McBoo

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Ah I see what you mean about all ATs getting this via their debuffs, etc ....

But the ATs aren't supposed to be balanced for team play and soloing.

That's according to the devs and documentation on and in the game. The only time they've adjusted this was when the mission slider was put in place (and that was more of a nod to the casual gamers versus the balance of ATs). They (attempted) to tackle early level damage with the Origin Powers but I think everyone will agree they were kind of a joke in that regard.

I doubt they (the devs) would change direction at this late date on one of the fundamental points of the game however (AT role).

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I think I'll start a new thread about this in the Suggestion And Ideas forum because I believe it could work if the details are hammered out but I don't want to derail this thread to do it. So back to Critical Taunt....

Critical Taunt Mk III

Trying to seriously injure a tanker is an exercise in futility. Weapons will melt, break or freeze to the point of near obsolescence and hand to hand combat is painful for the tanker's assailant.

The original target, and any targets hit by the Gauntlet effect, of a tanker's Tier 1 through Tier III attacks will suffer a 5% debuff to damage output for 6 seconds. This debuff cannot be stacked for the same tanker but can be stacked with debuffs from a different tanker.


(Disclaimer: Numbers, as always are subject to modification based on play testing.)

A to hit debuff has also been suggested which would also be helpful for low level tanker survivability even if it is a little binary in nature.

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As always, numbers are subject to change based on play testing. If the damage percentage needs to go up or down so be it. Perhaps set the damage bonus to 50% for the Tier I and 30% for the Tier II.

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Those are still insignificant numbers you're talking about.
You're still talking about increasing the average damage less than a percent.

50% extra base damage to two attacks that have the lowest base damage, and only with a 5-10% chance of firing at any time, and are at best only a small portion of an attack chain, isn't going to be noticable.

You don't need play testing to tell that 15 more damage points on Jab that happens once a minute or so wont make a lot of difference.

I think you should put some thought into your numbers, plug them into the scenario and look at the averages and then come back and present the idea again.

As for suggestions of numbers, how about a 100% chance to deal an extra 115% of base damage to Bosses and above?


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I never argue numbers Johnny, they mean next to nothing without actual play testing. As for your suggestion, it sounds attractive but it's pulling tankers toward the concept of single target boss killers. Your vision of tankers aside, that is not what tankers are set up to do in the game and I think that any change made to tankers should support what they were designed to do, fight groups of mobs.

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I can agree with getting rid of TO enhancements. I haven't slotted a TO since August '04.

I also like where you're going with adding an endurance modifier to Gauntlet. My only issue is that it takes us back into the realm of a behind the scenes effect and I'd really like to see something that makes Gauntlet more visible or tactile.

As I mentioned before I think that allowing debuffs and controls to be as effective as damage in defeating mobs would help alot of outstanding issues. For example, if a WP/Mace tanker could stack his damage with the stun delivered by his attacks then he would defeat the mob that much quicker which would translate to better DPE and survivability.

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Except that you now encroach on the Scrapper AT.

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I don't see that as encroaching, I see it as leveling the playing field. That kind of change would benefit all archetypes. If controls and debuffs are as effective at defeating mobs as damage then all archetypes will be equally effective offensively both solo and in teams. It could also lead to more build options within the confines of individual power combinations. As I've pointed out before, in a world full of superhumans it seems kind of silly that the only way to effectively defeat evil is by knocking it's teeth out.

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If you need a visual queue for this new effect how about everytime it activates a though balloon appears above your head saying:

YEAH BABY I AIN'T WAITING FOR END!!!!!!!!!!!

Could throw in a KA-POW! and a BANG! in there for good measure.

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I was looking for something a little less 1960's Batman serial.

Willpower makes a great set for a new or returning tanker. I would add Stone Melee to the list of good secondary options. It offers some very nice damage and aggro management tools. I played and Invy/Stone all the way to 50 and enjoyed every screen shaking minute of it!

Sheild/SS is also supposed to be a good combo. Good AoE damage with Shield Charge and Foot Stomp backed up by Rage.

Hmmm... the same thing appears to happen with Against All Odds for Shields. I noticed that the damage bonus for AAO also has a tendency to fluctuate as the OP describes.

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My Controller couldn't control much pre 30's either.

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Hmmmm

What game are you playing?

Cant control before 32? Ice, Fire, Stone, Plant, and Illusion all get pets at 32. Explain to me how Fire Imps, Fly Trap, Phantasm changed you to being able to control all of the sudden when your CONTROL powers didnt

Fire Cage, Char, Fire Cages, Flashfire, Cinders all happen at level 18 and you cant control until after 30+?

I'm telling ya man, we weren't all meant to smoke pot. Sometimes it really can just make ya say dumb [censored] (see my quote)

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I had the same strong reaction as you, although I thought it through a bit more, ie: maybe the amount of slots?

Only thing I can think is taking too many 2ndary powers but even then, that isn't a controller issue, it's a player issue...

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The key word in Johnny's statement is "much". His statement is perfectly valid for very large values of "much".

Now back to the Critical Taunt discussion. The general consensus appears to be a positive reaction to tying some form of mechanic or effect to Gauntlet but there are various suggestions for which mechanic or effect to use.

I can agree with getting rid of TO enhancements. I haven't slotted a TO since August '04.

I also like where you're going with adding an endurance modifier to Gauntlet. My only issue is that it takes us back into the realm of a behind the scenes effect and I'd really like to see something that makes Gauntlet more visible or tactile.

As I mentioned before I think that allowing debuffs and controls to be as effective as damage in defeating mobs would help alot of outstanding issues. For example, if a WP/Mace tanker could stack his damage with the stun delivered by his attacks then he would defeat the mob that much quicker which would translate to better DPE and survivability.

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Tankers do need more survivability at the lower levels. They don't reach the ability to tank until the 20's or 30's


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So? My Controller couldn't control much pre 30's either. None of the ATs, save Brutes and Scrappers, are that hot before level 25.

That's more an issue with Training Enhancers vs DOs and SOs and how slots are distributed across levels, in my opinion.


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No, that's actually just an indication that the "Damage is king" model that currently exists in the game needs to be updated so that things like holds and debuffs will be as valid for defeating mobs as damage. That kind of change would level the playing field and address many existing archetype issues.

Now back to Critical Taunt Mk III..... Anyone have any input?

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Confirmed: Wet Noodle Melee in I16.

Thanks, Castle!

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Woohoo! Is the noodle going to be customizable? I so want to beat up Freaks with spinach tagliatelle!

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I wouldnt mind seeing some -dam on the tier 1/2 attacks.

Bosses spank baby tanks bad. Being able to drop their damage some would go a long way to help survivability.

As you level up, since they are single attacks, it means less (unless it is an AV, which, I assume would have debuff resistance, so it would help some)

I like the concept, but I'd vote -dam. Lower level tanks need to survive esp against bosses (and its only single target), as you level up, its just a nice benefit.

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Okay I have to be honest here, one of the major things that I am trying to accomplish with both versions of Critical Taunt is to make the tanker's inherent group fighting ability more visible and proactive. For me the damage buff was really just a means to an end.

A damage debuff is not a bad idea and would even make it possible to stretch the Critical Taunt effect out to the Tier III attacks as well.

So how does this sound?

Critical Taunt Mk III

Trying to seriously injure a tanker is an exercise in futility. Weapons will melt, break or freeze to the point of near obsolescence and hand to hand combat is painful for the tanker's assailant.

The original target, and any targets hit by the Gauntlet effect, of a tanker's Tier 1 through Tier III attacks will suffer a 5% debuff to damage output for 6 seconds. This debuff cannot be stacked for the same tanker but can be stacked with debuffs from a different tanker.


(Disclaimer: Numbers, as always are subject to modification based on play testing.)

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Add a percentage chance equal to a scrapper's Critical Hit for all mobs affected by the Gauntlet effect from a Tier I or Tier II tanker attack to suffer 30% of the base damage suffered by the original target. The effect would apply to Tier I and Tier II attacks only and not be enhanceable. This would allow for more a group fighting feel to tanker combat and help tankers with soloing at all levels. More importantly it would help tankers through the lower levels where they seem to be found wanting.

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This would almost not be noticable.

A chance equal to a Scrapper's Critical Hit to deal an extra 30% on the base damage of a Tier 1 or Tier 2 attack?

Scrapper's Critical is 5% chance against Minions or below, 10% against critters above.

Jab deals 30.3 base. 30% of that is 9.09.

Your asking for a 5% chance to deal that every Jab attack?
That averages to something like only increasing jab from 30.3 to 30.7545

Whoop de frikkin' do.

Punch, same deal. The numbers and chances are just too tiny. It's pointless.

5% or 10% for Critical hit works because A) It's on every attack, not just two, or maybe even one, in the attack chain and B) Because it's 100% of the base.




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As always, numbers are subject to change based on play testing. If the damage percentage needs to go up or down so be it. Perhaps set the damage bonus to 50% for the Tier I and 30% for the Tier II.

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To the OP: I would rather see endurance scaling on powers (or part of the inherent) then a damage bump.

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Can you elaborate on the endurance scaling? While I'm down with the idea of alleviating endurance costs for tankers I was trying to come up with something that was more visible or proactive during game play.

We could take a page from Champions Online and make the Tier I and Tier II attacks endurance builders.

Well the Mark I suggestion was to have all mobs hit by the Gauntlet effect of any tanker's single target attack to get hit with the secondary effects (i.e. KD, stun, slow, etc.) for that attack. I still prefer that idea over a damage boost but I'm always up for brainstorming.

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Before I get into anything else, may I ask why this is limited to the tier I and II attacks? Those tend to be the weakest attacks in any given set. 30% of Jab's damage is almost nothing, even in the lower levels.

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Just as a starting point really, the Tier I and Tier II attacks are exclusively single target across all tanker secondaries. The percentage of damage applied can be modified as needed to make the effect more useful during game play.

I wanted to have it apply to Tier I through Tier III originally but Fire, Ice and Dark have AoEs or cones as their Tier III attack. I'm open to suggestions on how to add a Critical Taunt effect to those attacks. Perhaps adding extra DoT for all mobs hit?

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As I mentioned before, Granite is a great panic button but it just has too many debuffs (-recharge, -damage, - run speed, -jump, -fly) to overcome to make it worthwhile to have up all the time. You also wind up running Rooted with Granite Armor for the healing so that slows you down even further.

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I run Granite anytime I have more than 3 people on a team (which is virtually guaranteed that I will have more than that unless I'm soloing). I hardly ever run rooted and granite, and when I do it's usually because there is something really nasty that I have to deal with, and the mobility isn't as much of a problem.

In granite, I currently have a positive recharge, positive damage, and can run about 25 mph. That's with a pretty extreme build, but it's actually pretty easy to get workable numbers for a granite build. Before I started going really crazy I think I had cut the -rech in half, and made up the rest in my attacks, and was probably running somewhere around 20 mph.

Granted most of mine are not /ice so I've always felt like I had to go granite to make myself survivable in larger and tougher teams but that also made my agro better.

IMO, stone/fire is the best combo for agro generation and survivability. 2 aoe's, plus good quick charging attacks that also have dots makes it pretty easy. If you build for granite you don't need extra mitigation that ice would provide. I'm not saying you don't have a completely valid playstyle with stone/ice that works well, just that I did it differently.

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Fair enough, with the advent of IOs it is possible to slot around drawbacks for a given power or powerset and any play style that works for you is a valid play style in my opinion. The real gem in Ice Melee for tanking is Ice Patch, it's the great equalizer. One of those powers that changes your play style after you get it. It's also quite easy to make it stackable so that you can keep the mobs off their feet.

Add a percentage chance equal to a scrapper's Critical Hit for all mobs affected by the Gauntlet effect from a Tier I or Tier II tanker attack to suffer 30% of the base damage suffered by the original target. The effect would apply to Tier I and Tier II attacks only and not be enhanceable. This would allow for more a group fighting feel to tanker combat and help tankers with soloing at all levels. More importantly it would help tankers through the lower levels where they seem to be found wanting.

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This is only true if you are going to be running Granite. A Stone/Ice tanker doesn't really need to run Granite except in extreme cases. Between Ice Patch, good defense and with, the right slotting, a fairly impressive regeneration rate a Stone/Ice tanker can handle most situations with ease. I currently have Ice Path 3 slotted with Recharge SOs and the power is up and ready in 17.74 seconds on a level 37 tanker without Hasten. That, IMO, is comfortably within the roughly 20 second duration. The secret is really in Ice Patch, it is the great equalizer. Most things that step on an Ice Patch wind up flopping like fish so it provides a huge amount of damage mitigation for the tanker and his teammates.


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But if you're not running granite, you're just a worse version of an ice/ice tank. Less protection, slow and unable to leave the ground if you want mez protection.

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Having never played Ice/Ice I can't comment on the comparison. However if Ice/Ice is, as you claim, similar to a non-Granite Stone/Ice in survivability then it's a fairly impressive combo. As I mentioned before, Granite is a great panic button but it just has too many debuffs (-recharge, -damage, - run speed, -jump, -fly) to overcome to make it worthwhile to have up all the time. You also wind up running Rooted with Granite Armor for the healing so that slows you down even further.

The debuffs associated with running Rock Armor and Rooted are far easier to overcome and you are still able to actively tank rather than just standing there waiting for your lowered damage attacks to slowly recharge. By slotting Rooted, Earth's Embrace and Health for regeneration and making liberal use of Ice Patch the survivability of a non-Granite tanker is easily up to about 90% of the challenges out there.

<.<
>.>

So far so good......

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Ice / Stone is a total blast, with Energy Absorption providing the constant endurance Stone requires, and with all the AoE and auras, aggro management is no problem whatsoever. The only bummer is not having a self-heal outside Hibernate and Hoarfrost. Very tanky though.

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I've got an Ice/Stone in the 20s right now. After tanking my Invy/Stone to 50 and laughing at attempts to hurt my Stone/Ice tank for 30+ levels I figured I'd see what Ice/Stone had to offer. Glad to hear that it keeps getting better!

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I have a Stone/Ice tank in the mid 30s that will prove you wrong. Between slows, Gauntlet, the taunt aura from Mud Pots and knockdown from Ice Patch he's a certified aggro magnet. Mobility really isn't an issue either, even without Teleport. I've noticed that I can easily start running into a mob and fire off Rooted about halfway there. The -run speed doesn't take effect right away and by the time it does I've closed the distance to the mob and I'm ready to rock, as it were.....

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Like I said, if you play well I'm sure you can do fine as Stone. However nothing you've said really argues that you wouldn't have even better tools were you to pick a non-Stone set.

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I beg to differ, Stone/Ice offers a fairly comprehensive combination of tools to grab and hold aggro with little to no work required by the tanker. Enter melee range with Rock Armor, Mud Pots and Rooted running, set Ice Patch to auto fire and you can pretty much walk away from the PC once you're sure you have their full attention. Any tanker that is well played will be a good tanker, Stone/Ice just makes it easier.

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You mention Ice Patch for example. With a Stone tank you're going to need Hasten and/or set bonuses just to keep it up non-stop where a non-Stone tank is going to be able to throw out multiple Ice Patches with the same recharge boosts.

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This is only true if you are going to be running Granite. A Stone/Ice tanker doesn't really need to run Granite except in extreme cases. Between Ice Patch, good defense and with, the right slotting, a fairly impressive regeneration rate a Stone/Ice tanker can handle most situations with ease. I currently have Ice Path 3 slotted with Recharge SOs and the power is up and ready in 17.74 seconds on a level 37 tanker without Hasten. That, IMO, is comfortably within the roughly 20 second duration. The secret is really in Ice Patch, it is the great equalizer. Most things that step on an Ice Patch wind up flopping like fish so it provides a huge amount of damage mitigation for the tanker and his teammates.

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What do you do when your group gets ambushed by more than 5 enemies (I use 5 because that's the number of targets taunt will hit)? If you have mobility and recharge you can, for example, immediately run over and drop another ice patch. Meanwhile the Stone tank might be locked down in a spot and/or not even have the power back up yet.

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Throw out a taunt towards the middle of the ambush, drop an Ice Patch where I'm at and then charge over to the new group to pick up stragglers. With Swift 3 slotted for Run Speed I'm moving at just under 11 MPH. Will I win any foot races? No, but I am moving fast enough to cross the battlefield to grab aggro from an ambush. Other folks like to use Teleport, I do not for concept reasons, and they can move much easier from one group to the next.

Am I saying that there are not other good tanker combos out there? Nope. I have a level 50 Invy/Stone and a level Invy/Axe that are great at team tanking but they are also good for solo and damage so they make good "all around" tankers. They also tend to rely on inspirations when things get tough. Stone/Ice, IMO, is a combo that is tailor made for pure tanking which is what the OP was asking about in the first place.

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McBoo has a 95% chance to hit The Point and rolls a 97.

McBoo has missed The Point.

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I'd like to roll a Charisma check....

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All other things being equal the Stone tank will always be worse when it comes to getting and keeping aggro.

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I have a Stone/Ice tank in the mid 30s that will prove you wrong. Between slows, Gauntlet, the taunt aura from Mud Pots and knockdown from Ice Patch he's a certified aggro magnet. Mobility really isn't an issue either, even without Teleport. I've noticed that I can easily start running into a mob and fire off Rooted about halfway there. The -run speed doesn't take effect right away and by the time it does I've closed the distance to the mob and I'm ready to rock, as it were.....

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stone/ice = taunt bot

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Not really, with Mud Pots and Ice Patch you don't really need to use taunt to hold aggro. At least I never found that I did.

Stone/Ice is a great combo for pure tanking. You have the right combination of powers for drawing and holding aggro. Damage isn't great but it's not bad either. Just bear in mind that damage is the late blooming part of this combo.

Granite is a great panic button but it really isn't necessary with this combo once you get Ice Patch slotted so that you can stack them. Also if you 3 slot Health, Earth's Embrace and Rooted for Health you can get your regeneration rate pretty high while Earth's Embrace is in effect. So you have all the mobs around you , flopping like fishes, slowed and swinging at the air when they do get an attack off. If they do hit you you regen will erase the damage in short order. Welcome to tanking!

Stone/Ice.. hands down the best pure tanking combo out there....