Spell change that could help warriors_

[Zukobim AB]

Q: Why do people choose knights over warriors?
A: They can generate reliable agro at will.

Well, what about changing spells, so they had a random check too.
If you cast a spell today, then it generate an amount of hate, which we can call a base for hate generation.
If we now implemented a random check that made hate generation vary randomly from 50% x base to 150% x base for succesfull landed spells, then knights would have somewhat of the same randomness in their spells.
Some spells are used by other classes, but because the spectrum is both 50% over and under, then both agro building and agro avoiding situations are affected equally bad or good over time.

If the same routine would make a random hate generation of 0% x base to 100% base for resisted or immune spells, then the exploiting of lowlevel spells for agro would be alot lower, because the outcome would be lower.

What do you guys think?

[Aeka]

Simply put, even at 50% agro, Knights would still have multiple more attempts to taunt than a Warrior. If one fails to achieve the desired result, a Knight will try again with another.

No amount of monkeying with mana and agro will change this.

[Zukobim AB]

True, this will not solve it all, but it will put the randomness into the game again.

[Aeka]

I appreciate what you are going for but I really wonder what is with this idea that increasing randomness is at all exciting or needed. After all this exciting chance of failure is why Warriors seem to have a problem.

[Jear]

That would still have the same implications for warriors since a Wizard or a mage firing a nuke would sudenly generate 150% the agro and then where would you stand.. I know atleast where I would stand (close to the nuker hitting taunt as fast as I can) ...

[Redhenna]

I got to agree to a certain extent with Aeka here. This is not the solution. One of the basic ideas behind agro management is knowing about how much agro a spell will cause, and about how fast the tank can generate agro. This would make it nearly impossible to judge those things.

I think a much better way to go is scaling agro. Low level spells will generate significantly less agro(and if a mob cannot be affected due to level, none), making it important to use the higher level, higher mana spells for agro. I do not know if that would in itself be enough, but it would certainly help.

[landrain]

Originally posted by Aeka
I appreciate what you are going for but I really wonder what is with this idea that increasing randomness is at all exciting or needed. After all this exciting chance of failure is why Warriors seem to have a problem.

Well, this statement is wrong...

The chance of warriors failing is not causing warriors problems..

The ZERO chance of knights failing IS...

BEFORE they screwed up and gave knights everything a warrior had, there was this skill called aggro-management? It just doesnt exist in these days.

[Zukobim AB]

If you do not implement randomness into the knight tanking, then you would have to penaltize them severly otherwise, either by increasing the damage taken or force them to rest often.

Varying agro from spells does not make agro management harder, because the limit is just lower, but it opens up for the possibility for taking chances on extra spellcasts with both wins and loss as possible outcomes.

Because the spell can vary both 50% under and over the normal base of agro, then both clerics and paladins can win and lose on the spellcasts.
The clerics wish for a 50% agro roll and the paladins wish for a 150% agro roll.

[FarlanderB]

I think that would be messing with the game dynamics too much. X amount of damage = Y amout of hate all the time (when other factors like proximity, etc. are constant). It just doesn't seem to make sense that for some reason, you generate a huge amount of hate or a lower amount of hate for the same action.

It sounds like one of the better (non-bandaid) ideas to me, but I won't be the one to tell the Paladins that now their stuns can do half the hate... Nobody likes nerfs.

[landrain]

What I dont understand is this...

How could anyone think, that making spells that HAVE NO EFFECT on a mob, ie they are IMMUNE, cause zero aggro, is a NERF?

WTF...

I mean if I am immune to fire, and MR Big Bad Wizzard wants to cast Fire spells at me, sure they are pretty explosions, but they dont affect me, so what do I do?

charge the wizard?

HELL no, I wait to kill him last, because either

1, he cant hurt me,
or,
2, he is too stupid to hurt me..

The same should hold true for people casting spells mobs are immune to..

IMMUNE == NO AGGRO anything less is IDIOTIC

[Aeka]

First off, if you look on other boards I do think that low level stuns are problematic. A Paladin using Cease on a L60 monster is a little silly. I stopped using it because it just wasn't effective. Why throw away mana for agro when I can spend just a little more and gain agro and effect? I wouldn't miss it if it was made unavaiable against high level monsters. I also believe that most Paladins won't either.

As for the rest, there is this strange perception that Knights have infalable agro. Its pretty good were you can count on it most of the time but not always a given.

The fizzle rate for Hybrids is surprisingly high compared to casters. Interupts happen because of the fact you have a monster pounding on you. Particuarlly if the monster likes to bash and kick. Lastly one can just run out of stuns. Especially against a hyper active caster monster you can run through stuns and find yourself without one available when you need it.

Once again I'll state for the record that the non-secret to Knight agro is the sheer number of attempts we can use when the need arrises. Any one of the attempts can fail or be unavailable which isn't so costly since there is always a backup. Until SOE faces up to this fact, Warriors are going to continue to face POP style monster with a limited set of tools. This seems to have little to do with Knights to me.

As a final thoguht, here is some more things to think about. I can't speak for SKs but no one depends on just Stun for agro. Its easy to figure out what else is used. Here is another little secret: There are other ways to draw agro. Throw a heal on the puller during inc nearly always makes the monster turn on you. There are others but Stuns by far the most direct. Would a good suggest nerfing all of them because Warriors just plainly can't do them?

[Redhenna]

A comment from another thread here I think kinda highlites things nicely. Raznor(a pally) was talking about working without KEI and commented:

now if I had dropped QWoT and just used FoA I could have gone through more mobs but a few things would happen: 1. I no longer had secure agro 2. I couldn't really keep the mob stunned until after slow hit so I took more damage and the gap between warrior hp and knight started to hurt

His point, and I have to agree, is that knights are balanced(or at least closer) when KEI is not a factor. My reply to him was this:

So, from what you are saying, in the absense of KEI, you had less agro than normal, but still more than a warrior, and there was a noticable difference in your ability to take a beating. Why is this bad? It sounds to a certain extent like class balance as intended. More agro but less durability. In fact, it sounds like a good place to strive for. Knights: somewhat faster agro generation, somewhat less durability. Warriors: Somewhat less agro, somewhat more durability

So how would you make knights balanced both with and without KEI? Would lessoning the mana regen that hybrids get from KEI work? Some other solution? I simply cannot see where making agro on spells random will get us to this point, and I feel it is this point we should be striving for.

[Zukobim AB]

Lowering mana regen will not be enough.
Knights already got a mana pool that makes several hours of pulling possible without any mana regen at all.
You can not really lower the mana pool, because its caused by bad itemization.

Making the spell agro abit more random will lower the need for a lower mana pool, because knights will have to cast their bigger spells to be sure in creating enough agro.

[Ealdidar]

What I dont understand is this...

How could anyone think, that making spells that HAVE NO EFFECT on a mob, ie they are IMMUNE, cause zero aggro, is a NERF?

WTF...

I mean if I am immune to fire, and MR Big Bad Wizzard wants to cast Fire spells at me, sure they are pretty explosions, but they dont affect me, so what do I do?

charge the wizard?

HELL no, I wait to kill him last, because either

1, he cant hurt me,
or,
2, he is too stupid to hurt me..

The same should hold true for people casting spells mobs are immune to..

IMMUNE == NO AGGRO anything less is IDIOTIC

Nitpicking here I guess, but immune = 0 agro doesn't work for me. (and could create other problems) What is needed (and will never happen) is a full retune of spell agro. A mob that is mez immune should still beat a chanter to death for trying.

[landrain]

Originally posted by Ealdidar
Nitpicking here I guess, but immune = 0 agro doesn't work for me. (and could create other problems) What is needed (and will never happen) is a full retune of spell agro. A mob that is mez immune should still beat a chanter to death for trying.

Why?

It makes no tactical or logical sense.

If I am immune to your attacks, sure You will piss me off, but I will always wait until all the people who can hurt me first are dead..

Because, eithr you CANNOT hurt me/affect me, or you are too dumb to hurt me, either way sure u will get on the aggro list, but you will be way down at the bottom.

Now Resisted Spells, is a whole different story..

[Trondir]

If I am immune to your attacks, sure You will piss me off, but I will always wait until all the people who can hurt me first are dead..
The only thing that makes sense really (when facing an intelligent opponent) is that he goes for the ones he can kill fastest first. that means always casters. So dont argue with logic here :)

[Ealdidar]

Because, eithr you CANNOT hurt me/affect me, or you are too dumb to hurt me, either way sure u will get on the aggro list, but you will be way down at the bottom.

That's my point with zero aggro you won't get on the list. A pre 30 spell that a 55+ mob is immune o sohuld generate 1 agro. A spell that a mob is just immune to (a level 55 capped mez on a level 57 mob) should generate 70-80% of normal agro. (It sounds to reason the chanter might unload a bigger mez next if he has it)

[landrain]

Originally posted by Trondir
The only thing that makes sense really (when facing an intelligent opponent) is that he goes for the ones he can kill fastest first. that means always casters. So dont argue with logic here :)

Well Actually I would always kill the Priests first personally.. ESP if I had 1,00,000 hps.. the rest are trivial after no healers

[Chatja ogre]

Obviously priests would just be MTs now and tank switching (switching the healing on the tanknig priest) would become common.