Tank Abilities List

[Mesrith]

(10-19-2011 03:15 AM)Masterkiller Wrote:  Oilslick - Looks incredibly powerful when affecting multiple targets. The percentage may be less than the Warrior and Inquisitor but will be superior in certain situations. The important question here is "Will a BH tank die because they have 20% ADDITIONAL avoidance instead of 50% additional avoidance" and I don't think that situation is very likely. Unless the 50% avoidance pushes a hit off the table, there is still the chance to receive string of hits in a row, the chance is just less.

The counter-point to that is attack speed. Avoidance is an excellent defensive tool against fast attacking opponents. If there is an encounter where a single target opponent's attack speed increases for a duration of time, I would obviously prefer 50% additional avoidance over 20%. It still goes to the question, would a BH die due to having 30% less avoidance once every 3 minutes and I have a hard time believing that to be the case. Personally I would rather have Oilslick on a 1minute cooldown and raid saving potential then a 50% avoidance on a very long 3 min cooldown.

Yeah, I think we're mostly on the same page here. I'm sure Oilslick is only 20% avoidance because it:

A.) Effects more than one target;
B.) Is not a buff, but a debuff, hence it benefits more than just the caster.

If that's what they want to give us for our 31 point talent, then I'll gladly accept a ranged AoE avoidance debuff on a short cooldown. What I'm arguing is that it encourages the BH to be an off-tank instead of a main tank, since Juggernaut can get the same benefits from his off-tank BH, while still having his own, self-only cooldowns when needed. It's not an either/or case, it's that you can have the best of both worlds, at the cost of making the Jugg the main tank and the BH the default off-tank.

[GWARRR]

(10-19-2011 10:02 AM)Mesrith Wrote:  It's not an either/or case, it's that you can have the best of both worlds, at the cost of making the Jugg the main tank and the BH the default off-tank.

Keep in mind the Assassin has a 5% DR debuff via Wither and 5% accuracy debuff from Discharging Dark Charges. But all it continues to imply is that Juggs are going to be comparatively better at MT-ing because they have many more actives than Assassins and Powertechs, which doesn't help the situation at all.

I don't know of a good way to fix it completely: I think that giving everyone a 40% DR AND a +30% temporary HP yields too much homogenization. But then for Bounty Hunters and Assassins to be left in the dark completely would be dumb.

I think the easiest solution would be to make a +20% temporary HP a baseline for the Assassin, but let it be on a 4min cooldown, talentable down to 2min (or have it just be at an un-talentable 3min). Call it "Forceflood" or something. Alternatively, perhaps giving Assassins a 25% DR on a 2min cooldown. What the Assassin needs most right now is at least one way to deal with burst damage. But instead of having it be exactly the same, put the skill on a slightly shorter cooldown with comparably less "effect," so I think it fits more with the Assassin vibe (self-healing, "sustained" tanking). While Juggernauts will have both and Powertechs and Assassins will only have one each, Powertechs and Assassins will have more ways to make it up via the avoidance and self-healing. Powertechs can be that middle ground in the actives between shorter CD but weaker Assassin actives and the longer CD but stronger Juggernaut actives.

The problem I could see with giving Carbonite Shield back to Powertechs is that basically Juggernaut tanking could become pretty useless. Powertechs would have avoidance, massive armor ratings (higher than Juggernauts, I believe), with the same actives as Juggernauts. Juggernauts, as part of class "uniqueness," get defense increasers outside of the DR/+HP actives, which assuming diminishing marginal returns, is going to be much, much less useful than straight avoidance. Basically, Juggernauts could definitely get crowded out really fast if that happens. The only thing keeping them in front would be accessible to another class with exactly the same power and length. Essentially, since their actives will be the same, the only things distinguishing Powertechs and Juggernauts would be the "extra" flavor for tanking: defense vs. avoidance. And ceteris paribus, avoidance will almost always trump defense. Ergo, Powertechs would just become much better than Juggernauts, and there'd be little reason to play Juggernaut tanks if optimization was your only concern.

While Juggernauts certainly have more actives, they won't nearly be as party-friendly as Assassins or Powertechs. That is currently one of the few things that prevents Juggernauts from being the only choice for tanking. Of course, that doesn't stop one from going Jugg as a main tank and another to support/off-tank, but it's something to keep in mind. But these are just my opinions. I'm not exactly too good at the whole balancing mumbo jumbo, I just look at the trees and find something that works for a class.

[Mesrith]

I don't think we're seeing eye-to-eye on the meaning of avoidance, or I'm getting lost somewhere in your explanation. I understand avoidance to be a chance to completely avoid the attack, which means lowering the target's accuracy, or Defense (Parry/Deflect). Everything else, like passive damage reduction, armor, shielding, and anything else that doesn't completely avoid an attack, but rather lowers the damage of that attack, is mitigation.

Quote:Powertechs and Assassins will have more ways to make it up via the avoidance and self-healing.

I'm not in beta, but with the information that I'm working with, I don't see any self-healing or avoidance for Powertech. At all. None. We'll have the highest armor, 9% passive damage reduction (5% Ion Gas, 2% talented Ion Gas, 2% Power Armor) but no bonus DR to elemental/internal, and we have the middle-of-the-road shield chance. We used to have a talent for 6% Defense, but it was removed in favor of even more bonus armor. All I see for Powertech tanking right now is alot of mitigation. Juggernaut isn't that far behind in mitigation, but also has passive avoidance and self-healing, along with better active cooldowns.

[GWARRR]

(10-19-2011 12:17 PM)Mesrith Wrote:  I don't think we're seeing eye-to-eye on the meaning of avoidance, or I'm getting lost somewhere in your explanation. I understand avoidance to be a chance to completely avoid the attack, which means lowering the target's accuracy, or Defense (Parry/Deflect). Everything else, like passive damage reduction, armor, shielding, and anything else that doesn't completely avoid an attack, but rather lowers the damage of that attack, is mitigation.

Usually I'm mostly referring to accuracy debuffs or "dodge" buffs when I mention avoidance. I know Defense is also avoidance, but it's a stackable stat, so I tend to differentiate it with admittedly very little rhyme or reason. Since I'm assuming that Defense stacking will hit DMR, meaning that past a certain point (which I'm guessing will be achieved rather easily), stacking straight %avoidance will be much more beneficial than stacking Defense. Hence why I see that Powertechs are currently close enough behind Juggernauts that giving Carbonite Shield back to them will put them over the top because a +20% avoidance will be much better than an increase in Defense, which would be the last thing differentiating Powertech and Juggernaut.

Quote:I'm not in beta, but with the information that I'm working with, I don't see any self-healing or avoidance for Powertech. At all. None. We'll have the highest armor, 9% passive damage reduction (5% Ion Gas, 2% talented Ion Gas, 2% Power Armor) but no bonus DR to elemental/internal, and we have the middle-of-the-road shield chance. We used to have a talent for 6% Defense, but it was removed in favor of even more bonus armor. All I see for Powertech tanking right now is alot of mitigation. Juggernaut isn't that far behind in mitigation, but also has passive avoidance and self-healing, along with better active cooldowns.

Self-healing is an Assassin tanking "trait," I didn't really distinguish between Powertech/Assassins in that statement, which probably led to the unintentional confusion.

With regards to avoidance: Oil Slick? -20% accuracy is a powerful debuff, and its uptime is pretty good. From the new Guardian tree, Juggernaut has no extra passive boosts for armor, just Defense boosts and some spare DR from Dark Blood. Passively, Powertechs still seem like they have the most armor, while Juggernauts have the most defense. Then when you add in the actives, 20% avoidance vs. 40% DR. The actives address the area that the passives don't. I guess I just don't think that Powertechs are THAT far behind in MT capabilities. Highest armor rating + an ability that has 30% uptime for a -20% accuracy debuff? That's not half bad. No, they can't soak up burst via a Carbonite Shield spell, but I believe that the extra armor DR and Oil Slick can certainly combine to make the difference in the availability of active abilities mean less than it seems to on paper.

Also, keep in mind that the Juggernaut self-healing is limited (the most common self-heal is not even a self-heal anymore, it's a "shield" that absorbs damage, which I would guess would be different in nature than straight healing, while Payback is just too conditional to use often). Assassins currently have the best self-healing. But that's about all Assassins have, they need an extra active that addresses another area to bring them up to par, especially because self-healing is a reactive measure, not a proactive one.

[Mesrith]

(10-19-2011 01:00 PM)Darth GWARRR Wrote:  Usually I'm mostly referring to accuracy debuffs or "dodge" buffs when I mention avoidance. I know Defense is also avoidance, but it's a stackable stat, so I tend to differentiate it with admittedly very little rhyme or reason. Since I'm assuming that Defense stacking will hit DMR, meaning that past a certain point (which I'm guessing will be achieved rather easily), stacking straight %avoidance will be much more beneficial than stacking Defense.

You must know something I don't (and I don't mean that sarcastically, I'm not in beta and I'm just now absorbing some of the great info on this site, and other sites are lacking). How else do you "stack straight % avoidance" other than stacking the Defense stat? I'm unaware of what else in the game is stackable that consitutes an avoidance stat. Is there a dodge stat I don't know about? I don't even know if Bounty Hunters can make use of the Defense stat on gear and whether they can deflect/parry attacks without wielding a lightsaber.

Quote:Hence why I see that Powertechs are currently close enough behind Juggernauts that giving Carbonite Shield back to them will put them over the top because a +20% avoidance will be much better than an increase in Defense, which would be the last thing differentiating Powertech and Juggernaut.

I assume you're implying that Saber Ward, a 50% deflect/parry chance on a 3 minute cooldown, is somehow inferior to Oil Slick in a single target situation because Oil slick is "avoidance" while Saber Ward is just "Defense"...which is avoidance. A -20% accuracy buff is 20% avoidance, and 50% parry/deflect is 50% avoidance.

Quote:With regards to avoidance: Oil Slick? -20% accuracy is a powerful debuff, and its uptime is pretty good.

My point is that I don't see where Powertech has any passive avoidance, that is up all of the time. Averaged out over a static fight, Oil Slick is equivalent to 6% passive avoidance. A Juggernaut has 6% passive avoidance from deflect/parry talents, plus 18% for 3s after a Retaliation, plus any added from Defense rating (again, I'm unsure if BH can even make use of this stat), on top of a 50% activated avoidance cooldown.

I think you're missing the discrepancy that I'm seeing, because you're treating Oil Slick like it's comparable to Invincible, just because they're 31 point, activated abilities. I'm looking at it like this:

A Juggernaut off-tank can give 5% avoidance to a main tank by using Quake, which can have 100% uptime and is at the lowest possible talent location. Hell, you don't even have to be a tank to provide this debuff, a Juggernaut DPS could provide it if they spend 2 talents for the raid utility.

vs.

An Assassin off-tank can give 5% damage reduction to a main tank by using Wither, which can have 100% uptime, but is the 31 point talent for the tree.

A Powertech off-tank can give an average of 6% avoidance to a main tank by using Oil Slick, which is the 31 point talent for the tree.

Oil Slick is having to be both our passive avoidance and one of our main tanking cooldowns. Juggernauts have their own passive avoidance that is higher, they can provide an additional buff to other tanks that is only 1% lower, they have a more powerful 50% self-only avoidance cooldown, and they STILL have the Invincible cooldown, while Carbonite Shield was removed from Powertech. I don't think that all of that is offset by having 16% more armor.

[GWARRR]

(10-19-2011 02:20 PM)Mesrith Wrote:  You must know something I don't (and I don't mean that sarcastically, I'm not in beta and I'm just now absorbing some of the great info on this site, and other sites are lacking). How else do you "stack straight % avoidance" other than stacking the Defense stat? I'm unaware of what else in the game is stackable that consitutes an avoidance stat. Is there a dodge stat I don't know about? I don't even know if Bounty Hunters can make use of the Defense stat on gear and whether they can deflect/parry attacks without wielding a lightsaber.

Heh, my imprecise language continues to haunt me. I don't mean stack in that instance as in stacking via items. I mean just generally, via abilities, skills and otherwise. Though I honestly would not be totally surprised if +Avoidance started showing up on items too, but I don't have that information.

My presumption is that Bounty Hunters have to be able to make use of Defense: it would create terrible imbalances otherwise. I would assume that they'd just be considered "deflections" rather than parries i.e. "deflecting off of the armor" sort of deal.

Quote:I assume you're implying that Saber Ward, a 50% deflect/parry chance on a 3 minute cooldown, is somehow inferior to Oil Slick in a single target situation because Oil slick is "avoidance" while Saber Ward is just "Defense"...which is avoidance. A -20% accuracy buff is 20% avoidance, and 50% parry/deflect is 50% avoidance.

I actually forgot about Saber Ward. My impression has been that defense provides avoidance, but that as you get more defense, you're going to need more +Defense to provide an additional percentage of Avoidance on the margin: perhaps it's a far-reaching assumption, but seeing as how most things encounter diminishing marginal returns, I would reasonably expect it to be so. So when Saber Ward provides +50% parry/deflect, it is very different from straight +Defense. But as I said, I forgot about Saber Ward, especially as it doesn't show up in the Guardian/Warrior trees anymore. It certainly makes it more lopsided towards Juggernauts.

I've also probably been severely mixing up Diablo II stat systems with TOR at times. I played way too much of that back in the day and it still messes me up even now... (yes, I could probably still name tons of Diablo II builds off the top of my head...unhealthily)

Quote:...

Oil Slick is having to be both our passive avoidance and one of our main tanking cooldowns. Juggernauts have their own passive avoidance that is higher, they can provide an additional buff to other tanks that is only 1% lower, they have a more powerful 50% self-only avoidance cooldown, and they STILL have the Invincible cooldown, while Carbonite Shield was removed from Powertech. I don't think that all of that is offset by having 16% more armor.

Ah, ok, I see. I believe that Energy Shield is also still available to Powertechs, so there's some form of DR (though it's only 20%, but it's on a lower cooldown). Still doesn't help close the gap very much, I suppose.

[SlimX]

Defense is the only kind of avoidance and it works the same way for all classes. I can't say if it has diminishing returns if you stack it past whatever point with gear, but the tooltip made no mention of it.

[Verce]

(10-19-2011 03:13 PM)Darth GWARRR Wrote:  Ah, ok, I see. I believe that Energy Shield is also still available to Powertechs, so there's some form of DR (though it's only 20%, but it's on a lower cooldown). Still doesn't help close the gap very much, I suppose.

Energy shield is supposed to be roughly equivalent to Invincible - Half the DR, half the CD. I don't really see why the juggs have it better there.

[Mesrith]

I'm pretty sure Energy Shield is a 2 minute cooldown and Invincible is a 3 minute cooldown in the newest build, so it's not half the cooldown. It's 50% less powerful but only 33% more frequent. Since Powertech will have higher passive mitigation through armor anyway, it may end up being a wash regardless.

It's my fault for letting my main point get away from me in recent posts since we've mostly been focusing on the value of Oil Slick vs. competing abilities. My original point isn't that I begrudge Juggernaut all their cool toys or think that they are miles ahead of Powertech. My point is that I think they have the clear edge at main-tanking single-target raid encountersif they still have a comparable cooldown to Kolto Overload, since they are probably equivalent in passive mitigation/avoidance combined, they have all the active panic buttons that a Powertech does, and they're not missing Oil Slick because they can still gain it's benefit from having a Powertech off-tank.

If Juggernaut/Guardian still has their Endure ability, which is the same as Kolto Overload (they call it "Enure" in tooltips but I'm sure that's a typo), then I think it needs to be removed, or some more balancing needs to happen when it comes to active cooldowns between the two classes. Regardless, I still think Assassin/Shadow needs one more good panic button to hit, since Whither is more of a passive debuff, their 100% immunity cooldown has such a high timing demand (3 second duration!), and a 50% avoidance cooldown isn't as dependable as a health boost/damage reduction at keeping the tank up for a period of burst damage.

[Athens428]

Hey first post... so take what i say with a grain of salt.

Been following this post for a while and I think some people are forgetting something.

When you say "The Jugg will be MT because he has all his stuff plus ours" you have to remember that we might not be tanking near each other if he's MT and I'm (BH) OT (or vice versa)

Just because your both in the group does not mean you will be fighting the same boss at all times, or at all for that matter. In WoW, how many times are the MT and OT standing next to each other for the entire fight? twice? MAYBE three?

So yes if given the same boss AND a jugg MT AND a BH OT then the Jugg MIGHT be the better choice (skill obviously equal). But how many fights are actually gonna be that simple?