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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 see Taunt as a minor nuisance. There are two ways it can be implemented: soft lock and hard lock. I doubt The Devs will do hard lock after Wandering Mists input, soft lock however could be simple to implement (If they implement a taunt at all). The issue remains, Tanks with the current skillset can be a nuisance but they won't blister in PvP and they can't force anyone to strike the Tank.
Few people will play Tank in PvP if they are left until last while the rest of the team is killed. Its not a nice experience in any way shape or form.
Edit: Spelling mistakes.
What relevance does anything in regards to DPS have to do with the argument that you put forward in regards to healers?
I mean, that isn't he best argument you've got, we both know this. I'm happy to ignore you even mentioned it if you like
As to the rest of your post - obviously taunts would need to be 1 - 2 second duration at most, and have the same restrictions as other forms of CC. Without that, the PvP meta would be a bunch of healers with a ring of tanks around them, and that would be damn near unstoppable.
Obviously, thay would be stupid.
A tank having 4 or 5 taunts that each have 10 - 30 second cooldowns, and durations of 1 or 2 seconds, and leave the target with an immunity to taunts though, that gives tanks the tools to be able to do in PvP what they do in PvE, control the battlefield.
I mean, if I am standing next to a rival tank and attacking his healer, that tank damn well should be able to pull me off of that healer, that is what tanks are for.
I will admit, I am making an assumption that most players - specifically most tanks - would like to see tanks perform the same role in PvE and PvP. Working on this assumption, I've yet to see a better suggestion or implementation anywhere. Like everything, it has its downsides, but those downsides are able to be worked down to being so minute, without detracting from the purpose of the suggestion, that it really is the least bad option.
I wouldn't look too hard at the list of abilities right now.
No game has ever stuck to its ability list for the last 6 months of development, let alone the last 36 months.
Also, I consider altering who I am targeting to be much less invasive than altering whether I can move or not, less invasive than pulling me to a location I didnt opt to travel to, less invasive than preventing me from being able to cast anything, less invasive than stopping the cast I have already initiated.
Really, the only CC that I consider less invasive than a target change is a slow.
Of for sure I expect the abilities to change, especially since it's not even been decided as to whether or not we'll have the hybrid combat or full tab.
"[X] should be removed because it is something that interferes with your control of your character" was literally the basis given for your argument against a taunt mechanic. I am illustrating the folly of following that mentality by giving what is plainly an absurd example, by using the same argument. Until you can differentiate the reason one should advocate for one but not the other, you don't have a counterargument, you have a game design theory that revolves entirely on what you "feel" is good, rather than what is actually healthy for the game in a way you can coherently argue for. Calling attention to that stupid mentality is not pedantic, it is demanding something beyond intellectual laziness from you.
Steven has specifically said if hybrid doesn't work, they will default to tab.
/sigh
What about mob agency? Mobs have feelings too.
Sure, taunts have be a tanking tool for a long time, but it's still a lazy mechanic. A more active way of tanking in PvE would translate well into PvP. In a game with both PvE and PvP, the closer the mobs and players are treated, the less likely you are to have classes/specs that excel in one and suck in the other.
Want to talk about intellectual laziness? You could have asked me to elaborate, you could have just provided your counter argument, you could have simply said you disagree. Instead you yeeted my comment to a purposefully ridiculous level for the sole purpose of feeling superior and to try and insult me.
I never said I was against CC or loss of control of my character, but control over who I have targeted which is control over what I'm doing on my UI and saying "death does that" is pedantic as hell and does absolutely nothing to further the discussion.
If you want to suggest that a PvP Taunt mechanic could be a small interrupt or even a daze as you're "feared" or something then sure, but I personally dislike the idea of the game forcing who I have targeted. I even further said that if we have 3 hard CCs by level 10 then that says a lot for how CC heavy the game could be and went even further to demonstrate that Blizzard goes far too hard into heavy CC.
CC is very hard to balance b/c it absolutely feels like garbage to be in a fight and your only counter is to stand up and walk away from your pc.
Magic resists; more magic resistance = less time mezzed. There were magic resistance debuffs; if applied to you, you could reasonably assume focus fire or a mezmerization spell was coming, allowing you time to break line of sight, or otherwise position yourself in a beneficial fashion.
Mez removal spells; one of the support class abilities included a spell that would straight up eliminate mezmerization effects on your target. Consequently, there was extreme value in not getting "caught out" away from supportive backliners, where you might be mezzed and left in no-man's land while the battle raged on. In addition, there was a fairly long CD ability you could use to purge yourself of CC if you truly needed to be free of it right that moment.
Protective periods; after recovering from a crowd control effect, you were immune to that type of CC for a period of time dependent on how long the base effect of the CC was. For instance, getting stunned for 9 seconds meant you were sitting there for 9 seconds, sure, but once it was over, you were immune to stuns for about 45 seconds. This, interestingly, resulted in there being value in abilities that stunned for shorter periods of time, because they could be applied more frequently over the course of a fight, since they resulted in shorter protective periods.
Damage; except for stuns, all crowd control effects (roots & mez) were removed upon taking damage. This rewarded coordinated group tactics over uncoordinated zerg tactics; 800 people could be fought off by 8 if the 8 could apply an AoE mez and the 800 didn't have a supportive crew ready and able to remove the crowd control.
All these intertwining systems and more combined to make crowd control very powerful but also very fragile. It was a scalpel for use by coordinated groups to precisely cut enemies off from one another, and its presence made the game far better, not worse. In fact, haphazardly applied CC was a *bad thing* because it gave enemies protection from it for what could be the entire rest of the fight!
I say all this because even though "you lost control of your character," the presence of these mechanics actually helped make the game feel *more* tactical and interesting, not less.
You have to rationalize a better reason than "loss of control = badwrong because no control =
And that, after all, is what this is all about. Concocting a system where there are interesting choices to be made.
Honestly, I liked the way Warhammer Online handled it; taunting a player means the tank gets a damage bonus to that player for a short period of time, or until the taunted player hits the tank a couple times. Likewise, I enjoy the notion @Maciej posed; as a Tank attacks a target, he gains a buff that lets him deal more damage to that target; as he is attacked by that target, he loses the buffs that give him extra damage, roughly evening out to no damage bonus as long as the enemy target keeps his full attention on the Tank.
I'm personally always interested in ways to smooth that jarring gameplay jump from PvE to PvP effects. I don't like "PvE only" effects, because as others have mentioned, it creates a stronger divide between PvE and PvP, which should be avoided in AoC because one of its goals is to draw both types of players into a common world. The fewer gameplay differences there are between those worlds, the more readily and easily players will be able to engage with both sorts of content.
It makes no sense from any perspective if a tanks role in PvP is anything other than drawing the attention of the enemy.
I mean,if you have a situation where a group is PvE'ing, and is then attacked by another group, the DPS Carrie's on DPS'ing, the healer Carrie's on healing, the support Carrie's on supporting, what sense does it make at all for the tank to not carry on tanking?
The fact that most other games don't facilitate tanks being able to actually tank in PvP is a mark against those games, not an excuse as to why Ashes should follow suit.
I greatly prefer this idea to the "forced target" one especially in Ashes where the camera seems to be locked right behind your character. If you're forced to target something it could end up whipping your character that way which just sounds more frustrating than fun.
I understand stuns, fears, and similar effects are necessary but I'd far rather buffs and debuffs such as rogues getting a stacking damage multiplier the more backstabs they get on you than a slew of hard CCs b/c I've played a LOT of PvP in games like WoW where you end up having a single trinket and once that's popped you've either won or walked away and honestly it doesn't feel that rewarding to have fights come down to who has the most stuns.
So, your arguement basically boils down to "you dont want a thing because you once played a game with a poor implementation of a similar thing".
I dont want a poor implementation of any system in Ashes, and any arguments I put forward are based on the assumption that Intrepid would implement then as well as is possible.
Now, my issue with taunts being a damage buff are that tanks are not there for dealing damage, they are there to control the battlefield, to protect their friends.
As far as I am concerned, anything that doesn't allow tanks to be tanks is not the appropriate thing to give to tanks. Since tanks are tanks, not DPS, giving them something to increase their DPS rather than make them better tanks is a non-starter to me.
I mean, all of our arguments are based on past experiences. I don't want too much hard CC b/c I've played games w/ exactly that and it's just not fun to be stun locked for half a fight. The only real counterplay to stuns is to build for diminishing returns, pop a trinket, or just wait and twiddle your thumbs and I just don't find it fun.
I can understand some but I
Smite actually does it pretty well IMO where you have a good balance of slows, debuffs, and silences that are largely area control effects so smart positioning is a big part of the match.
Any issues any of us have with the game having too much CC should be directed at that system that they will have to have, not at any specific class.
To me, the best such system (or least bad system) is where you are immune to CC for a period after being CC'ed. This is not exactly a rare mechanic in MMO's.
If we assume that this period is 4 times the duration of a CC, that means that if you are taunted for 2 seconds, you are then immune to taunts (and potentially other forms of CC, at the developers discretion) for the following 8 seconds.
They could even have the immunity duration be based on the type of CC, so if you are stunned for 2 seconds, you have an 8 second immunity to all CC, if you are taunted for 2 seconds you have a 6 second immunity, if you are rooted you have a 4 second immunity, if you are slowed you have a 2 second immunity.
Now, this is not the only system they could have in place, a diminishing return on duration of CC is also viable. The immunity though is just my preferred.
Don't get me wrong, I totally agree with you in that the game needs to be designed in a way where players can't just be CC locked. That's shit, and nobody likes it. What I'm saying is that you can't make sure that doesn't happen on the class level, as if there is only one class with any CC in the game and no system to prevent CC locking, then you will see masses of that one class running around CC'ing everyone.
If you disagree that such a system is needed, I am interested to hear what you think will stop people CC-locking others with the few classes that will have CCs. On the other hand, if you do agree that such a system is needed, I am interested to hear why you think it would mean the game would then be too CC heavy if tanks had taunts that forced target - I mean, the system that caps CC is there anyway.
When I said limit how much there is I meant that I'd rather not see every single Archetype have a stun (I'd put sleep, daze, etc all in the same line) and maybe let them play around w/ other forms of interactioins such as damage increases (or for Tanks perhaps damage mitigation if he's not attacked by his main target) or things of that nature.
Here's the thing though.
There are 8 classes, each having around 30 abilities. Each ability has 4 options of augment based on the specific class chosen, of which each class has 8 to chose from.
Then there are at least 3 social organizations, as well as each specific race. Each of these offer up more augments. On top of that we have religion that has more augments.
When all added up, there are going to be thousands of different abilities in Ashes - far more than in any other game.
There absolutely will be CC effects on some of the augments for skills, as opposed to the CC being a core part of the base skill.
On top of that, you have the bard class. As a support class, CC is about as core to that class doing it's job as a taunt is to a tank doing their job. They won't just have one or two CC's, they will have perhaps a dozen different skills that will have some form of CC either as a part of the base skill, or as an augment.
Intrepid won't make the game in a way where each class has one or two CC's and that is it. That simply doesn't gel with what Ashes is.
Instead, they are going the diminishing returns route (not my first choice, but it is what they have decided).
What all of this means is that there will be more CC available to players than they will be able to use, due to those diminishing returns. Under that assumption, making tank taunts force players to target them in PvP has no real negative effect in terms of how much CC the game will have - as the game will have exactly the same amount with or without this change.
The relevance is that my first point included all classes, not just healers. You just cherry picked one sentence out of two paragraphs and tried to call it my first point. That's a super dishonest debating technique.
There is also zero evidence we're going to get friend and foe targeting in the game, so that's a moot point until we hear they plan to do it.
I think @Maezriel actually came with the best argument against forced target lock though, which is that it messes directly with the UI and player choice by force-clicking another target for the player. It breaks the 4th wall. None of the other common types of CC do that.
Can it work? Probably. Is it a bad idea? Definitely.
Also, your whole premise is flawed. We agree that skills in PvE and PvP should be similar in effect. The thing is, so far we have seen no evidence of a hard taunt in PvE that forces the mob to turn to the tank. It's all been soft taunt, which is threat based. That means that DPS or healers can have aggro, and the tank has to work harder to be perceived as the bigger threat to the mob.
And that is really it. Perception of threat. Check out all the tank skills in the video or on the wiki. It's all about generating more threat, which a means a hate/threat table, and the mob turning towards the one at the top of the table, because it perceives that person as most threatening. There is no forced target lock. Even if the tank gets one later on in level, that's just one skill out of many and isn't at all representative of the core class dynamic.
So if we want skills in PvE and PvP to be similar, tanks need to be *perceived* as the bigger threat in PvP by players, as long as they are played well. How that is accomplished is all about class balance and skills, and is certainly not just trying to brute force people to target the tank for a couple of seconds, a skill we don't even know a tank will get in PvE. It's about damage/durability and support skills and CC that doesn't break the 4th wall. A debuff on the target hit by a tank (or buff for the tank) is actually much more in line with how the PvE mechanic works, because of how it changes the perception of the threat from the tank (no brute forcing target lock).
1. The more the tank hits you with his threat generating skills, the more debuffed you get. The first couple of hits won't be too bad, but the longer you ignore the tank, the more it stacks and the worse it gets for the targets. To get rid of the debuff you have kill the tank or stay out of reach for X amount of seconds. And I don't mean just debuff the targets damage, also debuff the healing and other support skills.
2. Instead of a debuff, the tank gets increased damage on the affected player(s) for every time his threat generating skills hit them, until he becomes a super hard hitting juggernaut if just ignored. As in 1. kill the tank or otherwise stop him from hitting you in order to reset it.
3. Combine the two, just to half the effect for each obviously. I think this one is the better option personally.
So going with option three in small group fights, the tank can go straight for the healer and both debuff the healer's healing output, and actually kill him if not peeled off quickly. Or he can stay back and protect his own healer from the enemy tank the same way. Perhaps with an added buddy guardian ability that soaks up some of the damage on the healer, for those who prefer playing tanks defensively in PvP.
Sure, that might be good yeah. That's a playtesting thing for sure
Honestly, I assumed you were mostly joking with the rest of that point. There is nothing dishonest about not wanting to debate points that are not thought out.
I mean, why would a tank use a limited resource (taunt on a cooldown), that has a very limited effect by itself (can go back to what you were doing in literally 1 or 2 seconds) and then just run away? I mean, a rant for a se one or two isn't going to throw people off by itself.
Even *if* someone did this, and actually managed to gain some form of advantage from it, then that is just good play by them.
If it was deemed that this was giving tanks an unfair advantage (which it isn't), Intrepid could very easily add the condition that the taunt only forces the target if the tank is stationary. Since the idea of a taunt is to encourage others to attack you, this works in well with the basic idea.
League of Legends is very popular and it uses a Tank Taunt. I personally don't see an issue with Tank Taunts. Tank Taunts would be balanced like all other CCs. The argument against is the same argument I have in which, nothing will make me fight a Tank unless my class Hard Counters the Tank. In Warhammer Online I used to pull healers from the back lines into my raid and we'd nuke the healer.
I feel Javelin would perform much like the healer pulls in Warhammer Online. I'm all for tactics and strategies. In my mind, a Taunt will add more in-depth tactics and a grander scope for skill based PvP. We haven't seen Fighters yet but more often than not, Fighters replace Tanks in PvP. I think it would be a shame if Tanks are not taken to PvP Encounters.
Building on what @Maciej suggested: when you get taunted, if you don't hit the tank 3 times then the tank gets an opening to stun you - but he needs to actually hit you to trigger the stun.
That gives a lot of room for different playstyles and choices for taunt interactions.
3 attacks from a rogue could be over in a little more than a second, while the same could take a mage 6.
I dont think it has to be a level playing field. Mages being particularly vulnerable to a taunt is fine - I assume this only happens if a tank gets close to the back lines - so a mage should be disengaging anyways.
Some level of a gap is fine, but that kind of a level is a bit too much.
I mean, with mages being the class must vulnerable to melee attacks anyway, they don't also need to be the most vulnerable to taunts.
A three hit mechanic would mean that tanks are basically anti-mage, but near worthless on melee classes.
Also, I wouldn't assume that all taunts would be close range. I would imagine that both the tank/ranger and the tank/mage (as well as potentially the ranger/tank and mage/tank) would have some long range taunts.
Yeah definitely would need to be tested for balance. imo, it increases the scissors-paper-rock dynamic and increases the threat of the tank to the backline - because quite honestly a team should not allow an enemy tank to reach the back lines at all.
I know what you're saying about a ranged taunt - but if the tank has to deal a final blow to trigger the stun, then a taunt that the tank can't reach can be ignored. I haven't really thought about a tank wielding a bow though... hahaha, perhaps a new meta.
1. Allow a tank to activate a skill (or toggle a "shields up mode") and take all non-aoe damage (and may be reduce cleave damage) for a friendly, when the tank's in front of & within melee range of the friendly.
2. Allow a tank to activate a skill (or toggle a "shields up mode") and block (but take reduced damage from) any projectiles (and may be frontal cone aoe) aimed at friendlies behind the tank, provided that the tank's actually on the path of the projectile.
Immersion-wise this feels more "right" IMO as the tank needs to actually get between the attacker & the friendly in order to protect the friendly, and in this case it also makes perfect sense that attackers can't magically penetrate the tank and attack the squishies behind.
But I'm not sure about the effort to implement 2. -- all projectile skills (including tab targeting ones) now need to have collision detection (if they don't have already), and latency problem might make the whole experience terrible.
I have some doubts about making taunts work in PvP though. In PvE situations, "taunting forces the mob to attack the tank" can be explained away by "the mob's stupid / less intelligent / not capable of tactical planning" (otherwise who would want to attack the tank? it's hard to kill, it's less threatening than dps/healer/ccer). But when used against a player ... unless you add some sort of "magical debuff that makes target go berserk" to the taunts, otherwise I'd wonder what prohibits the player from ignoring the taunt and stay on his previous target (the squishies)?
Threat based abilities are another story entirely imo.