using the idea of effective HP. If you are not familiar with this, let's look at an example. Suppose you have 40% damage mitigation, ignore deflect for now, and 30,000 HP. For something to kill you, the 60% of their damage has to hit for 30,000, i.e. Damage*0.6=30,000. So solving for Damage, you get an effective HP of 50,000. So lets compare HP vs Defense.
Lets compare HP vs Defense at 3,500 defense and choose something reasonable like 30,000 HP and an armor class of 32. Your defense tooltip is calculated as 49.99*defense/(1643.6+defense)=34.016%. Then your damage resistance is given by 0.05*(Armor Class-10)+Defense Tooltip. In this case, we get 0.005*(32-10)+0.34=45.01%.
Now to calculate how much defense adds to our effective HP, we use: Effective HP at 3501 defense-Effective HP at 3500. Effective HP at 3501=30,000/(1-damage resistance)=54564.467, and our effective HP at 3500=30,000/(1-0.41161)=54561.385. So defense adds 3.081 effective HP.
How much does 1 point of HP add to our effective HP? Effective HP at 30,001 is 30,001/(1-0.4501)=54,563.204 effective HP. And at 30,000 HP, we have 30,000/(1-0.4501)=54561.385. This gives us a difference of 1.8 effective HP.
So it seems like defense is much better, by adding 3 effective hp vs 1.8 effective hp. But remember, HP enchantments have 4x the amount of HP than a defense enchantment has of the same rank. This means that HP crushes defense as a choice for an enchantment.
You can do the same calculations, adding in a weighted average for effective HP to account for deflection, but you still reach the same conclusions. The only downsides I can image for slotting HP are that it takes more healing to heal a tank with greater HP and that you would be more susceptible armor penetration, however, I suspect the armor penetration weakness is mainly a PvP concern.
I am a Tank and I approve this message. Completely agree. And the nice thing is... When you switch over to do PvP, if you are Conq with this set, the damage is Sickening. I have more than frustrated some people with 1 shots.
How are you more susceptible to Armor Penetration/Resistance Ignored effects with HP?! The opposite is true since HP has nothing to do with Damage Resistance...
Anyway, to the OP,
1. Build: follow dkcandy's guide or, if you really want a PvE defensive set, farm GG for Indomitable.
2. Core skill: you cannot face tank in this game as a shield-user like other games, you MUST reposition. You are not a GWF!
I do this and they start to run towards me but then they turn and start punching the closest CW/DC in the face....:mad:
Over the course of the week I'll try swap over to dkcandy's stuff...the knight captain setup looks neat. I do have a lot of GG coins as well...so picking up that set shouldn't take too long.
I do worry, however, that this is more player skill related than gear/spec....:eek:
Frontline Surge, Enforced Threat, Lunging Strike
Villain's Menace, Fighter's Recovery
Combat Superiority, Ferocious Reaction
This is my setup most of the time.
Armor of bahamut don't state that it reduces damage received AFTER your guard is broken. It states in English and German client that it reduces guard BREAKING damage with hitpoint impact. So how you will know that this 30% function?
Tab mark only work at first aggro appearing(like mob see you within aggro range and come to you). It don't generate aggro by itself. I use for example Knight Valor for party damage intercepting and aggro building.
I have the following suggestions:
I am sure I'll get some hate for this, but drop ferocious reaction. Five minute CD is just too long.
I recommend enhanced mark. This will help A LOT with pulling packs together to tank. If you insist on ferocious reaction, I would recommend enhanced mark over combat superiority. It is great for handling large packs.
If you are having trouble dealing with the damage, consider Iron Warrior. It buys a healer some time to help you out and it regenerates your guard meter. I was skeptical at first, but I use it all the time both when I am taking a lot of damage or, with wrathful warrior, dishing out some extra damage.
Nope, all good suggestions. I agree you'll get far more mileage out of Enhanced Mark than you would with Feriocious Reaction in PvE from most builds and most situations. Otherwise, my default Power setup is exactly the same as the OP and have no trouble in dungeons on threat, damage, survivability or even aggro (though for real aggro-sensitive situations like kiting all adds in an encounter, I use a different Power set entirely).
This is where I have the problem. What power set do you use for that?
Knight's Valor + Iron Warrior + Into the Fray + Villain's Menace + Supremacy of Steel + Enhanced Mark + Threatening Rush.
Add in Briartwine armor enhancement in your kiting set and your ranged threat (against ranged adds) increases even more.
If survivability is an issue, you can replace Into the Fray with Frontline Surge and replace VM or SoS with Fighter's Recovery, depending on which one you need least (probably SoS until you get confident or your group stops using aoe near your kite train).
My kiting set, which I do not use unless I was previously dps'ing in that dungeon in a pure dps set like Timeless, is a heavy Regen set similar to that in dkcandy's guide.
Trying to play DPS and just cleaving like most of the players here do with Conq spec won't work unless you have good stats and items since you're not outputting enough DPS. You either need to change gear or change your play style as Stalwart is no longer a DPS set or even useful at all. I'm Conq spec now from Tactician so that I can run through skirmishes and dailies quicker but the play style is pretty brain dead.
Problem with that approach is that none of the GF's At-Wills while blocking work with weapon enhancements. So, if use those heavily it is like having no weapon enhancement at all. This means the blocking specs do not scale as well with gear and content.
Conq. may seem brain-dead coming from Prot/Tactician builds, but there are many reasons (some good, some bad) why it is by far the most popular spec. Also, if you cannot manage in dungeons as Conq., you will make even less of a contribution as the other more complex specs.
Conq spec is popular because it's the damage spec and everyone loves doing huge damage. The more damage you do the quicker you kill things and the quicker you get items. It is why in most MMOs that the DPS classes are the most popular as they also like to see their name on the top of the DPS meter or kill count in PVP.
Using Stalwart now as conq spec is useless as the set gives no power so Reckless Attacker adds nothing for it. If it's not working for him for end game then maybe he needs to look into better gear or a different play style or just play another class.
I've been using a combination of 2 piece high general and 2 piece grand regent. High defense (maybe too much with the addtion of grand knight longsword and shield!), with added recovery and regeneration. The 2 piece/2 piece combo gives a smidge of arpen and power (about the equivalent of a rank 8 radiant and rank 8 dark enchantment).
I've also been using lunging strike and frontline surge as my mainstays, but it seems that Anvil of Doom seems to occupy that 3rd slot more and more. Good damage when used whenever, and double damage when the target is below 25% HP. I've had 30-40K crits on bosses using it. Seems to be a good compromise for tankiness, aggroing adds (with threatening rush and tab key), and dps.
Guardian Fighter is I'd say the least gear dependant class. You don't need any expensive equipment to perform decently. The only thing you really need is an augmentive pet (Ioun Stone preferrably). You can get a set of blue +5 Smiting Valiant (Helm/Armor/Boots/Gloves) for as low as 100 AD from the Auction House. Get Smiting Nefarious (+243 Power, +133 Crit) Rings/Belt/Amulet for about 1000 AD each and get your companion Piercing Berserker Ring and Neck. Rank 5 Radiants on you, Rank 5 Darks on companion.
to kite adds in Frozen Heart (last boss, sometimes second boss also) start by marking them with the tab button whenever possible, or marking them with threatening rush if you don't have golems to worry about. use frontline surge or enforced threat as often as you can, and combine these with Fighter's Recovery lifesteal daily power for huge self heals. also keep lunging strike handy for charging over to an archer that is attacking you but isn't in the pain train of adds - this also makes an excellent time to cast your enforced threat since the mob train is further behind you. slot combat superiority and enhanced mark in your class abilities. as with most fights, for at-will powers i slot cleave (to land a couple blows on archers before the train of adds catches up) and threatening rush (good to put mark on multiple targets at once, just be ready to move immediately after you cast it).
for the last boss in FH, i don't kite full around the entire area. i confine my circuit to the half of the ice floor near the entrance, so that kited ice golems never cross thru the boss or get near the rest of the party members. the only tough part is learning when you can stop to cast a power without getting locked into a chain of ice golem stuns. this is the main challenge as you should be trying to continue to move and cast frontline surge/enforced threat as often as you can to maintain threat on the mobs following you. this is significantly easier with the 10% run speed from GG gear. taunting newly spawned adds onto you can be a little hard if you dont have a clean line of sight to them, but they also shouldn't be one-shotting any of your teammates. if you need a few seconds to get to that newly spawned add, its usually ok. if something peels off to the healer because of an errant AoE splash, just mark it or use your lunging strike attack to get it back in line.
I support this ENTIRE message... and yes, I read it all.
On FH, I tell people to stay away from the front near the entrance at all costs and to not worry about those 3 archers as they can be used to rush ahead of your flock via lunging strike (just make sure to finish them off after 2 passes so they do not go running after you like the rest are). Using the front, I often try to get all the mobs into that recess/foyer area so I can easily see freshly spawning mobs when coming out of it, dodging around the golum red circles and just taking troll hits along the way.
Same methodology captkickass cited works in any map; Be it SP, DV, CN or MC when you may have to kite for a small time.
1/ Talk to your group before each boss encounter to make sure your kiting path does not intersect where they are going to fight the boss.
2/ Make sure your group only uses single target attacks because sometimes adds will spawn closer to them than you. If they're using aoe's and damage the adds it will be much harder if not impossible for you to peel them off.
3/ Slot "Into the Fray", "Threatening Rush", "Enforced Threat" and "Enhanced Mark".
4/ Now when the fight starts its easy to grab and hold packs of adds just with "threatening rush" then once away from the boss "enforced threat". Once you've accumulated a nice train of adds but notice more are spawning near your party use "Into the fray" but only when you've got the train furthest from your group. Using it there gives you the separation to run to new packs and use "threatening rush" or "tab" mark any individual mobs then quickly get away from your party. From then its just run and spam "Enforced threat" whenever its up and "Into the fray" whenever you're farthest from the grp...rinse and repeat
5/Pop major healing pots whenever you're below 75% because you never know when you might get cc'd for a couple secs. 99 pots are pretty cheap ~5000ad on the ah which can be made up easily with dailies and praying. When i'm kiting I never count on the DC because he could be either too far from me or have his hands full with the boss.
I think Warbong is the only person that mentioned 'Into the Fray'(If anyone else did, I apologize).
It's your most important skill for kiting. It keeps you ahead of the angry mob that wants you dead.
There typically should be someone else on Archer duty. If you tag them they WILL eat you alive fairly quickly and you'll be sucking down pots more than you should be.
As it's been mentioned, use your Lunge to gain breathing room or to help finish off an archer.
I'm not a fan of sitting on the ice spire and tagging the mobs. Unfortunately some groups insist on it because they don't like the chaos of kiting. I also don't like kiting as I said. It's the way the game is designed right now so we have to make due with it.
I've said it before and I'll say it again. Until this game treats aggro management like other games (ie. spells or skills that drop you on the threat meter). There isn't any reason for people to even bother with it.
If you think about it, why would a boss not walk over and pummel the living HAMSTER out of the CW that's melting him rather than stand there and take it? I'd love to see AI smart enough to call for help because a TR is either stealthed or using ITC nonstop and he can't stop them.
"Hey henchman! Come take this guy down". Followed by the enemy archer marking the TR and bringing him out of stealth.
I want actual tanking to occur. I know, it's a lot to ask.