Threat conversation

[Vader066]

Quote:BlackMink: Could you please explain SWTOR's threat
mechanics? What exactly do the de-taunt abilities do, and how exactly
is threat generated? Is threat directly related point for point to the
damage you do, or does each individual ability generate a pre-set
amount of threat?


Cameron Winston (Combat Designer): Threat is
calculated based on damage done, plus or minus certain modifiers, with
one damage translating directly into one point of threat. These
modifiers are always called out in the abilities which adjust them. For
example, Soresu Form increases your threat generation globally, while
Crushing Blow or Hilt Strike specifically generates extra bonus threat
when activated.


De-taunt abilities reduce your threat level by a flat percentage of
its current value. Healing generates less threat than damage and is
split evenly among all enemies you are currently fighting.

From the new Q&A
http://www.swtor.com/blog/community-qa-april-20th-2012

[Genshen]

The problem I see with current threat values is this:

As tanks are receiving new gear upgrades, their threat remains relatively the same because they are upgrading defensive stats. Conversely, as DPS gains better gear, their threat skyrockets as they are outputting more dmg.

For example, I have an opening rotation that does not include taunt. I wait for the dps to start kicking in and just before I think they will pull (mechanics permitting of course) will AE Taunt. Saving my single taunt for mechanic related issues. DPS doesn't pull off me except a rare occasion where they crit a ton after the taunt happens and it catches up quick.

[Kaedis]

That's actually an extremely common theme in MMOs, Genshen. Blizzard semi-solved it with their Vengeance mechanic, vastly amplifying tank attack power based on damage taken (and scaling with maximum HP). Still, there's really only 3 solutions to the problem:

1) Make threat scale with defensive stats. Blizzard danced with this a bit with Shield Slam on warriors (damage scaling with block value), but never fully committed to it.

2) Make defenses scale with offensive stats. This can cause issues in that tanks will have similar levels of offensive stats as dps characters (since they'll be wearing effectively the same gear), making tank classes hit very hard instead of just generating large amounts of threat.

3) Make threat not matter by giving tanks ridiculously large threat modifiers. This is the approach Blizzard finally settled on in WoW as of mid Cataclysm. Tends to piss off the player-base, though.

I tend to be a fan of the first one, as it has the least drawbacks (though it does take the most creative design techniques). Who knows what Bioware will ultimately settle on, if they even get around to acknowledging the issue in the foreseeable future.

[Freehugs]

Well in theory, tank upgrades still have damage boosts on them (more Aim/Strength/Willpower). So as long as their DPS is increasing about 2/3rds as fast as the DPS players, the 1.5x threat modifier will cause Tanks to keep pace.
Sadly that isn't happening and it's been really apparent on Toth and Zorn where the enrage timer is too tight to go easy on DPS. I do 1150 DPS on that fight and my tanks are doing 400 DPS, so even with the tanks threat bonus and Guard I'm still ahead of them. So I have to slow down the DPS until the tank swap and then use my agro drop, and even then the threat is borderline until second tank swap.

Maybe that's good in a way, we can't just ignore threat as a mechanic, but it's annoying when the Enrage timer is very tight.

[Anonymousy]

the dps increase benefits the tank because of the guard skill.
also the tor-taunt makes all types of threat generation based on damage/abilities almost meaningless after a short while in the fight (unless threat resets of course).

[Caeden]

I actually agreed with Ghostcrawler on Threat being a non-fun game element. I personally really like the DK model in WoW based on proper usage of cooldowns and offense to defense abilities. I love an active survivability model a lot. The juggernaut seems to play closest to that.

I'm still not convinced that Bioware really wants Taunts to function the way they do and its not just an oversight. That said, they would definitely need to make adjustments to threat without the current taunt function. At least for Juggernauts.

The first approach though would work with some sort of "each shield/defended attack generates 1 threat" Would need balance of course.

[Pantel]

I'm tanking in 16 man EC HM as a Guardian. My DDs can go up to 1400 - 1500 dps and I can hold the Aggro.
Befor I jump in I use a AP-Adrenal and after my first rota I use Hilt Strike. If someone gets Aggro I use AEtount.

Toth and Zorn have a very tide periode without tankswaping and althought Firebrand and Stormcaller.

After Tankswap I use forcestasis to build additional aggro to my tount and normal dps.
For the next Tankswap are AEtount and Hiltstrike ready ...

[Coriolis]

(04-30-2012 04:35 PM)Freehugs Wrote:  Well in theory, tank upgrades still have damage boosts on them (more Aim/Strength/Willpower). So as long as their DPS is increasing about 2/3rds as fast as the DPS players, the 1.5x threat modifier will cause Tanks to keep pace.
Sadly that isn't happening and it's been really apparent on Toth and Zorn where the enrage timer is too tight to go easy on DPS. I do 1150 DPS on that fight and my tanks are doing 400 DPS, so even with the tanks threat bonus and Guard I'm still ahead of them. So I have to slow down the DPS until the tank swap and then use my agro drop, and even then the threat is borderline until second tank swap.

Maybe that's good in a way, we can't just ignore threat as a mechanic, but it's annoying when the Enrage timer is very tight.

Your tanks appear to be doing very little dps, I'm a jugg and I still tend to do ~500-700dps in half rakata/half new gear. Although if you have guard and are pulling aggro before other people without guard, most likely the rest of your dps are bad and this is why you are having enrage issues, more so than the tanking problem. Just make sure the tanks know to use their aoe taunt, it's almost unavoidable that they'll loose aggro on the pull while you're getting into position, but they can still aoe taunt and save their single target taunt for when when the swap happens.

But yes, in the long run the lack of scaling will be a problem, especially if they want to move away from taunt being the main aggro tool. I don't think it would be that hard to make tank attacks or talents that scale threat with defensive stats though - they already exist for several classes, i.e. revenge talent for juggs and heat venting on shield for PTs. The only difficulty would be making them scale threat without scaling damage too much, since tanks could easily become OP in pvp with too much of a link between defensive stats and damage. Since they've already included such talents, it seems to me that they understand the problem and know how to fix it (in principle).

Right now I feel like the balance is pretty good - there's a fair bit of skill involved (chance for good players to shine), and tanking requires both good use of attacks and taunting, i.e. using everything. That's fine by me. The only problem I have with it is that the difficulty is too concentrated at the start of the fight, and then becomes trivial. There should be a nice way to spread this out a bit.

[Freehugs]

That's exactly right Coriolis.

[GeeDee]

Great info guys. I found my way here doing a search on Juggs Threat .

I'm having the same issues on the 2nd fight in EC HM with Threat.

I play a Sith Juggs (Full Immortal atm)
Full Rakata (with 5 augments belt/bracers/pants/saber/1 implant)

I almost always start on the right side, with a marauder and a sniper. I guard the Marauder however by the time DD hits I'll often lose aggro right after to the marauder which causes the 2 people who took the DD to instantly die, obviously making a taunt after that rather useless. I fear using my regular taunt a head of time because the tank swap comes almost right after DDs. Most know that's not that far into the fight. To counter this from happening they are having to slow their damage until after the tank swap happens.

After doing a search on this I'm getting the feeling I'm not the only one who's having this problem. Does anyone have any tips that could help me from losing aggro before that first tank swap? Someone else mentioned it here but with such a tight enrage timer in that 2nd fight every little bit of dps counts.

My typical rotation is as follows:

Saber Throw > Force Charge > Smash > Force Scream >Sundering Armor > Crushing Blow > Backhand > Ravage
followed by Retaliation or Vicious Slash and once cooldowns pop for the above mentioned I try to fit them back into the rotation .

I've posted this on other forums with people suggesting that I move FS and Smashing to the end of the rotation (which makes a lot of sense since at the beginning of the fight I'm really not taking much damage to begin with . I have roughly 24k hp in raids atm). What are people using for rotations?

And are people using more hybrid specs to build on threat or are most remaining in the cookie cutter Immortal spec?

Thanks for any advice I get

-GD