If we could fix the Warrior What would we suggest to SOE?

[landrain]

Here are my thoughts about warriors and what would help balance this class.

Basic Melee Combat Skills :
Raise the skill cap for all melee skills to 305. Warriors are supposed to be the masters of battle, Their skill with weapons should show this. H2H is only skill I would not raise to this level.

Basic Stats :
Why is it that Casters can raise their basic stat wis/int (ie mana pool) to 355 and warriors cannot raise their basic stat Strength/stamina (ie attk/hps) to 355? This to mee is an inherent unbalance in classes.

Disciplines :
These are great ideas. However they really need to be looked at a revision. Adding a spell gem with a refresh time would be wonderful. perhaps make them create a buff icon in the song window? Removing the one timer for all is also imperative. stacking could then become an issue. perhaps divide into 3 categories? Resists, Offense, defense and have a seperate timer for each? or allow only one discipline at a time, or perhaps one of each at a time. This is something that can be debated as the best way to change, but I think we all agree is that one timer is dumb. Adding new disciplines at levels 61-65 would also help. I hear this all the time on raids... Fast Melee Disc now! why dont we have one?

Melee Skills :
First off taunt. Give us a range greater than 5 inches. A scaleable range from level 50 to 65 would be very nice. say 5feet up to 30 feet? Second, I would love to get a message saying... "You attempted to taunt %T but he/she/it has decided to ignore your instigation."
Secondly, It would be nice as "the master of battle" to have a little more variation, than just kick,bash,slam...

Gear:
Please for the love of all things sane, do a LITTLE bit of work on itemization. Sorry class quest items do not count.
When was the last WAR only item created that people wanted? Hmm the shield from BOT Tower Bosses? ROFL.. nice but I dont see very many using shield/1hs. Now maybe if they put allowed shield equip warriors to auto slam just like dual wielding, then we would see shield equipped warriors. Stop the ALL/ALL, ALL PLATE items with ungodly hps, between these and the HUGE-HP buff spells available for every class the gap between warrior/ other is greatly diminished. We are supposed to be the unsurpassed leader of hps, but with mobs hitting for 2000+ having 300 more hps doesnt really mean much. I really like the idea of giving warriors an innate bonus on hps? say level/3 %? meaning a level 60 warrior would get a 20% premium on hps from gear/spells. So a 100 hp item gives 120 hps? a 1400hp spell gives a warrior 1680 hps? Another idea that I like, is that for all those items with mana that warriors wear, give us a hp for each mana? I would even extend this to all pure melee, monks/rogues included.

Alternate Advancement Skills:

Ambidexterity Improved Dual Wield
Area Taunt Taunt All Monsters
Bandage Wound Improved Bandaging
Double Riposte Chance to Riposte Twice
Flurry Allows Chance to Flurry Attack
Physical Enhancement Improve Other Abilities
Rampage Attack all Targets in Range.
Warcry Group Fear Immunity
Furious Rampage Decreased Rampage Re-Use Time
Hastened Instigation Decrease Area Taunt Re-Use Time
Living Shield Improved Shielding
Mithaniel's Binding Increases Amount Healed by Bandaging
Planar Durability Increases Maximum Hitpoints by 1.5%
Punishing Blade Chance to Triple Attack with 2 Handed Weapons
Raging Flurry Increased Chance to Flurry
Stalwart Endurance Endure Stunning Blows
Tactical Mastery Evade Enemy Defense

Of these several are duplicated by other melee classes and some are just useless.. The most usefull one we have is AoE Taunt and that AoE is what 3 feet? that is our defining AA ability? It is really balanced with Endless Quiver, Slay Undead, Dire Charm, Manaburn, Life Burn... etc.. This needs fixxed. I could easilly argue that half of the Warrior AA's should be revamped or outright changed.

Well, these are what I think make a good base starting point to revamp and balance warriors. Maybe we could come up with a consensus, and submit to the developers? Sure they will ignore us, but at least we tried.

http://www.magelo.com/eq_view_profile.html?num=197150

[Jear]

Umm manaburn ROFL what a jok to add in under the other ROFLMAO.... if you knew what manaburn did you wouldn't mention it here. And if you want to hold a better agro how can you say that flurry is crappy (might not be exact words, but I interprit that way since you say that only AE taunt is usefull) From my point of wiev more attacks = better chance at holding a better taunt and also a increesed DPS.

and besides casters can't get more HP like melees with the AAs where melees get Planar durabilety, casters gain higher int - wis. to be honest I would think Shamans and chanters among others would willingly trade their int - wis increese AAs for more hp.

Spell gem for melee discs? what then you want to go to a vendor and buy dics sorta like a trainer who needs to learn the dics so you can get it into your disc book.

And warrior gear well there are stuff like that ot there ... RoS in CT warrior bracer, BF or HG in ssra it is out there you just need to look. and yes it is good items. might not be in plane of time, but it is where a average guild can get some of it and some you need a higher lvl guild to get.

I don't think you should look for improvements under gear skills or stats. Where as yes range of taunt might be off. making it a range attack would be nice. What monster can't hear a damm ogre shout . "Me KEEL yr ma esterda" might not realy understand it but what race understands ogre they don't do it them selves .. ;)

(not meant rudely sorry if it is this way was in a hurry to write this so dinner wouldn't be cold ... /em runs off to eat dinner )

[Superchum]

"Of these several are duplicated by other melee classes"

Yeah, but that falls into one of two categories ...

1) Ambidexterity/Punishing Blade/Ferocity and AAs like that need to be duplicated by other melee classes, as they are melee oriented AAs.

2) Double Riposte and Physical Enhancement, and a select few AAs like that, while SHARED with other melees, benefit the warrior class slightly more. Physical Enhancment means more HPs for a warrior since they have more base HPs. Double Riposte is far better for a warrior than a monk because a warrior is facing the mob and actually riposting the mob, while the monk is either dead, playing dead or behind the mob.

Some AAs (ambidex) do need to be shared between the melees. And others, that some classes find useless (double riposte), warriors don't.

" and some are just useless.."

Yeah, but each class has useless AAs. Acrobatics springs to my mind. Heh.

"The most usefull one we have is AoE Taunt and that AoE is what 3 feet? that is our defining AA ability? It is really balanced with Endless Quiver, Slay Undead, Dire Charm, Manaburn, Life Burn... etc.."

AoE taunt is rather balanced with all of those listed, except Endless Quiver.

Slay Undead is limited. Dire Charm is limited, especially in PoP. Manaburn has become very limited. Life Burn has some obvious limitations. To me, all of those seem to be on par with AoE taunt, in regards to not being super over-powering, but still being a powerful effect that can be useful from time to time for the class that spent the AAs to get the skill.

Endless Quiver is a shade overpowered, imo, when COMPARED directly to the other class defining, very important class AAs.

But then again, AoE taunt almost always remains useful, while things like Slay Undead have long periods of time where they are useless.

[mazzarek]

Since warriors are the only class that can go Berserk, I think it'd be cool to have AA that modify that ability. They could add AA to allow you to go Berserk at higher % of HP left (maybe 50, 60, and 70), or they could make the stat inreases more significant when Berserk.

As it stands now, it seems that Berserk is pretty useless. I'm usually only berserk for a couple seconds before the CH lands. Either that or I'm dead...

[landrain]

Well for One, I never said Flurry was useless or that it didnt help aggro. I listed ALL the warrior specific AA's. Flurry is not useless.. but, is it within the first 70 AA's that a tank wants to get? I highly doubt that. ND,PE,PD,PP,CA,LR,CS,AOE Taunt... hmm thats about 70 or so, and we havent even scratched the offensive abilities. The problem is for our class definition, TANK.. it is not one that is of great advantage unless you have 80+ AA's.. it is not like EQ where at 27 AA we have an AWESOME class ability. Sure we could get it at AA number 27, but would any of us really advise that?

As to the equipment you listed, BF,HG? ummm look at those items.. WAR,RNG,PAL, SK.. so what advantage is that to us? We get the EXACT same HP's as they do. THAT is my point. Look at melee gear, it gives us same as hybrids, yet they get MANA in addition. Look at the new Quest ranged slotsfrom the new Hate... for an excellent example. the quest is IDENTICAL for melee and hybrid, the hybrid item is 100% identical to the melee item same AC, STR, STA, Saves, HPs...oh and 5 wis, 5 int, 75 mana... WTF! if they added these to the hybrid, why not make the melee stats better? Would 5 more str,sta and more hps really hurt? that is LAZY ASS itemization.. and blatantly unfair to warrior, rogues, monks...

If AoE Taunt lasted more than a split second and had some range then YES it would be balanced, as it is, it has really one use, swapping MT's on a boss mob. The range is so small it becomes virtually useless to save a group on a bad pull.

[Frodlin7th]

Well,

I hate to nitpick, but both BF and HG are Warrior only.

[Kaldanm]

I agree with you about itemisation, it is warrior diseaperaed with levels. it was always like :
- Crafted 23ac 5sta (for wars) vs Ro armor 20ac 5 str (for pals)
- Luclin armors : warrior is 22ac 8str 5sta: 5dex: hp25, ac22 str8 dex3 wis5 hp20 mana10 for pals.
- Thurg : 47ac 14str 10sta 5agi 7dex 90hp for warriors, 42ac Str6 sta6: Agi8 dex8 wis8 hp40 Mana60 for pals.

(I know, Twillight sea quest are impossible and not rewarding today :p)
After Velious set of armors, EVERY armor in the game is by armor type. there is no "warrior advantage" in gear, exept very rare ones (never the CAB in many attempts of the slime ring).
I know elemental is awesome, but between SS and elemental what an average warrior have ? the same equipement as knights.
And you're right about the hate quest... the rewards (3rd part of the quest) are :

Gem of Heroism
MAGIC ITEM LORE ITEM NO DROP
Slot: RANGE
AC: 15
STR: +10 STA: +15 WIS: +5 INT: +5 HP: +75 MANA: +75
SV FIRE: +5 SV DISEASE: +5 SV COLD: +5 SV MAGIC: +15 SV POISON: +5
Effect: Vengeance III (Worn)
WT: 0.0 Size: SMALL
Class: PAL RNG SHD BRD BST
Race: ALL

Gem of Victory
MAGIC ITEM LORE ITEM NO DROP
Slot: RANGE
AC: 15
STR: +10 STA: +15 HP: +75 SV FIRE: +5
SV DISEASE: +5 SV COLD: +5 SV MAGIC: +15 SV POISON: +5
Effect: Vengeance III (Worn)
WT: 0.0 Size: SMALL
Class: WAR MNK ROG
Race: ALL

Hell, let us use those those wis points for trade skill, or give a TRUE different reward...

[landrain]

my mistake on BF,HG.. i was thinking more of BoW and BoC who all can use.. BF is by the way the best ratiod 1hs that only a warrior can use, and that is 2 expansions ago? Still does not make make up for the sloppy itemization in PoP

[Coray]

Everyone should drop itemization issues because the way it is now is by design for a simple reason.

It's easier to balance things, if you have less things at issue between the classes. If you make it so warriors, paladins and shadowknights can use basically the same items, you (mostly) eliminate items as a factor in balance, making it easier to keep the classes in balance. You can reduce it to things such as skill caps, innate class abilities, etc.

They've gone away from making class specific stuff for that reason and also because it sucks to get your 8th warrior item when you only have 5 warriors.

My personal view on warriors is that there are a few things that could be done to make the class better or more interesting.

First off, I think taunt is fine but could stand to gain a hate boost wether you succeed or fail. Keeping taunt the same just tacking on say +50 or +75 hate. Also, I wouldn't mind seeing an AOE taunt that works like regular taunt, and they'd be on the same timer. My biggest issue as a warrior is not really holding aggro on the mob I'm attacking, it's everything else, and while I have AE taunt and even the AA to lower it down to 10:30 reuse time, even something that isn't as reliable would be handy.

Next, I don't really like the idea of messing with our disciplines because a lot is balanced around the existance of defensive/evasive.

What I'd like to see are like combat stances that are like our disciplines, only scaled back. Each stance would provide a bonus, but probably also a drawback, and probably should stack on top of disciplines. Each one would be mutually exclusive.

For example you could have a defensive stance where you take 10% less damage, but do 10% less damage in return. Offensive where it's reversed. You could have a hate stance where each blow does say 10-20% more hate than it would normally with no drawback.

Just numbers I toss out to get the point across but the idea is to give the warrior class a bit more depth without really altering balance.

[Kaesorn]

Mazz, I agree they really should add something to berserk through AA. I've seen the ideas for adding the ability to enrage during berserk...why not just make it simpler and just give warriors a significantly increased chance to riposte/dodge/parry. Yeah I know, this has been said before.

[Synapticus]

Need Utility and more abilities.

[Frodlin7th]

Everyone should drop itemization issues because the way it is now is by design for a simple reason.

It's easier to balance things, if you have less things at issue between the classes. If you make it so warriors, paladins and shadowknights can use basically the same items, you (mostly) eliminate items as a factor in balance, making it easier to keep the classes in balance. You can reduce it to things such as skill caps, innate class abilities, etc.

You are completely wrong on this. Class balance decisions and itemization decisions are not made together. In the last two and a half expansions, class balance hasn't even been an issue in itemization. I have some news for you. Vex Thal, the END GAME of EQ at the time, was itemized AND populated with mobs in one week. ONE WEEK! The intricacies of class balance between knight and warrior would demand longer than that, but the WHOLE ZONE was POPULATED AND ITEMIZED in 5 work days. That means coming up with... bosses, loot tables, random mobs, respawn times, and so on and so forth in ONE WEEK.

If you take a minute and have a look at Ornate and Elemental armors compared to one another you'll realize that there was no thought whatsoever put into class balance, or even into class needs... they took a core set of stats, and applied it to armors, put a different name and effect on it and put it in game. If they had had even a preliminary thought about itemization as it corresponds to class balance and server/world populations, there wouldn't be an almost comical favoritism towards knights in weaponry in PoP. You give FAR too much credit.


They've gone away from making class specific stuff for that reason and also because it sucks to get your 8th warrior item when you only have 5 warriors.

That was certainly a stated reason, but it's also significantly easier in both labor and in database conservation to simply make less items, which is the real motivation behind them.


Next, I don't really like the idea of messing with our disciplines because a lot is balanced around the existance of defensive/evasive.

You buy the propoganda hook line and sinker don't you? Actually, you want to know what's humorous? The diametric opposite of what you just claimed was the assessment of warriors during the 'melee balancing'. The "balancing" speificially took into consideration itemization, and warriors' access to the best armors in the game at the time (Cobalt/Velious).

Just numbers I toss out to get the point across but the idea is to give the warrior class a bit more depth without really altering balance.

Balance already HAS been altered, that's the point, it's out of whack at this time, completely. It's not like we're "balanced" and asking for general improvements.

[Jear]

Btw when talking about hybrid agro you all seem to mention that they hold their agro by using their mana pool. This is a mistake since any castering class who uses spells continuiosly uses their mana regen and not pool unless you constantly have breaks for medding.

A paladin - SK (atleast those I know) try never to use more then they regen. for what is the point of going so far down in your mana pool that you can't use taunt spells on the next mob.

Int- wis / mana ( on items) is just nice to have it isn' what they need for taunting they need the FT.

[NinjaBurger]

Uhhh I think monks are actually the masters of combat....they spend their lives honing their bodies for fighting.....


/duck

[Synapticus]

Warriors need more versatility. I know, I know.. warriors are all about being the several toons on a raid with the most HP/AC and will be taking all the hits, but I think they should do more than that.
When they gave warriors /shield, I thought it was a step in the right direction. When the first instituted the ability, i thought they were about to add more warrior-only abilities that enhance their usefulness.
Maybe give warriors several new abilities, that aren't quite like disciplines, and maybe exist as skill-based abilities, that improves their ability to defend and grab an NPC's attention. It should be something unique to a warrior.

Some that i can think of:
1) a shield-like ability that allows the warrior to absorb all the hits from his target, as if he himself was being hit by it. This of course, is an upgrade to /shield
2) an ability to that gives a warrior a 30% aggro multiplier for a brief duration of time.
3) an ability that allows every single blow landed by a warrior
to have a small knock-back effect, for a brief duration of time.
4) blind an enemy with the strike of his blade! - requires the warrior to equip a slasher (rogues must equip a piercer to backstab... this is similar)
5) crush an opponent's legs, effectively snaring his victim - requires a warrior to equip a 1 or 2 hand blunt weapon.

These should all have independent re-use times, and can be used on top of any /disc.

[babytank]

Warriors are one of a few classes overlooked in PoP. We weren't nerfed. We just got lumped with paladins sk's and other melee classes. Paladins and sk's have specific weapons that are dropped off high end encounters and warriors dont. Just about everything a warrior gets is a duplicate of what paladins and sk's have. Not all warriors have a BoC or BoW. Thats just a ridiculous presumption. Paladins have stun...LoH...rez...almost identical hp and ac....much better weapons...etc. Sk's have fd..snare...summon corpse...life tap...mana tap...similar hp and ac...much better weapons etc. Warriors have ae taunt.../shield...um yeah...thats what we have. Balanced? No freaking way. Why did I play a warrior? to be able to take more damage than a pally or sk. In end game PoP a paladin and sk can take as much dmg as I can.

WTF !?!

One of a few ways to increase our usefulness would be to increase our taunt to just under pally and sk taunt. Sure let the pally and sk have a superior taunt...its one of a few things they are good at. Just give us like 75% of what their taunt is and we will be happier. Increasing our ae taunt range. This would make spending the points worthwhile. Its useless in groups. Give us better stats on quest items...maybe adding like half of the mana as hp? Would not be unbalancing. Give warriors a much better hp/ac bonus at higher lvls. At level 60 is where you see warriors start to seriously fall behind in those areas. Also maybe increasing our caps to even 325 and leaving the rest at 305 would make playing a high lvl warrior at least something more than a freaking tank on a raid.

[Rumblingdeth]

If you think Sks have worse hps, Ogre Sks can wear Fierce Heraldric(or crimson darkscale), warriors wear the same. BP choice? Both prob have a Vindy, same there too! Agnostic warriors can actually have LESS hps than a RZ or CT Ogre/Troll SK!

[Lillyann]

Warriors should be masters of their Weapons and get more proccage out of em' here's an idea ^_^

[Lillyann]

Actually, seriously, Warriors should have had something like Area Taunt as a basic skill.

Supposedly at this time our only advantages out of main tanking on raids, is the superior HP.

Now what is all this HP for when we can't keep even 2 mobs on us ?

In the old world it still sorta works switching between 2 mobs taunting and hitting to try and keep em on me but is largely unpractical and soon as a mob runs to a caster havoc ensues.

[Draxus Diablus]

Simple. Either make taunt guaranteed on blue or lower con mobs, or add a +hate factor to taunt for these mobs. Make it so it doesn't work with defensive. Make it an AA, I don't care. This would still leave tanking near all raid mobs unchanged, while giving us agro control on par with knights in xp groups.

[Lillyann]

Honestly I don't know if I would want total aggro control.

What's the fun when the casters never get hit ? They really deserve it sometimes.

In fact, with that in mind, I'm afraid it's really hybrids who need a 'nerf'. :D

[Glatius2]

What's the fun when the casters never get hit ? They really deserve it sometimes.

Yes, absolutely. Casters and other support classes should never be confident that there is nothing they can do that will get them beat down. On the other hand, they also shouldn't feel there is nothing the can do that won't get them a beat down. With a SHD/PAL the first case is closer to true while with a run of the mill Warrior the second case is closer to true.

The middle ground is where in fact I believe it should be. Everyone able to play at a reasonable level without having to baby Warriors or being able to go full tilt with Knights.

[eqin]

In the preceeding thread, a secondary taunt check was suggested that I found interesting especially if it improved with levels to 65. This would improve the long standing warrior taunt issue into higher levels.

Melee class imbalance in PoP: Guaranteed spell snap aggro
-------------------------------------------------------------------------
This is a problem that attributes relatively high aggro to spells such as stun unilaterally to all monster sub-classes:warrior, caster, (c-heal), undead.

A warrior-mob should attribute little to no aggro from a stun whereas a caster-mob should attribute significant aggro to a stun. SK dots need to be addressed as well.

Once the mob-subclasses are assigning aggro appropriately, very small changes would be required to restore balance so that Warriors and Knights would have situational advantage in tanking. Warrior taunt is a chance to taunt. Sony gave Warriors proc'ing weapons (random aggro generation) so make spell aggro random as well to restore balance.

I don't believe Sony would completely nerf Knights to the level that Warriors would have ultimate taunt/aggro under all circumstance. But currently, Knights have ultimate taunt/aggro under all circumstances,via spell aggro, and I don't believe that was by design but by a lack of forethought (QA).

[ayash]

I'd also like to see DW brought more in line with 2H for DPS. Atm there is too great a disparity IMO