Knights

Cant just taunt make it so you get put at the top of the hate list and if successful it lowers the previous person 500 points ( or whatever you want ). This gives you a real way to get aggro, not worry about the second guy coming right behind you, and if you want to spam taunt its just hurting you.
 
auto-cast a concuss on the previous "tank" maybe.

edit: I suppose that would require mana, so no good for a warrior... I should keep my mouth shut about mechanics and coding type stuff.....
 
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Yamaha96 said:
My opinion, tanks should be innately good at aggro and shouldn’t need to put more than 30% of their focus to hold aggro. Freeing up more time to focus on other abilites that make you character unique, positioning, mechanics self heals etc.

Spamming “aggro spell” nearly 100% of the time is not much fun.
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I felt a simple like was insufficient. So much that.
 
taunt has really been unchanged from live here if there was way to add an additional higher above next highest but it really would only help warriors tbh , knight taunt caps at like 200? and is basically useless for them.
 
The big thing touched on above that hits my funny spot is the whole importance of class roles. What are the 'ideal' class roles of each of the tank classes? There is a big drift here from live (a good thing imho) but we seem to not have any defined roles for the classes beyond tank/healer/dps. I've heard a few things, like SKS were supposed to be the kings of single target aggro, Pallys ae aggro and warriors just best overall but needing support. That obviously isn't the case here with scythe and bloodlust. Without making this a warriors are op thread, I think we can agree that a warrior will out tank either knight both in less damage taken and the ability to self sustain, out dps either knight and have better (or at least near effortless) ae aggro versus the other two knights. (to be fair the dps gap is a lot closer now with the bash upgrade, and I haven't parsed it out) Add in the lack of need of mana, and all of the utility that the knights are supposed to bring to the table goes mostly out the window later once raiding really begins). That has been my experience anyway, YMMV. There are a few fights and areas where paladin undead abilities and or SK...feign death... are necessary and a few fights mechanically where one knight or the other is the needed tank, but overall both knights are certainly second cousins to equally geared/tiered warriors in 80% of raiding/xp situations. These things being said, what ARE the class roles of knights? I always assumed, that it was sk's were the dps tanks, warriors the tanky tanks, and paladins the healing tanks. Currently this is definitely not the case. Maybe at t14 it is different but this isn't what I am seeing. Basically I just go in, burn a TON of mana holding aggro off of any on tier dps and am not doing much 'cool stuff' other than tab target terroring everything in sight (I can only imagine the pain pallys must suffer), and look longingly at a warrior just ae autoattacking while he naps, sips lemonade and ends the fight at the same ability to enter a fight as when he started...I look at my 40% burned mana bar and sigh a little (forgive the obvious hyperbole).

SKs used to outdamage paladins by a small amount, now with the new R2, I'm not even sure I do outdamage a paladin anymore. That being said, paladins certainly need help in aggro generation, but what a lot of people are suggesting are just upping dps, which I'm not sure is the answer. Don't get me wrong, I want to do more dps and I don't exactly want paladins to NOT do more dps but what I'm getting at is my original point: class roles. How should we define the class roles of each tank and what should be done to their abilities to make the classes actually FEEL unique and play uniquely? For example, in Vanguard, the SK equivalent was the 2hs tank, the pally the sword and board tank and the warrior the dual wield tank (also come back Vangaurd, we miss you). Class roles can be broken up in many ways, so keep in mind that I'm just spitballing here.

Maybe this is too late in the revamp process to push this much of a change of direction but that is what I'd really like to see over 'moar deeps' 'moar aggro' is cool neat new unique stuff. Dps and aggro increases are certainly helpful for kind of short term balancing but especially since the devs have the ability to add actual new AAs to the game, along with spells and tomes (psst, thirdsktome cough), this could be an opportunity to really differentiate the classes in a way similarly to how Live did. For example, SKs had crappy necro pets FOREVER on live, but eventually (when like level 75 or whatever it was went in), SKs got their very own pet line, not tied to the necro line. They had unique spell lines, some of which were copied here, spears and the SK spell here Touch of Chaos was a whole line of spells that instead of a dot recourse it just gave mana/hp to the group as one chunk (incidentally much better for those who like buff slot management).

Random SK thoughts:
--The SK pet tome line is actually a good example of exactly what I'd like to see more of. I think the end game implementation leaves a bit to be desired, as others have mentioned above (having to use a pet clicky from another classes pet, and never actually using my own pet to do all the cool stuff is a bit of a sticking point), but that being said, it is unique and fun/interesting in a way that more bash damage is not (though I quite like the bash damage changes, don't revert that).

--Undead nuke line, why do sk's and pallys even have this, those spells are literally never useful at the levels they are attained, but at least paladins have other evocations spells they might actually cast, sk's do not. My evocation skill is maybe 100 and unlikely to rise unless I get exceptionally bored one day. On live it looks like sk's were given a 'scythe' line of quick casting undead nukes retroactively at lower levels on up. (not suggesting you do this for sk's but if you are going with an actual 'revamp' then changing lower level spells might be worth considering. I get that this game really starts at 65, especially on this server, but then why bother having pre 65 spells at all if half of the spell lines we get don't tier up past level 50ish (I'm looking at you sk mez)

--Harm Touch/Improved Harm Touch/Leech Touch: At 65 without tomes its about two spears worth of damage on a 35 minute timer. With four tomes done it might do nearly as much as a wizard's base crit or a three or four ranger non crit bow shots (about 9300). I LIKE leech touch quite a lot as a save my butt maneuver, but it sure isn't all that impressive. Currently it will heal about 60% of my hp total with one tome, with all four it should be a complete heal, but again, I have to do four tomes to make one of my class defining abilities do what it essentially should already do. Though again, if new aa's were added this would just be part of base progression rather than something 'special' which is how class tomes otherwise seem now.

-Voice line of spells: Why last ten minutes...is the design intent to make me never use it because the recast and reuse are both ten minutes so it annoys me out of actually gemming it? You win Sod:p

-OK I'm going to admit it, I just want to murder things with a huge 2 handed axe (or a 2 handed sword, I'm willing to compromise), please make this happen devs...

--
I'm talking a lot about sk's here, in what seems to be a pally focused thread, so forgive me, but that is the class I'm much more familiar with and can speak with much more knowledge on.


---------random fake edit addition--------------
One thing to look at across the board for knights is knight skill caps:

Melee weapon skills: 245 (why?)
Archery: 250 (why?)
Hand to hand: 250
Dodge/Parry/Riposte: 225
Bash: 250
Taunt: 200

My understanding from reading older threads was that the difference between 225 and 250 was much more important than one would think versus red (raid) mobs, though that was never definitively confirmed to be the case. In a thread or two on defensive skill caps, if I recall correctly it was suggested that getting your skills past 250 was a bigger bonus to the skill than anything before that, though it was antecdotal so may be incorrect or I could be remembering incorrectly. If this is the case then block would also be in the same boat skillwise since the most common high end shield (Amalgimated Greatshield) is 110 base ac (115 w aug, assuming augmented ac applies the same as base ac on shields, so a 220-230 skill). Even if it is the same reduction overall that's a 10% less defensive skill rate.
 
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Thuug said:
--Undead nuke line, why do sk's and pallys even have this, those spells are literally never useful at the levels they are attained, but at least paladins have other evocations spells they might actually cast, sk's do not. My evocation skill is maybe 100 and unlikely to rise unless I get exceptionally bored one day. On live it looks like sk's were given a 'scythe' line of quick casting undead nukes retroactively at lower levels on up. (not suggesting you do this for sk's but if you are going with an actual 'revamp' then changing lower level spells might be worth considering. I get that this game really starts at 65, especially on this server, but then why bother having pre 65 spells at all if half of the spell lines we get don't tier up past level 50ish (I'm looking at you sk mez).
Click to expand...

Don't ever admit to your evocation skill level because a dev will come out and inform you +evo mods do nothing if you're not capped.
I really agree a spell revamp would be the bees knees since like you have said most of them are just trash.
also rip zaelas plan to make us the 2handed tank.
 
shadowknight idea (from a paladin main) that might make shadowknights with 2-handers more viable in tanking scenarios, but this probably needs balancing because i like coming up with and coding ideas but not balancing them

Third Shadowknight Tome implementation:
Name: Shadowed Guard (probably a bad name i'm not creative sorry)
Description: Increases armor class by a percentage of your base armor class (yes, including AC gained from the agility stat) while using two-handed weapons.

On fomelo, base AC is roughly 720 (with agility at 305 cap).

Ranks could provide 4/8/12/16% of your base AC as bonus AC. (16% of 720 = ~115 AC gained while using a two-handed weapon at max rank... maybe this is too much [considering if you have a Jyre you'd be getting a whopping 265 AC from it], 3/6/9/12 may be more balanced).
Incentivizes using 2-handed weapons without reworking/overhauling them as well as getting agility stat to cap (for lower tier shadowknights).

also that one shielding mastery AA thing that increases benefit from wearing shields, maybe get rid of that (or rework it) to further incentivize using 2-handers on shadowknights.

another idea might be to provide raw damage reduction rather than bonus AC (i.e. 2/4/6/8 % of your base AC as flat damage reduction) but this sounds much more underwhelming at all tiers.

really just a concept, i don't play shadowknights and i also don't know how effective another 115 ac will be at higher tiers but i do like the concept of making each tank class unique in terms of what weapons they frequently use (stuff like the /shield command gives warriors a nice & unique flavor, so i figure shadowknights and paladins could get something a little different). shadowknights with two handed weapons, paladins with 1hs/shield and warriors dual-wielding (but you can feel free to do other things on each class, if you choose) sounds like a good way to cement each tank class's role/identity.
 
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Interesting idea. If SK's were pushed to be 2hs tanks, then it would have to be a pretty solid rework. AAs, stances probably and tomes. The benefit of wearing a shield is basically three things atm: The Stats from the shield slot (ac primarily, but all the other stats are huge to, hp/mana regen/resists/focuses etc), the block skill which is 2x the shield's ac, and the bash amount, which I am not sure of the scaling but the AC on a good shoulder piece is less than half of the AC of a decent shield.

---Random thought, should races that get slam naturally get some kind of innate bonus to shoulder ac bashing?-----

Back to topic: If SKs were made 2hander focused, then the class would have to change in some way to mitigate (pun!!) the loss of a shield, either block from a 2hs (done in eq2 I think?), or have some kind of proactive debuff to mobs the sk was fighting (done in Vanguard) or something as yet unthought of. The loss of a full defensive skill is what? 5% ish...% reduction? I don't have the links anymore to when defensive skills and bonuses were parsed out and don't even know if those numbers were accurate then or are accurate now. The loss of like 100+ printed ac is pretty huge however, no matter how you measure, and tanking with a 2hander as it is now is a terrible idea until one is overtiering the fights, when it doesn't matter anyway.

The only issue I have with the above suggestion for the third SK tome is that it would make the class one thing until tomes, then a 180 degree change to a 2hander focused class at 65++. On the one hand it would make it much easier to approach, not requiring a ground up redesign of the class (a great thing, I'd imagine if you are a dev) and just more of a look at/65+ class mechanics and gear. On the other, it would be odd to play a class as one thing until 250+aas in and then be something else, but to be fair, tomes do in some cases radically change how some classes interact with others, so it wouldn't be crazy.

Could some passive defensive mechanic be tied into the ratio of the two hander for SKs specifically. Give them a decently long mid level quest to find some old troll (best SK race) master of the 2hs to teach them how to access this, throw in some prereqs, alignment hits (we need more alignment hits in this game) and require some solid effort and done. Then, ideally the mechanic would scale as better weapons were gained in a way similar to how shields would scale. It would in theory be doable if the bash changes are any indication, as they don't apply to all classes with bash (poor poor clerics).

One thing I would add, if this were done, that I'd want to see each class given something unique, not just 'hey sks can tank without a shield and pallys can tank stuff with a shield and warriors can dual wield' ...something else cool to set each class apart, a bash only proc for pallys or their own bash type skill and sks some kind of effect when using a 2 hander that others may not get, again this isn't just a power grab, just something to make each class feel a bit more different from the others.

Further (terrible) ideas to follow perhaps..
 
Remember pre nerf 4.3 robe when t13 was endgame and pallies/sks were OP? Oh how the times change
 
remember when ikisith wasn't out yet and people actually did all the content from tiers 1 through 8, and it didn't matter what class you played?
 
I always wanted SK's to get more powerful with the more hate they build up.
i.e. have a proc rate/AC boost/lifetap heal recourse take effect and get better with more hate built up.


also would like to see have a boost to our pets, for pete's sake, i want to hand it summoned mage gear or something.... Zzzz increase its level to the lowest light blue or something. just a lil tweak.
 
I think it would be nice if possible to remove the long spell gem lockout attached to paladin ghots as well.
 
at least with lower paladins the lockout is kinda nice for my key spam style of playing them which allows me to focus more on whatever toon I am boxing with the paladin. when the lockout ends it is around time to refresh the hot to keep it ticking. unless you are referring to a pre-first cast lockout.
 
idea:
- give paladins a pet (basically a familiar, maybe with the appearance of a yellow wisp?)
- the pet casts no directly offensive spells and does not melee/draw any aggro (like a wizard familiar), but whenever the paladin casts an offensive spell (i.e. a blind, stun, refuge rain, final judgement) the familiar will randomly select a song (all songs are 3 tick duration, it's only a "song" so that it doesn't take up buff slots) to play on the paladin only.
- the buff can give him one of the following:
bonus AC/bonus attack/bonus max health/bonus aggression/bonus heal crit chance/chance to proc a weaker version of http://wiki.shardsofdalaya.com/index.php/Spell:_Martyr's_Intercession but still stronger than zealot's strike /chance to proc a fairly large undead DD (1k base damage?) if the target casted on was undead
- could potentially replace a bad paladin tome (cough, divine radiance) to make the pet's songs more effective some time after this pet's release?
 
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After playing around with the new SK spell, Unholy Shield for a bit, I have some thoughts:

The spell gives the sk a 30 second buff to ac and damage shield. This buff immediately wears off on a successful block (I believe this is correct) and then triggers a roughly 1k ae (unsure if this is affected by focus effects) 25ish second recourse that gives the SK a chance to proc a single target 400pt dd with hate component. The spell itself is on a 2 minute cooldown.

Some thoughts and feedback

1)Thank you for a different and interesting spell. I like new and different things, rather than just 'self buff version 25 or upgrade to spear line 4

2) The spell doesn't work if one has a 2 handed weapon equipped (the recourse never triggers) or if one uses the bandolier to switch from a 2-handed weapon to a 1 hander (I assume the game still thinks the sk has the 2 h weapon equipped). It can be fixed by manually unequipping and reequiping the weapon. I get that flavorwise I am making my shield unholy, but still frustrating if I have to switch quickly from a 2hs to a 1 hander to gank aggro due to unforseen circumstances (a not uncommon occurance).

3) The spell has some very welcome and necessary utility for sure, as the AE that procs actually generates aggro to the SK is something the class has lacked (the Servant Training tome abilities, that ae, lifetap, mez, etc all come from the pet, so generate no aggro, never crit and are unaffected by either my own focus effects or the pet tomes I have done or my ability to share my focuses with my pet-I feel like this is an oversight but that's another thread).

4) The in game spell itself lacks an in game description. The reason I mention the lack of in game description is to note that it is difficult for me to determine of the spell is functioning correctly if I am not positive about what it is intended to do. I don't say that to be a smart ass, just being clear.

5) A quibble I have about the spell is that the first part, the part with the damage shield bonus, lasts a random amount of time, and often wears off after less than five seconds. It will generally proc the ae correctly, but it is an incredibly short duration buff proc on a two minute reuse (it also can occasionally bug out to a five minute reuse). I believe the ranger spell glacial strike was changed to give a similar type of buff and was extended to a minute+ duration from 30 seconds because the time wasn't enough time to actually proc. The thing that is frustrating is that for effectively thirty to forty seconds out of every two minutes this spell has some effect on the game (some ac and a chance to proc a dd) and the rest of the time it just takes up a spell gem. I just think that the duration should be increased or maybe the spell reworked so the damage shield bonus applies for the duration of the spell. Perhaps it could be changed to just proc a reactive ae instead of wearing off and applying a recourse buff? I mean I quite LIKE the idea of having SOME kind of ae beyond the 150pt Word of Spirit form lv 38 or whatever it was.

6) It takes up a buff slot. This is a big thing for raids as SKs already have their actual class self buff, maybe the 10 minute duration voice line, the recourse from touch of the succubus/shroud of nightmares, the recourse from vortex of hate and the recourse from the veil line all eating up buff slots that are already in short supply when added to the core necessary raid buffs. Then there are debuffs. It is really difficult to find another open slot for a spell that is up at best about 35-30% of the time during a fight. If short duration buffs is our 'thing' as it kind of seems to be, is there a way to mitigate the extra large number of short duration buffs SKs have to manage? Is moving them to the song window too much? I get that buff slots are a resource and resource management is a factor of this game, but SKs are the only class that has quite this many short duration buffs to manage (or as many seem to do, forget and ignore).

The alternative is to not use all or some of those, but then why have them if they aren't used? If I am not using the interesting tools of my class, why am I playing that class. The spells are all useful to varying degrees for tanking and adding another short duration buff to the lineup is pretty painful It is already hard to justify memorizing the spell when the spell bar is looking like: Sublimate Soul, Deflux, Runic Spear, Terror, Terror, veil, vortex of death...with a 'flex' slot.

I'm not trying to sound bitter about this, just expressing frustration with certain difficulties that I do not believe are game imbalancing and trying to spark a conversation about how to make this better. As always, criticism of my criticism is welcome. Also this post probably needs another editing pass but I lack the time atm.
 
I just hope the classes maintain their uniqueness. I don't know about SKs so much but pals seem to be losing their focus on adding some healing to the group and are getting more DPS, which seems more SK to me.
 
Agreed. It always made sense to me that the pure tank would be tankiest. The hybrid healer would have heals and utility. And the hybrid dps would do more damage. Of all the classes someone has to get the sort stick on DPS and paladins make sense for it being a hybrid of two archetypes that aren't dps.
 
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