Tank Roles

Tanking is one of those roles that people either love or hate. Loads of people hate the idea of a tank build because of the stress of tanking content due to other players ridicule and harassment. I found this was the case in FF where people would all want to dps so they could contribute to content but not be criticised for failing or doing a “bad” job.

This then creates problems in itself. New tanks learning content or how to tank being grouped with people who race ahead with their dps builds pulling mobs and screaming at the tank to “do their job”. It’s quite humiliating and turns people off wanting to play that role.

While there’s no perfect way to handle it a tank shouldn’t hit hard but should be able to take the hits and provide CC. This encourages the dps and the healer to stay behind the tank and deal damage/heal.

So what happens when in Ashes you’re wandering around and come across a caravan being attacked? You decide you want to defend the caravan and be the local hero. However, you’re a PvE tank and there’s no one else around. Your tank build is going to be pretty useless against players attacking the caravan since you can’t output high amounts of damage on your own. Will these types of engagements all be PvE until you engage in them, thus becoming PvP events or maybe you can somehow swap from a PvE to PvP build on the fly?

Traditional roles work but they do turn more casual players off. Guild Wars doesn’t have set classes and while this works for most of their content it has caused problems with their raid community. Their solution was build templates, which allows for instant swapping of gear to support different roles for different content. Such a solution may work in Ashes, particularly if you were relaxing at your local node when it suddenly gets attacked. A quick gear swap and you’re ready to defend your node.

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ArcaneGuardian

Ludullu

The solution is "don't separate your gear builds". And Intrepid want it that way
https://ashesofcreation.wiki/Gear#Gear_types

Dygz

The solution is having classes made up of from different Archetypes:

Tanks who want to add some Mage-style damage to their tanking abilities can do so.
Tanks who want to add some Rogue-style damage to their tanking abilities can do so.
Tanks who want to add some Cleric-style damage to their tanking abilities can do so.
Clerics who want to add some tanking abilities to their heals can do so.
Bards who want to add some tanking abilities to their debuffs can do so.

Dygz

Ashes is a PvX game.
How in the world could "PvE Tank" build be "useless"?
Who says you need to output high amounts of damage to be helpful?

A Caravan is essentially PvE until it gets attacked by players.
You cannot swap builds on the fly in Ashes.
Ashes does not have "traditional" classes.
Ashes is PvX - we shouldn't need to swap gear from "PvE gear" to "PvP Gear" to defend our Node.
It's just PvX gear.

George_Black

There is no PvE gear. How are you going to be a pve tank?

Ludullu

Dygz wrote: »

Ashes is a PvX game.
How in the world could "PvE Tank" build be "useless"?
Who says you need to output high amounts of damage to be helpful?

A Caravan is essentially PvE until it gets attacked by players.
You cannot swap builds on the fly in Ashes.
Ashes does not have "traditional" classes.
Ashes is PvX - we shouldn't need to swap gear from "PvE gear" to "PvP Gear" to defend our Node.
It's just PvX gear.

I'd even add this!

Dygz wrote: »

The solution is having classes made up of from different Archetypes:

Tanks who want to add some Mage-style damage to their tanking abilities can do so.
Tanks who want to add some Rogue-style damage to their tanking abilities can do so.
Tanks who want to add some Cleric-style damage to their tanking abilities can do so.
Clerics who want to add some tanking abilities to their heals can do so.
Bards who want to add some tanking abilities to their debuffs can do so.

That is to say - this was a double post, yet you answered both and in different ways

Atama

Just an FYI, I reported the OP. I made it clear that I have no objection to the poster or this thread, but I asked if a moderator could merge the threads because it looks like having two threads was a mistake and we have two parallel discussions on the same issue.

Dygz

NiKr wrote: »

That is to say - this was a double post, yet you answered both and in different ways

Haha! Your post inspired me in the other thread.
💜

daveywavey

Atama wrote: »

Just an FYI, I reported the OP. I made it clear that I have no objection to the poster or this thread, but I asked if a moderator could merge the threads because it looks like having two threads was a mistake and we have two parallel discussions on the same issue.

As well as a Dev Discussion where this could easily have gone.

ShadonSol

Merged the two threads into one.

Asraiel

Does there even exist pvp gear?

as far i know it will only give gear and noth specialized stats for pvp purpose only.
tanks are allwasy welcomed into partys and in ashes it will give many oportuintys not only in dungeons where taks as a essential part

bloodprophet

No there is only gear.
No special PvP stats either.

Lincs

It seems like the tank roles are going to have a fairly technical role in combat. I'm curious to see how they start out

Songcaller

I kind of wish Ashes moved away from WoW Raids. I far prefer tactical Raids - Destiny styled raids if you will. It will be awesome when we know more, however, even the 1% instances could've still been tactical raids rather than massed raids. Makes the raids far less removed and far more involved. We haven't seen the raids yet though, you could still build tactical raids for 40 players.

Asraiel

Lincs wrote: »

It seems like the tank roles are going to have a fairly technical role in combat. I'm curious to see how they start out

hmm wouldnt say that for ashes since there will be 16 diffrent tank builds at least. 8x tank class +Archetype and 8x class + Tank Archetype

ï like the holy triangle however this also means every group often has a tank and a healer and the rest is more or less fillers

so there 2 classes will have the highest chances to find groupes. how they manage in solo questing i dont know

To7feh

Tanks shouldn’t be a no dps class / taunt spam buttons. They should be a dps class with the dps tied to their utility skills similar to lost ark. Some of the posts in the dev discussion are old ideas from old school gamers that translates to completely useless class.

Lost ark approached this in a clever way, it made tanks a dps class with a caveat. All your damage comes from playing the class like a good tank:
+% damage to frontal attacks
+% damage when shielded
+%damage based on damage absorbed
Shields regenerate from taunting
Taunt is very short but refills % from shields , gives +%dmg output to all part members for 5 seconds ( opener) and interrupts certain skills.

You are forced to be in the mobs face, you are forced to position, you are forced to tank the damage, you are forced to taunt and your are forced to be as annoying as possible in pvp if you want to do some dmg. Actually even your dmg skills are activated from dmg taken.

They made the class valuable in terms of dps and valuable in pvp. Tanks in pvp are ignored until the end in most games. But with a system that makes you valuable you are a priority like everyone else.

Tank skills shouldn’t be 2 rows that are disconnected from each other with one row completely useless in pvp. They should be a full system built around the play style of the class.

bloodprophet

GW2 does this that is a shit show. Roles need to be important.

CROW3

To7feh wrote: »

Tank skills shouldn’t be 2 rows that are disconnected from each other with one row completely useless in pvp. They should be a full system built around the play style of the class.

Good tanks were beasts in WoW PvP. I did solid damage and lasted forever as either Blood or Vengeance.

To7feh

CROW3 wrote: »

To7feh wrote: »

Tank skills shouldn’t be 2 rows that are disconnected from each other with one row completely useless in pvp. They should be a full system built around the play style of the class.

Good tanks were beasts in WoW PvP. I did solid damage and lasted forever as either Blood or Vengeance.

I didn’t play WOW tanks . But I played a tank main in Aion, Wildstar,Tera, lostArk ,Rift,Silkroad, Final Fantasy and few others. Outside of Tera and lostArk, they all had the same common denominators.

- Horrible dps and a chore to level.
-Extremely gear dependent to become viable in pvp and in some cases required the best gear period to compete with a an average dps class.
- Most pve skills had no meaningful effects in pvp.
- The gameplay is almost similar ( taunt , turn the boss to you, summon your pocket healer and wait).
- In serious raids a dps class with good gear and a good healer is probably the better option.

All I am trying say is that this old formula for tanks have been recycled over and over with the same issues carrying over. I like having roles but the design of the traditional tank role isn’t viable and if this video is any indication things aren’t looking any better.

https://youtu.be/-ZkkVKZ64Ns

Skills: pull ,protection shield or bubble that most likely slows you down , shield bash the probably stuns, bleed skill… literally your average generic tank with the least creative weapons imaginable, a sword and shield and a two hander.

bloodprophet

Sounds like your looking for GW2.
All DPS all the time.

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