Greetings, glorious adventurers! If you're joining in our Alpha One spot testing, please follow the steps here to see all the latest test info on our forums and Discord!
Options
Tank - The role of threat/Hate in PvP
FreeThinker
Member
I know this has been a point of consideration for the Devs. From what I’ve seen there has been discussions of auto lock on to the Tank player in PvP settings.
As much as I like being a meat shield as a Tank I don’t believe this is a viable option in PVP because all that will happen is that you’ll insta die from 5 players forced to attack you before moving on and focusing on a DPS/ healer.
I don’t particularly have an amazing alternative idea but I thought starting a discussion around this topic could put some good ideas I out there that maybe the devs can pick up on.
My idea
You know what they say “hatred eats away at the hater” so I was thinking maybe in a pvp setting this acts as a DoT alongside the target switch but also the tank has decreased incoming damage when applying hatred skills to other players. This way Tanks aren’t just a minor inconvenience that everyone hyperfocuses on to get out the way or ignores due to super low damage and is a viable threat in pvp. Thoughts & ideas?
As much as I like being a meat shield as a Tank I don’t believe this is a viable option in PVP because all that will happen is that you’ll insta die from 5 players forced to attack you before moving on and focusing on a DPS/ healer.
I don’t particularly have an amazing alternative idea but I thought starting a discussion around this topic could put some good ideas I out there that maybe the devs can pick up on.
My idea
You know what they say “hatred eats away at the hater” so I was thinking maybe in a pvp setting this acts as a DoT alongside the target switch but also the tank has decreased incoming damage when applying hatred skills to other players. This way Tanks aren’t just a minor inconvenience that everyone hyperfocuses on to get out the way or ignores due to super low damage and is a viable threat in pvp. Thoughts & ideas?
2
Comments
If your primary archetype is tank, then you simply choose the secondary with the best AoE skills. Secondaries will be tested in Alpha 2 … maybe it’s Mage or Fighter (not sure yet).
Tank with Tank secondary (meatshield) and AoE skills? I’m afraid that would be god mode … you can have one but not both.
I’m sure the Intrepid Combat Team has been flooded with those types of OP requests already …
Why 😭 tanks are so underrated
if you dont want 5 dps to target and hit you, then dont use your aoe agro skill next to them. you simply dont press that button...you press that button when you think you can handle the damage. but let me tell you something, its better if you die than your healer
also, tanks probably wont die from a fe dps hitting them, i mean they should have damage reduction stuff plus high defenses, blocks, etc plus you will have a healer healing you...
You’re focusing on the wrong thing. My point is the skill should have some utility in pvp
thats literally the utility, you use it and now ur healer and dps wont die
It would also make the "Unkillable healer" problem in PvP go away, and it would make 1v1 PvP stalemates impossible.
They sneak into my hate list somehow
If there was a damage bonus to who ever had the most threat, then you want your DPS to have that and thus a tank is a negative (a damage bonus means dealing more damage - not sure if you are aware of that based on this post).
On the other hand, if the character with the most hate had a reduction to incoming damage (what it seems like you were actually trying to suggest), you would want that on your healer, not on your tank - thus still making having a tank an over all negative.
Even if a group did have a tank in either of the above scenarios, the opposition side is still best served by just ignoring the tank, as said tank isnt actually able to do anything of concern.
In order to make tanks viable in PvP, you need to give the opposition a reason to want to kill them before they go for the healers. The only viable means to do this is to make the healers very hard to kill if there is a tank looking after them.
This is why a short duration forced target as the mechanic for a taunt works, you will want to kill the tanks before killing the healers if this was in place.
Your response isn’t a thought out response if you read my post in full you would have noted the part where I said it was an idea (not necessarily a suggestion) and this was more of a conversation starter.
But you ironically made my point for me with
Your last sentence “ you will want to kill the tanks before killing the healers if this was in place”
Sounds like it might not of occurred to you, but that is the exact role of a tank. This should be the ideal scenario not being ignored because you’re doing negligible damage and taking even less.
The Tank SHOULD be the first to die (if you can pull it off) but there should be appropriate threat to lose to a tank in no way should you lose half your skill utility to the same effect that ultimately doesn’t do much in pvp is my opinion.
How can you “look after the healer” while not actually doing any damage apart from the occasional CC.
Admittedly this is highly speculative due to not knowing how viable a tanks damage will be overall
Cover/Guard/Aegis?
Whatever the game wants to call it. Ashes is positional enough that we'll get one. I'd suggest they make two of these, actually.
Is it that weird?
No not at all that’s my point exactly there should be more options I’d also take another one of those or even Hate/Aggro building temporary hp for allies in a certain radius
This skill already exists on Tanks in Ashes (some people, including me, have issues with the most recently shown implementation, but it's there). In Ashes, it's called Aegis.
Steven is a Pathfinder DM, and has played many MMOs, if we don't get SOME version of 'Shield Ally' in the final build, then I'll be dumbfounded.
All I can advise is to not let the crop of terrible RPGs/MMOs darken your eyes as to what Ashes already offers. I hope you get your discussion, but I'm not expecting it, we get a lot of these threads, so...
Where I said "you will want to kill the tanks before killing the healers if this was in place", I was talking about giving taunts a forced target effect - if that is what a taunt did in PvP, players would want to kill the tank first, as you and I agree should be the case.
If every time you go to use a half decent attack on a healer you are instead forced to target a tank, you will soon learn to not bother trying to kill a healer if a tank is around.
On the other hand, if there are damage reductions or buffs floating around that you cant really do much about (as per your suggestion), then you will just ignore them and go after the healer.
i think he means a damage bonus onto the enemy player who has a higher threat, so you will be doing extra damage when you attack that person.
anyways if such thing existed, it could be activated by the tank, not just an automatically damage bonus.
A damage buff where you deal more damage to opponents if the tank has generated more hate on them is something that at least on the surface makes some sense, but from a gameplay perspective is still kind of stupid, and still doesnt alter the desire to go after healers first.
The reason it is stupid is because it turns tanks in to DPS buffers in PvP, rather than being actual tanks.
ok you see when you have 3 dps attacking a boss (or a normal mob) the mob will atack the person who is doing the most dps (so that person generated more threat) unless the tank aggros the mob. thts what he means. parties will have some invisible threat meter like normal mobs i guess, and the enemy dps who is doing the most damage will receive a debuff where the damage they reseive willbe increased. thats what he means
i personally dont think its a good mechanic because it can be abused on so many ways. more damage than other party members can mean just 1 more damage than your friend. you dont necessairly ned to be doing 50% more damage than your mate.
you can just put your warrior or tank at the front, when their mage hits you they become vulnerable, then your rogue jumps him and one shots him. people would be too afraid to attack first.
or do some damage then the enemy healer heals they get highest threat u jump him and one shot him...
or in 1v1 just let the other person hit you first now u start your combo with extra damage.
etc etc etc
i think it would only be good if the tank (or any other class really, maybe the summoner who specced for debuffing, but this thread is about tanks) could activate it on a target as way to bring someone down, but not having this automatically turned on by just doing damage. i was just clarifying what he meant.
I get he means to have a threat list like you have in PvE, but that still doesnt make any sense. If its designed so that who ever is on top takes more damage, then you are having tanks working hard in order to die easier.
All in, its just a really poor idea.
damn i had that one in my mind as well and forgot to write it in my previous post xD
since tanks can do more threat than dps using aggro skills (even if they do little to no damage) the moment you use it to take threat away from your dps so he doesnt get the debuff, you just have everyone focusing you and you just explode.
He should be able to create temporary walls and players should be responsible to hide behind them.
He could even have the possibility to rise in the air one team member, to protect it from melee damage. That would be a tower instead of a wall.
Just add a scaleable amount of mitigation from pvp dps when auto lock provoking depending on the number of targets you hit with the skill and you are good to go.
Hit enough people and you are basically invincible for the duration of the skill. let's say this spell holds for 45 sec and has a cd for 60 sec there is a window of 15 sec where you could get oneshotted if everyone keeps hitting you regardless of not doing dps.
Another tank has to auto lock or you have to move out of range of the spell, let's say 100m. The locked players can follow you into your backline and get killed in the process or flee from you to reduce the debuff down to 10 sec.
Spec into mitigation to get this and other traits like trading DPS for mitigation or longer duration of auto lock or spec into other things like DPS or cc to act more as a tanky DPS or support instead.
or something like that but balanced out for the game
It allows tanks to soak up some damage and give them a role in PVP.
The downside is that this defines the combat to a high degree. But, it makes tanks super useful and is less annoying than charm abilities in PvP.
I truly, with all of my heart and soul hope Intrepid do not force me to target the tank when I am taunted.
SWTOR has a far better solution with debuffing my damage significantly unless I attack the tank.
I mean geez, even reduce my damage to 10% if I dont attack the tank. But I really do hate losing the ability to chose what I am going to do.
PvP has a lot more than just simply doing damage, there are interrupts, snares, CCs, pushes, pulls, all sorts of things. Dont force me to waste these on a tank, just nerf my damage against anyone but that tank if I am taunted. This still satisfies the idea that the tank is soaking up damage.
Yeah I think damage redirection in the form of single ally target damage redirects + area of effect damage reduction or something in a radius around the tank should be the minimum tanks should do in pvp. Having a decent amount of CC's (probably soft CC's to help peel, nothing too oppressive like long CC chains and lockdowns) would also give tanks a distinct roll on the battlefield.
Additionally, there should be some damage but it should be only limited sustained dps OR some limited burst capacity (with less damage between its burst abilities), less than what a full on dps spec could dish out. This way you cant completely ignore a tank who is allowed to stick to a target in melee range.
I think " every " Character - that can make a noticeable Difference in a Battleground - is automatically more or less hated from the opposing Side.
You can be a Damage-Dealer,
a Tank,
or a Healer.
Just " annoy " (lol) the Enemy Forces just long and effective enough with your Ability to more or less efficiently stand in their Way of Victory,
and then a LOOONNNG TIIIMMME back then in Alterac-Valley in WoW in around 2005 or 2006,
the " /SPITS " from the Spit-Emote were flying onto your Character in about the same Ratio as some Enemy Projectiles or Melee Attacks. 😁 😁 ... 🤣 👍