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Phase I of Alpha Two testing will occur on weekends. Each weekend is scheduled to start on Fridays at 10 AM PT and end on Sundays at 10 PM PT. Find out more here.
Check out Alpha Two Announcements here to see the latest Alpha Two news and update notes.
Our quickest Alpha Two updates are in Discord. Testers with Alpha Two access can chat in Alpha Two channels by connecting your Discord and Intrepid accounts here.
Comments
I feel the same way for Mage and even Cleric, to an extent.
It might be that the Secondary Archetype is what's intended to build your niche?
First I would like to say how excited and impressed I am with the development team! Incredible work! I am a tank main and this gives me hope that the tank class won't be boring.
Note:
- Understand this is still Alpha 1 and a lot of fine-tuning is still in the works. (But combat in a game is what makes or breaks a lot of MMORPG, so I hope it flows nicely)
- As mentioned by Steve and the team, all effects can be turned down by the user. (So there is no harm of having every move being flash and big)
Idea/Confirmation:
-Have the tank moves look normal, but when the sub/second class is chosen let the effect change to merge together
-So each tank archetype will look different, a tree/nature tank, a lava tank, an ice tank, etc..
Example:
--- Argent, have the moves show music or song type animation. Axe throw with sound, a shield bash with sound waves
--- Spell Shield, have an axe throw with fire, or a chain grab with lava, a charge with ice, and the slams with lava
--- Warden, have a tree/nature effects to all your moves.
-- Nightshield, have shadow and darkness effects on all your moves.
-Similar to how the City of heroes was. You picked a tank but then can be an ice tank and slam the floor and ice shards pierced the ground. Or had fire breath etc.
Final Statement:
I am not sure if this is the plan for the effects and class creation. If so... that will be amazing!!!!!! If not I am still super hyped for the game and it's probably my only and last hope for MMORPG.(No pressure lol)
Edit: Except the shield bashes. I prefer the current shield punches the devs have given Tank.
When I first played Dragon's Dogma the combat felt goddamn amazing. Looking at the video, it still looks great. Honestly when I saw the trailer of AOC when it first came out, I was hoping that combat was like Dragon's.
Absolutely 100% agree with this. Very good reference!
However, there are two skills that I think could be improved/clarified.
Firstly, the Bulwark skill which "strikes your target and increases your block chance, generating additional threat" The mention of a "block chance" has me curious about how tanking will work. In the Apoc pre-alpha action combat test, blocking was manual and active. Is this going to be the case in the MMO or will it be automatic and triggered by percentage chance to block an attack? If active blocking is going to be possible, then it may be a good idea to have the skill increase the amount of damage mitigation while blocking instead of increasing the chance to block.
Secondly, regarding the same Bulwark skill, I think the animation of the second shield bash would look better if the swing were wider. I loved the animation of the first swing, but the second bash didn't extend very far and does not look like it would connect with targets. It looks more like the character is quickly raising their shield to defend than trying to smack a target with the shield. Having a broader swing on the second bash would improve the appearance of the skill in my opinion.
Lastly, I did not like how the Lacerate skill's animation had the player appear to disarm themself by abandoning their weapon after stabbing it into an enemy. I thought the animation of jamming a weapon into an enemy was great, but I don't think leaving it embedded is very immersive or realistic. I'm not usually a stickler for realism in fantasy, but I think having a the character violently pull the weapon out of their enemy after stabbing them would feel more visceral and satisfying. (And it wouldn't leave players wondering where their character is getting infinite swords to sheathe in their enemies.)
Again, I'd like to say I loved the video and think these first skills for the tank class look great. Most of what was shown exceeded my expectation for early alpha stage, and I just wanted to express my few personal concerns.
I think additional animations should be part of the augments when you select your second class. So if you choose spellshield it will be a fire scorpion mortal combat feel.
I think the fire effects are used in too many places, when physical damage should probably look like metal flashes, shockwaves or blood splatter depending on the core reason for the ability.
Because the devs won't benefit from me sucking up to them I've tried to be highly critical here:
https://drive.google.com/file/d/1e2kj_XOTJHoAeqk5BlLvp01MnFq0PNkX/view?usp=sharing
The above is the kind of standard that I would hope to see in the released game.
I can recommend slowing the video down to x0.25 so that you can see the issue with fluidity of abilities with two or three hit combos. I can understand that you may be stringing single attacks together to make a combo, but the big pauses and abrupt changes in attack pattern look a little strange at normal speed and plain awkward/clunky in slo mo.
Great work, I hope you find the feedback helpful.
Mac
I read it as only invulnerability if you are near to zero hit points. Damage mitigation proportional to missing hit points. More of a conditional invulnerability. We don't know the duration or CD either, so somewhere in 1-10th level may be fine. There's still time to fine tune it.
I also want to compare and contrast Fighter with Tank. This is more interesting to me than Ranger, which exists alone in its ranged non-magical specialty field.
Agree here as well!
But Tank without subclass or the Tank/Tank, Tank/Fighter (and so on) constellation should have no to very little magic about them - in my opinion.
Yeah man, I understood that too. Ultimate Defence is the only skill which doesn't generate threat. The Devs didn't want Bards to be a Buff Bot and sit in a corner. Excess tanks in a raid will have to sit in the corner. Fights will be too chaotic if multiple tanks are generating equal amounts of threat. And, you can't not generate threat with all the moves except Ultimate Defence.
I still believe, aggro swapping will be difficult when wanted and not stoppable when unwanted if all the tanks fight. It is possible encounters in Ashes won't need more than a Main Tank but I had hoped for better variation and better challenges than simply 'Tank and spank'. I don't know if augments will remove threat generation, but, without a Taunt or Goad, reduced threat generation might mess up the threat tables.
Edit: I suppose, you could spam weapon skills rather than threat generation skills if you're an excess tank. Weapon skill trees shouldn't generate threat, though they will still generate aggro from the DPS. You could probably weapon swap into a Two Handed Weapon but I think your DPS would be suboptimal without main abilities to weave in-between. It is a mind bender really, difficult not to have concerns at this point. We've only seen up to level 10 skills too. The Tank might have main damage abilities which don't generate threat at a later level.
If I can, on the ability “ONSLAUGHT”, after you hit the the target , I would like to see an effect where you can see that you have gain an absorb shield. That would be cool.
On the “WEAPON TOSS” ability, I think the weapon should come back to the player after it hit all enemies. It would be more emmersive don’t you think? Cause if you toss weapon and it doesn’t come back, then how can you have a weapon after
Question : can you run / walk and use all abilities?
Good job!
Please give the animation team a raise for that. It’s so fluid, metal and hardcore.
Love it! ☠️🖤
Steven Sharif is my James Halliday (Anorak)
“That is not dead which can eternal lie,
And with strange aeons even death may die.”
-HPL
Edit: Ranged Tanks are a niche in PvE, but, Ranged Tanks would be less of a niche in PvP. I suppose weapon swaps will give Tanks ranged skills while the predominant disposition would be melee. I'm not sure how a Tank/Mage would perform, or a Tank/Ranger would perform. Would the dominant skills still be 'Melee' or would the Tank also have 'Ranged' potential.
Second Edit: I also don't see the Tank as able to hold Groups of Mobs. There is no scope for gleaning threat generated on multiple mobs unless you strike multiple mobs. The Tank wouldn't be able to hold aggro on multiple mobs unless they can strike all mobs in one go. Even then, high DPS could outpace threat generated. Not an issue if you have multiple tanks, but, I see conflictions between having a Main Tank and having Multiple Tanks in a Raid. For some encounters, One Tank will be sufficient, in other encounters Multi Tanks will be required. Balance between both of these encounters will be difficult.
Third Edit: In older games where I tanked, I had single target taunt and AoE Goads. I could also generate threat through charges, and pick up stray mobs. I could marshal the PvE Encounters and take on multiple mobs with enough heals. I see the Ashes Tank has a similar prospect in terms of charges and melee moves but I still believe Taunts and Goads should be invested into.
Fourth Edit: Not sure if we can 'Kite' Mobs or not. A ranged Tank would be able to 'Kite' a Mob if it is possible. It is the niche protocol I expressed earlier. Raids do often use Ranged Classes to 'Kite' Mobs, but, a Ranged Tank could perform all Tank Roles, even 'Kite' without the need to use a 'weaker' class. I only bring this up because in terms of contestation/PvP in a boss area, you would have to 'kite' the boss to be able to PvP effectively. You could keep the 'Tank Group' on the boss and the rest of the raid could fight in PvP but it would be nice to have options and not be forced to PvP in an outnumbered position every time.
Fifth Edit: I've assumed the stuns could hold multiple mobs for a time. I'm also not sure if some Mobs will have stun resistance. You could Javelin up to 5 mobs in a consistent manner, I suppose you could hold multiple mobs in such an approach, but, I'm not sure if Stuns are broken on damage, or, if stun locks are enabled. It is difficult to provide feedback on actual potentials when I do not know the prerequisites. All of my feedback is from my history as a tank and how I have related the current Tank Skillsets into my tanking experience.
Sixth Edit: A 'Guard Function' would be good for PvP. Guard Functions divert percentages of damage from a guarded target to the tank. Would need to be rather short range though. Guard Functions are normally single target and often enable a Tank to protect vulnerable targets. A Guard would make Tanks more viable in PvP alongside a Taunt/Goad.
Javelin: a light spear thrown in a competitive sport or as a weapon
Harpoon: a barbed missile resembling a spear that is attached to a long rope
Can we have the shields rotate around the character before vanishing?
Can the shields have a more physical and opaque silluete?
Can we have a metal sound effect at the finish of the animation to confirm we are now armoured?
Can we make the animation for Resounding Smash keep one feet in the floor while changing weight distribution and stepping forward? The right legs falls at the same time as the axe.
Rotating hips mid-air looks weird and that's not how humans move or generate power.
Similar issue with the Mage fireball. Even if it is magic, or a paper ball in a videogame.
There is no intent, conviction or will to hurt with a double spin. That's not how we generate force or throw things.
Even for the sake of show, some things are so intuitively ingrained that we know something is off.
Throwing things to hurt other things is human 101. Double spin is anthropomorphic unnatural and the aesthetic value doesn't pay off imo.
Sloppy, but I did it with the best of intentions
Every game has the tons of armor, come hit me tank--but I would like to see the option for evasion/mitigation tank. Something that is less of a rock, or a Mac truck, and more of a swirling dervish that is lithe, difficult to hit, and involve creating hate-kiting-picking up addsm relying less on armor and more on evasion/deflection.
I believe that such a tank would be more in line with the Vaelune who are desert bred. Lets face it, if you live in the desert you are not going to want to wear 40lbs of metal on your body. I have been involved in full contact Medieval combat in Phoenix in the summer. Trust me, full Gothic plate is not an option at 110 degrees in the shade.
The idea being that combat does not devolve into someone standing in one place holding something while others wack on it with sticks but allowing the tank to be more dynamic.
Tank/Rogue, Tank/Ranger: Evasion Tank
Tank/Tank: Traditional brick wall.
Tank/Cleric: I could see a similarity to Brigitte in OW where the tank heals themselves and possible others whenever the strike an enemy or use a skill. Of course, not on par with a cleric primary, but effectively supplemental.
Tank/Summoner: I'd like to see a less robust tank capable of summoning shields or minions capable of acting as alt tanks that can take heat off of the main tank as well as the rest of the party. This may be less effective in large raids where you already have alt tanks, but it'd still be neat imo.
Tank/Bard: Buff tank. Give your allies the encouragement they need with well placed, and timed, strikes and skill usage.
Tank/Fighter, Tank/Mage: I believe would work best as either high (for a tank) damage tanks, or, and this is my preference, tanks that use their innate combat abilities to hinder and debilitate the enemies, a.k.a. cc/debuff tanks.
Anyways, just a few stray thoughts on how I think the tank role could see some effective, and impactful diversity.
I would much prefer the tank to be a pure fighter class with abilities centered around martial prowess. The preview here looks to me like a powerful mage/elemental/summoner.
The weapon toss only makes sense if he/she magically summons a weapon and then throws it and it is the same with the magic javelin. The moves all have fire/explosion effects that are distracting and way over the top and most importantly belong to a mage/fire elemental class IMHO.
The only one I thought was okay was the onslaught rush ability as that is based around a physical ability but please remove the fire.
All the fire and explosions are fine if they come from an appropriate combination of other classes who use magic.
Keep up the good work and hope you can use the feedback.