Fighter: Stalwart Defender Changes

[Severlin]

Paladins get a potential +100% Bonus to AC from there Heavy Armour and Shield from having:

Tier 2 & 3

Reinforced Defenses: Multiselector:
Reinforced Armor: The Armor Class bonus you gain from wearing heavy armor is increased by (15/30/50)%. (This benefit also applies to Warforged with Adamantine Body.)
Reinforced Shield: The Armor Class bonus you gain from using a shield is increased by (15/30/50)%.

as well as

Tier 4 & 5

Reinforced Defense: Improves the Armor Class bonuses you receive from shields or armor.
Choose One:
Reinforced Armor: The Armor Class bonus you gain from armor or docents is increased by 15%/30%/50%.
Reinforced Shield: The Armor Class bonus you gain from using a shield is increased by 15%/30%/50%.

But fighters only get the Tier 4 & 5 aspect and so 50% less?
That doesn't really seem fair to me.

I am not sure how I screwed up the Sacred Defender tree write up to include Reinforced Defense twice and drop Instinctive Defense but its fixed in the Sacred Defender OP.

Sev~

[EllisDee37]

Please don't do this, this way splashes in fighter or Paladin classes will become too much powerful. Stalwart Defence is a very powerful stance for just 3 level splash and you are removing the movement penalty too.

It doesn't seem OP compared to getting grandmaster of forms by splashing 1 level of monk. Of course that should be fixed, and monk stances should require monk levels instead of character levels. Once that insanity is corrected, then I'd be more inclined to agree with keeping stance at level 6.

One thing to consider is how many AP you can/must spend on buffing a stance you aren't high enough level to use yet. That's always been a fundamental flaw in both defender trees, so moving stance down to level 3 at least mitigates the bad design somewhat.

[FranOhmsford]

1st thoughts:

1) Waaaay too many Short term Action Boosts - Many of which will never be used!

2) Stand Fast is USELESS - The Usable while Knocked down is broken and simply doesn't work! +5 Passive Balance and Fear Immunity would be better

3) Defensive Sweep - Why is this yet another Action Boost? How about making this work like Kensai's Power Surge and last 1 Minute?

4) Last Stand - Yet another Action Boost! We don't all use MACROS Devs! There's 10 Icons on a Bar and chances are only 3 or 4 will see much use - Cleave, Great Cleave, Trip and Sunder are the standards for low level play and as we gain levels we gain more and more abilities that we simply never use!
20 Second Action Boosts are no good to many of us and this one especially should last longer with a 3 Minute Cooldown - It's basically ONLY usable against Bosses so should last 1 minute!

5) Counterattack - Another Clickie and uses an action boost - Requires ACTIVE Shield Blocking! This should be a passive chance to deal damage upon enemy missing you.

6) And why have we lost Shield Striking?
It's fantastic that you've decided to allow Two Handed and Two Wpn Fighters to take Stalwart again BUT why remove an Enhancement specifically aimed at making Shields viable as weapons?
It's not like we're supposed to HAVE to take every enhancement in a tree is it?
You don't need to take away from the Shield Users to give to the DPS guys!

7) Defense Boost - Add 20/40/60 Second Duration to the 3 Tiers {In fact I'd like to see this done for all the standard Action Boosts {Haste/Dmg/Skill/Sprint etc.} and give the full +15 Boost at Tier 1. {It's not like +15 AC is all that great these days anyway and PRR/MRR work on diminishing returns too.}.
This way the Ubers with their Macros can save a couple of AP while us lesser players have the chance to pick up the extra duration.

And I'll say again - What's with all the Action Boosts and Clickies?
There's way too many of these!
Legendary Dreadnought - The most likely ED for a Stalwart is absolutely chock full of them too!


Active Shield Blocking is absolutely terrible in this game - And has no chance of being made viable as a DPS Option with all the movement we have to do.
Can we please get some PASSIVE Shield Blocking bonuses and Leave the Active Shield Blocking for what it's meant for - ALL OUT DEFENSE!

[Severlin]

Let me try to give insight into why the changes to this tree are minimal. We had three goals in mind:

~ Bring the tree in line with the armor up changes.
~ Make it less dependent on shield.
~ Reduce some costs.

Basically if it didn't fall in line with one of these goals we didn't make changes to the tree. That's why a lot of existing enhancements were not changed.

(A full redesign of this tree would have pushed the next update out too far.)

Sev~

[MonadRebelion]

Again the thing that concerns me most here is the fact that the defensive stance is available after just 3 levels. This isn't as bad as making the paladin stance available at 3, but it's still a pretty bad idea.

I also agree that give tanks a 10% speed boost is pretty pointless. There is no reason a super armored guy should be moving faster than an unarmored guy, and such a small boost will do basically nothing to help a tank be the first get agro against folks determined to out run him.

The concern about running speed having something to do with forcing people to play according to certain rules of cooperation doesn't make sense to me. On the one hand, if you are a tank and you find yourself in a group where your tanking abilities help the party (maybe the party can't kill faster than they lose hit points so everyone wants you to agro mobs first), then your tanking abilities naturally become recognized as helpful to the party's success. Maybe cooperation is being forced here, but surely not in some kind of unwelcome sense. At any rate, I don't see how much would turn on +/-10% to a tank's running speed for such a group. On the other hand, if you find yourself in a party with ridiculously powerful PCs who smash mobs roughly on sight, then your tanking abilities won't be needed so you'll just run around and contribute as much dps as possible. Again this is a kind of cooperation, and it would be appreciated, while a demand to allow you to tank would be neither. You might say that this second instance illustrates a pretty crappy way to play the game (call it cooperative soloing), but that is a separate issue from the one at stake here. The reason being, hardly any of the PCs' abilities in the party described in the cooperative soloing scenario will contribute to party success. If everyone in your party is super powered, you will not need your character to do much of what it was designed to do. The party's attitude toward demands to allow you to tank will be about as well respected as the blitzer's demand to allow her to blitz, and the necro's demand to allow him to necro, etc. At any rate, I simple fail to see what cooperative soloing has to do with a tank's 10% bonus to running speed. The issue with tanks in a group of cooperative soloers isn't that the tank isn't fast enough to to make tanking relevant. The issue is that everyone is so overpowered that almost every strategy is irrelevant/unnecessary, and cooperation for everyone is reduced to zerging.

[FranOhmsford]

Let me try to give insight into why the changes to this tree are minimal. We had three goals in mind:

~ Bring the tree in line with the armor up changes.
~ Make it less dependent on shield.
~ Reduce some costs.

Basically if it didn't fall in line with one of these goals we didn't make changes to the tree. That's why a lot of existing enhancements were not changed.

(A full redesign of this tree would have pushed the next update out too far.)

Sev~

Then what I don't get is why you removed a SINGLE PASSIVE Enhancement off to the side of the tree that was specifically there to help make Shield use viable as a DPS option while keeping in the Active {and therefore useless!} shield block clickies and +1/2/3 AC bonuses!


It's bad enough that unlike Two Handed or TWF Sword and Board has so many requirements and ACTIVE abilities BUT to remove basically the ONLY Passive DPS boost strictly for a Sword and Board Fighter in the ENTIRE Tree once again Pigeonholes S+B into Tank and therefore worthless in all but maybe 1% of the game!

[maddmatt70]

So fighter and paladin stacks now. Looks like that will be tanks now like 14 paladin 6 fighter or something like that probably dwarf.

[Severlin]

Then what I don't get is why you removed a SINGLE PASSIVE Enhancement off to the side of the tree that was specifically there to help make Shield use viable as a DPS option while keeping in the Active {and therefore useless!} shield block clickies and +1/2/3 AC bonuses!


It's bad enough that unlike Two Handed or TWF Sword and Board has so many requirements and ACTIVE abilities BUT to remove basically the ONLY Passive DPS boost strictly for a Sword and Board Fighter in the ENTIRE Tree once again Pigeonholes S+B into Tank and therefore worthless in all but maybe 1% of the game!

I think when the Vanguard tree is released on the live forums you will get a chance to see our plans for weapon and shield DPS.

Sev~

[maddmatt70]

Players have builds that rely on shields, but still wear robes/outfits.

Sev~

I am actually always one of those who like two weapon fighting tanks. I currently have a 10 monk 6 paladin 4 fighter which uses shortswords and likely will be gutted with these changes or at least too far behind 14 paladin 6 fighter to be competitive.

[HatsuharuZ]

I think when the Vanguard tree is released on the live forums you will get a chance to see our plans for weapon and shield DPS.

Sev~

Does this mean you'll be making changes to the shield fighting feat line?

[XodousRoC]

Again the thing that concerns me most here is the fact that the defensive stance is available after just 3 levels. This isn't as bad as making the paladin stance available at 3, but it's still a pretty bad idea.

I also agree that give tanks a 10% speed boost is pretty pointless. There is no reason a super armored guy should be moving faster than an unarmored guy, and such a small boost will do basically nothing to help a tank be the first get agro against folks determined to out run him.

The concern about running speed having something to do with forcing people to play according to certain rules of cooperation doesn't make sense to me. On the one hand, if you are a tank and you find yourself in a group where your tanking abilities help the party (maybe the party can't kill faster than they lose hit points so everyone wants you to agro mobs first), then your tanking abilities naturally become recognized as helpful to the party's success. Maybe cooperation is being forced here, but surely not in some kind of unwelcome sense. At any rate, I don't see how much would turn on +/-10% to a tank's running speed for such a group. On the other hand, if you find yourself in a party with ridiculously powerful PCs who smash mobs roughly on sight, then your tanking abilities won't be needed so you'll just run around and contribute as much dps as possible. Again this is a kind of cooperation, and it would be appreciated, while a demand to allow you to tank would be neither. You might say that this second instance illustrates a pretty crappy way to play the game (call it cooperative soloing), but that is a separate issue from the one at stake here. The reason being, hardly any of the PCs' abilities in the party described in the cooperative soloing scenario will contribute to party success. If everyone in your party is super powered, you will not need your character to do much of what it was designed to do. The party's attitude toward demands to allow you to tank will be about as well respected as the blitzer's demand to allow her to blitz, and the necro's demand to allow him to necro, etc. At any rate, I simple fail to see what cooperative soloing has to do with a tank's 10% bonus to running speed. The issue with tanks in a group of cooperative soloers isn't that the tank isn't fast enough to to make tanking relevant. The issue is that everyone is so overpowered that almost every strategy is irrelevant/unnecessary, and cooperation for everyone is reduced to zerging.

Speed boost, in addition to the removal of the speed reduction, is a realized 20 percent increase in movement from the base stance as stands today...a not insignificant increase. It is, to me, a a sort of nod toward Paladins being mountless in DDO. It is entirely likely that, given your scenarios, the increased movement speed benefits both. When a tank becomes necessary, it is realistically slowing the entire party by 20 percent in current base stance versus the improved new version. This makes long quests and encounters cumbersome, and introduces an unnecessary mechanic to our play time. The speed boost is fine, and will not negatively affect play in any group, while making it more fun for those irritated by the stance's current penalty. It is a good change, not a bad one.

The concern over stances being available at a lower tier without any concern over the fact that enhancement points have to be spent to improve a stance you can't even use until (currently) level six baffles me. Forcing those points to be spent prior to stance acquirement is wonky and wrong-headed. *That said, I do recognize the validity of concern over stances being available to a lower investment in the class...I simply think there should be a better stance improvement mechanic that doesn't force points to be spent before the stance is even acquired*

[FlaviusMaximus]

Make the defensive stances require 12 levels of the class if they are not going to require a shield. These changes, at present, unbalance more than they balance.

It will be worth looking into either fixing how the defensive stances work or changing a couple epic feats to work with them. As more people start to utilize the stances, it will be problematic when they realize that Inspire Excellence does not stack with the Stalwart stance and Bulwark of Defense does not work with either the Paladin or Fighter stance.

[Thrudh]

Last Stand is still kind of limiting for a capstone (20s every 180s, not a lot of uptime there...) maybe make the capstone last 30s with a 120s cooldown, and youre well on your way here.

100% max hps, 50 PRR and 50 MRR is pretty powerful... And 20 seconds is long enough to turn a bad situation around...

This is very nice capstone as it is... 30s with a 120 second cooldown is too powerful... There's plenty of downtime between big fights... Your change would mean a fighter could use the ability 50%-100% of the time during big fights...

I could go with adjusting the boost or the cooldown, but not both... Maybe 30s boost and a 180s cooldown, or a 20s boost and a 120 sec cooldown.

[FestusHood]

100% max hps, 50 PRR and 50 MRR is pretty powerful... And 20 seconds is long enough to turn a bad situation around...

This is very nice capstone as it is... 30s with a 120 second cooldown is too powerful... There's plenty of downtime between big fights... Your change would mean a fighter could use the ability 50%-100% of the time during big fights...

I could go with adjusting the boost or the cooldown, but not both... Maybe 30s boost and a 180s cooldown, or a 20s boost and a 120 sec cooldown.

I could go for it actually giving you hit points to fill the max hit points that you just gained. My experience with this is that the first few seconds of this ability is actually spent "healing" yourself enough to make the max hit point increase mean anything.

[maddong]

Just to clarify when I suggest:
On attacked you get a stacking +1 damage bonus for 6 seconds. This stacks up to 3/6/10 times.

I mean that after 6 seconds you lose the whole stack, not the decrement by 1 that happens with other powers.
To keep it at a +10 damage stack you would have to be constantly attacked.
So after every skirmish it would be reset to 0.

Also I'm not sure you want the speed boost as is. A Bard 15/fighter 4/barbarian 1 would have a permanent 35% base run speed (greater than the current 30% max) and a ? 55% permanent with the warchanter boost. You could either make the speed boost the same type as the swashbuckler or barbarian boost or just cap run speed at a certain limit (and let the player base know what it is capped at).

[bbqzor]

30s with a 120 second cooldown is too powerful... There's plenty of downtime between big fights... Your change would mean a fighter could use the ability 50%-100% of the time during big fights...

Post suggestion, its only up 50% of the time for "big fights" if those big fights all take 60s or less. Its only up 100% of the time for "big fights" if those fights all take less than 30s. Neither of those is really likely on higher difficulty settings (ie, EE), where the ability is most useful. No one really needs a 50 prr boost to get through EN... Anyhow, I dont mind discussion, obviously, but its not like its suddenly on "all the time" with a 25% uptime (which is what 30 of 120 is).

I could go with adjusting the boost or the cooldown, but not both... Maybe 30s boost and a 180s cooldown, or a 20s boost and a 120 sec cooldown.

In such a case the cooldown is the relevant portion. A "bad situation" you want to turn around, lasting a regular action boost duration, is probably sufficient. But having to wait 3 minutes after a use can be a bit limiting. 20s every 120s would certainly be fine, if that was a workable solution.

Frankly, I think the idea of going pure for something you can only use once every 3 min is poor form. Yea, you get 4 con or whatever too okay great. But bear in mind you can get 2 con from another trees enhancements via multiclass... so its not quite as good as it seems. The boost being usable every 2 min would go a long ways towards making it feel like you could use it more freely, rather than having to save it for "really bad" things. Thats only a 100s wait when it ends, before you can hit it again... thats pretty manageable I think.

TLDR version, 20s with 120s cd (20 on, 100 off) fits, if that version of the proposal is fine with everyone else. Cheers.

[Oberon_Shrader]

Overall, I like the proposed changes and especially the reduced AP costs.

However, I have to agree with many of the above posts that making Stalwart Defense available for 3 levels is not good for the game.

I disagree with low hanging fruit on principle. As I've stated before, multi-classing should make a character more versatile, but I think Pure should be more powerful. (I'll take the opportunity to mention that classes that give evasion for 2 levels are also not healthy!)

Finally, any chance on getting some kind of improvement to Dwarf's Throw Your Weight Around? It's a cool idea, but its high investment and your Attack score and Tactical Feats take a major hit, usually making it a bad build choice.

[Nadion]

It is rolled into the Vanguard tree. We didn't want Vanguard builds to be forced to dip into this tree for that 15% chance of a secondary shield bash.

Sev~

Honestly, I really dislike the idea of a separate S&B tree for Fighters and Paladins. Would have made more sense to put some more S&B stuff in the Stalwart/Sacred Defender trees and make the 3rd tree based around boosting the party with auras and group action boosts.

[J-mann]

Please don't do this, this way splashes in fighter or Paladin classes will become too much powerful. Stalwart Defence is a very powerful stance for just 3 level splash and you are removing the movement penalty too.



This is a nonsense... Block and Cut needs "Block"! Please rename that at least.
You get that, with the actual cooldown (20s), this enhancement is a +25% doublestrike half of the time right?

On the stance at 3 thing I disagree. Stance disallows rage bonuses, so no primal scream and no rage spell, so essentially you are trading 2-5 str for 10 prr/mrr. Cant compare with an upgraded stance as that costs you ap and its impossible to tell what you will loose by spending that ap in stalwart instead of wherever else you might have done so. Further, the stance increases your hate generation by 50 percent (nothing while soloing, but in raids it matters), not really something you are likely to want as a dps build. I find that the tradeoffs with the stance keep it from possibly being op at lvl 3.

[MonadRebelion]

Speed boost, in addition to the removal of the speed reduction, is a realized 20 percent increase in movement from the base stance as stands today...a not insignificant increase. It is, to me, a a sort of nod toward Paladins being mountless in DDO. It is entirely likely that, given your scenarios, the increased movement speed benefits both. When a tank becomes necessary, it is realistically slowing the entire party by 20 percent in current base stance versus the improved new version. This makes long quests and encounters cumbersome, and introduces an unnecessary mechanic to our play time. The speed boost is fine, and will not negatively affect play in any group, while making it more fun for those irritated by the stance's current penalty. It is a good change, not a bad one.

The concern over stances being available at a lower tier without any concern over the fact that enhancement points have to be spent to improve a stance you can't even use until (currently) level six baffles me. Forcing those points to be spent prior to stance acquirement is wonky and wrong-headed. *That said, I do recognize the validity of concern over stances being available to a lower investment in the class...I simply think there should be a better stance improvement mechanic that doesn't force points to be spent before the stance is even acquired*

I agree that putting points into a stance you can't use is a little wonky. At the same time, those levels go by so fast it doesn't seem to cause much of an issue, and the use of having a character really specialized in something at that point is pretty limited. So, it's not an optimal situation, but justifiable given the obvious alternative.

Concerning your reflections on the effective 20% speed increase, while I very much appreciate your point about paladins not having mounts, I'm still unconvinced that this adds anything more than an odd convenience. In addition to the reasons I gave there are two reasons why boosting a tank's speed won't really do much. First, dungeon maps are too small for this small distances in speed to make a huge difference. Second, dungeons are filled with obstacles that slow groups down (mobs, doors, dungeon alert, etc.). This makes it pretty easy for tanks to stay with the party given the movement penalties they have.