Should reaper not reduce the threat of damaging attacks?

[Tilomere]

I was thinking about how to create a stronger identity for dps melee within the existing game paradigm and having a niche for various methods of combat. I had the idea for reaper mode to only reduce the damage dealt, and not the amount of threat the original attack would have generated.

This will have multiple effects.

First, it will preserve the value of threat reduction. Melee have higher and more available threat reduction than ranged and casters, which means they should be able to deal more damage to make up for being in melee. Currently, as the reaper penalty reduces threat equally with dps, it provides a free 80% threat reduction for all dps. This eliminates the value of higher and more available threat reduction to melee. By restoring original threat generation, melee get the value they were designed for, and can once again do that higher dps they were designed for in exchange for the drawback of being in melee.

Second, it will promote tanks building threat generation into their gear and more actively tanking, which will lower their tankyness, reducing the difficulty they can tank, reducing the difference in defense between them and melee. Lowered difficulty will improve the survivability of melee dps. In addition, in dungeons against trash ranged/casters will more commonly pull aggro, also making it safer to melee.

Third, this will safeguard ED design and may promote build diversity. If players are up against threat caps due to reaper no longer reducing threat, then building for threat reduction will yield higher dps capacity before pulling threat which is great for red names. This will be building differently than for max dps with procs that have no threat reduction. Some EDs and enhancement trees and EDF may need tweaking to emphasize this choice. EDF for example, could add +10% or -10% threat generation, depending on if your current threat generation was overall positive or negative.

Melee then gain the identity of having a higher dps capacity before pulling aggro, while ranged and casters still keep the identity of the safety of ranged. All three get the choice to build for higher damage with higher threat from procs, or lower threat and lower damage with a non-proc approach.

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Mathematical implementation would be to add 2% stacking melee threat adjustment to melee enhancement cores (enhancement and ED trees) and style feats. This adjustment is positive or negative depending on other threat %. If other threat is 0% or less, it is negative, if it is 1% or more, it is positive.

Then, multiply threat from damage by an amount determined from the reaper damage penalty to add back in to attacks some or all of the threat reaper mode removed until it feels right.

Ranged/casters then keep the safety of ranged, and melee gain the identity of having the safety of not pulling boss aggro and being able to dps harder.

[Oxarhamar]

I was thinking about how to create a stronger identity for dps melee within the existing game paradigm and having a niche for various methods of combat. I had the idea for reaper mode to only reduce the damage dealt, and not the amount of threat the original attack would have generated.

This will have multiple effects.

First, it will preserve the value of threat reduction. Melee have higher and more available threat reduction than ranged and casters, which means they should be able to deal more damage to make up for being in melee. Currently, as the reaper penalty reduces threat equally with dps, it provides a free 80% threat reduction for all dps. This eliminates the value of higher and more available threat reduction to melee. By restoring original threat generation, melee get the value they were designed for, and can once again do that higher dps they were designed for in exchange for the drawback of being in melee.

Second, it will promote tanks building threat generation into their gear and more actively tanking, which will lower their tankyness, reducing the difficulty they can tank, reducing the difference in defense between them and melee. Lowered difficulty will improve the survivability of melee dps. In addition, in dungeons against trash ranged/casters will more commonly pull aggro, also making it safer to melee.

Third, this will safeguard ED design and may promote build diversity. If players are up against threat caps due to reaper no longer reducing threat, then building for threat reduction will yield higher dps capacity before pulling threat which is great for red names. This will be building differently than for max dps with procs that have no threat reduction. Some EDs will need tweaking to emphasize this choice.

Melee then gain the identity of having a higher dps capacity before pulling aggro, while ranged and casters still keep the identity of the safety of ranged. All three get the choice to build for higher damage with higher threat from procs, or lower threat and lower damage with a non-proc approach.

I like it

The problem I see is that when there isn't a dedicated tank though Ranged and Casters will pull aggro too mucj causing the whole "don't kite" scenario to be worse

I don't see a solution to that though since it's already an issue when there is no dedicated tank because of the population and the lack of players who want to tank

Wouldn't it be better just to make melees able to hold agrro and a bit more tank without being a dedicated tank

Idk

[Saekee]

/signed

tired of my gimp dex stealth builds pulling aggro despite all the gear and enhancements

[Bjond]

Melee have higher and more available threat reduction than ranged and casters

This is the part I have a problem with.

My melee find it nearly impossible to avoid threat increasing gear and abilities. Most groups lack a tank and so it's usually fantastic to have extra hate on your melee. The problem is that many +threat methods lack an off switch.

BTW, my ranged and caster find -threat to be trivial; it's free with most all builds and gear. My ranged has threat-50% without even trying and threat-125% with a single clicky. I have a suspicion threat is buggy, though. With -125% my ranged pulls agro more quickly than it does with -50%.

(AND what does threat-125% actually mean? should dragons roll over and purr if I shoot them?)

The real problem with hate-tanking isn't lack of threat. I have a hate tank. It holds agro VERY well. The problem is making something swap agro to you, especially on intimidate-immunes. It's definitely not an instant swap once you're on top. You can whack a critter for 10~30s with ZERO agro from anything other than initial spawn-in hate before something will swap.

IMHO, the "Throw the Boom" ability from US does an amazing job of "fixing" agro for tanks. It clears existing agro, locks it to the tank for a bit, and gives time to build enough hate to lock it in. The only major issue I have with Boom is that it's tied to using a shield.