Tank - The role of threat/Hate in PvP

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?

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Raven016

I think Tank's role in PvP should be to protect nearby players.
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.

Enigmatic Sage

Tanks can be a lot of fun in PvP if done right. I had a lot of fun playing a Juggernaut in SWTOR in its vanilla years. The game had its problems but the intercepts, intervenes and mitigations were fun to synergise with the healers or whatever squishy needed your help because they had terrible positioning. Force choke and force push was a great combo for throwing players off the cliffs too lol.

Scarctic

FreeThinker wrote: »

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 are a viable threat in pvp. Thoughts & ideas?

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

willsummon

I like in PVP where for tanks, taunt skills can be used, with in a small area, to force enemy players target focus on the tank.

It allows tanks to soak up some damage and give them a role in PVP.

Thokan

On the other hand, threat and taunts are mechanics that generally fit PvE better. One easy way to skip that and still have tanks more than useful in PvP is to give them a linked damage sharing ability. For instance in Warhammer: Return of Reckoning the tanks hade a Guard(?) ability where they appointed another character and soaked half of their incoming damage instead.

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.

Ruerik

willsummon wrote: »

I like in PVP where for tanks, taunt skills can be used, with in a small area, to force enemy players target focus on the tank.

It allows tanks to soak up some damage and give them a role 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.

Voeltz

Forced target switching from taunts and/or redirecting the camera is bad. The way it was in Warhammer was perfect. The combination of Guard (reduce damage done to an ally by 50% and redirect to yourself while in range), Taunts reducing the targets damage and threat generators also reducing damage or having an additional effect such as a knockback, silence or some other Crowd Control.

Dimitraeos

Voeltz wrote: »

Forced target switching from taunts and/or redirecting the camera is bad. The way it was in Warhammer was perfect. The combination of Guard (reduce damage done to an ally by 50% and redirect to yourself while in range), Taunts reducing the targets damage and threat generators also reducing damage or having an additional effect such as a knockback, silence or some other Crowd Control.

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.

Aszkalon

Raven016 wrote: »

I hate tanks so much!

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. 😁 😁 ... 🤣 👍

SmileGurney

Warhammer Online got tanks right in pvp, you could argue it's one of the most impactful class types. They also came in different "flavours".
https://www.returnofreckoning.com/forum/viewtopic.php?t=23767

I hope Intrepid are going to shamelessly steal a lot of the Warhammer Online / Return of Reckoning ideas.

koltovince

Some people have already pointed it out, but SWTOR (and apparently Warhammer) have a great system for tanks in PVP. Any taunt from a tank will cause the enemy player taunted to do 10-20% less damage to any target that isn't the tank. They also have a guard ability which redirects 50% of the damage a player takes to the tank. And each tank also had unique utility to further add on to this mitigation by stopping other players or repositioning allies.

A guard never forced players to swap off the guarded target and hit the tank, but smart players could play off this guard and focus both tank and guarded target to melt the tank until they die or take off the guard. Additionally tanks had the role of watchdog for the healer, specifically moving their guard and targeting key enemy players to taunt so the ally dying can get enough damage mitigation to survive until the healing got them back up to full.

Regarding the forced re-target to tanks in PVP, I can see it being useful if say the deployable wall of the tanks also began to contain line of sight mechanics. A tank should have survivability, but they also have to know when to not take damage, and if they can force the enemy to target them and successfully evade the punishment with use of the environment then it can be a good mechanic. We can also see mechanics where hitting the tank will cause the enemy to be debuffed, allowing for allies to follow up and use their debuffs and stun any enemy who chose to to attack the tank when they got re-focused.

Dygz

Grapple also works as a kind of PvP "Taunt".

Endowed

Every single hate/threat skill should have an useful ability in pvp.

Tanks as a total afterthought out in the world as a solo character is an awful design.
One nearly every mmos ignores.

If the Tank is the worst pvp class out in the open world, everytime, than its a total fail by the designers.

willsummon

Taerrik wrote: »

willsummon wrote: »

I like in PVP where for tanks, taunt skills can be used, with in a small area, to force enemy players target focus on the tank.

It allows tanks to soak up some damage and give them a role 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.

That would be my second suggestion on the matter. Though, I would suggest the debuff be 50% less damage to every target but the tank, and last for ten seconds.

Lodrig

Way back in the day I started a similar thread, https://forums.ashesofcreation.com/discussion/55589/aggro-threat-mechanics-dont-work-in-pvx/p1 In which I point out that simplistic hate table systems would not allow similar gameplay for tanks from pve to pvp. I recomended that Tanks have a kit with makes attacking them actually the strategically optima/nessary thing to do and that AI mobs just have a smart enough AI to realize that and take the same actions a player would. As they will NEED to make the Tank kit that way for pvp anyways they should just skip entirely having skills which only the AI registers.

Lodrig

I'm in agreement that force target changing by being taunted is BAD.

But I think their could be room for a limited varient. Target specific silencing. So if a Tank taunts you then you can only use targeted abilities on them, but can still use basic attacks on anyone and you retain full normal control of who you target. An even softer version would be an incressed mana cost for any ability not targeting the taunter, such a effect is potentially viable was a wide mass taunt of long duration that can cause mana constraints.

The only instance where I can see untargeting as valid is if the Tank (maybe Tank/Rogue), has actually caused their allies to become temporarily stealthed (maybe the Tank used a smoke bomb on the area, or turned themselves into a Roman candle which is so distracting that it 'blinds' everyone to targets behind them). In which case your targeting must drop, but it dosn't got to the Tank, it just goes to untargeted the same way it would if a target died or move out of range.

SmileGurney

Warhammer Online, despite its flaws, had some decent ideas regarding tanks in general. They all were slightly different, some more dps oriented, others more "tanky". There is a modded Warhammer Online server which was created by the Warhammer pvp fans, Return of Reckoning, in case someone feels like a nostalgia trip.

Shaladoor

I'm in agreement that target redirection is not a good idea. It makes sense in PvE, but not PvP. I also believe that there should be a good reason for an opposing group to WANT to target the tank. There's a good reason to target good DPS, because if an opposing sides DPS are dead then they can't kill you. There's a good reason to target healers because if an opposing sides healers are dead, they can't heal, and thus, you have the advantage.

So what's a good reason to WANT to target a tank? In a PvE scenario, mobs/bosses target tanks because they have threat/hate. Is there a decent way to make an opposing team hate a tank so much that they want to target them first?

Tanks aren't going to be the best DPS or healers, so they would have to alter a fight in a specific way. That could be through buffs/debuffs/dmg mitigation/dmg redirection, or something else that's equally annoying. I don't think there's a need for threat tables or meters behind the scenes. A tank's toolkit should be enough to sway a fight to a degree where tanks will naturally grab threat from players. It can't be too passive (like aoe buffs/debuffs) and there needs to be good ST abilities (like the Guard ability mentioned in prior discussion). I think more ST abilities for tanks would allow good tanks to stand out from bad tanks.

I also think it needs to be clear which members on the battlefield are the tanks. Tanks are the rallying point, the leaders, the flagbearers. They should stand out amongst a group. In PvE, it's almost always clear which mob on the screen is the boss. Why? Because they're bigger! And in my opinion, nothing screams, "Hey! Look at me! Attack me!" like being bigger and more eye-catching than anyone else on the screen. One idea is that tanks could slowly glow, grow in size, or both during fights. That way, if someone says, "Target the tank!" then everyone would immediately know who you're talking about.

What if tanks had an aoe ability that slowly applied an aoe dmg mitigation? I'm thinking like the bard's melodies, and slowly ramps up over time for a limited duration. Something like aoe dmg reduction for the group, increased dmg taken by the tank over the course of 20 seconds? The tank would slowly grow over the course of 20 seconds, clearly marking him as the target and the longer it drags on, the more dmg reduction the group gets. If you've played WoW before, think of the debuff players get when holding the relic. The longer they hold the relic, the larger they grow and the more dmg they receive. That's the idea I get for AoE situations.

ST situations could work differently. If you're the DPS or healer and get targeted by a tank and are now dealing much less dmg/healing than before, I think it should be clear to that DPS/healer where that tank is at on the battlefield. I think this is also a chance where a glow effect around the tank could be useful. Now that you've been targeted by the tank, you know where the tank is and what they're doing. However, it's up to you if you want to try and do anything about it.

Endowed

Lodrig wrote: »

I'm in agreement that force target changing by being taunted is BAD.

We all get Rooted. Snared. Feared. Mezzed/slept. Charmed. Disarmed. Slowed. But a tank (and only a tank - who are the weakest things ever in PVP) changes your target until you tab or click again, is "BAD".

Nah - its annoying like all those others items.

scottstone7

I’ll admit, I only read most of the first page of this post and glossed over the second page some. I may have missed some good ideas or more likely more of multiple people arguing the same idea with each other from different points.
I’ll start out by saying I’ve never played a tank in any kind of PvP setting. I’m almost always the guy everyone wants to target, the healer. While I agree it would be awesome if there were some ways for the tank to force other players to focus on them for a limited time. It would have to be just that, the tank must initiate the ability and must be for a very limited time, I’d say no more than 5 seconds tops, 3 seconds would be better. I’d say very small range AoE version and a single target version, with cooldowns double their activated duration. It should take skill and timing for the tank to properly use the abilities. I’ve not really read into the official information on what is planned but from what I’ve seen discussed in this thread I would say that the taunt method the dev’s have planned or set up could work perfectly.
With that being said. While it is the tank’s job to protect the back line in combat, it is more so the back lines job to protect themselves. If they cannot be at least somewhat self-sufficient in protecting themselves then they need to go back to basics and retrain. Over the years as a healer in various games and PvP situations I’ve employed several ways to avoid the attention of other players. I’ve been known to dress up and masquerade as a DPS caster or an off tank. I’ve used illusions and invisibility; I’ve hidden behind larger characters or stayed just under max cast range and hidden behind world obstacles. Back in the days of EverQuest I even went so far as to spend a couple of months spawn camping a rare spawn that was almost unkillable just to get his cleric only hammer drop that made the wielder invincible for a while after hitting something.
All I’m saying is, IF the tanks have some abilities to temporarily keep other players from attacking the back line that would be awesome. Either way it’s not entirely the tanks job to keep them alive, the back line players lives are in their hands.
I’ve had a great many arguments with more players that I could even remember about their bad play style because they died. I’m the healer, it’s not my job to keep you alive it’s my job to HELP you stay alive. Same goes for the tank. It’s not their job to keep you alive, it’s their job to HELP you stay alive. You do something stupid or flashy or otherwise grab attention, that’s on you. As a healer my number one priority for healing lands on me, then the tank, then anyone else. The best tanks that I’ve ever played with had a similar outlook, they keep themselves alive, then the healer, then anyone else.

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