Melee Survivability Changes Feedback Thread

[Ballrus]

That's not a terrible idea.

It's a fair idea!

Many people arguing that melees dominate reaper. But they don't say which melees are dominating.
So, if these people dont't know (sarcasm on), they are: monks, rangers and vkf rogues. (sarcasm off)

These classes/builds don't need more power!

In the future, the game will be balanced around this buff, and who need this buff "now", will still be far behind.

Edit: Keep the 25% and stacking with stalwart and sacred defense (no armor restrictions),
OR,
keep 25%, non stacking with stalwart/sacred, but working only if using medium/heavy armor (i know that casters can use armor, but still loose power while it active).

[sjbb87]

Make the bonus apply only when wearing medium/heavy armor.
Monks, rangers, vkf rogues not need more power! They already have evasion/improved evasion, high dodge etc.

Not so fast
Monk have
high AC ,
high dodge,
improved evasion,
medium prr


Rogue have
high dodge,
improved evasion,
low ac.
low prr

Ranger have
evasion (improved with high cost),
low dodge,
medium ac,
medium PRR

fighter/paladin have
high AC,
low dodge,
high prr,
medium mrr

[KingNite]

It's a fair idea!
monks, rangers and vkf rogues. (sarcasm off)

It is not. They are more popular on high skulls right now because of the superior DPS not because of their superior survivality. Fighters, pallys and barbs already have slightly more hp and/or better prr. But the thing is that in high skulls (r8+) 200-300 hp more or less doesn't matter that much. 2000 or 2300 hp you are going to get killed in one shot or two most of the time, and if you are smart you are going to be killing CCed mobs who can't hit back all the time. So it all comes down to who can put better dps numbers and it is usually light melees who have the best dps to compensate for their lower hp and prr.

[Ballrus]

Not so fast
Monk have
high AC ,
high dodge,
improved evasion,
medium prr


Rogue have
high dodge,
improved evasion,
low ac.
low prr

Ranger have
evasion (improved with high cost),
low dodge,
medium ac,
medium PRR

fighter/paladin have
high AC,
low dodge,
high prr,
medium mrr

Sure, but to have all that AC, prr, mrr and stuff, fighter/pally need give up almost all dps.
And your monk, ranger, rogue no.

I´m wrong?

[KingNite]

Sure, but to have all that AC, prr, mrr and stuff, fighter/pally need give up almost all dps.
And your monk, ranger, rogue no.

I´m wrong?

Any dps oriented fighter can have better PRR, MRR and AC than a light melee without sacrificing much dps or non at all. If they specialize for defense they can get it too much higher values but then they have to sacrifice a lot of dps. To get your prr high enough on light armor and robes you have to invest in some ap and/or feats too, same for dodge and max dodge bonus, it does not come free.

[Ballrus]

It is not. They are more popular on high skulls right now because of the superior DPS not because of their superior survivality. Fighters, pallys and barbs already have slightly more hp and/or better prr. But the thing is that in high skulls (r8+) 200-300 hp more or less doesn't matter that much. 2000 or 2300 hp you are going to get killed in one shot or two most of the time, and if you are smart you are going to be killing CCed mobs who can't hit back all the time. So it all comes down to who can put better dps numbers and it is usually light melees who have the best dps to compensate for their lower hp and prr.

If the idea is: be smart and only kill cc'ed mobs", why we need AC, prr, mrr etc?
Just kick the high defense player, and invite another CC.

[KingNite]

If the idea is: be smart and only kill cc'ed mobs", why we need AC, prr, mrr etc?
Just kick the high defense player, and invite another CC.

Oh I don't like it either and hope this changes help to change it, but it is what it is right now. Otherwise you are a soulstone unless you the tank.

Btw, for 6 man quests is more like kick the high defense player and invite another full retar* DPS so we kill champs and the boss faster. 1 CC, if good, is enough.

[Ballrus]

Oh I don't like it either and hope this changes help to change it, but it is what it is right now. Otherwise you are a soulstone unless you the tank.

Btw, for 6 man quests is more like kick the high defense player and invite another full retar* DPS so we kill the boss faster.

Agree, and i hope changes too.

[Yamani]

Sure, but to have all that AC, prr, mrr and stuff, fighter/pally need give up almost all dps.
And your monk, ranger, rogue no.

I´m wrong?

Just pointing out outfits(monks) and robes have a capped MRR of 50.

[Ballrus]

Just pointing out outfits(monks) and robes have a capped MRR of 50.

Well, nobody's perfect.

[noobodyfool]

Just pointing out outfits(monks) and robes have a capped MRR of 50.

Improved Avation Trumps so called high mrr especially when combined with jade and META DPS

[FuryFlash]

Well, nobody's perfect.

Then why do pure monks get a feat called "Perfect Self"?

[sjbb87]

After some tests I realized that the hp bonus is very little. Of course this is a first step. And really need to be slow not to get too powerful.

I tested it with my tempest

Hp

Before stance - 2131 after - 2582 - should be 2663
Note: My character has an 18% hp bonus from Green Steel.
Extra 100 hp of passive reaper tree


Healing range test

On paper it was much worse, in practice I believe that it remained in a reasonable distance. With my tests it is very easy to heal other near dps . But heal ranged / caster players impossible.


I believe this feat will only help a very small group of melee players. The cost benefit is not good.

[Captain_Wizbang]

I believe this feat will only help a very small group of melee players. The cost benefit is not good.

yup.

[SpartanKiller13]

Can this instead be changed to a flat HP buff? Either like 500 flat or maybe 80 per Epic Level?

As a flat HP bonus it benefits new/poorly built/undergeared players more than the 2.5k HP DPS vets and 5k HP tanks, it makes a 500 HP rogue a bit more survivable at cap, and it still benefits tanks (who get a little extra thanks to having a Defender Stance percentage increase, but it's a smaller overall percentage gain). Everyone has the choice to be a bit more survivable, but it's not quite as much of a requirement as it currently will be.

As it stands, future tank builds are likely going to be forced into weird builds like Warforged 12/5/3 Barb/Arti/Fighter which gives 11% DR, 20% HP which will actually stack with this (from T5 Renegade Mastermaker) and cheap Con/PRR/MRR from the defender stance.

[Niminae]

Just pointing out outfits(monks) and robes have a capped MRR of 50.

There's an exception to every rule:

Nystul's Mystical Defense - 5 Pieces: Your Max MRR Cap is increased by 40

Of course, then you're not using Prowess.

[sjbb87]

Ahhhh forgot to mention, thanks for organizing the feat by category

Edit: can you change the hp gain?

the hp received be the last to lose and not as first?

Equivalent to the HP received from the constitution bonus.

Currently it is like false life, so whenever you disable and activate again you should use a heal

[Thoden]

Please make Shield Mastery feats give the hp bonus. This will make Bard/Fighter/Rogues better, since then they can get the full SWF bonus hp AND shield mastery bonus hp.

So, yeah, do that.

[Qhualor]

so I finally logged into Lammania to check out the defensive feat copying over my pure ranger and barbarian. 2 minutes after I logged in on my barb got the broadcast that Lammania would be closing soon, so didn't have a chance to run a quick quest to test the new barb DR.

I cannot express how much I hate this feat enough. it is such a non teamwork feat that its going to cause some problems with groups. this is a feat for pretty much barbs and fighters or any build that doesn't use spells to cast on others. that includes the popular Cocoon that a lot of melee use in epics. you guys say you are trying to help melee right now, this is NOT it. please scratch this idea and go back to square 1. as a soloist, this wont matter to me and I would rather let the hire die before toggling the feat off from across the room and keep him alive. which reminds me, the toggle puts everything on the hot bar on cooldown for like 10 seconds. I thought I was freezing up or lagging out. so if I wasn't lagging out, than there is no quick toggling on/off to throw quick heals. when you toggle it on, you also don't get the full hit points and have to heal or let regen fill it up. so that's another thing that will make it hard to toggle while questing.

in the dojo on my ranger, I had to be about 10 feet away to cast any buff and cure spell on someone. at level 21 and with no gear to boost the hit points, he had about an extra 150 hit points.

on my barb, without rage and no gear to boost hit points, about 100 hit points. with rage, about 300 or so. I assume the more you can boost Con and general hit points, the more benefit you get from the defensive stance. also, no DR on the barb character sheet.

with the defensive stance and the nerf to power surge, helping melees is going backwards not forwards.

[DrawingGuy]

Improved Avation Trumps so called high mrr especially when combined with jade and META DPS

High MRR is most definitely better than Improved Evasion overall, and especially in Reaper. MRR works on rays, dots, cyclone (a common thing now as it is a Reaper spell), hellball, fort spells, etc. So while it is true that Improved Evasion is superior on spells that Evasion works against, the "everything else" puts MRR in a better position. My S&B character can run through many situations that my Monk will face-plant in, and evasion spells are reduced to ignorable numbers anyways due to the double MRR from shield anyways. The spells that MRR doesn't help against, Improved Evasion doesn't help either on. Horrid Wilting from R10 reapers is still stoopid. I'd gladly change Imp Evasion for high MRR. My Monk will never be able to tank Reaper Baba without high MRR.

Monks, rangers, vkf rogues are not meta because their dodge/imp evasion makes them able to survivable - it is because CC (and thus casters) are king and towing along DPS is the meta, and those classes fit that meta. Soloing an R10 on a warlock is just a matter of getting your DCs in line. Doing so on an "OP monk" is an exercise in futility on anything outside of specific low-density quests.

Having Reaper balanced in a way where "you can't get hit" simply goes against melee, and needs to be changed in some form. If they change it away from the meta being just a caster with pocket DPS as the only real viable party make-up, then that opens up metas. Tanks that are not just 0 DPS intim turtles. The ability to PUG without a pre-determined party makeup, which could open up the LFMs majorly.

There is the question if this is the right move. The touch penalty I definitely don't think should apply to healing moves -- I feel that is counter-productive to the "you must heal each-other" goal of Reaper, and kicks melee healers and Paladins in the plums. OFFENSIVE and CC spells should face this penalty, but not healing. I also feel that it should stack for tanks. This will allow for tanks to break from the 0 DPS pile of kittens, or for those that still go that route, to be able to tank larger groups without the caster CC. I completely disagree with the sentiment that light/no armors should be excluded. Allowing the DPS oriented melee classes to escape the 1-shot range won't change the meta -- caster CC + pocket DPS will likely always be the top option (which is not a bad thing really), but it should not be the only option for these classes.


Though speaking of Intimidate Tanks... any word on fixing Ki Shout to properly use Concentration again?