2H Knight Suggestions

[detrap]

Staggering Impact is not a must for warband play. NOTHING 2H knight brings is a must for wb play. It's quaint to have the wounds and crit debuff; ocassionally you'll run one knight, who's probably well geared and friends with the wb leader. Prior to the Vigilance change you did have specialised 6-mans that did run 2H knight in warbands (Secrets and Matt come to mind), but from that to calling it a "must" is just gibberish.

When push comes to shove, most warbands will pick any SnB tank over a 2H knight; and for good reason.
Your 10% (defendable) defense debuff is not that important. Any Engineer (and lord knows we have enough of them) can cover that debuff and more, while also doing *gasp* damage. Look up Pierce Defenses. That debuff happens on target defense; meaning if the target is in need of a defense debuff, it will get one, without wasting a tank slot or a global cooldown. You are literally bringing the warband down by not just putting on SnB and guarding an Engineer with Pierce Defenses (hell, even SW have Pierce Defenses; do you realise how much defense piercing order has????)/

At the end of the day, we have on one side people who realise that, no matter what 2H spec you run for smallscale/scenarios, Overpowering Swing is where it stops in Conquest tree, and on the other hand... detrap, who runs 2H in warbands.

Stripping 10% from block check then another 10% from parry/dodge/disrupt is a must for warband play. It's unfair to your dps not to use it. Consider it an ability that gives your warband 10% strike through against all defenses for 10 seconds.

If you want to be selfish about the ability, it makes it easier for you to apply wounds and crit debuff. If you are stacking crit you can use biting blade with arcing swing as well because the debuff stacks with tactics.

For small scale SI might not be necessary.

Im sure BG's are using their block and parry debuff often, or maybe that's not needed as well?

[puzzolamistica]

is it worth to take staggering over focus mending if u are the only kotbs in your party?
i am asking, i have no idea but for me is not worth, u can run the build whit staggering impact only if u have another kotbs that is running focus mending in your party.

[detrap]

is it worth to take staggering over focus mending if u are the only kotbs in your party?
i am asking, i have no idea but for me is not worth, u can run the build whit staggering impact only if u have another kotbs that is running focus mending in your party.

Should have plenty of points for both FM and SI at 40, I don't think warbands I'm in are ever short in available knockdown/stagger cc's that would force me to pick up smashing counter. Maybe it's useful if there was no snb IB's in warband or the dps don't mind you ruining their rotations by giving away immunities. RR 60+ is nice because you can consider picking up Runefang as well.

[zulnam]

Stripping 10% from block check then another 10% from parry/dodge/disrupt is a must for warband play. It's unfair to your dps not to use it. Consider it an ability that gives your warband 10% strike through against all defenses for 10 seconds.

If it doesn't get resisted. And your warband survives long enough to do said damage because the only knight in p3 is 2H, so no Vigilance/Shield Rush, so he will die, causing a cascade of failures (no more focused mending, no more guard, more die, wb starts to backtrack). I'm using worst-case scenario, since you are using best-case scenario: assuming you get to frontline, use SI and it hits more than 5-6 people.

We have enough utility as it is. We are hogging utility at this point. If you care so much for that 10% debuff, give it to 2H SM's Phoenix's Wing so they have a nice aoe debuff as well, while we get to actually hit for something that is reasonably close to "worth a damn".

You are already debuffing wounds and increased crit chance, besides debuffing any stat aura that you are running (toughness, resistance, str, AP, incoming & outgoing heals if you are edgy).

That's enough.

[detrap]

Stripping 10% from block check then another 10% from parry/dodge/disrupt is a must for warband play. It's unfair to your dps not to use it. Consider it an ability that gives your warband 10% strike through against all defenses for 10 seconds.

If it doesn't get resisted. And your warband survives long enough to do said damage because the only knight in p3 is 2H, so no Vigilance/Shield Rush, so he will die, causing a cascade of failures (no more focused mending, no more guard, more die, wb starts to backtrack). I'm using worst-case scenario, since you are using best-case scenario: assuming you get to frontline, use SI and it hits more than 5-6 people.

We have enough utility as it is. We are hogging utility at this point. If you care so much for that 10% debuff, give it to 2H SM's Phoenix's Wing so they have a nice aoe debuff as well, while we get to actually hit for something that is reasonably close to "worth a damn".

You are already debuffing wounds and increased crit chance, besides debuffing any stat aura that you are running (toughness, resistance, str, AP, incoming & outgoing heals if you are edgy).

That's enough.

If you have a slot for a 2h knight in the warband to assist on the blob and they are not using SI, they are gimping the warband damage. I always use FM, why would you not run it?

Survivability is fine, you cant face tank a warband but you still aim to get behind the blob before you debuff them. If you are forced to guard a mdps for city, since cities are predominantly melee heavy, then you need parry gear and stack weaponskill, runefang helps with that.

Also you wounds debuff is higher with SI.

[titaniummushroom]

Gentlemen,

- 2H knight is not the tankiest 2H spec. In fact, knight has two abilities that help them survive longer: Vigilance and Shield Rush. Both of those require a shield. Whatever you believe, that's it. Auras are a buff to survivability, but often not as strong as people thing. Besides that, 2H tank (in order to hit for anything) often has only 1 defensive aura. Personally, in a SC, i get str, AP aura (cause i'm a thirsty boy) and then a defensive, depending on situation: toughness, resistance or stay focused

- Path of Conquest is the only, ONLY, 2H tank spec in the game where players avoid getting the channel attack. Because it is very weak. Weaker than 3 Precission Strikes. If you take anything away from this thread; this is it.

- these changes will not make 2H tank OP (or "more OP", as some of you said), but will in fact make the tank choose between DPS and Utility when going 2H

- lol @ the guy who counted Distracting Bellows (standard tank morale) like a knight pro to show how OP they are. But hey; lets make Distracting Bellows usable with a shield only

- to all those that like staggering impact: agree to disagree. We need to lose this ability if we ever want to see the "dps" knight hit for anything. Honestly having utility even in our dps spec is dragging us down; and again, this is not even good utility. It can be defended. Pierce Defenses is superior

Currently, for organised smallscale/SC for group play, this is the best 2H knight build.
Notice that:
- most points are in Glory path
- no active ability was taken from conquest, only one aura
- the class remains in a utility role still, since there is no damage to speak of. Even Staggering Impact that some like is still more utility.

With the proposed changes, that spec would change to this (imagine new skills being there). Straight off the bat, Knight has to choose between "big deeps" and keeping group utility. Focused Mending (a very strong team tactic) cannot be slotted if you go damage. Solar Flare, don't even think about it.

No team will lose a 6v6/SC because knight got a 10%/5% tactic or because MF is worth a damn.

You know what will happen instead? Knight will get a small damage boost. Class will increase in popularity, knight population will go up with people who like to solo/SC play 2H tanks, said people will realise they need to do group play to get the gear they want, they will join warbands as SnB since that is required.

To summarise, a slight increase in damage for a solo/smallscale spec for this tank class has the potential to increase number of tanks on order and balance the factions.

i like when people actually post logical things on the forum. this guy gets it