"Pattrik's Essay on Class Balance"

[Scottx125]

The problem I have with this is you're comparing classes 1:1 and not comparing them with the current meta of the game..

It's not just about mirroring (I'd argue classes are not exactly mirrored to ensure they have flavour). But it's about making them fun and useful in general content(whilst ensuring one is not stronger/weaker than their counterpart). I'll use the WP as an example as that's the class I know best.

WP Salv is great in most content, not ideal in kiting fights but it works.

Grace, bad choice for ORVR. It works okay in small scale, cities and PVE but that's it. It's a high risk low reward spec as it does low damage and okay healing (salv is better). It's also a shame you can't hybridise this spec properly between casted healing and melee damage.

Finally Wrath. Useless in pretty much all forms of content. Does poor healing, does mediocre damage, doesn't bring anything useful to groups/WBs that other classes in their primary spec can already do better.

[Ananelle]

Agreed 100%. If things stay like this, the pop will drop to unplayable numbers. Double RR revitalized the game a bit , but it won’t stay like this for long until new players get a hang of what’s happening.And old players leave lol. All those things you mentioned need to be changed, and firstly start with nerfing the rampage by at least 50%. Order is dominating every manfight, every scenario, and city that has multiple geared slayers in it. Choppa just can’t compete except pull some kills in orvr. And yeah, Black Orc is pathetically weak. Killing all the fun out of the game.

[IVendettaI]

A touch of destro bias in that OP, so take it with a grain of salt.

Couple things:

1. Access to certain tactics does not make a class significantly better than its counterpart, as you must choose a certain tactic in place of another.

Easy example - chosen tactic for -10% crit chance. It's pretty good, but is it better or worse than 160 toughness? Renown point wise, 160 toughness costs a lot more renown points than -10% crit chance. If a 2h chosen decides to take it over something else, what are they giving up to take it? This point is often lost in arguments and essays.

2. Swordmaster 25% parry buff is a garbage utility due to its extremely short duration and SM ability balance mechanics making it extremely difficult to keep up 100% of the time. It would require a serious loss of DPS to keep that buff up a lot.

3. RP V Zealot. RP has access to a lot of useful tactics that Zealot does not - 1/2 stun duration, armor, ranged snare chance on 15 sec dot tick, aoe punt CD reduction + snare. Zealot has a very limited selection of useful tactics. RP also has a greater ability to provide aoe support damage with Rune of Battle that Zealot does not have while not hindering healing abilities.

4. One thing you didnt mention is that the BO has probably the highest damage potential on squishy targets among tanks in the game. The one saving grace of the worst tank is that it can do decent damage, but it still won't compare to real DPS classes and does not make up for lack of real utility that other tanks can provide. Shield BO is probably the worst tank spec I've ever had the misfortune of playing.

5. Slayer's unblockable aoe disarm is probably the most overlooked powerful utility in the game that no one seems to talk about. Seriously.

6. GtdC pull is a slot machine of either being useful and pulling heals/dps or handing out immunity to tanks that got pulled 10 feet. There are definitely issues with how it behaves in keeps that cannot be denied. I'd advocate for rampage and GtdC to be completely disabled around keeps as they both completely ruin funnels.

7. The proposed counters to rampage and GtdC by keyboard warriors are laughable. Just shatter barely works in small scale scenarios, and good luck constantly taunting/interrupting all the choppas in a zerg every 20 seconds. Stop kidding yourself and everyone else about it as it will not work even 30% of the time.

"A touch of Destro bias in that OP, so take it with a grain of salt."

Predictable.

"1. Access to certain tactics does not make a class significantly better than its counterpart, as you must choose a certain tactic in place of another.

Easy example - chosen tactic for -10% crit chance. It's pretty good, but is it better or worse than 160 toughness? Renown point wise, 160 toughness costs a lot more renown points than -10% crit chance. If a 2h chosen decides to take it over something else, what are they giving up to take it? This point is often lost in arguments and essays."

It doesn't significantly make one class better. However, we can certainly say that a Slayer can become viable and meta much more quickly and easily than its Choppa counterpart? This is an undeniable issue.
Your "Easy example" is understandable, but you chose the wrong example. Rugged (I assume you meant Toughness) and Flawless Armor are core tactics. So, they cost nothing. On the other hand, Deamon Claw could be an example, but there's clearly no comparison in reality.

Your example discusses a smart choice of tactics on a given class, which is off-topic because I was talking about differences in equity between counterparts. Rampage and Git To Da Choppa are the flagship abilities of the two classes, and that's why people compare them even though they are not alike. Of course, on a given class (e.g., Chosen), taking Opressing Blow and Rending Blade will most likely be wiser than taking Feed on the Weary for the same build. This is not exactly what I was talking about.

"2. Swordmaster 25% parry buff is a garbage utility due to its extremely short duration and SM ability balance mechanics making it extremely difficult to keep up 100% of the time. It would require a serious loss of DPS to keep that buff up a lot."

It does indeed last for 5 seconds, but it's spammable. Now, stacking it with Wall of Darting Steel is not easy, yes. But it remains possible.

After all, as I said, all tanks need a buff (I was harsher on the SM, but he deserves a buff too).

A 5-second buff extension could be a good thing, for example. (He doesn't deserve more sympathy from me lol)

"3. RP V Zealot. RP has access to a lot of useful tactics that Zealot does not - 1/2 stun duration, armor, ranged snare chance on 15 sec dot tick, aoe punt CD reduction + snare. Zealot has a very limited selection of useful tactics. RP also has a greater ability to provide aoe support damage with Rune of Battle that Zealot does not have while not hindering healing abilities."

I didn't delve into this topic. If you say so, I'm fine with it, you're going in the direction I'm suggesting, so that's good.

"4. One thing you didn't mention is that the BO has probably the highest damage potential on squishy targets among tanks in the game. The one saving grace of the worst tank is that it can do decent damage, but it still won't compare to real DPS classes and does not make up for the lack of real utility that other tanks can provide. Shield BO is probably the worst tank spec I've ever had the misfortune of playing."

Yes, it has the double armor debuff, indeed. But apart from the Bring 'Em On + Keep it Goin'! build to spam Da Big Un', it doesn't have more impact than other offtanks. Yes, it spams AoE, so it deals damage. It takes two tactics to use a spell, though. Not great.

"5. Slayer's unblockable aoe disarm is probably the most overlooked powerful utility in the game that no one seems to talk about. Seriously."

You mean disarm a Slayer? Yes, KD, disarm. We can do lots of things to reduce the sentence lol, but Rampage => 20 sec, not 5.

"6. GtdC pull is a slot machine of either being useful and pulling heals/dps or handing out immunity to tanks that got pulled 10 feet. There are definitely issues with how it behaves in keeps that cannot be denied. I'd advocate for Rampage and GtdC to be completely disabled around keeps as they both completely ruin funnels."

Okay, so there's a slight "Destro bias," but in the end, you clearly agree with me?

Okay, why not!

[IVendettaI]

The problem I have with this is you're comparing classes 1:1 and not comparing them with the current meta of the game..

It's not just about mirroring (I'd argue classes are not exactly mirrored to ensure they have flavour). But it's about making them fun and useful in general content(whilst ensuring one is not stronger/weaker than their counterpart). I'll use the WP as an example as that's the class I know best.

WP Salv is great in most content, not ideal in kiting fights but it works.

Grace, bad choice for ORVR. It works okay in small scale, cities and PVE but that's it. It's a high risk low reward spec as it does low damage and okay healing (salv is better). It's also a shame you can't hybridise this spec properly between casted healing and melee damage.

Finally Wrath. Useless in pretty much all forms of content. Does poor healing, does mediocre damage, doesn't bring anything useful to groups/WBs that other classes in their primary spec can already do better.

You need to say the full names of spells if you want me to understand, i'm not english (I think it's visible)

[Scottx125]

Agreed 100%. If things stay like this, the pop will drop to unplayable numbers. Double RR revitalized the game a bit , but it won’t stay like this for long until new players get a hang of what’s happening.And old players leave lol. All those things you mentioned need to be changed, and firstly start with nerfing the rampage by at least 50%. Order is dominating every manfight, every scenario, and city that has multiple geared slayers in it. Choppa just can’t compete except pull some kills in orvr. And yeah, Black Orc is pathetically weak. Killing all the fun out of the game.

This if off topic somewhat. But just to put things straight. The population upswing is two fold, one because winter is coming and people play more. Two, because a French streamer brought a lot of his followers here. Whilst the balance will eventually have an impact on population, it's not going to cause it to die overnight.

Rampage is currently the one saving grace for Order's melee train(most of order is RDPS). Order already struggles to win in ORVR fights due to Destro having better mobility and morale pumps. Order normally wins the funnel fights primarily due to Rampage. Without that, the advantage swings to Destro both in funnel fights and open field fights.

Choppas on their own aren't too much of a problem. But if you mass them like Slayers and combine them with an AOE KD. You can end up pulling a large swath of DPS/Healers and killing them in a very short span of time. Crippling a WB within seconds.

IMO both Choppas and Slayers are too powerful and need toning down. Especially their utility.

[Scottx125]

The problem I have with this is you're comparing classes 1:1 and not comparing them with the current meta of the game..

It's not just about mirroring (I'd argue classes are not exactly mirrored to ensure they have flavour). But it's about making them fun and useful in general content(whilst ensuring one is not stronger/weaker than their counterpart). I'll use the WP as an example as that's the class I know best.

WP Salv is great in most content, not ideal in kiting fights but it works.

Grace, bad choice for ORVR. It works okay in small scale, cities and PVE but that's it. It's a high risk low reward spec as it does low damage and okay healing (salv is better). It's also a shame you can't hybridise this spec properly between casted healing and melee damage.

Finally Wrath. Useless in pretty much all forms of content. Does poor healing, does mediocre damage, doesn't bring anything useful to groups/WBs that other classes in their primary spec can already do better.

You need to say the full names of spells if you want me to understand, i'm not english (I think it's visible)

I haven't mentioned any spells... WP = Warrior Priest, Salv = Salvation tree, Spec = If you're running Salv, Grace or Wrath specialisation trees. Everything else is commonly used within the game, discord and forums which you should be familiar with.

[IVendettaI]

The problem I have with this is you're comparing classes 1:1 and not comparing them with the current meta of the game..

It's not just about mirroring (I'd argue classes are not exactly mirrored to ensure they have flavour). But it's about making them fun and useful in general content(whilst ensuring one is not stronger/weaker than their counterpart). I'll use the WP as an example as that's the class I know best.

WP Salv is great in most content, not ideal in kiting fights but it works.

Grace, bad choice for ORVR. It works okay in small scale, cities and PVE but that's it. It's a high risk low reward spec as it does low damage and okay healing (salv is better). It's also a shame you can't hybridise this spec properly between casted healing and melee damage.

Finally Wrath. Useless in pretty much all forms of content. Does poor healing, does mediocre damage, doesn't bring anything useful to groups/WBs that other classes in their primary spec can already do better.

You need to say the full names of spells if you want me to understand, i'm not english (I think it's visible)

I haven't mentioned any spells... WP = Warrior Priest, Salv = Salvation tree, Spec = If you're running Salv, Grace or Wrath specialisation trees. Everything else is commonly used within the game, discord and forums which you should be familiar with.

Yes, alright, the judgment wasn't necessary. I didn't understand, I'm not English. I'm already making an effort to express myself in your language. You want me to express myself in French and be 100% comfortable with my explanations while you rely on translation?
Je le fais maintenant si tu veux et ça ne va pas être drôle pour toi

Now, you believe it's a mistake to compare 1:1, fair enough. But don't we need to start by comparing counterparts to each other before confronting them with the rest? Because saying:

"WP Salv is great in most content, not ideal in kiting fights but it works."

Not ideal for kiting, but compared to what? In my opinion, the DoK/WP compensates with its medium armor, which other healers don't have.

"Grace, a bad choice for ORVR. It works okay in small scale, cities, and PVE, but that's it. It's a high-risk, low-reward spec as it does low damage and okay healing (salv is better). It's also a shame you can't hybridize this spec properly between casted healing and melee damage."

I have a DoK shield, and I don't find it bad in ORVR. But I think it's much more a matter of personal preference than a consensus.

"Finally Wrath. Useless in pretty much all forms of content. Does poor healing, does mediocre damage, doesn't bring anything useful to groups/WBs that other classes in their primary spec can already do better."

Not well-informed on this one, but yes, I'm aware it's not as good as DoK DPS. However, there are very few DoK DPS players because it clearly doesn't appeal to everyone either.

[Detangler]

A touch of destro bias in that OP, so take it with a grain of salt.

Couple things:

1. Access to certain tactics does not make a class significantly better than its counterpart, as you must choose a certain tactic in place of another.

Easy example - chosen tactic for -10% crit chance. It's pretty good, but is it better or worse than 160 toughness? Renown point wise, 160 toughness costs a lot more renown points than -10% crit chance. If a 2h chosen decides to take it over something else, what are they giving up to take it? This point is often lost in arguments and essays.

2. Swordmaster 25% parry buff is a garbage utility due to its extremely short duration and SM ability balance mechanics making it extremely difficult to keep up 100% of the time. It would require a serious loss of DPS to keep that buff up a lot.

3. RP V Zealot. RP has access to a lot of useful tactics that Zealot does not - 1/2 stun duration, armor, ranged snare chance on 15 sec dot tick, aoe punt CD reduction + snare. Zealot has a very limited selection of useful tactics. RP also has a greater ability to provide aoe support damage with Rune of Battle that Zealot does not have while not hindering healing abilities.

4. One thing you didnt mention is that the BO has probably the highest damage potential on squishy targets among tanks in the game. The one saving grace of the worst tank is that it can do decent damage, but it still won't compare to real DPS classes and does not make up for lack of real utility that other tanks can provide. Shield BO is probably the worst tank spec I've ever had the misfortune of playing.

5. Slayer's unblockable aoe disarm is probably the most overlooked powerful utility in the game that no one seems to talk about. Seriously.

6. GtdC pull is a slot machine of either being useful and pulling heals/dps or handing out immunity to tanks that got pulled 10 feet. There are definitely issues with how it behaves in keeps that cannot be denied. I'd advocate for rampage and GtdC to be completely disabled around keeps as they both completely ruin funnels.

7. The proposed counters to rampage and GtdC by keyboard warriors are laughable. Just shatter barely works in small scale scenarios, and good luck constantly taunting/interrupting all the choppas in a zerg every 20 seconds. Stop kidding yourself and everyone else about it as it will not work even 30% of the time.

"A touch of Destro bias in that OP, so take it with a grain of salt."

Predictable.

"1. Access to certain tactics does not make a class significantly better than its counterpart, as you must choose a certain tactic in place of another.

Easy example - chosen tactic for -10% crit chance. It's pretty good, but is it better or worse than 160 toughness? Renown point wise, 160 toughness costs a lot more renown points than -10% crit chance. If a 2h chosen decides to take it over something else, what are they giving up to take it? This point is often lost in arguments and essays."

It doesn't significantly make one class better. However, we can certainly say that a Slayer can become viable and meta much more quickly and easily than its Choppa counterpart? This is an undeniable issue.
Your "Easy example" is understandable, but you chose the wrong example. Rugged (I assume you meant Toughness) and Flawless Armor are core tactics. So, they cost nothing. On the other hand, Deamon Claw could be an example, but there's clearly no comparison in reality.

Your example discusses a smart choice of tactics on a given class, which is off-topic because I was talking about differences in equity between counterparts. Rampage and Git To Da Choppa are the flagship abilities of the two classes, and that's why people compare them even though they are not alike. Of course, on a given class (e.g., Chosen), taking Opressing Blow and Rending Blade will most likely be wiser than taking Feed on the Weary for the same build. This is not exactly what I was talking about.

"2. Swordmaster 25% parry buff is a garbage utility due to its extremely short duration and SM ability balance mechanics making it extremely difficult to keep up 100% of the time. It would require a serious loss of DPS to keep that buff up a lot."

It does indeed last for 5 seconds, but it's spammable. Now, stacking it with Wall of Darting Steel is not easy, yes. But it remains possible.

After all, as I said, all tanks need a buff (I was harsher on the SM, but he deserves a buff too).

A 5-second buff extension could be a good thing, for example. (He doesn't deserve more sympathy from me lol)

"3. RP V Zealot. RP has access to a lot of useful tactics that Zealot does not - 1/2 stun duration, armor, ranged snare chance on 15 sec dot tick, aoe punt CD reduction + snare. Zealot has a very limited selection of useful tactics. RP also has a greater ability to provide aoe support damage with Rune of Battle that Zealot does not have while not hindering healing abilities."

I didn't delve into this topic. If you say so, I'm fine with it, you're going in the direction I'm suggesting, so that's good.

"4. One thing you didn't mention is that the BO has probably the highest damage potential on squishy targets among tanks in the game. The one saving grace of the worst tank is that it can do decent damage, but it still won't compare to real DPS classes and does not make up for the lack of real utility that other tanks can provide. Shield BO is probably the worst tank spec I've ever had the misfortune of playing."

Yes, it has the double armor debuff, indeed. But apart from the Bring 'Em On + Keep it Goin'! build to spam Da Big Un', it doesn't have more impact than other offtanks. Yes, it spams AoE, so it deals damage. It takes two tactics to use a spell, though. Not great.

"5. Slayer's unblockable aoe disarm is probably the most overlooked powerful utility in the game that no one seems to talk about. Seriously."

You mean disarm a Slayer? Yes, KD, disarm. We can do lots of things to reduce the sentence lol, but Rampage => 20 sec, not 5.

"6. GtdC pull is a slot machine of either being useful and pulling heals/dps or handing out immunity to tanks that got pulled 10 feet. There are definitely issues with how it behaves in keeps that cannot be denied. I'd advocate for Rampage and GtdC to be completely disabled around keeps as they both completely ruin funnels."

Okay, so there's a slight "Destro bias," but in the end, you clearly agree with me?

Okay, why not!

#1. This was more of a general statement about tactic choices and arguments. Base or spec'd tactics it doesn't make much of a difference. You can only pick 4. Another example - Runepriest vs. Zealot. Runie can have all the tactics mentioned in my other post, but there is no way they would slot all of them as 2-3 tactics are core (25% absorb shield on heal, 25% heal increase on heal crit, possibly AP regen on heal crit). It can be hard for some to follow along with ability names if they don't know the class in and out, so description of abilities makes it easier for all to follow along.

#2. SM parry buff technically isn't 100% spammable. It requires improved balance. Even with stance shifting you can't always be able to hit the ability.

#5 should have stated "Aoe cooldown increaser," not disarm. Typing a long reply on my phone during boring work meetings and I made a goof.

[Aethilmar]

I think somebody lost one too many times to a Swordmaster and is cranky about it.

Good to know we are "the best tank in the game", though. Maybe somebody should tell warband leaders that because when they are not desperate they are filling out the slots with 4 Knights and 4 "other" tanks with some preference for IB or SM depending on if they need good single buff or group CD buff (and bugger off if you don't slot that).

Similarly interesting that BG is strongest destro tank. Guess someone should tell their warband leaders to stack them instead of 4 Chosen plus whatever else ...

Anyway, everything outside of the inevitable rampage discussion (and maybe the BO could use a little love ... maybe) was just a typical Destro diary entry about victimhood just like Order complains about pulls all ... the ... time.

[Farrul]

It does indeed last for 5 seconds, but it's spammable. Now, stacking it with Wall of Darting Steel is not easy, yes. But it remains possible.

After all, as I said, all tanks need a buff (I was harsher on the SM, but he deserves a buff too).

Eagle's flight (25% parry) does not stack with wall of darting steel.

As for SM vs BO comparison just keep in mind the population balance as well, there is 3-4 black orcs for every swordmaster on this server. I agree that BO deserves to be buffed and need some sort of group utility added but SM is squishy for a tank and that's the price for having better utility and more versatile damage channel / spirit). The best tank classes remain Chosen/Kotbs for their respective faction.

Yes, it has the double armor debuff, indeed. But apart from the Bring 'Em On + Keep it Goin'! build to spam Da Big Un', it doesn't have more impact than other offtanks. Yes, it spams AoE, so it deals damage. It takes two tactics to use a spell, though. Not great.

2H BO singletarget crits and burst can't be matched by any other tank class( including SM) vs squishy targets.

6. GtdC pull is a slot machine of either being useful and pulling heals/dps or handing out immunity to tanks that got pulled 10 feet. There are definitely issues with how it behaves in keeps that cannot be denied. I'd advocate for Rampage and GtdC to be completely disabled around keeps as they both completely ruin funnels."

Okay, so there's a slight "Destro bias," but in the end, you clearly agree with me?

Okay, why not!

The strength of Rampage is precisely in funnels and GTDC excels in the open rvr lakes, disable rampage and GTDC in funnels would be a huge destro buff and big order nerf, not balanced at all.

Having said that, the main issue with slayer vs choppa is clear. Both classes have too much power relative to the other dps classes in their respective faction and deserve to be adequately nerfed for a long time. This is long overdue and the ''meta'' need to change to not revolve around these two ''berserker'' classes when we discuss faction balance.

GTDC is an abomination and a pug nightmare, makes the game unfun for Order. There is a reason why Choppa is the most played dps class in the game by far( this is an issue since the game for many hours of the day do not have organized gameplay and pugs IS the game, except for prime times etc). It is an abusive and still broken ability ( it screws the camera of the victim, seem to sometimes ignore parry defences and is still bugged pulling people through walls and stairs).

Rampage is ridiculous since it can trivialize tank defences, it need an adequate nerf as well. Instead in the manifesto for some weird unknown reason the devs have decided to gut marauders and white lions aoe build and leave these two overperfoming classes . I hope that is only temporarily until ''real'' class changes.