Innate HP gap between Warriors and Knights [Archive]

BrikBludgaard

11-05-2003, 01:39 AM

Just want to bring up the point that a warrior picking the "best" gear for a knight is generally ludicrous.

Here are a list of HP and AC totals for all of our warrior, paladin, and SK who have both over 40% attendance AND have been with the guild for the past 6 months straight. (Thus they participate and are not just barely gearing up, so they have had time to pick and choose their loot for awhile.)

Warriors
8672 2142
8037 2102
8360 2011
8299 2085
8078 1894
8377 1928
8462 2146
8165 2116

War Average attendance = 72%
War Average unbuffed HP = 8306
War Average unbuffed AC = 2053

Paladins
7156 1742
7414 1890
7336 1886
7538 1928

Pal Average attendance = 67%
Pal Average unbuffed HP = 7361
Pal Average unbuffed AC = 1862
**note the two highest HP/AC Paladins are using a shield, and thus doing even LESS damage than normal.**

Shadowknights
7055 1838
7211 1799
7617 1942

SK Average attendance = 72%
SK Average unbuffed HP = 7294
SK Average unbuffed AC = 1860

I included average attendance to prove that the three types attend raids about equally...

our warriors have about 1000HP unbuffed more than the average knight... and 200AC to boot.

We are not new to time... we were one of the first 10 guilds in time across all servers.

Why do our actual numbers not match your theoretical ones? Because knights choose FT and Spell focus items over pure HP items. We don't pick the highest HP item all the time due to losing effectiveness on our spellcaster side. We have to choose BOTH caster and melee equipment, and if we don't take a hit to our caster side.

The real equipment choices from top guilds debunk the dim vision the "sky-is-falling" warriors want everyone to see.

Hybrids value their caster side, and rightly so. So we sacrifice vengeance, avoid, accuracy, Hp and AC to gain FT and caster foci. We don't search for the most HP on an item... we search for the best combination of effects and HP.

I am NOT saying warriors couldn't use improvements... indeed I think melee overall needs to be properly balanced with casters at this time. I also agree with improving the TAUNT system... even if its only for warriors...

but I simply cannot let this drivel continue without debunking it.

Stop the bull please.

Brik

Battleblade

11-05-2003, 06:19 AM

Brik,

When a Paladin choses FT or a focus effect instead of raw HP it is not merely to avoid an atrophied caster side. It is because in their estimation the FT or focus effect is of even greater value than the raw HP.

Even with your hand picked example the #8 melee in your guild has 8165HP 2116AC. The #9 melee in your guild has 7538HP 1928AC. Since #9 is a Paladin, we add in the effect of AoTC and discover he is in fact 7888HP and 1958AC. That's a 277HP 188AC gap.

For that 277HP 188AC and lack of Defensive the Paladin is compensated with a spellbook, 5000+ mana, FT, and focus item/s.

On raids Warriors and Paladins may have different roles, but I would expect that with all of your melees at a raid Warrior #8 does not have a greater raid role than melee #9 (Paladin).

While in an LDoN experiance group both would perform very well, it is undeniable that the Paladin's Root, snap aggro on demand, etc. will make him the better MT.

And the problem is that even at level 60 the Paladin has all of these experiance group assets at full strength. The Warrior on the other hand has inferior aggro control, a HP advantage that needs to be measured with a microscope, and Defensive which is hardly ever used in that environment.

It is true that it is difficult to establish how much raw HP or mitigation (or Vengance) FT1 is "worth". However there are things that we know about HP/other trade offs:

1. Plate/ALL items give Knights a mana pool bonus and WIS/INT in addition to all of the stats a Warrior can use.

2. Some key Paladin spells are ridiculously cheap to cast and in a mana rich environment can be cast at need.

3. Knight spells and their Tanking abilities reinforce each other - the whole is greater than the sum of its parts.

4. It's not a matter of IF a Paladin chooses to have near equivilant survivability to a Warrior (we know they can), it's a matter of how many HP's are they willing to exchange for the even greater value found in FT and focus items.

When a Warrior's assets are survivability + aggro control and Paladins can achieve near equilalent survivability + superior aggro control + a deep mana pool + FT + a spellbook that reinforces their tanking ability then Warriors are hugely underpowered.

Yes, all Pure Melee need to be adjusted compared with casters. But Paladins already have recieved all of the benefits of being a caster and need no adjustment.

I just wanted to point out how ludicrous your post was. I couldn't let your drivel continue without debunking it even though it has been throughly debunked by everyone and their sister for months on end.

Now go away or I shall taunt you a second time.

BB

Boleslav

11-05-2003, 07:52 AM

I don't think it is fair to compare the lowest Warrior to the highest Paladin. The averages are a better indication in my mind. I don't think the example is hand-picked, it is simply the one he has the most experience with. His.

That said, they show a 1000 HP difference, which of course drops to 670 with AoTC. So your theoretical 'naked' difference of 370HP increases to 670 HP with gear in the experience of this one high level guild.

We are still talking about a difference of about 6% fully buffed between the Warriors and the Knights. This number is greater than 0%, but still pretty low.

Boleslav Forgehammer
Paladin of Brell in his 65th Campaign
E'ci – Sacred Destiny

Daemonwynd

11-05-2003, 08:56 AM

brik, you're conveniently ignoring your own self buffs which stack with just about everything... which screws your entire argument.

The fact you're busily trying to ignore is that with even your self buffs alone, AoTC and BSS, that difference drops to a mere 300HP or so on average, which is UNDER 5%, and completely in line with the "drivel" you're trying to debunk.

Nice try.

Thaak

11-05-2003, 09:02 AM

Mmmm.... I sense a Library thread with these HP numbers...

Arathena

11-05-2003, 10:10 AM

Just a side note.... Brik's uber self buff is 279 HP, 13 AC, 10 DS, and it does not stack with BSS. His buff setup will be identical to the warriors.

Unfortunately, none of us tank naked, and itemization is screwed... But if you're going to go off on geared folks, use SKs and Paladins geared as SKs and paladins, not SKs and Paladins geared as warriors. The gap needs tweaked, and AotC needs brought in line with its parent spell line, yes.

I do wonder exactly what the AC difference does to tanking, and exactly what gear and buff AC do. It could mean a hell of a lot more than 500 HP does.

Tugurok

11-05-2003, 10:33 AM

The point is that gearing sks and paladins as warriors in comparisons is a relative advantage FOR THE KNIGHTS.

Since they evidently CHOOSE to gear their casting side up (while whining about their tanking), it's clear they get MORE power doing so.

You can't ignore the option to gear up the tanking side in exchange for even greater power on the casting side, and then whine about unfair comparisons.

If you do that, well hell, let's make the comparisons more fair, and use a mana/ft/spell -> hp/ac conversion algorithm (just as YOU do implicitly when you favor your casting side over your tanking side). And when we do that, pretty much no matter how we do it, knights come out a mile ahead. And so they are.

Kaesorn

11-05-2003, 10:38 AM

That's true...since Brik is a SK he doesn't get AotC (pally only). SK Cloak line is the same line as Brells (doesn't stack). Since it has AC and a DS on it, it looks like it should, but it's same line.

However, that doesn't excuse not including AotC on the paladins hp.

Gerick

11-05-2003, 11:05 AM

im sick of hearing about having to get flowing thought and focus effects and mana off items, and how BADLY it hurts the poor poor knights, look folks, now days its like katsup at mcdonalds like i have said before, earring of solstice for example, windworn bp is another, i could go on and on about if ya would like me to

Arathena

11-05-2003, 11:07 AM

I did not intend to attempt to downplay the small HP gap, Tugurok, but rather, I was hoping more to state that we can't look at this as something that boils down to something as one dimensional as HP, because we will choose foci over HP/AC. The thirty or so HP I gave up going from a Valorium ring to a War Crested ring for Improved Damage is made up at least ten times over by the focus. I freely admit that. The point that I was hoping to convey was itemization was the single largest issue in the HP gap... Although, I also agree that AotC in its current state is relatively broken.

Aeka

11-05-2003, 11:17 AM

Just as a point of fact: I say get rid of the HP component of Aura. Fine with me. Go go ra ra. In fact if SOE is reading, give that 230 HP to Warriors. My treat. ^_^

If you guys can figure out how to make 230 HP useful go for it.

Vezax

11-05-2003, 11:35 AM

The hp gap is a non issue for a under VT guild (note: I'm in a recently VT enabled guild.) The average HP for warriors, who actively raid and have at least ND3 in hp aas, in my guild is roughly 5500-6100. The average hp for the top 3 knights in my guild, note also active raiders and at least ND3 for hp AAs, is 4400-4900 (me personally standing at 4780 ish hp with ND3, PE and PD1). We're looking at an almost exactly 20% advantage of HPs between knights and warriors. Loot is done on a attendence based system and is distrubed very fairly btw.

Theoretical number crunching is nice, but in actuallity the HP balance between knights and warriors is pretty fair to at least the ssra level. However warriors do need help maybe after vt, and pretty much definately at the elemental/time levels of the game.

Terrorus

11-05-2003, 11:44 AM

Originally posted by Vezax
Theoretical number crunching is nice, but in actuallity the HP balance between knights and warriors is pretty fair to at least the ssra level. However warriors do need help maybe after vt, and pretty much definately at the elemental/time levels of the game.

I guess you havent been paying attention to itemization in SSRA/VT. This is where the balancing issues started. Our top Paladin has 100-200 hp less than me not including self-buffs.

Valeris

11-05-2003, 12:17 PM

The unfortunate point is also that Ssra/VT style itemisation is becoming prevalent in LDoN purchased armour - which will eventually become a benchmark for all I would imagine.

Vezax

11-05-2003, 01:22 PM

The % advantage of hp enjoys over a knight still stay about 20% through the ssra level. Note also i said for a ssra level guild, I obmitted vt purposely because I know that where the HP gap % wise will shrink.

As for a solution for the dimishing HP % advatage, why not put a % hp modifier on gear for warriors, say about 10%-15% pure hp mod on (so if a piece of gear has 100 hps, it gives a warriors 110-115) VT + levels. that 10% -15%plus the natural HP advatge of 600-800 (this is in actuallity comparing a few war to knights time profiles I've browsed through) warriors enjoy, would push them closer to their original 20% hp advantage.

My original point is the hp gap generally stay about right online with what I think it should be through ssra (about 20%). Im all for warriors maintaining that HP advantage through out the game. But my counter point is the balance of hps between wars and knights is fine on the below ssra game. The diminishing HP gap is a problem, but mostly more of a higher end problem.

For terrous
There is something way wrong if a pally is within 100-200 hp of you unless he raids like crazy and you dont raid at all. Seriously, from what ive seen, in the exact same gear a warrior tends to have at least 600 hp over a knight. Can you post both your profiles? Also might be a aa discrepency, I have like 600 more hps over another 65 sk in guild who is simalarly equiped with no HP aas.

Edit: just saw your gear, no way it can be a aa discrepency =D

Sylas

11-05-2003, 03:32 PM

plus the natural HP advatge of 600-800 (this is in actuallity comparing a few war to knights time profiles I've browsed through) warriors enjoy....
Seriously, from what ive seen, in the exact same gear a warrior tends to have at least 600 hp over a knight.

No, 586 hps. That is the absolute max difference between the innate hps of a war and knight. Any other difference is due to either AAs, levels, or difference in Stamina. That was sort of the point of me posting this. There's no longer a need to make guestimates like '600-800' on the difference in Knight/War hps. 586 with max hp AA and lvl 65, anything less and the gap shrinks.

BrikBludgaard

11-06-2003, 02:10 AM

Battle,

I'll ignore the attack on my veracity... I posted every warrior and every knight who matched the query (>40% attendance and 6+ months of consistent raiding)

You like math?
let me explain it in a way you might understand.

Since I am a Shadowknight, lets use DPS.

During standard XP groups I deal a good 35% of my damage from spells.

My overall damage is dependant on BOTH spells and melee.

Warriors damage is ONLY dependant on melee.

Lets say a vengeance 3 item drops.

Warrior:
100% of damage done from melee
so 100% of 1.5% = 1.5% overall increase in DPS.

Shadowknight:
65% of damage done from melee
so 65% of 1.5% = .9% overall increase in DPS. Note that a Shadowknight can not outdamage a warrior in straight melee due to having a 10% penalty in weaponskill AND offense caps.
Shadowknights use DoTs, nukes, and taps to even out and exceed warrior damage output.

in order to get the same benefit in overall DPS increase, a shadowknight REQUIRES not only Vengeance 3, but a spell focus or FT or a combination of the two that results in a .6% increase in overall damage. Note, this is to get the SAME overall upgrade as the warrior who just gets the Vengeance item.

In order to get the same upgrade, I must loot multiple items.

The same logic applies to HP and Mana. I must have both, or I don't get the same benefit. I MUST cast in order to be equal to a warrior on any level. If I do not cast, I am a severely nerfed warrior.

Shadowknights who do not cast taunt WORSE than a warrior.
have at least 586 Hp less than a warrior. (not counting WAR-only items) Have 100 less ATK and deal less damage overall even using Knight-only weapons. All this on top of taking more damage overall (slightly) and having absolutely useless disciplines. Shadowknights MUST cast to be even in the ballpark for comparison to warriors.

Note, I used Shadowknight DPS, but knight surviveability and nearly everything else you see them doing is dependant on both casting and melee abilities. Modifying only one half of their nature results in a lower overall bonus than warriors receive from a melee bonus.

I must CHOOSE which part of my effectiveness needs to be brought up to standards at any one time. Warriors do not. This is why warriors choosing HP gear for a knight while ignoring foci, FT, and our casting side is entirely ludicrous.

The spells and melee skills are a package that should be better sometimes and worse others. Name me ONE time the knights have been better and the warriors haven't bitched about it incessantly. Knights are currently considered "better" in XP groups where warriors are "better" in raids. I wholeheartedly agree that this distiction needs to be blurred from both sides.

The sad thing is, the whole arguement is stupid, as warriors DO have more HP on average... and Hp aren't currently the problem... Beastlords have enough HP to tank in LDoN, and do more damage than warriors OR knights. If warriors were to get a 2000 Hp bonus, it STILL wouldnt make them more desired in XP groups, and would only widen their already wide gap in raid tanking.

Battle, I'll ignore the personal attacks... I will expect better from you in the future... you were taunting? Try harder please. :-)

Daemon, Brik = Shadowknight... do some homework please... The shadowknight spell is less Hp than brells and does not stack. I am rather constantly reminded of how infrequently I use Cloak of Luclin (a 65th level spell) due to always having either Brells or Tunare. For a self-only buff its mighty weak. Indeed Warriors can get themselves a better buff by buying some Ornate armor. (yours doesnt stack with Focus, mine doesn't stack with brells, I guess thats fair... oh wait.. you aren't even a hybrid!) Of course we both know you were conveniently ignoring all that...

Bole, due to stacking AoTC gives a 227 Hp gain... 1000 - 227 = 773. Either you mistyped something or warrior math is very creative. Note half the paladins in this example are using a shield while the rest of the playing field is using 2H or Dual wielding resulting in a MUCH better DPS. if we were to equip their 2H, I imagine the average number would drop.

Turg, We choose to advance BOTH sides, because we MUST in order to get the same upgrade. Ignoring our caster side is rediculously stupid, but it is just as stupid to ignore our melee side. The comparisons here are of warrior dressing knights in the best Hp gear and thgem quoting DPS when the knight is wearing caster foci! When a knight is dressed in KNIGHT gear chosen by someone who knows what the heck they are doing with a knight, then its not as much as the "sky-is-falling" warriors here want to believe.
BTW, equipment generally DOES close some gaps... Warriors gain TAUNT from equipment, and knights gain durability. Warriors gain a shitload more TAUNT on a knight from a BoW (comapred to equal equipment) than I gain in HP on a warrior(compard to equal equipment) from any THREE pieces of equipment. Warriors gain the ability to lifetap, buff, etc from items... where is my /disc evasive or /disc furious from items? If I traded my skills and disciplines for a spellbook, and warriors get a lesser spellbook (backpack) from items, why don't I get better (but lesser than warriors') melee skills or addition halfway-useful disciplines?

Sylas, okay we have a hard number... 586HP nakid. So we have 586HP nakid, and 1000HP on average when both are properly equipped in the high end. 1000 + 586 = 1586. 1586/2 = 793 extra HP average at level 65. gee whiz, thats between the 600-800 number isn't it... So I really should be saying 793 average Hp difference for Shadowknights and 566 for paladins when fully buffed. Hey look! that 600-800 number is still pretty close. Thanks for doing the math to confirm the 600-800 number... we will change it to 566-793 for accuracy reasons.

Brik

Frodlin7th

11-06-2003, 02:42 AM

Brik,

When was the last time you had to make a conscious choice to pass up a great piece of time gear because it didn't enhance your caster side?

Battleblade

11-06-2003, 04:28 AM

Brik is just disatisfied with his > Warrior DPS and the fact his lifetaps effectively give him more HP's than a Warrior.

Let's say a Vengeance III item drops. Hmmmm... Ring of Force
20AC 18STR 18DEX 12WIS 12INT 145HP 135Mana 8SVall

Why lookie there! With such great HP, you get to close the HP% gap a little AND get 12 Int and 135 Mana. Woo woo. Please show me a Vengence item (not aug) without mana or Int.

While we're at it, lets put a Ring of Algae on your other finger 10AC 20STR 10STA 12WIS 12INT 25AGI 135HP 120Mana 25SVF FT3

Oh wow, you're right! 12INT, 120Mana, and FT3 but only 135HP!! The injustice. Quick, everybody petition SoE. SK's are nerfed because they MUST use FT at a crippling loss of HP.

Your melee abilities and caster side re-inforce each other making the whole greater than the sum of its parts. If you did not get more value from FT or a focus item by trading off a little HP you would not do it.

Until Shadow Knights can MT Quarm as well as Paladins you're going to complain because Warriors have some maginal advantages that you can make up with the flick of a finger.

I do not attack your veracity. You impeach yourself.

BB

Vezax

11-06-2003, 06:31 AM

Sylas.

Ask all your knight mains how have the same general aa/level/gear for their hp. Then get the average HPs of you knights. Then repeat with your warriors. Give me an actual real number, instead of the hard set in stone advanatge you keep pushing. I want real numbers pls.

the ave for my guild top 3 warriors is 5984
the ave for my guild top 3 knights is 4787

I dont want to see what the max magelo profile of a warriors vs knights hp, I actually want people to post actually HP averages of actual warriors and equally geared real knights.

I cant possible see a knight of equal amount of raid gear/aa/level to be within 200 hp of a warrior, and I rarely see knight get within 600 hp of a warrior. From what I see it the average differential is about 700-1000 HP in real life aplication. All those complaining check for your self. Dont just buy hype, get your own numbers. Heck get mutiple guilds numbers, so many people have magelo profiles, Im sure it would be easy to do. The HP differnetial is there, it just diminishes because the differntial stays the same, but the sheer base of hp is so greatly raised.

And im not attacking you guys, on higher end you do more of a HP advantage, but the problem is with higher end itemization then knights them selves. IMO you guys deserve the same hp % differntial you always enjoyed. Im just stating, through my own observations, that the hp differential is ok till youre in full VT/ssra gear, then your Hp advantage starts eroding. (made the ssra concession, especially if your guild was able to farm the heck out of it, but on most servers I doubt this is the case because its pretty competitive in there=P)

landrain

11-06-2003, 07:11 AM

Originally posted by Vezax
Sylas.
Give me an actual real number, instead of the hard set in stone advanatge you keep pushing. I want real numbers pls.

the ave for my guild top 3 warriors is 5984
the ave for my guild top 3 knights is 4787

You are still in the lower tiers where the terrible disparity in gear does not become evident yet. These players probably were still wearing class only velious or maybe ornates, etc... When you get to elementals the differences rapidly diminish to nothing.

helm,gaunt,chest,wrist,wrist,arms,legs,boots = 8 piece

Full set of Raex = 1335 hps
Ful set of Trydan's = 1220 hps

difference = 115 pts...

leaving...
ear,ear,neck,face,finger,finger,shoulder,back,wais t, pri,sec, range, charm...

97% of these are dual use war/pal, and I have seen more hybrid/knight only than war only gear here.. 100 hps in each slot is NOT that uncommon, and rather conservative as most elemental is 115/125/140 for hidden slots, giving 1300 more hps for both...

so thats a total of 2335 hps warrior and 2220 hps for knights...

Giving knights 95% of a warriors hps from gear, on average in a full set of elemental gear..

Now looking back at the Innate differnce in hps betwen Knights and Warriors...

Warrior = 4396
Knight = 3810

This has Knights at 87% of warriors...

Add in gear..

Warrior = 6731
Knight = 6030

Well look theres that 700-800 hp difference we talk about.. and a 90% of the warriors hp's...

I dont even want to look at Time Gear, because except for 15 hps on the BP.. Knights wear THE SAME GEAR as warriors...

Knight DO NOT have to choose caster or melee.. that whole concept is gone. They have gotten every melee upgrade + every caster upgrade with no loss of one for the other, thats the problem..

Sylas

11-06-2003, 09:05 AM

It seems you misspoke. you argued that there was some natural HP advantage warriors had over Knights somewhere in the 600-800 area. You are mistaken, the largest difference is 586 hps.

Add items and the gap widens, obviously. however, the miniscule amount that the gap widens is the entirety of the Itemization issues that exist today. I couldn't care less about Elemental armor, I'm not concerned about warriors at that level of the game. (and landrain already covered that), I'm more concerned with the middle game warriors who are the ones who are having the most difficulties with the unbalance that exists in tank classes today. The warriors who's Innate HP advantage over knights is lower than 596, the ones closer to only having 400 innate hps more than a knight. Bob the lvl 60 war with 4 AAs using a frosty or a GSoT trying to tank in groups where the non tanks are going to town with their all/all Copper Hammers of Striking and who are used to slow on Inc cus the tank that the warrior replaced was a 54th paladin and he could hold aggro just fine.

The major problem really is the ease of which Max Stamina is reached. Back in the day, say back to Fear/hate armor, warriors got like 50 hps, and paladins got none on their complete armor sets. 50 hps wasn't that much, even back then, but with the way that the HP formula works, Warriors received more HPs per point of stamina than Knights, so even then with only a 50 hp lead item wise, the difference in stamina levels + the class based modifier meant that Warriors had a clear advantage when it came to hps. However, Max stamina (with buffs) became the norm instead of the except back around Velious HoT. So Developers could slide by with craptacular imbalance of HPs on gear before, because the stamina gap existed, since the stamina gap is gone, so the HP gap on gear should rise to make up for it. however, the rise never happened.

Here's Skyshrine Armor (velious)
Myrmidons 335 hps
Scaled Knights 270 hps

65 hps

2 expansions later

heres Tier 2/3 stuff, Ornate HP differential

530 total hps from Ornate (kizrak's)
450 total hps from Ornate (Jaylia's)

80 hps.

Joe warrior in pick up groups is probably somewhere in a hodgepodge of gear between Velious and ornate. Joe Paladin his competition for the same PUG is in the same situation; gear, aa, and now, stamina wise. This 1000hp+ differential is a myth at this level of the game. I do not care about your Magelos of the warriors/paladins of your time level guilds. When is the last time you heard a time lvl warrior complaining about aggro in a PUG?

I'm done. I'll leave you with 2 somewhat scary thoughts for the state of class balance:

1. Difference in Hps on every set of Armor, for all levels of the game (20's to VT equivalent), for Warriors and Knights in LDON: 0

Anyone know of any Warrior only + HP augs from vendors? cus i sure don't.

2. Look at the magelos of the warriors in your guilds. Its assumed that those warriors are after the absolute most HPs they can possibly get without sacrificing AC. So warriors, looking for only 1 thing really, are only 600-900 hps higher than your knights, who "Must sacrifice Hps for caster foci/FT, etc." Subtract from the difference 586 hps, and you see how many HPs your knights really had to "sacrifice" in order to max out their casterside foci, ft, mana, int/wis, etc.

Partha

11-06-2003, 09:34 AM

Joe warrior in pick up groups is probably somewhere in a hodgepodge of gear between Velious and ornate.

<--------Joe Warrior (See Magelo for details) :D

Gerick

11-06-2003, 10:32 AM

brik, what about the fact that your DoTs are doing damage WHILE you melee? i think that makes up for you lost dmg, and if your a necro/warrior why arnt you in leather or chain? i mean a ranger is a druid/warrior and they are in chain, and a bl is a monk/shaman so they are stuck to leather, tell my why you get to have plate armor?

wraq

11-06-2003, 12:42 PM

Brik, The math doesn't add up in my guild either. I am MT usually for our guild with a Pally as the 1st OT and SK for the second. We are a pre VT, SSRA guild. Fully buffed between the 3 of us in equal gear there is never more than a 3-400HP difference. I tend to top out right at 8200 atm with our knights reaching the 7800's to 7900's. There is an issue some where. I have to believe it's in everyone wearing the exact same gear. /shrug

Graal the Dorf

11-06-2003, 05:28 PM

Brik,

When was the last time you had to make a conscious choice to pass up a great piece of time gear because it didn't enhance your caster side?

This isn't time level gear, but it illustrates the point.

http://everquest.allakhazam.com/db/item.html?item=12906
http://everquest.allakhazam.com/db/item.html?item=13161

Those are the 2 best masks for a paladin in VT. Do you choose the vengeance 6, extra AC, and 25 extra hp or do you choose the FT 4? I went with the FT4, simply because it is very difficult for hybrids to get meaningful amounts of flowing thought. That 1 item is over half of my total FT. Most of the FT items useable by paladins use a few slots: shoulder, finger, ear, face, back. Those are often the slots that have +atk effects and or haste too. I don't know about time gear, but pre time, you definitely have to make tradeoffs to get FT. Generally you will lose a possible vengeance or aura of X effect, hp, AND AC to get that FT.

Let's look at rings.

Luclin end game rings:
Azaliil's Ring of Analogies (http://everquest.allakhazam.com/db/item.html?item=13238)
Starred Yttrium Ring (http://everquest.allakhazam.com/db/item.html?item=11408)

Elemental Level rings:
Moss Encrusted Band (http://everquest.allakhazam.com/db/item.html?item=19020)
Band of Swirling Air (http://everquest.allakhazam.com/db/item.html?item=18828)
Ring of Algae (http://everquest.allakhazam.com/db/item.html?item=18074)
Black Basalt Band (http://everquest.allakhazam.com/db/item.html?item=17217)

Elemental level cloaks:
Cloak of Combustion (http://everquest.allakhazam.com/db/item.html?item=18099) Focus might be useful for SKs, but I doubt it. This always goes to casters in my guild.
Leaf Jointed Cloak (http://everquest.allakhazam.com/db/item.html?item=20724)
Cloak of Flickering Flame (http://everquest.allakhazam.com/db/item.html?item=20909)
Cloak of Wrulons (http://everquest.allakhazam.com/db/item.html?item=17357)
Cape Embroidered with Runes (http://everquest.allakhazam.com/db/item.html?item=17306)

Elemental level masks:
Great Mask of Flame (http://everquest.allakhazam.com/db/item.html?item=19024)
Abalone Engraved Tribal Mask (http://everquest.allakhazam.com/db/item.html?item=17942)
Fine Hammered Faceguard (http://everquest.allakhazam.com/db/item.html?item=20886)
Mask of the Insightful (http://everquest.allakhazam.com/db/item.html?item=17900) Very nice mask for a hybrid. Has FT2 and distance focus.
Grimfaced Visor (http://everquest.allakhazam.com/db/item.html?item=17999)
Baroque Half Mask of Solusek Ro (http://everquest.allakhazam.com/db/item.html?item=17782)
Red Eyed Mask of Rage (http://everquest.allakhazam.com/db/item.html?item=17401) I'm sure this focus is good for SKS. Not good for paladins.
The next 2 masks both drop from General Druav. Notice how 1 has +atk and slightly more hp while the other has FT.
Lava Forged Face Guard from General Druav (http://everquest.allakhazam.com/db/item.html?item=17743)
Burning Mask of Terror from General Druav (http://everquest.allakhazam.com/db/item.html?item=17719)

Elemental level Belts:
Girdle of Earthen Stability (http://everquest.allakhazam.com/db/item.html?item=18076)
Woven Steel Sash (http://everquest.allakhazam.com/db/item.html?item=20884)
Valiant Belt of Fallen Heroes (http://everquest.allakhazam.com/db/item.html?item=18555)
Prismatic Belt of Queztocatal (http://everquest.allakhazam.com/db/item.html?item=17627)
Girdle of the Tactician (http://everquest.allakhazam.com/db/item.html?item=17167)

A paladin in full elemental armor (minus the BP) will have improved healing 4 and mana preservation 4 foci, and will have 130 +atk. The rest of the atk and foci, haste, and ALL of the flowing thought has to come in the other slots. The exception is that a paladin can trade out one of his elemental bracers for a loss of 15 raw ATK to gain extended range focus and haste. The other stats on the bracers are all comparable.

I think the best example of what NOT to do when designing items is the Talisman of Vah Kerrath (http://everquest.allakhazam.com/db/item.html?item=13340). Another example is Sharkbone Plated Shoulderpads (http://everquest.allakhazam.com/db/item.html?item=19923). Very few items offer everything with no tradeoffs like that, however. Most of the time, there ARE tradeoffs to be made. Whether those tradeoffs are significant enough for balance reasons is a subjective thing. One of the big problems is that there is a very small collection of items (like the aten neck) that make those tradeoffs much less of factor by offering both +atk and significant amounts of flowing thought or a good focus effect. I can get half of my possible flowing thought from a single item...which also has +atk. If they could keep from making items that DO have both melee centric and caster centric effects, it wouldn't be nearly the issue it is now. One thing to keep in mind though, is that if a paladin or shadow knight doesn't have one of those few items, there really are significant tradeoffs to be made when choosing gear. Those items are designed such that they are in extremely high demand by many different classes and are generally also rare, the exception being the aten neck of course. The fact that you can't upgrade the aten neck even with time gear says volumes about how broken it is.

Valeris

11-06-2003, 07:05 PM

Vezax

11-06-2003, 11:03 PM

Sylas give me your guild url pls. Ill get the average of youre top 3 knights vs you top 3 warriors for you. Well depending if youre guildies are up to date w/ magelo. Also people who are complaining, pls post the results of the ave hp for your top 3 knights and top 3 warriors.

Btw did this for a guild on prexus who is done with vt, just got in to elementals.

Warrs 6600-6700
Knights 5800-5900

These were the top 3 of knights and wars. I will do more research and post results later, tired right now =P

Battleblade

11-07-2003, 05:30 AM

Graal,

Good idea choosing the Mask of Piety. Since you were in VT, I hope you got a Great Shadow Platemail and Talisman of Vah Kerrath. In the same tier Starred Yttrium Ring is nice.

Betwen Sanctus Ser and Vex Thall a Paladin can boost their mana pool size, ATK, mana regen, and regen very substantially while getting the AC and HP's one would expect on Warrior-like items.

And that is the problem. You see it as being forced to make tradeoffs. I see it as walking into a tier with maybe FT3 and being able to walk out with focus, FT10+, Vengence 15+, a couple thousand more mana, and Warrior-like AC and HP's all before even setting foot in PoP.

Don't even bother arguing that you have FT2 and you are in the Elemental planes. Guilds are skipping content because they can and it works. Just because the limit is FT15 doesn't mean Paladins need all 15 to function.

Players pretend that a Paladin tanking Quarm is all about PoTime/LDoN "mudflation". Well buckos, I claim that in LoY the caster-side of Paladins got major improvements while keeping pace on the melee-side with Warriors.

I'm OK with not nerfing Paladins. But with them able to tank every mob in the game, clearly Warriors are due some adjustments and perhaps top-end mobs as well.

And Vezax, give it a rest. Wether the gap is 400HP's after AoTC or 800HP's, it isn't enough.

BB

Valeris

11-07-2003, 05:35 AM

But with them able to tank every mob in the game, clearly Warriors are due some adjustments and perhaps top-end mobs as well.

And how many months/years off of being able to tank those nice warrior specific mobs are the vast majority of a server populations warriors? How many warriors experience current content when it is new enough to matter?

Why does a dedicated tank only qualify to be a better tank against a small specifically designed percentage of content whilst a generalist suffers no penalty verses the vast majority of content for his additional skills. Redesign a warrior from the ground up so that he gets equal utility from generalist skills similar to that gained from a spell book and only then does this idea have merit.

Battleblade

11-07-2003, 05:38 AM

I think it was 90 days or so for about 2 guilds per server. Obviously old content.

BB

Valeris

11-07-2003, 05:40 AM

Ninja edit sorry.

Sylas

11-07-2003, 08:31 AM

Warrs 6600-6700
Knights 5800-5900

So Knights in your guild had to choose to lose 214 hps in order to gain FT15, max mana, max int/wis, and caster Focus effects? Cry me a river. SK and Pal self buff makes up that gap easily, more so with a Paladin. watch, simple math:

War 6700 Hps, choosing purely based on most HP per slot (without losing AC)
Knight 5900 Hps, choosing HP/ac/mana/int/wis/focus/FT/etc

Difference = 800 hps

War Naturally has 586 hps more than Knight(at 65 w/ max hp AAs, reference page 1 if you are confused), so 800-586 = 214 HPs the knight had to 'sacrifice' in order to gain exponential gains to his caster side. I play a Beastlord, I'd trade 214 hps + my left testicle and my first born in order to gain as much as Knights do on the plate/all Knightemization BS that exists today.

Vezax

11-07-2003, 02:57 PM

Sylas youre mixing up sks. =D

And that was a generic profile of another guild (IE not mine) that finished or is nearly done with VT. Im seriously not trying to flame you, but i think on a lower level the HP balance is fine. You tend to enjoy a 20% advantage in HP which end up reducing to about a 8-10% advantage at the highest levels of the game.

The points of all my threads so far is a) warriors in real practice as opposed to theoretical number crunching, tend to enjoy a 700-1000 hp advantage. b) High end warriors traditional % advantage of about 20% is being destroyed by high end itemization. You keep tossing about the warriors only have a 586 hp advantage, but when I do the research in most cases it still comes up 700-1k while comparing comparible equiped/aa knights vs warriors.

Im an advocate on class balance where it is needed. Warriors do need better agroing abilities, and some unique abilities to give themselves more utility.

Aldarion_Shard

11-07-2003, 11:36 PM

look. this comparison of raw hp numbers, and the resulting overestimation of that difference, is absolutely foolish. Our HP Totals have increased, and our hp advantage has not increased along with it.

And the comparison of only innate HP is flawed as well. We never perform our function naked. So dont show me naked HP numbers - show me with gear - class specific, when available. This is how we function - armored.

Lets compare Paladins and Warriors. Geared in Class Specific Armors, through the expansions.

Era ................. HP Advantage
Original EQ ........ 14%
Velious .............. 19%
PoP ................... 08%

...Warrior armors no longer offer enough benefit, or knight armors offer far, far too much.

My point is - the warrior innate hp doesnt scale well enough with levels, you are right, but itemization makes it even worse. This shit needs fixed.

uhrlik

11-07-2003, 11:38 PM

Don't forget to take into account the raw mana and caster foci on the knight-specific armors as well.

BrikBludgaard

11-08-2003, 12:00 PM

QUOTE
When was the last time you had to make a conscious choice to pass up a great piece of time gear because it didn't enhance your caster side?
END QUOTE

Frod, read it again... I simply have more variables to calculate before gettting that great piece of time gear... If the time plate boots drop, I have to find another slot that will carry my mana pres effect on my elemental boots that doesn't lose me as many HP and AC and vengeance as any other way. (mana pres is huge)
I have to get TWO loots for every ONE the warrior loots to get the same upgrade. One with caster and one with melee. There are very few items with both... and those items are contested by damn near every class!

One thing of note... While most items have both STR and INT...
like all time-equipped characters, I long since maxed INT like you maxed STR. I have somewhere in the neighborhood of 370+INT.... too bad I can't use more than 305.
Stats are pointless for time characters.
Now find me a suit of stuff with both FT and vengeance on them.
(there are very few such items such as the VT neck and time items-neck,bracer,range- with Spiritual Fury)

one example:
most warriors will shoot for the quarm ring, and the timestone adorned ring. (210HP and 195HP respectively) where shadowknights will drop one of those two for the 170HP ring of thunderous forces... the wrath of Druzzil spell foci affects our offensive spells VERY nicely... I lose 25 raw HP. Thats only two slots.

another example:
The best weapons in the game for a shadowknight are either vanazir or GBoC. (230HP or 250Hp respectively)
the best weapons for aggro/HP/damage as parsed by our guild for a warrior are DBotW (225HP) and EoE (180HP) or quarm hammer (220HP) thats 405 - 445 HP!
(Shadowknights can use the 1Hb off Terris for 180HP, and the shield off Rallos for 195 for a total of 375HP, but give up HUGE dps to do so. Let me put it this way... the 1HB off terris rots every time it drops with three shadowknights who don't have it standing there.)

another example:
Wrath of Solusek (X of Solusek, or ID4) is the only time foci that focuses our HT. Most Sk will want it.. and it only appears on two items we can wield. The mask off of RZtw in plane of tactics, (pre-elemental) or the cast range drop off of Quarm. The Solusek focus will also focus our Disease based spears that only one other item in the game (Grimror's BP) will focus. I am MUCH more likely to get the quarm drop than I am to ever get the Grimror's BP as I am not a warrior. Add on top of this that the ONLY slot the time DoT focus comes on is the range slot (that every warrior and his twink will have before me)

So I get a choice.... either wear elemental arms all my existence (losing 50 raw HP) Wear pre-elemental mask all my existance (losing 80 raw HP) or lose greater than 7-8% of my total damage output (what happens when I ready ONE of my current LESSER spell foci!) due to not having those foci.

Note, hybrid equipment decisions are a tad more complicated than warrior ones eh? And may I remind you that you asked for it?

Brik

Valeris

11-08-2003, 12:05 PM

Fuck off and die Brik, k :p

I can't remember, did my original post have a question mark?

BrikBludgaard

11-08-2003, 12:29 PM

QUOTE
Brik is just disatisfied with his > Warrior DPS and the fact his lifetaps effectively give him more HP's than a Warrior.
END QUOTE

Only If I can cast them... most time gods that turn on me kill me in < 3 seconds... (and i wear mostly time gear) find a spell that will give me 1000HP in 3 sec please. Oh we are getting CH chains? Then why am I casting lifetaps again? I should be casting taunt spells so I actually can outtaunt a warrior. Oh the mob is a XP mob? Then taunt spells and a single cleric CH chain...
Oh and incedentally.. I only outdamage warriors when i am NOT tanking... and by 10% sustained dps.

Jealousy is a stupid thing... lifetaps are useful... but not for what you have the example for.

QUOTE
Let's say a Vengeance III item drops. Hmmmm... Ring of Force
20AC 18STR 18DEX 12WIS 12INT 145HP 135Mana 8SVall

Why lookie there! With such great HP, you get to close the HP% gap a little AND get 12 Int and 135 Mana. Woo woo. Please show me a Vengence item (not aug) without mana or Int.

While we're at it, lets put a Ring of Algae on your other finger 10AC 20STR 10STA 12WIS 12INT 25AGI 135HP 120Mana 25SVF FT3

Oh wow, you're right! 12INT, 120Mana, and FT3 but only 135HP!! The injustice. Quick, everybody petition SoE. SK's are nerfed because they MUST use FT at a crippling loss of HP.
END QUOTE

Look at my previous post for an exmaple that stomps your attempt at logic to the ground.

QUOTE
Your melee abilities and caster side re-inforce each other making the whole greater than the sum of its parts. If you did not get more value from FT or a focus item by trading off a little HP you would not do it.
END QUOTE

Correct... we choose the upgrade based on our needs at the time. But my problem is warriors dressing knights in warrior-choice equipment who forget caster needs, and then bitching that knights have so many HP, THEN comparing our DPS in caster gear in the same breath. Thus we seem to be able to wear multiple caster and melee items in one slot and get the benefits from both sets of equipment for the warrior comparisons. You are comparing two knights, combining them into one, and then claiming warriors are immensely underpowered due to knights having all this power. (all the advantages from BOTH sets of equipment)

Any wonder why knights like me shoot you down consistently?

QUOTE
Until Shadow Knights can MT Quarm as well as Paladins you're going to complain because Warriors have some maginal advantages that you can make up with the flick of a finger.
END QUOTE

Shadowknights can tank Quarm if paladins can... of course we are talking about guilds where the knights now have as many Hp as the warriors who first fought Quarm.. and Bulwark. How many times was quarm fought with warriors to gear up everyone before the knights were even allowed to give it a shot?
/disc defensive is NOT a marginal advantage against Quarm... obviously you are talking out of your behind.

QUOTE
I do not attack your veracity. You impeach yourself.
END QUOTE

I had to smile at that... you haven't even begun to prove my original post false. Do you know what veracity means?
Is English your first language?
If you are native with English, do yourself a favor and look it up please.
Not understanding words is one thing, not having the presence of mind to look something up (hint www.webster.com) when you don't know the meaning of the word is inexcuseable.

Please, it would be a lot more fun if you could actually compete.

Brik

BrikBludgaard

11-08-2003, 12:45 PM

Gerick,

All the comaprisons are done with the shadowknight using everything he has... 10% more damage from the back sustained.

Note, I don't do the damage of a necro... and I don't have the Hp or skilcaps of a warrior... I follow the paladins' template for a hybrid in being a defensive (tank) melee where rangers and Beastlords follow the offensive (damage dealer) template for a hybrid.

Shadowknights are the offensive spells/defensive melee hybrid.

Paladins are defensive spells/defensive melee hybrid.

realistically, Shadowknights' skill sets and spells are quite balanced with warriors if warriors could actually taunt and if they added a auto-block ability for warriors/knights using a shield so that knights (and defensive-down warriors) could transition tank the cutting edge.

I don't know why I bothered to post that, as no amount of logic or thought will allow you to transcend your current "situation".

The warriors (most especially Gerick) are in a mob-mentality mode over (god forbid) the fact a 10k+ paladin can tank quarm after 4-5 months of farming quarm as a "we-never-lose" encounter.

You can bet that EVERY guild who just starts on time gods or Quarm will start with a warrior tank. Nothing has changed except the mob-mentality of a bunch of people who have never seen time let alone Quarm.

Brik

Daemonwynd

11-08-2003, 03:08 PM

brik, suffice it to say your arguments are quite often flawed because they ignore or downplay facts and arguments that do not support your position, while you trump arguments and fact that do support it; case in point your ignoring self buffs when speaking about HP totals, so that the difference appears larger than it actually is. This is actually amusing because you're denouncing stuff that you say is full of shit, yet by ignoring more variables than the post you're replying to, you're showing your posts to be worse than the so-called tripe you're denouncing. Likely you do this because you wish to protect the status quo. You do it on the SK board, and now you're doing it here.

Your credibility on this board is pretty much toast because of it..

Valeris

11-08-2003, 06:57 PM

Fu.. Nahhh you can have this one Brik old pal ;) pontificate to your hearts content I'll just ignore you this time

Battleblade

11-08-2003, 07:51 PM

Brik,

It's pretty silly to pretend a Hybrid can't enter the VT/Seru/Ssra tier and exit in much better shape than a Warrior. Would a Hybid have marginally less AC and HP's? Yes. Would the FT and mana increase make up for it? I think so.

My comment about lifetaps is pretty easy to understand. Your manabar can add to the HP's displayed in your Player Window. I did not say you were MTing.

I appreciate all the nice long posts, but concidering your point of view, why don't you just simplify it? Let me help

:D
"WaRYrZ R tEh sUkE aND I H8 ThEM!" - Thik as a _ _ _ _

Frodlin7th

11-08-2003, 11:34 PM

Frod, read it again... I simply have more variables to calculate before gettting that great piece of time gear... If the time plate boots drop, I have to find another slot that will carry my mana pres effect on my elemental boots that doesn't lose me as many HP and AC and vengeance as any other way. (mana pres is huge)

Brik,

While I appreciate your arguments, I must point out that they aren't quite as valid as they've been declared to be. I'm sorry, but you are taking the same tactic as Thott in his inherently flawed "Hybrid AA experience penalty" in that you are stating that in order to level up both sides of your character, you must pay twice as much, in his inherently flawed argument it was in number of kills, in yours it's the amount of loot.

What you fail to realize, or better stated, fail to acknowledge is that having the ability to match perfectly our side, you have another avenue to build upon. In other words, you have greater opportunity than us, and this opportunity is NOT a penalty, but something of inherent value.

Your archetype AA skills cost identical to ours, and have the identical effect. The difference is we have no opportunity to expand upon that beyond class AA skills, which you ALSO have. Once matched class skills are accomplished, Thott's argument, and by extension yours, states that you "have to then augment your caster side", which is true IF you want to reach the pinnacle of your power. The part the two of you leave out is that we are completely denied the opportunity to further maximize our melee side to compensate, so what you perceive as a penalty, we perceive as a lost opportunity, which it is.

Let's move back to loot. Let's just say for instance that you do "bite the bullet" and loot the quarm ring (as cited below). You gaine the IDENTICAL benefit from that ring as a warrior does, AND you gain an additional boost to your mana pool. This is essentially granting you greater power for the same piece of gear than it's granting me.

To deny this is to be dishonest. So, your argument is that BECAUSE you can make a choice which benefits you even to an even greater degree above me than the one piece of gear which ALREADY benefits you more than me, that you are making some sort of sacrifice?

You've lost me there.

I have to get TWO loots for every ONE the warrior loots to get the same upgrade. One with caster and one with melee. There are very few items with both... and those items are contested by damn near every class!

Again, the reason that this is fallacious and incorrect is because you're not thinking through the entire issue Brik. You're a bright guy. Normally people who gain such a visceral response as multiple "fuck yous" tends to be pretty bright in my experience to be able to rouse up such emotions in others. On the other hand, you're either ignoring some realities, to grandstand and make a point, or you missed them. The real issue is that no matter WHAT piece of time gear that a warrior gains outside of class specific BP/weapon (which I'll cover in a moment) you will ALWAYS gain the same identical benefit from on the melee side.

You will also ALWAYS gain at least a sizeable chunk of mana from it, and often you'll gain not only a focus effect, but also many times mana regen.

One thing of note... While most items have both STR and INT...
like all time-equipped characters, I long since maxed INT like you maxed STR. I have somewhere in the neighborhood of 370+INT.... too bad I can't use more than 305.
Stats are pointless for time characters.
Now find me a suit of stuff with both FT and vengeance on them.
(there are very few such items such as the VT neck and time items-neck,bracer,range- with Spiritual Fury)

There's no items that I'm aware of with Vengeance 10 and haste either, but then again, setting up strawmen isn't really my cup of tea. There exist high hitpoint flowing though, and high hitpoint vengeance and high hitpoint/high ac/focus thought items throughout EQ. Again though, and I hope you're letting this sink in hard and fast.... EVRY SINGLE ONE OF THESE is benefitting you MORE than it benefits me. There isn't a single item in time that we can both wield that would benefit me more than it would you. Simply because you have more choices and opportunities to customize is NOT a penalty.

another example:
The best weapons in the game for a shadowknight are either vanazir or GBoC. (230HP or 250Hp respectively)
the best weapons for aggro/HP/damage as parsed by our guild for a warrior are DBotW (225HP) and EoE (180HP) or quarm hammer (220HP) thats 405 - 445 HP!
(Shadowknights can use the 1Hb off Terris for 180HP, and the shield off Rallos for 195 for a total of 375HP, but give up HUGE dps to do so. Let me put it this way... the 1HB off terris rots every time it drops with three shadowknights who don't have it standing there.)

This the the ONLY fair thing for warriors in the whole plane, the fact that we can gain some hitpoints from dual wielding. This is a GOOD thing, it's just not enough. On the other hand, ther is indeed truth to the notion that dual wielding over the long term results in a net loss of hitpoints due to ripostes. It's probably a wash, which is unfortunatate because it lets you grandstand without having to consider all the way through the situation.

another example:
Wrath of Solusek (X of Solusek, or ID4) is the only time foci that focuses our HT. Most Sk will want it.. and it only appears on two items we can wield. The mask off of RZtw in plane of tactics, (pre-elemental) or the cast range drop off of Quarm. The Solusek focus will also focus our Disease based spears that only one other item in the game (Grimror's BP) will focus. I am MUCH more likely to get the quarm drop than I am to ever get the Grimror's BP as I am not a warrior. Add on top of this that the ONLY slot the time DoT focus comes on is the range slot (that every warrior and his twink will have before me)

This is not a balance issue, but is an issue of item distribution in your guild. If your guild doesn't deem that you should get a BP, then it's your guild you should be talking to, not warriors in general.

So I get a choice.... either wear elemental arms all my existence (losing 50 raw HP) Wear pre-elemental mask all my existance (losing 80 raw HP) or lose greater than 7-8% of my total damage output (what happens when I ready ONE of my current LESSER spell foci!) due to not having those foci.

Or you can spend 1150 Adventure points and snag a nice 40hp aug at Rujarkian, and make it all better.

Note, hybrid equipment decisions are a tad more complicated than warrior ones eh? And may I remind you that you asked for it?

On the other hand, I don't think I ever claimed that they weren't more complicated, merely that they have greater opportunity, and for the most part, do not require any realistic sacrifices that place you at any competitive disadvantage. When we're nitpicking under 100hp in GRAND TOTAL sacrifices, I'd say we're only off by a 0 from where we SHOULD be arguing.

Valeris

11-09-2003, 06:50 AM

Normally people who gain such a visceral response as multiple "fuck yous" tends to be pretty bright in my experience to be able to rouse up such emotions in others.

You know what really pisses me off about Brik? He does appear to be relatively intelligent but he then quite deliberately (or so it appears to me) chooses very selectively what arguements he chooses to aknowledge so that it favours his point unfairly. That pisses me off way more than someone who is obviously ignorant.

Valeris

11-09-2003, 06:54 AM

This the the ONLY fair thing for warriors in the whole plane, the fact that we can gain some hitpoints from dual wielding. This is a GOOD thing, it's just not enough. On the other hand, ther is indeed truth to the notion that dual wielding over the long term results in a net loss of hitpoints due to ripostes. It's probably a wash, which is unfortunatate because it lets you grandstand without having to consider all the way through the situation.

It's been stated by Furor elsewhere that time equipped knights can garner greater AC than warriors. Does that explain Lin's DPS taken figures and does that have anything to do with either AC on 2handers or knight 1H and shield combo's? I was just wondering how they do it?

Ezedriel7th Ham

11-09-2003, 03:32 PM

Brik...

the thing is we aren't exclusively suffering from any kind of imbalance in our melee and caster side. Some of our most effective aggro spells cost almost no mana, most of which is regenned in a tick or two thanks to Voice of Quellious and other such utilities. We aren't finding ourself at a loss because the itemization is so out of whack that we balance our melee and our caster side in generally one item (with a few given exceptions where one must hold out for one piece of gear over another for a favorable effect). A breastplate with 40 HPs and 40 Mana is the same benefit to your caster side as it is to your melee side.

And yes your example is right, you do have to hold out for some items. But this is not a hybrid exclusive thing. It's not just knights who find themselves giving up one or two pieces of gear so that they can get something later on.

Warriors are constantly turning down weapons that would be substantial upgrades for them simply because it, while is very, very nice, doesn't match what he needs in order to successfully do his job. I.E. Stone Etched Warswords drop...people want them all the time...but tanks are always wanting a Blade of War as well...they certainly can't have both (or at least right now they can't have both) so they need to make a decision.

And this is also a decision that effects the entire guild on many levels. If he gets the SEWS then great, maybe no more Rallos Zek the Warlord raids, maybe no more backflagging in that department and they can move on, the warrior has himself a nice pretty sword, all is well.

But then he still doesn't have the same aggro he does with a Blade of War, the DPS is about the same...give it a bit better on the BoW, and the SEWS lacks the EB effect. Therefore now the warrior doesn't tank with greater efficiency because while he can give the monster a nice punch...that monster would much prefer to be punching other members of the raid.

While it can be argued that we need to balance our caster/melee side...our caster/melee side is balanced by the upgrades we're getting with save a handful of exceptions. The warrior has to figure out "Do I want more HPs or more DPS? Do I want more AC/HPs or do I want better taunt? Will my taunt be sufficient to hold this mob locked down while our casters nuke? While our clerics heal? What if my aggro breaks, can I hold him after that?"

They too are trying to "balance things out", but the problem is they're being fed the scraps from SOE's table to fight over so that they can begin to enhance their one ability that is still being dominated now by other classes. They have to contest and fight each other over super and ridiculously rare drops that really don't make any sense to their rarity when knights weapons are rotting by the dozens daily.

A 40/30 mace rots more often than orc pawn picks because a warrior wants his pet sword off an already rare and contested spawn...a 40/30 weapon...a ridiculously good and easy weapon to get in place of something that the warrior prolly really should have.

Then we have the same style sword (a pet sword) dropping far less rare for them with prolly far less contestation due to its ditribution as well.

Warriors are always having to fight for weapons that will not let them do their job well...but do their job. Bloodfrenzies, blades of carnage, Blade of Wars (a weapon that theoretically can and has been contested amongst several other classes and for what reason is beyond me), all these weapons are crucial for a warrior to do his job in several encounters...and yet why bother with that when Mr. Knight can walk up and throw out a new stun every now and again for 15, 25, and 65 mana in 1.5 seconds, 1.8 seconds and 1.0 seconds respectively, then not only hold the aggro ten times as well as the warrior could ever desire...tank just as well if not better.

The problem is we don't go "Well if I weigh out my caster side my melee side won't catch up and I'll be a weak meleer..." the problem is we have the opportunity to go "Well let's see...my melee side is overpowered to the max...what items should I get to overpower my caster side?" It's hard to have sympathy when people are dominating one section of a class and are simply trying to find ways to jack up our lesser used side (which paladins seem to strangely always complain about...if they hate their caster side so much why do they play paladins?) which is still substantially more powerful than warriors.

How can anyone justify a complaint or call that "hardship"? Every single piece of gear in the Planes of Power that benefits a paladin and a warrior and a Shadow Knight gives both a boost in their melee, and then the paladin a near or equal boost in his mana and casting ability.

Neither is that balanced nor strenuous in someone's decisions of how to play their character.

Graal the Dorf

11-10-2003, 12:47 PM

How many points of mana on each of those 'less useful' items? how many hp's? How much stamina? How much Int/Wis? Well fuck me you have it so hard, don't cha. I wonder how many hp's/mana etc you drop in real terms to get the entire suite of foci items and F/T 15. 600? doubt it's even that.
I don't really care about how much mana is on an item. The size of a casters mana pool is significantly less important than the speed with which that caster can regenerate mana. Here (http://forums.thedruidsgrove.org/showthread.php?threadid=5336) is a thread on the druids grove where pure casters argue the relative importance of hp versus mana. This is an indicative post from that thread:
"Right now I value hp roughly twice as much as mana; 1 hp = 2 mana. The way I see it:
Short fight...hp is all that really matters. I'm not likely to be able to burn all of my mana before the fight ends, and a larger mana pool would make little to no difference in the fight, while high hp makes it much more likely for me to survive early spot heals and AE's and such so that I can continue using the mana.
Long fight/crawl...mana pool adds very little to how much I can contribute, only affecting my "burst" spell usage; instead mana _regen_ is king. High hp is still important in any place that I'm likely to be hunting."
The size of your mana pool only affects burst mana expenditure, which is situationally important in a tiny fraction of encounters. If you look at hybrid spells, they are almost all spells with limited recast times (group heals can be cast every 30 seconds, ranger nukes can be cast every 30 seconds, paladin heal over time spells every 30 seconds, etc.). Hybrids generally CAN'T burst mana like pure casters can. A larger mana pool is nice, but it isn't really a big deal for a hybrid. We want FT.
You ever go oom Graal without intensive healing of party members etc? I've had a paladin with more hp's than me (thanks to AA ) keep an entire group upright over the course of a 20 odd minute AE fight in ssra (with a bit of help from a post nerf mod rod), he was pre-VT as were we.
That wasn't the size of his mana pool that allowed him to do that, it was the amount of mana regen he had. Let's assume he has a very big mana pool for a hybrid: 5k. Now let's assume he was using Wave of Marr, since it is our most efficient group heal. His mana pool would only allow him to cast that spell 5 times. Mana regen has to cover the rest. Flowing thought is so much more important than the size of mana pool to most casters. That mod rod you listed is powerful because it increases mana regen rate. BTW, the only time I generally go OOM is when I'm hit with an AE or curse that drains mana ala Babs in fire. Mana regen can generally keep up with my rate of mana expenditure in most situations. In fact, most of the time I'm sitting at full mana because I have very little to spend it on. Then again, I spend the vast majority of my time raiding.
You loose attack? aww shucks, i dual wield while you swing away with your big arse 2handers. DPS is absolutely essential to a warrior to try to maintain aggro, you can prop it up with stuns. Anything else is just gravy.
You make a few choices (go you) but exactly how big an impact do they make really?
If a paladin or SK chooses to outfit themselves mainly for FT at the expense of +atk and +hp gear, it can have a significant effect on their damage output and total hp. Making gear choices that give an extra 5 FT at the cost of 75 worn attack will have a significant effect. Less melee damage for greater mana regen. Many hybrids go this route. Often they will have less hp as a result as well. Just as a means to understand what I'm talking about a little better, try gaining 120 +atk, haste, and as much FT as you can in the non visible slots from those items I linked and other VT/Elemental items. Assume you are a paladin with full elemental gear, minus the breastplate. The challenge is, do it without using an aten neck or an aten BP. Don't forget distance focus, buff duration focus, and spell casting haste focus. If possible, try and get the GOOD focus effects for improved healing and mana preservation, instead of the basic focus effects provided on elemental armor.
Graal,
Good idea choosing the Mask of Piety. Since you were in VT, I hope you got a Great Shadow Platemail and Talisman of Vah Kerrath. In the same tier Starred Yttrium Ring is nice.
Because Great Shadow Platemail drops every time doesn't it? Our guild has had 1 BP drop in over a year and half. Of course, it's easy to get the aten neck since it drops every time. No, wait. Every single other person in the guild wants it too. Hrmm. Check out my magelo, then look at the "future" profile I created. That is the gear I am looking to get to upgrade myself from mobs that we currently kill. I am focusing much more on hp, atk, AC, and resists (in that order) than I am focus effects and FT. This is assuming I would be awarded ALL of these drops. It would give me 235 atk from gear, only 15 below the cap. I would have FT 9, and 2 basic focus effects. If I completely ignored FT and focused even more on hp and +atk gear I could theoretically get about 100 more hp, 50 more raw AC, and I could cap my worn attack. Is that a large enough gap for a gain of 9 mana regen a tick? Is it too small of a tradeoff? That's a subjective judgement, and I'm not an impartial bystander, so I can't say.
Betwen Sanctus Ser and Vex Thall a Paladin can boost their mana pool size, ATK, mana regen, and regen very substantially while getting the AC and HP's one would expect on Warrior-like items.
And that is the problem. You see it as being forced to make tradeoffs. I see it as walking into a tier with maybe FT3 and being able to walk out with focus, FT10+, Vengence 15+, a couple thousand more mana, and Warrior-like AC and HP's all before even setting foot in PoP.
You are looking at these knights in a vacuum. Compare the gains they make to the gains that a warrior in the same guild would make. The warrior is gaining more atk and more hp than the knight is for gear upgrades at the same stage of the game. That is assuming of course that both the warrior and the knight have the chance to pick and choose exactly what gear they want from that stage of the game. It also assumes that the knight chooses some caster centric items over melee centric items. Where that breaks down is when you start introducing Aten items into the mix. Being able to get vengeance 10 on a single item and being able to get 8 FT (and +ATK!) on a single item make it much easier to get the best of both worlds without having to make tradeoffs. THAT is the thing that is messed up. There are a few specific items that break that balance of having to choose between a caster effect and a melee effect.
Warrs 6600-6700
Knights 5800-5900
So Knights in your guild had to choose to lose 214 hps in order to gain FT15, max mana, max int/wis, and caster Focus effects?
All those knights have FT15, max INT/WIS (umm, who cares?) and have all of their focus effects...at the highest percentage? I somehow doubt that. Hell, there are 5 paladins on my server who have a 15 or greater unbuffed mana regen and that includes mana regen AAs. Generally without getting an aten neck, it aint happenin, not without making very large tradeoffs in other areas.
BTW, my guild's best 3 equipped warriors with magelo profiles have 7105, 6929, and 6692 unbuffed hp (One of our top 4 doesn't actually keep a magelo, but there is a good chance she is higher than 6692). Our highest hp paladins have 6072, 6019, and 5753 unbuffed hp. All of these people have have raided regularly for a long time. We have a warrior who joined the guild about a month ago with much lower quality gear. He's been in the guild for a month and has 5785 hp unbuffed. He has the lowest hp of all our active warriors, and yet he has more hp than all except the 2 best equipped paladins. Those are actual numbers from actual equipment, not some fantasy magelo where you can pick and choose whatever items you want.
Keep in mind, total hit points doesn't affect xp group efficiency very much at all unless the tank is borderline underequipped for the mobs he's fighting and then survivability becomes the main issue, not efficiency. Survivability is where the hit point gap can make a significant difference and in the situations in which added hp do affect survivability, small changes to total hit points can have a dramatic effect. The problem with using the hp gap and survivability differences to balance warriors and knights (which is what has been done) is the fact that if neither the warrior nor the knights are in that relatively small region where total hp makes a difference...that difference in hp is almost meaningless. If a mob can 1 round for 6k, a 6.2k tank has an enormous advantage over a 5.9k tank. There is very little tanking difference between a 7k and a 7.4k tank or between a 4.7k and a 5.1k tank against that same mob.
Warriors have been balanced against that bleeding edge of content based on a massive survivability difference between themselves and knights (count the hp gap and then multiply it by 1.3-1.45). That is what has screwed warriors.
Lets compare Paladins and Warriors. Geared in Class Specific Armors, through the expansions.
Era ................. HP Advantage
Original EQ ........ 14%
Velious .............. 19%
PoP ................... 08%
This is pretty accurate. In original EQ, the best equipped warriors and paladins both fully buffed were about 85/100 for hp comparitively. I would say that that gap has shrunk to about 5-8% for the best equipped of each class according to what I've seen here over the past months. I know you guys hate hearing it, but defensive is what killed that hp gap.
Why does a dedicated tank only qualify to be a better tank against a small specifically designed percentage of content whilst a generalist suffers no penalty verses the vast majority of content for his additional skills.
The answer is that it may be harder for a warrior to keep aggro than a knight, it is something that can be worked around, whereas it is simply not possible for a knight to tank things that can kill him in 1 round. Like I mentioned earlier, balancing for that small margin of survivability is always going to screw warriors, IMO.
-----------------------
Personally, I think that simply making the taunt skill work dramatically better against white and below mobs will be a massive boon to warriors and would go very far in addressing the problems warriors are facing. It wouldn't hurt to add some utility type skills ala /shield that have some real usefullness to help make adding a second warrior to a group a more attractive option. I do not think that further seperating the survivability between warriors and all the other classes in the game is what warriors really need, I think that would just further cement warriors as raid classes and nothing more.

Graal the Dorf

11-10-2003, 01:27 PM

quote:
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
So I get a choice.... either wear elemental arms all my existence (losing 50 raw HP) Wear pre-elemental mask all my existance (losing 80 raw HP) or lose greater than 7-8% of my total damage output (what happens when I ready ONE of my current LESSER spell foci!) due to not having those foci.
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Or you can spend 1150 Adventure points and snag a nice 40hp aug at Rujarkian, and make it all better.

I'm sorry Frodlin, that is a complete and utter bullshit argument. Would it be fair for paladins to be able to get 30 more hp than warriors on each piece of gear and then for me to say it is all balanced because "you can spend 1150 Adventure points and snag a nice 40hp aug at Rujarkian, and make it all better." No it isn't. I honestly don't know how the tradeoffs work at the time level because I'm not there, and I haven't looked into the loot options from time. I don't know whether Brik is talking out of his ass or not. Using +hp augments that can be used by any class as an argument isn't really valid as a rebuttal. "But then again, setting up strawmen isn't really my cup of tea."

Valeris

11-10-2003, 02:04 PM

Mana totals sure count when you're casting ahead of regen. The paladin i mentioned went OOM at least once (used the mod rod)therefore his mana total meant something, eh?

Actually, who says you should have a full set of foci and FT ever?

It's a choice, your own proofs show it certainly can't be that important of a choice, because all those top end geared Paladins and etc don't seem to be suffering terribly for the lack of it , eh?.

Furor

11-10-2003, 02:40 PM

Originally posted by Graal the Dorf
I don't really care about how much mana is on an item. The size of a casters mana pool is significantly less important than the speed with which that caster can regenerate mana. Here (http://forums.thedruidsgrove.org/showthread.php?threadid=5336) is a thread on the druids grove where pure casters argue the relative importance of hp versus mana. This is an indicative post from that thread:
"Right now I value hp roughly twice as much as mana; 1 hp = 2 mana. The way I see it:
Short fight...hp is all that really matters. I'm not likely to be able to burn all of my mana before the fight ends, and a larger mana pool would make little to no difference in the fight, while high hp makes it much more likely for me to survive early spot heals and AE's and such so that I can continue using the mana.
Long fight/crawl...mana pool adds very little to how much I can contribute, only affecting my "burst" spell usage; instead mana _regen_ is king. High hp is still important in any place that I'm likely to be hunting."
The size of your mana pool only affects burst mana expenditure, which is situationally important in a tiny fraction of encounters. If you look at hybrid spells, they are almost all spells with limited recast times (group heals can be cast every 30 seconds, ranger nukes can be cast every 30 seconds, paladin heal over time spells every 30 seconds, etc.). Hybrids generally CAN'T burst mana like pure casters can. A larger mana pool is nice, but it isn't really a big deal for a hybrid. We want FT.

That wasn't the size of his mana pool that allowed him to do that, it was the amount of mana regen he had. Let's assume he has a very big mana pool for a hybrid: 5k. Now let's assume he was using Wave of Marr, since it is our most efficient group heal. His mana pool would only allow him to cast that spell 5 times. Mana regen has to cover the rest. Flowing thought is so much more important than the size of mana pool to most casters. That mod rod you listed is powerful because it increases mana regen rate. BTW, the only time I generally go OOM is when I'm hit with an AE or curse that drains mana ala Babs in fire. Mana regen can generally keep up with my rate of mana expenditure in most situations. In fact, most of the time I'm sitting at full mana because I have very little to spend it on. Then again, I spend the vast majority of my time raiding.

If a paladin or SK chooses to outfit themselves mainly for FT at the expense of +atk and +hp gear, it can have a significant effect on their damage output and total hp. Making gear choices that give an extra 5 FT at the cost of 75 worn attack will have a significant effect. Less melee damage for greater mana regen. Many hybrids go this route. Often they will have less hp as a result as well. Just as a means to understand what I'm talking about a little better, try gaining 120 +atk, haste, and as much FT as you can in the non visible slots from those items I linked and other VT/Elemental items. Assume you are a paladin with full elemental gear, minus the breastplate. The challenge is, do it without using an aten neck or an aten BP. Don't forget distance focus, buff duration focus, and spell casting haste focus. If possible, try and get the GOOD focus effects for improved healing and mana preservation, instead of the basic focus effects provided on elemental armor.

Because Great Shadow Platemail drops every time doesn't it? Our guild has had 1 BP drop in over a year and half. Of course, it's easy to get the aten neck since it drops every time. No, wait. Every single other person in the guild wants it too. Hrmm. Check out my magelo, then look at the "future" profile I created. That is the gear I am looking to get to upgrade myself from mobs that we currently kill. I am focusing much more on hp, atk, AC, and resists (in that order) than I am focus effects and FT. This is assuming I would be awarded ALL of these drops. It would give me 235 atk from gear, only 15 below the cap. I would have FT 9, and 2 basic focus effects. If I completely ignored FT and focused even more on hp and +atk gear I could theoretically get about 100 more hp, 50 more raw AC, and I could cap my worn attack. Is that a large enough gap for a gain of 9 mana regen a tick? Is it too small of a tradeoff? That's a subjective judgement, and I'm not an impartial bystander, so I can't say.

You are looking at these knights in a vacuum. Compare the gains they make to the gains that a warrior in the same guild would make. The warrior is gaining more atk and more hp than the knight is for gear upgrades at the same stage of the game. That is assuming of course that both the warrior and the knight have the chance to pick and choose exactly what gear they want from that stage of the game. It also assumes that the knight chooses some caster centric items over melee centric items. Where that breaks down is when you start introducing Aten items into the mix. Being able to get vengeance 10 on a single item and being able to get 8 FT (and +ATK!) on a single item make it much easier to get the best of both worlds without having to make tradeoffs. THAT is the thing that is messed up. There are a few specific items that break that balance of having to choose between a caster effect and a melee effect.

All those knights have FT15, max INT/WIS (umm, who cares?) and have all of their focus effects...at the highest percentage? I somehow doubt that. Hell, there are 5 paladins on my server who have a 15 or greater unbuffed mana regen and that includes mana regen AAs. Generally without getting an aten neck, it aint happenin, not without making very large tradeoffs in other areas.
BTW, my guild's best 3 equipped warriors with magelo profiles have 7105, 6929, and 6692 unbuffed hp (One of our top 4 doesn't actually keep a magelo, but there is a good chance she is higher than 6692). Our highest hp paladins have 6072, 6019, and 5753 unbuffed hp. All of these people have have raided regularly for a long time. We have a warrior who joined the guild about a month ago with much lower quality gear. He's been in the guild for a month and has 5785 hp unbuffed. He has the lowest hp of all our active warriors, and yet he has more hp than all except the 2 best equipped paladins. Those are actual numbers from actual equipment, not some fantasy magelo where you can pick and choose whatever items you want.
Keep in mind, total hit points doesn't affect xp group efficiency very much at all unless the tank is borderline underequipped for the mobs he's fighting and then survivability becomes the main issue, not efficiency. Survivability is where the hit point gap can make a significant difference and in the situations in which added hp do affect survivability, small changes to total hit points can have a dramatic effect. The problem with using the hp gap and survivability differences to balance warriors and knights (which is what has been done) is the fact that if neither the warrior nor the knights are in that relatively small region where total hp makes a difference...that difference in hp is almost meaningless. If a mob can 1 round for 6k, a 6.2k tank has an enormous advantage over a 5.9k tank. There is very little tanking difference between a 7k and a 7.4k tank or between a 4.7k and a 5.1k tank against that same mob.
Warriors have been balanced against that bleeding edge of content based on a massive survivability difference between themselves and knights (count the hp gap and then multiply it by 1.3-1.45). That is what has screwed warriors.

This is pretty accurate. In original EQ, the best equipped warriors and paladins both fully buffed were about 85/100 for hp comparitively. I would say that that gap has shrunk to about 5-8% for the best equipped of each class according to what I've seen here over the past months. I know you guys hate hearing it, but defensive is what killed that hp gap.

The answer is that it may be harder for a warrior to keep aggro than a knight, it is something that can be worked around, whereas it is simply not possible for a knight to tank things that can kill him in 1 round. Like I mentioned earlier, balancing for that small margin of survivability is always going to screw warriors, IMO.
-----------------------
Personally, I think that simply making the taunt skill work dramatically better against white and below mobs will be a massive boon to warriors and would go very far in addressing the problems warriors are facing. It wouldn't hurt to add some utility type skills ala /shield that have some real usefullness to help make adding a second warrior to a group a more attractive option. I do not think that further seperating the survivability between warriors and all the other classes in the game is what warriors really need, I think that would just further cement warriors as raid classes and nothing more.

Spare me the nonsensical newbie chatter Graal. I wonder if you even buy what you're trying to sell. You cannot be this jaded, nobody can...

Graal the Dorf

11-10-2003, 02:57 PM

Care to present some arguments? By what criterion does my post qualify as "newbie chatter" pray tell? If I'm wrong, and you convince me that I'm wrong using something beyond a witty comment with no substance, I will gladly admit it.

Furor

11-10-2003, 03:03 PM

Originally posted by Graal the Dorf
Care to present some arguments? By what criterion does my post qualify as "newbie chatter" pray tell? If I'm wrong, and you convince me that I'm wrong using something beyond a witty comment with no substance, I will gladly admit it.

Convince you? Who the fuck do you think you're talking to? I refuse to rehash my arguments for the 1000th time. I'm done playing this game. I've addressed your bullshit on this board and on my own site, as well as a slew of other sites. If you want the answers, which I simply cannot believe you don't already know, do a search.

What bothers me, is YOUR idiotic argument was refuted in this VERY THREAD. Jesus Christ man pull your head out of your ass.

Play the Kunark card or something, it's less insulting than another idiot coming in here talking about Knightemization and the perils of 'choice.'

Ezedriel7th Ham

11-10-2003, 03:29 PM

The answer is that it may be harder for a warrior to keep aggro than a knight, it is something that can be worked around, whereas it is simply not possible for a knight to tank things that can kill him in 1 round. Like I mentioned earlier, balancing for that small margin of survivability is always going to screw warriors, IMO.

You know, getting killed in one round makes it hard for just about anyone to tank mobs.

But a paladin doesn't get one rounded if he is in appropriate gear, as is seen with Rallos Zek, Bertox, and Quarm.

And it's not like the paladin is taking inherintly more damage when they didn't even change the healing rotation on those three Time mobs...

so what exactly is your point?

That hypothetically speaking a paladin in raw hide would get one rounded and so warriors have an advantage?

Graal the Dorf

11-10-2003, 03:59 PM

Convince you? Who the fuck do you think you're talking to?

Apparently someone with a fucking ego problem. Personally, I thought I was talking to someone who ran a guild in everquest and has been wildly successful at doing so...which doesn't make you God's gift to fanbois everywhere. As soon as you display to me that running a high end guild requires using areas of the frontal lobe that no other activity in human endeavour requires, then I'll consider licking your boots, but not until then.

I refuse to rehash my arguments for the 1000th time. I'm done playing this game. I've addressed your bullshit on this board and on my own site, as well as a slew of other sites. If you want the answers, which I simply cannot believe you don't already know, do a search.

Ok, O King of the Internet, I'll do that. If you didn't want to "address my bullshit" then don't. If you aren't willing to engage in discussion, then don't pipe in with some smarmy remark dismissing someone's arguments out of hand with nothing other than your ego and charisma to back it up. If you aren't willing to engage in discussion, then don't.

What bothers me, is YOUR idiotic argument was refuted in this VERY THREAD. Jesus Christ man pull your head out of your ass. Play the Kunark card or something, it's less insulting than another idiot coming in here talking about Knightemization and the perils of 'choice.'

Where was it refuted? Quote it for me. I spoke about the elemental/VT game and the loot available there. I did not speak about the game at the time level because I have absolutely no experience there. It may very well be that every single piece of time armor has FT and foci on it without any sort of tradeoff to be made. I don't know. I never claimed to know. At the level of the game that I talked about, is it easy for a knight to max FT and vengeance while getting all the best available foci without having to pass up items that would give more AC/+ATK/hp? With an Aten neck and an Aten BP, sure. It is stupidly easy to do so with Aten loots. Without them? I can understand if you are going to argue that knights don't have to give up enough in terms of hp, AC, and/or +atk gear to gain those caster related benefits. I don't know what acceptable tradeoffs are because I'm biased. So are you. But to say that no tradeoffs need to be made for knights to get those effects is a pretty fucking "idiotic argument".

Fuck the Kunark card. I've never said that warriors should be a less viable choice than a knight as punishment for imbalances in Kunark. Try again. I have seen YOU argue that warriors should be the primary choice for tank in all situations. Best at absorbing damage, sure. Best all around *choice* all the time? No.

Ezedriel7th Ham

11-10-2003, 04:07 PM

Fuck the Kunark card. I've never said that warriors should be a less viable choice than a knight as punishment for imbalances in Kunark. Try again. I have seen YOU argue that warriors should be the primary choice for tank in all situations. Best at absorbing damage, sure. Best all around *choice* all the time? No.

The warrior needs to be the single best pure tank. He needs to take the damage best, keep the mob on him the best, and everything that entails. Period.

He shouldn't have to share this job, ever. When they go "Okay what do we want to tank?" The first thing to come to mind should be the warrior in exp groups, in raids, you name it.

The paladin should always support him, the group, you name it. Tank in some situations, but have those situations be few and far between.

The paladin wasn't made to be a tank, he was made to be a mixture between clerics and warriors, not the "I'm a warrior with spells". He shouldn't be as good at tanking as the warrior and he shouldn't be as good at healing as the cleric, but it should come in and balance itself out in the end.

Frodlin7th

11-10-2003, 04:46 PM

I'm sorry Frodlin, that is a complete and utter bullshit argument. Would it be fair for paladins to be able to get 30 more hp than warriors on each piece of gear and then for me to say it is all balanced because "you can spend 1150 Adventure points and snag a nice 40hp aug at Rujarkian, and make it all better." No it isn't. I honestly don't know how the tradeoffs work at the time level because I'm not there, and I haven't looked into the loot options from time. I don't know whether Brik is talking out of his ass or not. Using +hp augments that can be used by any class as an argument isn't really valid as a rebuttal. "But then again, setting up strawmen isn't really my cup of tea."

If I didn't have to put +CHA augments in many of my slots you would have a case. As it is now, +CHA is significantly more important than having +40 HPs. Therefore the arguement is moot.

Graal the Dorf

11-10-2003, 04:54 PM

DI is only castable on warriors? Or is that only warriors make a check against CHA to see if it fires successfully? I'm curious.

You know, getting killed in one round makes it hard for just about anyone to tank mobs.

But a paladin doesn't get one rounded if he is in appropriate gear, as is seen with Rallos Zek, Bertox, and Quarm.

And it's not like the paladin is taking inherintly more damage when they didn't even change the healing rotation on those three Time mobs...

so what exactly is your point?

That hypothetically speaking a paladin in raw hide would get one rounded and so warriors have an advantage?

You pretty much just illustrated what I was talking about:

"Keep in mind, total hit points doesn't affect xp group efficiency very much at all unless the tank is borderline underequipped for the mobs he's fighting and then survivability becomes the main issue, not efficiency. Survivability is where the hit point gap can make a significant difference and in the situations in which added hp do affect survivability, small changes to total hit points can have a dramatic effect. The problem with using the hp gap and survivability differences to balance warriors and knights (which is what has been done) is the fact that if neither the warrior nor the knights are in that relatively small region where total hp makes a difference...that difference in hp is almost meaningless. If a mob can 1 round for 6k, a 6.2k tank has an enormous advantage over a 5.9k tank. There is very little tanking difference between a 7k and a 7.4k tank or between a 4.7k and a 5.1k tank against that same mob.
Warriors have been balanced against that bleeding edge of content based on a massive survivability difference between themselves and knights (count the hp gap and then multiply it by 1.3-1.45). That is what has screwed warriors."

There has always been a narrow band of content versus equipment that allowed only a warrior to tank said content. That band is pretty damn small. Warriors have been balanced against that narrow band. I even illustrated that above. If it takes a minimum of x amount of hp to tank a mob and have a decent chance of success, if only warriors have greater than or equal to X amount of hp (including factoring in defensive) then only warriors can tank that content with any chance of success. As soon as any class other than a warrior gets x+1 hp, they become viable tanks for that mob, all other things being equal.

Warriors are balanced around the idea that they will be the only class able to tank certain content. The only way to do this is with a survivability difference relative to other classes. Since survivability is greatly influenced by gear, it is a moving target that they are aiming for. Unless gear upgrades offer no meaningful improvements to survivability, there will always be a time when ANY class can tank a mob that was once only tankable by a warrior. When guilds were first venturing into time, how many of the gods were tanked by knights? It is only after those knights get a massive increase in their chance to survive by farming the loot those mobs drop that they can now tank those mobs. Warriors tanking those mobs allowed the knights to get the gear to replace those warriors as tanks. Warriors were initially required to tank the mobs, they aren't any more. We haven't had another raid level expansion to move that band a little bit higher. There is no area of the game that requires warriors as tanks anymore (from what I've read here, I don't know firsthand). I personally think this is why warriors have been screwed up ever since VI (at the time) realised that defensive put them in a corner and started designing content around it. Any one else remember Furor's complaints about taunt shortly after FoH first entered ToV? Were complaints about taunt something of major substance before /disc defensive was put in the game? I don't recall them being so. Maybe a larger difference in survivability is a good method to balance out warriors, but I don't think so.

Graal the Dorf

11-10-2003, 05:02 PM

The warrior needs to be the single best pure tank. He needs to take the damage best, keep the mob on him the best, and everything that entails. Period.

He shouldn't have to share this job, ever. When they go "Okay what do we want to tank?" The first thing to come to mind should be the warrior in exp groups, in raids, you name it.

The paladin should always support him, the group, you name it. Tank in some situations, but have those situations be few and far between.

THIS is what I'm fighting against. The mentality that the warrior should be the best choice between a paladin, shadow knight, and a warrior in every situation. That the paladin or shadow knight is supposed to stand on the sidelines and wait until the warrior is no longer available to tank, or is occupied.

"He shouldn't have to share this job, ever"

What job would a paladin have in an xp group? Honestly? Warriors should have to compete with knights for xp groups. It should be a far more level playing field than it is now, but they should still have to compete with the other 2 plate tanks for the job of tank in an experience group. For xp groups, it really should be the first plate tank availabe gets the job.

"The first thing to come to mind should be the warrior in exp groups, in raids, you name it."

I'll be blunt. Fuck you. I don't think we will ever see this happen, fortunately.

Partha

11-11-2003, 12:14 AM

Make more content that plays to the strength of SK's and Paladins. Already they have more than enough tankability for XP groups, they don't need more. They could even do with a little less and still be viable.

EDIT - Vikos: Keep in mind that I'm a strong advocate of getting rid of even the idea of 'melee aggro-lock'.

Vikos

11-11-2003, 12:55 AM

You mean like the zones with large ammount of undeads? LDoN and PoP had a good share of those to the point that before PoP came out SoE was thinking of nerfin Slay Undead.

Mobs that require instant and on demand aggro so casters dont get plastered? PoP did just that alogn with LDoN hard adventures and raids.

MTing on elemental raids during clearing so casters can cut loose and kill quick without consequences? Thats old news.

MTing bosses that is not viable for a warrior to tank due to aggro issues? mobs that root, slow or simply proc so much that defensive is useless. Yup those things been there since PoP.

Knights Tanking the high end Time mobs while having aggro lock? Its happening.

Knights dont need jack shit on exp nor in raids. Knights have roles in raids a warrior cannot fill, not even with a full set of Time gear. Yet a knight can fill a warrior's role and surpass them with their control on aggro generation.

Oh yes knights are gonna get something. But its not gonna be MORE content designed to their strenghts. Its been 2 expansions of just that.

Halivon

11-11-2003, 04:56 AM

On top of the due fixes, warrirors should be given LoH and FD, not a lot, just one little thing of both knight classes, how about that? would it make such difference? ;=P

/disc defensive
/ready to take on flames

8=)

Ezedriel7th Ham

11-11-2003, 07:36 AM

THIS is what I'm fighting against.

Fight against it all you like but this is what sane people are and should be fighting for. It's what warriors signed up to be. They didn't sign up to be the "okay maybe he might sometimes be the best raw tank", they signed up to be the best raw tank.

The mentality that the warrior should be the best choice between a paladin, shadow knight, and a warrior in every situation.

In a situation that involves tanking alone? Leave it to the warrior, it's what he's supposed to do best and has nothing else in the game to do. The paladins have FAR more jobs than just to tank, and yet they want that ability to be at warrior efficiency or greater.

Pick and choose, do you want utility or do you want tankability?

That the paladin or shadow knight is supposed to stand on the sidelines and wait until the warrior is no longer available to tank, or is occupied.

Congratulations you have just stated exactly what second, third, and fourth warriors do on raids, and yet not what paladins do. Make the paladin the off take, the guy who breaks off and helps keep adds under control, that is a tanking job whether that's the one you want to or not.

In all actuality, knights do tank more than warriors, far more, and far more often. Knights, until now, just rarely tanked the main mob. And guess what's happening now.

What job would a paladin have in an xp group? Honestly?

Should I bother stating this or are you going to sit there and deny all of your utility to the point of non-existence?

Hate to break this to you, but stop pretending you're the one who invites you into groups, you seem to not grasp why they do so. A paladin doesn't need to be the best tank to get a group, he was doing fine in Velious and most of Kunark give or take a month or two.

He has back up/spam heals (which can be main heals in several zones), he has ressurections, he has group heals (don't deny their usefulness), they have HP buffs, they have crowd control. Groups where you may get unmezzable adds always desire paladins to tank the adds as well, why is this so illogical for you guys to grasp?

Why do our tasks have to be that of warriors? Because we recently began sitting smugly in their chair and suddenly like the feel of it? Well tough.

It's time to give them their jobs back and acknowledge that that wasn't our designed or primary role, it's what you guys decided to take advantage of.

Warriors should have to compete with knights for xp groups.

Now tell me with 100% honesty and not your high end fed BS...

Why isn't it fair for the paladin to bring utility + good tanking, the SK to bring DPS + good tanking, and the warrior to bring GREAT tanking?

Oh because "Oh dear me my utilities are no good"? Wrong, try again.

It should be a far more level playing field than it is now, but they should still have to compete with the other 2 plate tanks for the job of tank in an experience group.

What is balanced about being the best HP buffers, the best tanks, good healers, good rezzers, great crowd control, and great group heals? And then turning to warriors who aren't even great tanks any more?

Being a tank encompasses more than HPs and mitigation. A tank position requires superior aggro, the ability to take the hits properly in accordance with this aggro, the ability to make sure that the group doesn't need to spend too much mana on you, as well as allowing the group to optimize its efficiency.

Warriors do not optimize the efficiency, hold aggro, or necessarily optimize the mana costs of heals.

Paladins seem to not forget that in exp groups they can actually keep their targets from ever attacking them at al until the stun wears off. There's not a better tank ability than that anywhere. We can stop a target from attacking us. That doesn't seem like it could be powerful in any way? That can't possibly help us tank?

So on top of ALL of these abilities, you still want us to tank as well as or greater than warriors.

No, the warriors need to be the best at raw tanking, the paladin needs to pick between having all his spells/utilities and tanking, having both is BS.

For xp groups, it really should be the first plate tank availabe gets the job.

But it isn't, and won't be as long as Knights contribute equal tanking and utility.

This is very simple I can't fathome why you don't get it.

The knight, with more utility, should tank less. The warrior, with nothing but tanking, should tank more. Do I need to break it down for you further?

I'll be blunt. Fuck you. I don't think we will ever see this happen, fortunately.

And this is the crux of the issue. As soon as it finally comes down to this, this is what makes knights shit their pants. That they might not be the best tanks any more and they lash out.

Why should a knight tank as well as a warrior, receive utility, and have zero drawbacks?

Sylas

11-11-2003, 08:21 AM

Hi again. Joe Average non uber gamer here, Trying to represent Joe Little guy. Thanks Ezedriel for pointing out what I was trying to illustrate in my other post about fixing warriors. At this point in the games life cycle, with classes how they are from lvl 51 through lvl 65 with all states of gear from Bazaar to HoT to Luclin to Pop +, Joe warrior is Obsolete. I said it in my other post and I'll say it again here: If warriors today were given superior, ranged, snap aggro *lock* on the level of Paladins or SKs, I, and every other joe regular gamer out there, would STILL PREFER KNIGHTS as MTs. Aggro lock would basically put warriors on par for tanking ability (aggro+survivability), but warriors would still lack the 100% utility that Knights bring. In order to level the playing field in the perceptions of the general gamer populace out there, Warriors need far more utility in addition to zero risk aggro lock.

Guilds today that still use warriors to tank stuff, no matter their state of the game whether its Ssra or VT or Tier 2 pop or Elemental +, do you ever wonder, especially in merit loot guilds, what if the focus wasn't on warriors as MTs? Remember the SK who looted the BoW and the BS that came from that? That's a player stigma attached to items, 'X item is considered war only, must outfit MT as best to survive encounter first,' etc. The game, since Velious, certainly has not been designed for Warrior preferred Itemization. Will it take a Knight starting a merit-loot guild on a newbie server and MTing every encounter for them as they grow, from northToV through PoTime, in order to prove it? Come to think of it, that guild where the SK looted the BoW (which he didnt' want to do you all know the story) uses that SK as their Primary MT, and they've atleast gotten to elemental +.

jaosonspal

11-11-2003, 05:17 PM

I agree that Warriors should get some enhancement from Sony but not in Hp's or in DPS but in agro. I hear all the stuff about lower HP gap between Knights and Warriors and yet no mention of the Disc gap, as a Knight I have 4 disc's 3 of wich are almost useless. A warrior has 11 disc's several of which any knight would love to have. The Warrior is not only about AC and Hp's and any good group and all good raids would be well served to have a Warrior in them. As a Pally I know I can tank, but I also know that I can not tank as well as a Warrior of the same level. We each have advantages and limits and the key is to use what we have to our best abilities. As a Pally I will never be able to duel weild or Kick , my archery will never get above 75 and my disarm skill is useless after level 40. There are many things I can do that a warrior can't , but there are just as many things a warrior can do that I can not.
So if the question is should a warrior be able to gain agro as fast as a Pally or Sk , I say yes , if the question is shold a pally or Sk be nerfed so the mindless toons that don't understand the value of a warrior be forced to have a warrior in their group or sit and wait for one to be available , I say no.
If your going to compair classes don't just pick one area like Hp's to compair. This game is about playing your class and useing the skills you have and the stratigy that best suits who you have to work with. I for one will always welcome a Warrior in my groups because I know the value they bring.

Jao

Thaak

11-11-2003, 05:30 PM

Originally posted by jaosonspal
As a Pally I will never be able to duel weild or Kick , my archery will never get above 75 and my disarm skill is useless after level 40.
Duel Wield is slowly becoming obsolete, thanks to the upgrade in DPS 2handers have.

Archery we use for pulling only, and we wouldn't give a fuck if it was only lvl 1, for as long as it aggros the mob, we don't care.

Kick is THE ONLY other attack we have besides our weps, why the fuck do you care? You have detrimental spells that are 5 times better than fucking KICK.

Disarm? You want 250 disarm? Sure, great. I don't care. You can disarm those eleet LoY weps that are nonmagical, but that'll be it. Disarm is fucking WORTHLESS (well, there's some debate about whether or not it adds hate or not).

jaosonspal

11-11-2003, 06:02 PM

Well perhaps your whining due to you lack of understanding of the Warrior class. I for one have a lot of respect for warriors and if you want to pick and chose what parts to reply to , have at it. The fact is that warriors have now and will always have skills and Disc that Pally/SK won't have , a good warrior knows how to use them to his advantage just as a good Pally knows how to use his skills to his advantage. If this is about envy, I pity you. You think that if Sony nurfs the Pally/SK class you will be wanted again in groups, well all I can say is that if are useing you skills well now you should be a welcome addition to any group , if your not you won't be now or even after some nerf. It seems I have more respect for the Warrior class than you do, and that is a shame.

Jao

Daemonwynd

11-11-2003, 06:02 PM

Kick? you want to talk about kick? Fine, let's TALK about kick.

Kick was a tool/skill for warriors that dates back to the original game, back when the 8/24 "uber" weapons weren't even obtainable yet. The damage that it put out was balanced FOR the weapons of the day, and in its time was actually considered worthwhile to use. This tool/skill has since been utterly ignored and not updated expansion after expansion, so that this skill which WAS balanced now nears irrelevancy while the devs are focused on giving casters new tools after new tools, expansion after expansion. Kick is a PERFECT example of how melees have been ignored for new tools and toys, while casters get updated and given new and updated tools. While weapon damage has double, tripled, and sometimes even more, kick still does the same damage it does in the original game. How bloody hard is it to change the damage range for this skill, or, better yet, actually GIVE us skills past level 35, so that we actually have something to look forward to for the next 30 levels?

Kick. /snorts in disgust

Imagine not having any of the spells that ANY of the expansions have given you as casters, and then talk to me about how pure melee don't need updating.

Aldarion_Shard

11-11-2003, 06:06 PM

It seems I have more respect for the Warrior class than you do, and that is a shame.

No, you have a complete goddam lack of understanding of the warrior class, and based on this, you overestimate it.

We have higher weapon skills, which do nothing to make us better than knights in this area.
We have higher taunt cap, which does nothing to make us better than knights in this area.
We have kick, which does nothing to make us better than knights in this area.
We have dual wield, but 2hs is so much better that again, this does nothing to make us better than knights in this area.

Come back when you know what these skills actually do for us.

Making a list of skills warriors have that knights dont is all well and good, until you realize the truth: that all these extra skills actually amount to one thing: we make coffee better than knights, and that is ALL.

Thaak

11-11-2003, 06:11 PM

Originally posted by jaosonspal
Well perhaps your whining due to you lack of understanding of the Warrior class. I for one have a lot of respect for warriors and if you want to pick and chose what parts to reply to , have at it. The fact is that warriors have now and will always have skills and Disc that Pally/SK won't have , a good warrior knows how to use them to his advantage just as a good Pally knows how to use his skills to his advantage. If this is about envy, I pity you. You think that if Sony nurfs the Pally/SK class you will be wanted again in groups, well all I can say is that if are useing you skills well now you should be a welcome addition to any group , if your not you won't be now or even after some nerf. It seems I have more respect for the Warrior class than you do, and that is a shame.

Jao
I hope you're smarter in real like than you are about EverQuest, because you are an idiot.

Coravix

11-12-2003, 01:58 AM

Okay, I'm not a god tank, I'm just your avg 59th lvl Warrior but I do have 1 thing to point out in all of this.

A LOT of this argument seems to be based around the mathmatical formulas (etc.) on the hp difference between Wars and Knights. So far there seems to be a general concensus that there is roughly 300-1k (using a wide, general number here to make all watching happy) hp difference between Wars and Knights. This is depending on who you talk to and whose formula you believe, and the general AC seems to be about even between the 3 classes.

Maybe I am totally and completely wrong here but... What good is having 300-1k more hps and a few more AC..

IF WE CAN'T KEEP *&^$#* AGGRO?????

If we're not the ones getting hit, ***WTF*** does even 1k more hps do us?

Personally, I have no problem if Knights have as many hps as I do although I will admit it would be nice if a class designed *specifically* to be a damage sponge was significantly better at it than a class that was not. The part I have a problem with is that Wars have to work our fingers to the bone trying to keep aggro when a Knight can get aggro from us with minimal effort.

Ask *ANY* PoP exp group which they would rather have as MT.. a war with 7k hps, or a Knight with 6500hp. Personally, when I play my ranger (who still has to melee as no AM3 yet), unless it is a warrior that I know, I would rather have the knight.

-me

Frodlin7th

11-12-2003, 06:12 AM

DI is only castable on warriors? Or is that only warriors make a check against CHA to see if it fires successfully? I'm curious.

Graal, now you're just being stubborn for the sake of being stubborn. Really, you are. Let me spell this out for you. Warriors still "generally" tank boss mobs, and it's really our "big" role since you've replaced us in groups. Warriors for the most part are going to have on their minds the dire need for Charisma every time they consider an augment for their armor, because they eat, sleep and shit "you have been rescued by divine intervention". I have Innate natural Charisma and Advanced Innate natural charisma AA skills maxed, and I did so before doing a SINGLE offensive AA. Can you or any other paladin say the same? I'm betting not a single one. How many +Cha augments do you have? I'd be willing to bet that I have a LOT more than you.

Would you like to compare logs with me to see which one of us has had DI cast on them more? I'd really like that.

Why is this? Well, it's simple really, we buy it in PoK. Yes, kind of near the KEI whores, there's the little known "Divine Intervention Committee" which used to be conveniently located near our snareturd recharging vendor. We say a secret word, and the clerics inside have one of their 2-boxed rogue alts pick the lock and we come in, hand them an emerald and 50pp and get Divine Intervention. This way, we can gain experience for the next 6 minutes, if there's a blue mob we can kill. This is what has compensated us since PoP was released for our inability to find groups. We even get a Charisma buff for no extra charge, the thing is, we're running out of money, which is why the issue of us finding groups is now becoming so crucial. Warriors serverwide cannot afford the cost of emeralds and DI every 6 minutes, so we're devising a new strategy. This is known as "Trying to convince Sony that we should be able to tank in exp groups without being a danger to everyone in the zone". Furor did a /random one day and according to the Friends of Dionne Warwick psychic chart, when he got a number 354, it told him to play track 3 of Zamfir, Master of the Pan Flute, and listen to the 29th word which would have been in the song had it been lyricized like in the original. Well, it turns out that word was 'Taunt", from there we determined that the best way to begin bringing warriors back into financial solidarity by having us group instead of seeing the secret Divine Intervention committee was to ask for better aggro, and augment our armor with Charisma so we'd get the best prices.

Now you know the secret.

Frodlin7th

11-12-2003, 06:15 AM

Also,

You glossed over the ENTIRE "opportunity is not a penalty" argument. Perhaps that was written on your monitor illegibly behind faded red letters and you need some of those cool red glasses to make out the words, where should I send them?

Valeris

11-12-2003, 06:31 AM

Why is this? Well, it's simple really, we buy it in PoK. Yes, kind of near the KEI whores, there's the little known "Divine Intervention Committee" which used to be conveniently located near our snareturd recharging vendor. We say a secret word, and the clerics inside have one of their 2-boxed rogue alts pick the lock and we come in, hand them an emerald and 50pp and get Divine Intervention. This way, we can gain experience for the next 6 minutes, if there's a blue mob we can kill. This is what has compensated us since PoP was released for our inability to find groups. We even get a Charisma buff for no extra charge, the thing is, we're running out of money, which is why the issue of us finding groups is now becoming so crucial. Warriors serverwide cannot afford the cost of emeralds and DI every 6 minutes, so we're devising a new strategy. This is known as "Trying to convince Sony that we should be able to tank in exp groups without being a danger to everyone in the zone". Furor did a /random one day and according to the Friends of Dionne Warwick psychic chart, when he got a number 354, it told him to play track 3 of Zamfir, Master of the Pan Flute, and listen to the 29th word which would have been in the song had it been lyricized like in the original. Well, it turns out that word was 'Taunt", from there we determined that the best way to begin bringing warriors back into financial solidarity by having us group instead of seeing the secret Divine Intervention committee was to ask for better aggro, and augment our armor with Charisma so we'd get the best prices.

i can see the single line brush off for this coming but.. lmao. :D

Shadowfrost

11-12-2003, 06:35 AM

Yup, that paragraph was absolutely hilarious. ;)

Frodlin7th

11-12-2003, 06:35 AM

As a Pally I will never be able to duel weild or Kick

You get 2h bash AA skill, which is in essence giving you that 3rd attack without sacrificing a god damned thing.

Dont' you DARE talk to me about AA costs. You guys get quite a fucking bargain on the ol class aa cost tree. It never even dawned on me how much warriors were getting FUCKED UP THE ASS on class AA skill costs until someone brought it up. Paladins have a grand total of TWO class skills that cost 3/6/9. Slay Undead and Double Riposte. Wanna talke to me about warrior class AA skill costs?

Bandage Wound... after dumping 3 points into First Aid, we pay 3/6/9 to almost double the amount healed per bandage. EIGHTEEN POINTS OF AA'S SO I CAN HEAL 30 MORE HITPOINTS OUT OF MY 9000 PER 10 seconds.

Double Riposte: Same as you, 3/6/9

Flurry: 3/6/9 after doing Combat Fury 3 which has NOT A GOD DAMN THING TO DO WITH FLURRY WHATSOEVER.

Warcry: 3/6/9 for.... get this bullshit... 15 seconds of fear immunity for a group, whereas you and your SK buddies get Fearless, permanent immunity from fear for... 6 points period.

Yeah, you won't ever get kick, you'll get just as good for a whopping 6 AA points. I won't get lay hands for 6AA points.

Graal the Dorf

11-12-2003, 11:44 AM

Graal, now you're just being stubborn for the sake of being stubborn. Really, you are. Let me spell this out for you. Warriors still "generally" tank boss mobs, and it's really our "big" role since you've replaced us in groups. Warriors for the most part are going to have on their minds the dire need for Charisma every time they consider an augment for their armor, because they eat, sleep and shit "you have been rescued by divine intervention". I have Innate natural Charisma and Advanced Innate natural charisma AA skills maxed, and I did so before doing a SINGLE offensive AA. Can you or any other paladin say the same? I'm betting not a single one. How many +Cha augments do you have? I'd be willing to bet that I have a LOT more than you.

*I'm* being stubborn? The point is that if paladins are going to tank raid level content, they need DI to do so even MORE than warriors do. Your paragraph did nothing but point out exactly how important DI is for raid tanking. At the same time, you relegate DI to something that only warriors need. Let me ask you straight up: if experience group tanking is balanced between knights and warriors, should warriors still be the only ones capable of tanking non trivial raid mobs? Not the best at it, not the most efficient...the only ones capable. Be very careful how you answer that. You did want parity in experience groups, right?

Also,

You glossed over the ENTIRE "opportunity is not a penalty" argument. Perhaps that was written on your monitor illegibly behind faded red letters and you need some of those cool red glasses to make out the words, where should I send them?

I never "glossed over" anything. I thought it blindingly obvious that any available choice was only a good thing, simply because it allows you the freedom to pick what you think is the most important for the advancement of your character. I don't think many people are going to make a gear choice if it is going to reduce their effectiveness. I'm sorry I didn't explicitly state "the sky is blue" simply because I thought only an idiot wouldn't realise it. I'll remember not to rely upon your judgement any more and to be pedantically, punctiliously obvious in all of my further posts. If for some reason I miss a minor detail, assume that if I don't specifically take issue with something you say that either I agree or that I don't have great confidence that what you say is either wrong or spurious.

The only real problem I have with hybrids having more gear based benefits to juggle is the concern that hybrids will be balanced against pure melee assuming they have the same amount of +atk, AC, +hp and other effects/benefits on gear...and yet at the same time be balanced against casters assuming that we have full FT and all foci. I think the ability to max all of those things at once with very little tradeoff (even if the items are rare or extremely difficult to get) is what makes it hard for SOE *not* to have to balance that way. The aten neck is even worse in terms of item design than AoW monk pants, IMO. It should have been a rotating turn in that was either melee centric OR caster centric. Being able to get massive amounts of FT or +atk on single items is just as bad. Vengeance 10 on 1 item, regardless of how rare it is, essentially makes the hybrid who gets it overpowered...or it makes all the hybrids who don't underpowered. I've mentioned before that I don't know how itemization is in time, but if they made more items analagous to the aten neck or BP, then yes, they fucked up royally. If there was a strict tradeoff where a hybrid could only get X amount of FT if they Y amount of +atk and vice versa *OR* if it wasn't very difficult to max both +atk and FT/Foci but that it was taken into account when balance decisions were made, it wouldn't be so bad. Trying to balance against a hybrid who has maxed FT, all Foci at the highest level, and maxed atk and hp when they are rare is only going to introduce an imbalance either at the high end or the low end. It's like balancing warrior taunt. At what level do you balance it? Do you balance it for the warrior with no EB weapon or for the warrior weilding an anger 3 augmented BoW? If EB weapons were relatively common, it would be easier to make that decision. Keep in mind that EB weapons are orders of magnitude more common than a hybrid who has maxed atk, FT, AND foci.

i can see the single line brush off for this coming but.. lmao.

Yes, Valeris...it was mildly amusing. It was also a load of horseshit.

Frodlin, I can't comment with great confidence on the relative cost of class specific AAs, I don't know enough about them to do so. I will say that generally I agree more than I disagree from what I do know, especially in regards to monks. I will say that I don't think it is nearly as bad as you make it out to be. Stalwart Endurance and Tactical Mastery seem to offer a very large benefit for a very reasonable cost, at least at first glance. I know I would be willing to pay much more for both of those than the cost warriors currently pay for them. I may misunderstand their effectiveness, I don't know.

Yeah, you won't ever get kick, you'll get just as good for a whopping 6 AA points. I won't get lay hands for 6AA points.

Are you honestly comparing kick to lay hands or are you being specious again?

Frodlin7th

11-12-2003, 12:07 PM

*I'm* being stubborn? The point is that if paladins are going to tank raid level content, they need DI to do so even MORE than warriors do. Your paragraph did nothing but point out exactly how important DI is for raid tanking. At the same time, you relegate DI to something that only warriors need.

It's something only warriors concern themselves with at this time. Tonight, let's log onto the the Paladin channel, I'll ask some simple, non-hostile questions about AA points and spending adventure points on augs, and you tell me after said discussion if Paladins have the same concern for Cha as warriors.

Let me ask you straight up: if experience group tanking is balanced between knights and warriors, should warriors still be the only ones capable of tanking non trivial raid mobs? Not the best at it, not the most efficient...the only ones capable. Be very careful how you answer that. You did want parity in experience groups, right?

The answer isn't nearly as simple as "yes/no". It is painfully obvious to me at least that warriors should tank and be asked to tank a much higher percentage of raid level mobs than either knight, since the alternative role for warriors is merely turning on attack, whereas both SK's and Paladins have other roles. As long as others have a wider raid role than warriors, then warriors should have a deeper one than others, except in special circumstances.

And as far as comparing kick to Lay Hands.... I'm commenting on how a Paladin skill that they get early in their careers hasn't been doled out and dished out to everyone through AA's like every warrior skill has been.

Graal the Dorf

11-12-2003, 12:42 PM

And as far as comparing kick to Lay Hands.... I'm commenting on how a Paladin skill that they get early in their careers hasn't been doled out and dished out to everyone through AA's like every warrior skill has been.

Warriors were the only ones to have kick? Knights never had bash before getting the 2 handed bash AA? Knights don't gain a new askill, they get to use an ability they already had in situations that they couldn't previously. How is that a warrior ability being "doled out"?

Frodlin7th

11-12-2003, 07:31 PM

Warriors were the only ones to have kick? Knights never had bash before getting the 2 handed bash AA? Knights don't gain a new askill, they get to use an ability they already had in situations that they couldn't previously. How is that a warrior ability being "doled out"?

Warriors were the only tank class with a 3rd attack. Now the other two tank classes do. You know this, I know this, we all know this, quit with the ridiculous nitpicking. Read this again. You didnt' have a 3rd attack until your epic, which should have NEVER given the ability. Then it was given to you as an AA to use with any weapon, thereby lowering the value of warriors, as you didn't need to make any choices or sacrifices to do what we do which separated us.

Warriors had innate critical hits, only, alone, no one else had them. Now everyone does, and not only that, most whio have them put warriors to shame with them.

Pure melee were the only ones with disciplines WHICH THEY SHOULD HAVE ALWAYS BEEN, hybrid discs are fucking idiotic since by nature hybrids are undisciplined in a single area.

Frodlin7th

11-12-2003, 08:39 PM

Stalwart Endurance and Tactical Mastery seem to offer a very large benefit for a very reasonable cost, at least at first glance

They're both quite nice, but they're not class AA skills, they're Planar, I was talking about class skills, the expensive ones.

uhrlik

11-12-2003, 08:45 PM

The ones we can't pay for if we can't get groups. :D

Tugurok

11-13-2003, 12:03 AM

Hey Graal, if you get parity in raid tanking, can I have parity in loh, rez, root, buffs, cures, stuns, fast heals, group heals, and quad damage undead?

Frodlin7th

11-13-2003, 01:38 AM

Actually,

let me take it one step further.... it is an outrage that Kights get a melee attack of ANY kind that warriors dont' get at all (2h bash).

Brael

11-13-2003, 02:50 AM

I doubt theres many Knights who would care about sharing 2h bash with other melee classes. For all I care give it to casters even, it's not exactly a huge skill. Would you use it over kick if you had access to it considering that you generate equal damage with the two skills, generate far more aggro with kick, and are able to interrupt spells with kick also?

Fitemore

11-13-2003, 03:11 AM

How do you think we generate far more aggro with kick than bash? Also, bash *seems* to more consistantly interupt spells.

Brael

11-13-2003, 03:55 AM

Was under the impression kick was changed to give you more aggro in Velious when the changes to the skill were implemented.

Valeris

11-13-2003, 10:32 AM

I don't think kick provides a great deal of aggro from experience with it :p

Graal the Dorf

11-13-2003, 03:59 PM

Hey Graal, if you get parity in raid tanking, can I have parity in loh, rez, root, buffs, cures, stuns, fast heals, group heals, and quad damage undead?

Sure, assuming paladins also get the exact same hp modifier as warriors, all gear that has either paladin or warrior now has both, paladins get all the same skill caps and AAs as warriors, and paladins get all the same disciplines warriors get. You can have our disciplines for free, even if we never do end up with anything resembling raid tanking parity. ;)

We'll just change the name of both classes to palawarrior, or maybe warridin.

quad damage undead
Eh? Can paladins get this too?

Furor

11-13-2003, 04:16 PM

Originally posted by Graal the Dorf
Sure, assuming paladins also get the exact same hp modifier as warriors, all gear that has either paladin or warrior now has both, paladins get all the same skill caps and AAs as warriors, and paladins get all the same disciplines warriors get. You can have our disciplines for free, even if we never do end up with anything resembling raid tanking parity. ;)

We'll just change the name of both classes to palawarrior, or maybe warridin.

Eh? Can paladins get this too?

You're still talking?

Apparanty Graal is stuck in a timewarp, circa the year 2000. While you're there, let me just give you some advice - DON'T HOLD ON TO YOUR DOT.COM STOCKS FOOL! SELL HIGH DON'T LOOK BACK!

When you get back to the year 2003, share the secrets of time travel with me, we will make millions.

Graal the Dorf

11-13-2003, 05:36 PM

Again with your pointless drivel? What was that supposed to add to the discussion Egoboy?

Yes, I'm still talking. More importantly, I am still discussing the situation based on logic and reason. Feel free to disagree with my logic and reason. Feel free to correct me if you think I'm wrong. In fact, feel free to kiss my ass if you are going to waste my time with your banal chatter, Egoboy.

You remind me of Jesse Jackson (when he was younger). He had nothing of any substance to say, but when he talked, it sure did rhyme well.

Or are you going to ask me "Who the fuck do you think you're talking to?"

Daemonwynd

11-13-2003, 06:53 PM

Furor

11-14-2003, 02:25 AM

EDIT: You're right, not gonna assist in dragging this forum into the dumpster.

Goladus

11-14-2003, 03:19 AM

And I'll apologize to the mods right now for this post.Well yeah because this board is for discussion, not coming in to flame people that say something you don't like.

The only antagonist I see here is Furor, and maybe that Brik guy although I skipped over all his posts. Christ Furor it doesn't even look like you actually read what he wrote in the first place, you just gathered a general impression and guessed that it might be disagreeing with you. At that point you figured it would be best to flame the shit out of the motherfucker just in case. If you want to do that, use your own forums.

Fitemore

11-14-2003, 03:24 AM

Basically at this point, both the Outhouse and The War Room are full of posts that have gone past reasoning and making suggestions to the point that they're useless. All this stuff has been hashed and rehashed. We're now at the stage that we might as well flame each other to pass the time until something changes.

Furor

11-14-2003, 03:50 AM

EDIT: Ditto, see previous post.

If you want flames, I'll meet you in the outhouse, otherwise continue with the same old tired song and dance routine.

Wyvernwill

11-17-2003, 07:39 PM

Normally, I tend to avoid reading many forums about EQ as I tend to start to grow more and more bitter towards people in general.

There are a few things I have learned reading through these forums over today and a couple thoughts that I would like to interject in the hopes of avoiding possible problems that have occurred on both sides of the coin to both Knights and Warriors now. That is... Uselessness.

There was a time, up until Mid Velious that Knights were deemed useless until they hit 60, then they were semi-suitable tanks for Warriors and only the better Knights could handle things that Warriors could exp groups and raids, raids it was almost suicide for a Knight to tank.

When AA came out, and later yet, level 65, those roles reversed. Combat Stability and Combat Agility made Knights gain an innate boost to their defensive powers, though Warriors got the same gain, the area Warriors did not gain was the ability to keep up with the agro rate of your average casters. When PoP came out Lightning Reflexes and Innate Defenses hit, it made defensive an almost unneccessary ability for *average* raid mobs. Once again, Warriors did not gain the ability to generate agro fast enough to keep up and that gap widened.

The gap in Hps is meaningless to tell you the truth. Give a PoTime warrior 20k hps and keep Knights at 10k. It doesnt really matter. Hit Points will not matter ever for Warriors beyond 11k in PoP.

From what I have seen, the attention and focus is not so much on fixing Warriors and making them more desireable, but on nerf'ing the hell out of Knights.

The focus should be on a Warrior having the ability to protect their groups moreso than they can now. Shield IMO was more of a slap in the face to Warriors than giving them nothing... atleast that is how I viewed that ability.

There is no way to take away from a Knight that will make them on par with Warriors short of removing every ability they have over a Warrior. Remove the spell book, remove their class abilities and then you have basically what Knights use to be, worthless amorphous blobs.

There is no way possible to make Warriors the only and supreme choice for exp groups. My apologies for being pessimistic, but it is not possible. A lvl 65 LDoN adventure mob(normal) hits for 400 dmg tops. Any melee based character, with the exception of a Rogue could tank that as long as they can generate the agro.

To make a Knight a non viable tank for those, you would have to remove all defensive AAs and cut their hit points down to the supreme Knights maxing at 7k. If that is what happens, I gaurantee you ever Knight in the game would quit, but hey, that seems to be what the overall idea behind what everyone wants.

Hybrids are inherently powerful, and most are far more powerful than their parent class/es at something. Points below:

Rangers = Wide open spots quickly become the kings of DPS while having Trueshot running.

Beastlords = More DPS than a Monk, able to slow well enough to be the only slower in a group and buffs almost on par with a Shaman

Bards = Probably the most dangerous Hybrid period if played properly.

Shadowknights = Defensive Tank by definition. Takes hits better than other hybrids as well as some damage out put from DoTs, no where near it's parent classes when looking at combined DPS or damage mitigation.

Paladins = Defensive Tanks by definition. Heals and Stuns prevent a high amount of damage and generate high agro. Still can not tank as well as Warriors, not heal anywhere near as well as clerics.

My point in all of this is fairly simple. Ask for the tools to do "your" job right. Do not be asking for the tools of other classes to be taken away because of the inherent differences in every class and their abilities.

Personally, I don't care about tanking on raids. If I am given the opportunity, I give it my all and try not to let my guild and the raid down. Offtanking is what I do best and what I enjoy doing. Contrary to the beliefs of most... I really don't see many Knights as wanting to drive Warriors out of EQ. This is a game where people work together for a common goal, not my class is so much more uber than your class.

I do hope that SoE wakes the f up and gives pure melee the upgrades needed finally, but I do also hope that it doesn't ruin the character I love playing most also.

Ezedriel7th Ham

11-18-2003, 01:52 PM

Trust a paladin to not even mention all his spells... trying to keep his spellbook to himself when he wants to get defensive... thinking that if pallies had everything a warriors have, but not giving warriors the spellbook, that that somehow doesn't matter, that there will still be balance, honest.

Off the top of my head the ones I think should be dealt with:

-Cease [Remove it's ability to generate aggro on immune mobs]
-Desist [Ditto]
-Holy Might [Ditto]
-Stun (the spell name) [Ditto]
-Quellious' Word of Tranquility [Ditto]
-Force of Akilae [Ditto]
-Valor of Marr [Remove it, it's not even fair that we should get a greater innate haste than eyepatch of plunder]
-Aura of the Crusader [Remove it, it serves no purpose other than to overpower knights]
-Ethereal Cleansing [Jesus H. Christ remove this piece of crap spell for my sake]
-Quellious' Word of Serenity [Remove the amount of push generated by this thing. There's no excuse for this spell ruining a Mystical Arbitor raid]
-All Symbol Spells [Make a paladin make due with what he's got]

Those are just the ones off the top of my head, I'm sure there's more that need to be corrected.

Aeka

11-18-2003, 02:19 PM

Thank you for making stuns that much easier to use! I like that idea...go with it! ^_^

And also, I was under the impression Druids and Shamans were irriated at Etheral Cleansing. *shrug* Whatever works.

Partha

11-18-2003, 02:20 PM

What part of immune do you still not understand?

Wyvernwill

11-18-2003, 04:43 PM

-Cease [Remove it's ability to generate aggro on immune mobs]
-Desist [Ditto]
-Holy Might [Ditto]
-Stun (the spell name) [Ditto]
-Quellious' Word of Tranquility [Ditto]
-Force of Akilae [Ditto]
-Valor of Marr [Remove it, it's not even fair that we should get a greater innate haste than eyepatch of plunder]
-Aura of the Crusader [Remove it, it serves no purpose other than to overpower knights]
-Ethereal Cleansing [Jesus H. Christ remove this piece of crap spell for my sake]
-Quellious' Word of Serenity [Remove the amount of push generated by this thing. There's no excuse for this spell ruining a Mystical Arbitor raid]
-All Symbol Spells [Make a paladin make due with what he's got]

All I have to say to this is... HELLO!? What do you not understand that Paladins have access to CLERIC SPELLS? People like you really don't understand the simple basic fact of what a Paladin is. Ok, remove the agro from Stuns, big deal, If you really think that will even remotely slow down Paladin agro you are a bigger fool than your post implies. Paladin agro is not solely based on stuns, they are one of the more common. I mean hell, while you are at it... Remove us getting the Shield of Words line AND the Heroism line.

As for stuns... if you think that making them lose agro when a mob is immune will fix a problem... you are only looking at raids. Exp groups, 90% of mobs are not immune to the top two stuns anyway... some awesome fix there!

Oh hey! How about another series of things to remove. Throw away Slay Undead. Paladins should have a MAX hit with a 60 dmg weapon of 100. Let's make it so their 1 handers average 16/30 with -100 hps on shields. How about we get rid of the Pious Might and Ward of Nife line too... adds too much DPS. Let's make Expel undead the lvl 65 Paladin Undead Nuke. Oh yeah, while we are at it... Let's make Flame of light only a 50DD nuke as it's WAY overpowered at 125 dmg!

Omg Valor of Marr... How often do I use that? When I am soloing or farming... which is almost never because solo'ing as a Paladin is a waste of time when you can solo, and farming, who the hell cares if we have a few % more haste than the piece of crap eyepatch spell. What is a beastlords innate haste spells again?

If Paladins are dumb enough to use QWoS/QWoT on raids where push is a problem, they deserve to be smacked upside the head.

Ethereal Cleansing? Not even a Paladin spell.

It's funny how a Paladin himself is bitching about being overpowered? Maybe you need to take a step back a few years and learn what it was like when Knights in general were the scum of EQ. It's finally nice to have some use in raids and in group settings. Quit trying to nerf your own class into oblivion again and take a minute to learn wtf you are.

Paladins and Shadowknights have been given tools to make them better. Instead of throwing around your hands pointing at shit to nerf that will never be nerfed, take some time to think about what things would give Warriors the tools THEY NEED to improve their class.

uhrlik

11-18-2003, 04:56 PM

Who are you kidding? Knights are still the scum of EQ. You've got all these nifty new bells and whistles, but nothing else has changed.

Oh, and as far as Partha being a fool: At least he can make a point without resorting to hystronics and posts of ludicrous length.

...and he can figure out how to close a quote tag...

Ezedriel7th Ham

11-18-2003, 05:06 PM

All I have to say to this is... HELLO!? What do you not understand that Paladins have access to CLERIC SPELLS?

Yes, I know this. And? Your point is what? That because they have access to cleric spells they should somehow be as powerful as a cleric? Or is it that their spells should give them a significant HP advantage? Or are you one of those who believe that paladins should be able to narrow the HP/AC gap to warriors?

People like you really don't understand the simple basic fact of what a Paladin is.

Do you want the historical, fantasy, EQ or mechanical lay down of what a paladin is?

Ok, remove the agro from Stuns, big deal, If you really think that will even remotely slow down Paladin agro you are a bigger fool than your post implies.

Cease and desist are 15 and 25m for aggro that a wizard can't take from us. You are honestly going to tell me people don't use those? Or that they don't help a paladin at all?

Who's post is the foolish one?

Paladin agro is not solely based on stuns, they are one of the more common.

Wait wait...let me guess...paladin aggro is based on...

TAUNT?!?!?!

I mean hell, while you are at it... Remove us getting the Shield of Words line AND the Heroism line.

If that's what you really want.

As for stuns... if you think that making them lose agro when a mob is immune will fix a problem... you are only looking at raids. Exp groups, 90% of mobs are not immune to the top two stuns anyway... some awesome fix there!

See the thing is, I don't hunt in Paludal Caverns. Nothing that *I* hunt will cease or desist ever land on. The bare minimum of what I fight is general 59-65. Cease and Desist cap at 55.

I have no old stuns that I can use that will stop a mob in its tracks.

Oh hey! How about another series of things to remove. Throw away Slay Undead. Paladins should have a MAX hit with a 60 dmg weapon of 100.

Okay I am seriously questioning your level here. Until very recently I used a 35 damage weapon...which hit for 235 quite frequently.

I now use a 31 damage weapon which hits for an average of 110, with hits as high as 210.

Get to level 55, maybe then you'll see some hits greater than 100.

Let's make it so their 1 handers average 16/30 with -100 hps on shields. How about we get rid of the Pious Might and Ward of Nife line too... adds too much DPS. Let's make Expel undead the lvl 65 Paladin Undead Nuke. Oh yeah, while we are at it... Let's make Flame of light only a 50DD nuke as it's WAY overpowered at 125 dmg!

Sure, again if that's what you really want, but that is your statement, not mine.

Omg Valor of Marr... How often do I use that?

how often does a warrior use an eyepatch of plunder? And yet how often do you see people slaving away for it?

Don't begin to question the stupidity of this spell. Whether you use it or not does not negate the fact that it IS in your arsenal of spells to use at whim, warriors don't get that luxuary.

When I am soloing or farming... which is almost never because solo'ing as a Paladin is a waste of time when you can solo, and farming, who the hell cares if we have a few % more haste than the piece of crap eyepatch spell. What is a beastlords innate haste spells again?

Am I a beast lord? Are you SERIOUSLY trying to bring in beast lords into a class balance discussion? "Well a beast lord has it, why shouldn't I?" Yeah, that's a good one.

I'll enlighten you to something.

Every bit of haste helps. If you aren't utilizing this ability when another haste is on hand, then you are misusing the spells you have. That's not a fault of the spell, that's a fault of you.

If Paladins are dumb enough to use QWoS/QWoT on raids where push is a problem, they deserve to be smacked upside the head.

I agree. I still would like to see the push reduced regardless.

Ethereal Cleansing? Not even a Paladin spell.

http://lucy.fnord.net/spell.html?id=3683&source=Live

Here's the quest where you get it:

http://everquest.allakhazam.com/db/quest.html?quest=2383

Want screenshots from my spell book?

It's funny how a Paladin himself is bitching about being overpowered?

Yes that's quite different isn't it?

Maybe you need to take a step back a few years and learn what it was like when Knights in general were the scum of EQ.

The "scum" of EQ...yes I can see it. Hell if I really want to see a class in the dumps I'll watch a warrior try to look for a group, or get into an exp group. I assure you they're far worse off than we ever were.

It's finally nice to have some use in raids and in group settings.

Right because none of us were lvl 60 before Planes of Power because we could never get groups right? And we didn't split tank and leak aggro off during Kael/ToV raids? Because we weren't adequate stand in tanks for warriors (not as good as warriors but with more utilities) for exp groups when one wasn't present?

Quit trying to nerf your own class into oblivion again and take a minute to learn wtf you are.

I want you to quote where I said "Nerf my class into oblivion".

I specifically stated that I want a few key things nerfed. Perhaps you should go look them up before putting words into my mouth.

Paladins and Shadowknights have been given tools to make them better. Instead of throwing around your hands pointing at shit to nerf that will never be nerfed, take some time to think about what things would give Warriors the tools THEY NEED to improve their class.

Warriors need an increase, paladins need a nerf. Now either refute what I said needs to be nerfed with actual facts or stop the speculation and placing of words into my mouth. It's getting old.

Wyvernwill

11-18-2003, 06:04 PM

The Eyepatch of Plunder is probably one of the best masks in the game that doesn't require a raid to obtain. And even still, you rarely see good balance in stats + hps + effects in masks outside of raid environments, although there are now a few purchaseable ones with the same or a fraction less hps.

As for your questioning me about my character, my character is lvl 65 with 260 AA points. I've been playing him since preKunark. I also have over 370 days played on that character alone with none of those hours spent as a bazaar trader.

Anyways, back to the matter at hand, yes, where no other haste is available, I do use Valor of Marr. But I have yet to have been in a full exp group without a chanter/Shaman or bst in ages. So yes, it is a worthless spell.

The AoC spell is no where near as powerful as the cleric line of them. We can cast the buffs in the Aegolism line. Hey, even in LDoN they gave us a spell that's Aegolism by a different name... they also gave us Temperance and a group form of Temperance by different names too.

As for narrowing the gap, personally Hit Points are NOT the reason for the problem with Warriors... AGRO is the problem. Rangers narrow the gap on Warriors too, and get access to the same defensive AA that Paladins and Rangers do. I have even seen a Ranger MT a BoT group for hours on end without any slowing in pulls... but then again... the problem is solely on Knights.

Slow is the problem. Always has been, always will be. Even moreso now, EQ programmers have gotten extremely lazy with designing armor. Take a look at the difference between Chain, Leather and Plate armor sets in LDoN. All of which have the exact same slots, and the Hit points and mana are the exact same if not a hair off one way or another. But then again, the problem is only that paladins need to be nerfed.

Notice that I said Top Two stuns, IE Force of Akilae and QWoS. Both work quite well in LDoN high risks... maybe you should try using them sometime there, you might see they work quite well.

As for Cease and Desist, remove their agro completely.. It WILL NOT HELP WARRIORS AT ALL IN GETTING EXP GROUPS! In exp groups I only use Force of Akera, Force of Akilae, and QWoS. Hey, they cost more mana, but they STUN the mob. That's what result I want, not something that's just a ping for agro. Removing the fact that stuns don't agro things that are immune only makes it more difficult for a Paladin to assist tanking on raids.

As for Warriors who have issues with Knights tanking raids, why not talk to your raid leaders then? My guild uses everyone for their best strengths and we don't use Knights to MT unless it is a mob designed around that fact. Other than that, we stick with Warriors MT'ing as they do the job the best. The closest I go to MT'ing mobs is pulling it into camp and managing to survive until the Warrior pulls agro from me.

My primary weapon is a 41/31. And my statement was extremely sarcastic. Maybe you didn't pick up on that.

As for exp groups, I rarely cast more than two or three stuns. I don't need to, I save my mana for more important things.

Oh yeah, and I looked up Ethereal Cleansing... There's a good reason I didn't remember, I was already 65 with Supernal Cleansing when that piece of junk came out. Why would I waste my time getting a worthless spell?

Besides, after finishing up the healing AA... the Cleansing line isn't even as powerful as the direct heals anymore either.

When it comes down to it, Paladins have never gotten stronger as tanks... our caster side is the side that grew and made us stronger. The only way that side will ever been weakened is when they remove FT and Foci and the KEI + line that made it so powerful in the first place.

But hey, let's remove all hybrids and make them all warriors, monks and rogues so everyone is on an even playing field again. Because there will never be an equality between a Hybrid and a True melee, ever.

uhrlik

11-18-2003, 06:12 PM

You can actually say with a straight face that being put on the same mitigation table as a warrior didn't make you a stronger tank? That the melee archetype AAs didn't make you take and avoid hits better? That wearing the same armor as a warrior and having your weapons handed to you by SOE didn't make you a better tank?

LMAO!!

Wyvernwill

11-18-2003, 06:44 PM

The sad thing is, I have hunted with warriors that are on the exact same level as me, in terms of gear and AA. When a warrior has about 260 AA invested, they hold agro very well. But hey... not everyone in EQ has that many AA, nor is willing to stop whining and work at getting that many either.

And hey, if I want to rip agro off of a warrior like that, sure, I could, but if they generate that much agro... there's not a reason in the world that I would, especially with the fact that most still have a considerably higher amount of hps and Ac.

Maybe you need to go back and reread my posts, because you are basically saying exactly what I said happened.

As for narrowing the gap, personally Hit Points are NOT the reason for the problem with Warriors... AGRO is the problem. Rangers narrow the gap on Warriors too, and get access to the same defensive AA that Paladins and Rangers do. I have even seen a Ranger MT a BoT group for hours on end without any slowing in pulls... but then again... the problem is solely on Knights.

Slow is the problem. Always has been, always will be. Even moreso now, EQ programmers have gotten extremely lazy with designing armor. Take a look at the difference between Chain, Leather and Plate armor sets in LDoN. All of which have the exact same slots, and the Hit points and mana are the exact same if not a hair off one way or another. But then again, the problem is only that paladins need to be nerfed.

But then again, maybe you need to learn how to read, instead of skim and pluck whatever you feel like twisting.

uhrlik

11-18-2003, 06:47 PM

How very paladin of me. :rolleyes:

Still, that was an incredibly stupid statement and I called you out on it. Refute it if you can.

Wyvernwill

11-18-2003, 07:13 PM

Oh yes, SOE hands out awesome weapons to Paladins daily! I forgot about that, I will have to pick mine up again tonight! I think this time they are giving me a 90dmg 10 dly 1 hander. Get real.

As for the Damage Mitigation Avoidance AAs... EVERY CLASS IN THE GAME GETS THOSE AAs. I know Enchanters with LR/ID5. WHOA! OMFG Paladins got it too! Problem is, they didn't give Warriors higher levels.

But hey, let's degrade Knights completely, so that Rangers are now the second preferred tank. I'm sure Warriors will bitch about that too.

Fact of the matter is, I dont care if Warriors are given 2 times the hps of a paladin, 10 times the mitigation of a paladin, faster snap agro than a paladin... as long as my class doesn't get degraded.

Degrading Knights as half of the solution to the problem will never help as then it just puts Knights back, while no melee are given any sort of advance towards matching casters.

uhrlik

11-18-2003, 07:25 PM

Ok, I'll concede the weapon part as an exaggeration. However, if you'll note, I've bitched about everyone getting the Mit/Avoid AAs, not just knights. All I said was that they made you a stronger tank, which was in direct opposition to your "knights have never been made stronger tanks" stance (which I still think is ludicrous).

Slow is not the only problem in the game. Snap aggro based on extremely low-cost spells that a creature is immune to is also a problem.

Still, anything that I say here is not going to make a lick of difference since if Sony does do anything they're going to screw it up anyway.

Wyvernwill

11-18-2003, 07:36 PM

You're reply was only directed at Knights, more so Paladins in response to what I said, not an entirely generalized area. Thus why I responded as I did.

Regardless, the fact that everyone gets them isn't so much the problem is nothing was given to Warriors to give them better. Where as if you look at spell crits for INT casters (yes, completely different side of the coin, but the perfect example) I believe that Wizards have atleast 1 type of Crit increaser that is purely Wizard only. IMO, that is something that is needed for Warriors on the defensive side of AA, even though it does not at all serve to solve the problem at hand...

Warrior AGRO is the problem. Nothing else is misbalanced other than the fact that Warriors do NOT generate enough agro fast enough to make them as desireable as someone that can generate agro at the push of one button. Granted, if they gave Warriors an extended range on taunt and made it able to always work and snap agro speed, it would be far more effective than any spell ever given to a Knight.

Why? Taunt can be used when you are stunned, spells can not. Also, Taunt does not have a longer reuse timer nor does it get interrupted. Give the taunt enough range, if the caster is too far out, then its not the Warriors fault the idiot died.

Partha

11-18-2003, 07:42 PM

I have yet to see one of two things.

a) A Warrior pull with taunt

b) A Paladin get stunned interrupting his pull cast.

uhrlik

11-18-2003, 07:49 PM

But then several other classes get Taunt as well...

Wyvernwill

11-18-2003, 08:05 PM

Lots of classes do get Taunt including atleast one that shouldn't (rangers). Thus, make a new taunt key for Warriors only... not really a hard to come up with idea on that one.

Nobody gets interupted on their pull casts, wether it is a shaman pulling with slow/malo, a chanter pulling with tash or slow, a ranger with snare/jolt, a druid with snare or another dot, or a Beastlord with slow. That is not just a Paladin thing. The issue is not really with just Paladins and SK's..

Warriors need some utilities. But removing the utilities from other classes will not make Warriors better.

Battleblade

11-18-2003, 08:18 PM

I read with intrest the statement that HP's are not the problem, aggro is. Actually, they both are.

A Warrior's role is to be the pure tank archetype. No other class should come close to a Warrior's survivability and that survivability should matter. When a significant number of players from other classes can come quite close to matching a Warrior's HP's thanks to Plate/ALL equipment - that's a problem. When every class get CA, CS, LR, and ID - that's another. The Warrior survivability advantage is too small.

Even if Warriors had a numerical survivability advantage it does not come in to play when experiance mobs hit for 200-300's.

There are things that can be done about this. An innate Natural Durability could be given to Warriors to increase their HP's. They could be put on separate mitigation tables. Mobs could hit like they meant it. CH could be bumped back up to 10kHP's.

Increase Warrior survivability and have experiance mobs hit harder and then (and only then) will other classes cease being Warriors-Plus.

Aggro becomes less important should this be done, but Warriors still need aggro improvements. Green mobs can kill an Enchanter as readily as a red mob. When RNG dominates Warrior aggro there is too little skill involved.

There are two problems with this:

1. SoE has already given virtually every class the chance to MT experiance mobs and they like it.

2. Casual players must be able to have fun too. They need a "safe" environment (like LDoN). They can not deal with real mobs hitting for real damage. EQ-Lite is here to stay.

If LDoN adventures could score groups based on HPs, AA, and equipment and tune mobs accordingly, then it would all work out.

Because SoE decided Warriors should not be indespensible, they're not - they're obsolete. Because less well-equipped casual players pay a monthly fee too, the game needed to be made easier.

There is no mystery what is wrong with Warriors, how it happened, why it happened, and what would need to be done to actually fix it.

BB

Wyvernwill

11-18-2003, 09:07 PM

Originally posted by Battleblade
Aggro becomes less important should this be done, but Warriors still need aggro improvements. Green mobs can kill an Enchanter as readily as a red mob. When RNG dominates Warrior aggro there is too little skill involved.

Actually... that would make agro even more necessary. Let's take a mob that currently hits for 400 dmg. Let's bump that damage up to 1000 (This is, in my opinion, about where Knights become to the point they can not really tank as effectively as a Warrior, this is based on personal experience from my standpoint of buffing to 8100hps.)

The average cleric / enchanters that I hunt with range from about 4k-5.5k buffed, tops. Said mob comes into camp, pulled by the Warrior so he has some agro built just by pulling it. Take the chance that he did not proc any as he starts meleeing a mob that double attacks at 1000 tops and has a special of say bash for 400ish. Bash stuns the Warrior by chance (it happens, less with Stalwart endurance, but still happens). Mob is fairly resistant to magic and the enchanter has to Tash to slow. They cast Tash, then cast to slow. Slow lands, but the mob turns and agros the enchanter.

That enchanter does not have long to live... at all. His only hope is to A) Boggle it off himself, which can get interrupted and sometimes does, B) Cleric starts spam healing the enchanter with fast heals to keep him up, and or C) Warrior manages to get taunt and a few procs to pull agro back off. If slow was resisted... that enchanter is dead all in a matter of usually 5 seconds.

Agro is a huge factor when hunting mobs that hit that hard. A lot of people wont even want to deal with the stress that that entails either simply due to the fact that a lot of times, the exp gain isn't as good as it should be compared to killing faster, smaller stuff with less stress.

The more dangerous the mobs become, the more emphasis gets put by groups on the fact that they need a tank that can hold agro and keep agro off of the casters. Dead Caster = A lot of down time.

Then again... argument can be made... casters need to learn when to and not to cast certain spells.

As for CH. There isn't a person in EQ that I know of that it matters if the CH is 7500 or 10,000. 90% of the players of EQ don't even break 10k, most don't even break 9k by much. If a cleric is delaying a CH to the point that it heals you for over 7500... they waited way too long to start casting that, especially if mobs are hitting for that hard. Even at 10Khps a cleric should never let you drop below 25% health.

If LDoN adventures could score groups based on HPs, AA, and equipment and tune mobs accordingly, then it would all work out.
If that were the case... with the people I normally hunt with most of the mobs would be easily doing 800+ damage constantly. But then again... that would make things a lot more enjoyable for myself too as I get bored easily in Normal risk adventures.