Thread: Compilation of changes to the Warden.

Originally Posted by Untg99

We don't need buffs at all, except to make up for pve raid performance (not that tanking even matters in this game). And here we are getting buffs for all-around 0.o

Well this also assumes that the content with be the same difficulty as it is now. I'm fairly confident one of the major objectives of the stat changes was to widen the survivability gap between tanks and non-tanks... which points to harder content that requires the more survivable tanks.

hey guys, i only have 1 single question

i;ve readed this post, and liked most of the changes, but i'm not sure if i miss-understood it or not but

is this real official info that is planed to be released (and may stil be changed/tweaked as all other beta plans) or is this some sort of petition of community in a single post?

i realy got a bit confused, so would like to know.

thanks.

Originally Posted by Akhilles

hey guys, i only have 1 single question

i;ve readed this post, and liked most of the changes, but i'm not sure if i miss-understood it or not but

is this real official info that is planed to be released (and may stil be changed/tweaked as all other beta plans) or is this some sort of petition of community in a single post?

i realy got a bit confused, so would like to know.

thanks.

These are just "Suggested Changes" like the devs set around and a table and tossed ideas back and forth of of each other after some deliberation and this is what they come up with. This is what you would call a "Rough Copy". Meaning when these was posted they was meant to be a look into the insight of what the devs might be planning for this class. Same with all the other "Suggested Changes" When ROI comes out we may very well see all these changes and more. Or could quite possibly see none of these changes. Devs just toss these out there to see what kind of feedback they get from them and to give players something to possibly look forward to.

Originally Posted by Akhilles

hey guys, i only have 1 single question

i;ve readed this post, and liked most of the changes, but i'm not sure if i miss-understood it or not but

is this real official info that is planed to be released (and may stil be changed/tweaked as all other beta plans) or is this some sort of petition of community in a single post?

i realy got a bit confused, so would like to know.

thanks.

This is a compilation of changes proposed by Orion, the developer in charge of the class update for Isengard. All of the elements in here are subject to change if necessary, but these were the planned updates as of the last communication with Orion, and they appear to have been implemented in the beta, for the most part.

Originally Posted by striverg

Well this also assumes that the content with be the same difficulty as it is now. I'm fairly confident one of the major objectives of the stat changes was to widen the survivability gap between tanks and non-tanks... which points to harder content that requires the more survivable tanks.

Well, everything is changing really, i don't think it will be a great deal more difficult in comparison when considering the changes. But we will find out.

That post was more to do with the now, right now, wardens could use some additional threat components to be more on par with fights like the balrog.

thanks for the info, since in a general way i kinda like what they planing do to Warden (but truely hope they give a bit even more attention to Fist line, since from what i've read it stil wont be enough)

Originally Posted by Untg99

Well, everything is changing really, i don't think it will be a great deal more difficult in comparison when considering the changes. But we will find out.

That post was more to do with the now, right now, wardens could use some additional threat components to be more on par with fights like the balrog.

That just sounds like comparing apples to oranges. We're in a thread about changes, discussing the upcoming changes, changes that are strictly proposed for the sake of dealing with the changing content and mechanics like finesse and yet you want to compare to the here and now... apples and oranges.

Originally Posted by LtDiablo

That just sounds like comparing apples to oranges. We're in a thread about changes, discussing the upcoming changes, changes that are strictly proposed for the sake of dealing with the changing content and mechanics like finesse and yet you want to compare to the here and now... apples and oranges.

I don't really see why i cant compare.

Proposed changes aren't happening right now to my warden on live servers.
I am telling of how right now I think my warden needs some changes on live servers to be more on par. Those changes are likely coming with RoI with the new proposed gambits on page 1.

Which makes me pleased

^ Maybe i forgot to mention ;P

Bump so everyone remembers this exists

Originally Posted by Mysterion

Bump so everyone remembers this exists

Thank you very much, Mysterion. I almost forgot what I was complaining about

I haven't read through all 20 pages, but what is planned to do with masteries seems a deal breaker to me. I played this character, well, game actually, only because of degree od complication and possibilities Warden was offering with the Mastery system. If they going to dumb this down, I'm gonna stop playing.

Originally Posted by Tarsus666

I haven't read through all 20 pages, but what is planned to do with masteries seems a deal breaker to me. I played this character, well, game actually, only because of degree od complication and possibilities Warden was offering with the Mastery system. If they going to dumb this down, I'm gonna stop playing.

Hmm, you can still get your masteries by traiting Way of the Warden. You'll still have SpSH, SpFi, ShSp, ShFi, FiSp, and Fi,Shield but now it only takes one legendary trait instead of 3 class traits. The original mastery skills give you a double builder, ie Master of the Spear gives you a SpSp mastery. Which is going to be useful with battle mastery. If anything wardens are getting a little more complexity and not "dumb"ing down.

Originally Posted by Tarsus666

I haven't read through all 20 pages, but what is planned to do with masteries seems a deal breaker to me. I played this character, well, game actually, only because of degree od complication and possibilities Warden was offering with the Mastery system. If they going to dumb this down, I'm gonna stop playing.

?? Dumb what down. They're just being moved to a different slot essentially. (Unless I missed some updated proposed change)

Thanks chaps for clearing it up. Jumped into conclusions... I just like playing with masteries too much I guess

Originally Posted by LtDiablo

?? Dumb what down. They're just being moved to a different slot essentially. (Unless I missed some updated proposed change)

Yep, and existing mastery traits will be double builders (Goad + Defensive Strike + Deft Strike in one mastery) Personally, i will enjoy the added masteries, and tweaking my rotation based on 12 keys, and not 9 (lol, not really) But, i do however like the idea of Goad being my openner traited for 6 targets.

They're actually increasing the complexity of the class by adding 3 more masteries to the ones we already have, they're just being jumbled around on our traits. (our 6 current ones will move to the Way of the Warden Legendary trait.)

Masteried Goad openner ftw! Cant wait

Yeah, my personal opinion is that the way Battle Memory in general is overly complicated and clunky, the double gambit builders most of all. I understand that Orion is trying to squeeze more life out of the low level gambits, but this doesn't seem like the best way to do it.

Originally Posted by greendragoon100

Yeah, my personal opinion is that the way Battle Memory in general is overly complicated and clunky, the double gambit builders most of all. I understand that Orion is trying to squeeze more life out of the low level gambits, but this doesn't seem like the best way to do it.

Deft strike being omitted, the other two quite possibly could be useful, with only roughly half a second to fire it off. Goad, I project to be the most useful of the three, but defensive strike could be useful aswell, depending on how easy/hard it is to cap block to 25%. And if currently what they're saying is correct, if you're traited capstone, all 3 of them will give "potency."

Looking forward not to be locked into a 5/1/1 5/2 May after all be possible!

Goad openner ftw.

As someone who already does a Goad Opener, now I'm just more happy

3 quick back to back to back Goads traited for 6 targets? Mmm can't wait for near instant perma lock threat lol

With the masteries being moved, what will you guys end up traiting? I'll still be running shield capstone all of the time, so that gives me two class traits to work with. One will be efficient thrust, I haven't yet decided what the other will be.

Originally Posted by Leinad312

With the masteries being moved, what will you guys end up traiting? I'll still be running shield capstone all of the time, so that gives me two class traits to work with. One will be efficient thrust, I haven't yet decided what the other will be.

Depends, efficient thrust and veteran would pair well with shield cap. For PvP, slotting expert hurler + shield cap would be pretty awesome.

2 fist traits (3-target goad + 1 other) make for +10% percieved threat.

My early thoughts were going 5 shield, fist mastery for instant goad and the +3 goad target for group traits.

Full spear + never say die and perseverance might be a good way to go for solo or moors. Depends on how squishy I am in that build or else it might be full shield all the time with some spear thrown in.

Tough choice, either improved power efficiency or 10% more threat...

Honestly, I didn’t liked most of the suggested changes, but I think its great at the class is being revamped. I think the devs should thinks of it thoroughly and, of course, test it exentensively so it doesn't fall just to theories. As always, I never only criticize - I throw suggestions.

As on every warden post I make, lets say quick-thrust = 1, shield-bash= 2, warden's-taunt = 3 (the three basic gambit builder skills).

Potency: Striking for 1-1, 2-2 or 3-3 to get potency buff doesn't seems practical to me if battle memory skill will RESET after I use the skill stored in it. In practice: I'll use a gambit I practically never use and I still have to do the original gambit to store it in battle-memory skill, then I'll pay 5% morale to use (instead of power) and then battle-memory will reset and I'll have to start all over (with deft strike or the other skills, etc)? Its not practical, its not saving me any time and any power (since I'm doing a simple gambit at start JUST to do this). Most of all, it makes the class more complicated over little (or none) benefit.
A suggestion for potency: Remove potency, but hold on the battle-memory idea - it is good. Battle Memory alone can be the solution and you don't need to include this potency mechanics that, as said earlier, doesn't compensate for itself. Please read Battle Memory as follows.
A suggestion Battle-Memory: When this skill is activated, the next gambit the warden uses (or the next he uses in 5-10 seconds) will be stored in battle-memory. Battle memory will become the gambit stored and will have its cost changed to morale. After using the stored gambit, this skill becomes battle-memory again. If reducing our power stress is what you're aiming, make this skill cost no power, since its first use does nothing but to store the gambit there. Then you can even make the stored skill cost its normal power instead of changing it to morale.
But in any case, please don't make it a fixed 5% our total morale - you're making its cost much for some skills and sometimes we might just want to store a simple defensive strike or wall of steel of steel on it for future use (renewing defenses, for instance), so please don't make it have a fixed (and high!) cost, the way you mentioned about it seems like it would only be worth using for conviction (if much).


Master of the Spear/Shield/Fist: Please don't make them build a "double builder". Masteries are meant for us to memorize different gambits and to them save time on the build ones (which sometimes need to e fired right away, depending on the situation). Making it a double-builder (1-1, 2-2 and 3-3) will only make it work for these three basic gambits. In other words, you would only press it to ‘save’ pressing 1, 2 or 3 a second time and save (just a little) power. Doesn't seems worth slotting, even if the current potency idea comes to live (I hope it doesn't).

Way of The Warden: This legendary is already good as it is, it doesn’t need to have 3 masteries traits (6 mastery skills!) on it - it will overpower it so much that you would never trait anything else in its place. I think turbine want us to think before choosing our favorites legendaries and sometimes even alter them according to role or the instance/raid/quest we're going to face ahead. If I haven’t said this enough - this suggested change is too much.
Suggestion for Way of The Warden: Instead of changing it, make the legacies, traits and set bonuses that gives a bonus to any of the three instances also apply to way of the warden. This would make Helegrod full set to give a bonus to defense if way of the warden is used (the same as he would have in conservation instance), it would make extra icpr and/or extra icmr from legacy to apply on the stance (if more than one instance is giving extra icpr, just use the highest of course). If you dont like my idea, at least make the mastery skills only available when the instance is activated (would still be 'OP' imo tho...).

Recklessness: I'm surprised this stance is not being mentioned, even though determination is receiving icpr and critical defense now. All wardens DPS in conservation, it doesn’t matter if they're soloing, grouping, doing instances or raids. Even if you keep a moderate use of skills (if you don’t go "all-out"), the power leaks too fast and we already have 3 stats to prioritize - specially now that the caps are removed. A warden without icpr is the same as a champion dpsing without a stance - except that we don't recover power from an enemy defeat response.

Deflection - Sounds promising, but its yet a new "gambit line" to memorize. We still have gambit lines not filled. Why not use 1-2-1-2-1. Sound easier to memorize and it completes the "1-2-1" gambit line (onslaught, wall of steel). Make it hit 3 times, a little harder than wall of steel, make it interrupt (maybe, not much necessary) but instead of giving parry it does a "threat bump", just as intended, or make him receive a -10% outgoing threat for 20 or 30 seconds (this way it would apply to the next mob if the current ones is killed quickly by your group). It's a long gambit, like unerring strike, conviction, etc.. but reducing threat would be something for the warden who is dpsing while thinking on the long run to not steal the tank's aggro.

Shield Tactics - On the same line of thought as before, this could instead be the finishing gambit for the Shield Mastery Gambit (2-1-3-1). Wardens tanking already keep this gambit up frequently because it gives block and evade for 1 minute, but by adding a fifth stroke to the gambit it could give the same thing and just add a 30s stun immunity. It would cost more power and take a little more time to build it instead of shield mastery, but this would be used by wardens who know the mob or boss he/she is facing stuns. If giving stun immunity like a LM is too much... and instead of adding (it only works once every 60 seconds), which adds complexity, why not make it say "Reduces stun durations by 50%"? Would work nicely. I don't see a necessity for tactical defense on it, (I would use for the stun buff mostly) but it wouldn't hurt to gain some I guess.

Aggression - Maddening Strike, Dance of War and Conviction already does that. K, I know that Dance of War and Conviction does more than that, but Maddening Strike only does that already. No necessity for this gambit, we have enough gambits already in my opinion.

Shield Four Set Bonus: More HoT pulses would be too much. If you want to boost our healing (which I don't thing that needs boost at all), boost the quantity please, not the duration. We already have two gambits that do the same thing (which one of them should be changed imo), we have the shield legendary capstone that gives 2 more. I suggest to make it one more pulse instead and add another thing (as critical defense maybe) or just leave one more pulse.

Never Surrender - Its a very nice change and now I would put it in my hotbar again and bear the penalties to use it. It just doesn’t seem like a "panic button" if it lasts 5 minutes. It could last 1 minute or even 30 seconds (something like Shall Not Fall This Day of RK's) so you would use it in advance when you see the healer died (and its being on its way to be ressed, maybe haha) or the boss just got too angry, bad debuffs on you, etc. If it lasts 5 minutes, I would activate it on the most "tense part" of a boss fight (like Durchest when you start calling the adds) and just let it stays there for the rest of the fight and not worry about anything. Doesn't seems thrilling.
Suggestion for Never Surrender: Reduce its duration to 30 seconds or 1 minute (and some of its cooldown, if possible) or.. make it work like it works now (transfer 20% of each fellow's threat to warden), but remove the penalties altogether. The thing is, after having your threat on a boss reduces to zero, getting 20% of your five friend’s threat would give you 100% of the AVERAGE threat of your group, which in 90% of the cases is still far from what the leading threat member have. And knowing how threat works, there’s a percentage which you have to BEAT that friend's leading threat for you to get the boss' attention back. But its ok, we can work on that as fast as we can (not with out macros grayed out tho). Please mind that losing all your fellow's buffs, food buffs, scrolls and token on you is already a debuff enough for dying and the tank now has to get threat back as fast as possible (after ress casting, accepting ress AND revive animation) before someone else dies. It doesn’t need penalties.

Defiant Challenge: It spooked me to see this legendary wasn't mentioned also. There’s a big petition for it to change, please check the warden's forum for it. My suggestions are there also, so I wont post them here again (this got already big as it is haha). In any case, its not a good one to trait as it functions right now.

I read the Captain Dev's Diary for expansion last week and it surprised me (a good surprise haha) on how much Turbine thought of the class thoroughly and that now you can sat that EVERY class trait, legendary trait and skill there are worth it. After expansion release my captain will have a long conversation with the city bard lol - I will sit back and think carefully time I retrait my captain, for anything. I hope I feel the same thing about wardens - that those skills/traits that weren't as useful as they were designed to be, now can be used or slotted. I want to think between good choices before traiting my warden. Please do that Turbine, not only for wardens but for every class. Reduce what is OP, increase what is UP - test it extensively.

Thank you.

Originally Posted by Farian

Master of the Spear/Shield/Fist: Please don't make them build a "double builder". Masteries are meant for us to memorize different gambits and to them save time on the build ones (which sometimes need to e fired right away, depending on the situation). Making it a double-builder (1-1, 2-2 and 3-3) will only make it work for these three basic gambits. In other words, you would only press it to ‘save’ pressing 1, 2 or 3 a second time and save (just a little) power. Doesn't seems worth slotting, even if the current potency idea comes to live (I hope it doesn't).

Way of The Warden: This legendary is already good as it is, it doesn’t need to have 3 masteries traits (6 mastery skills!) on it - it will overpower it so much that you would never trait anything else in its place. I think turbine want us to think before choosing our favorites legendaries and sometimes even alter them according to role or the instance/raid/quest we're going to face ahead. If I haven’t said this enough - this suggested change is too much.
Suggestion for Way of The Warden: Instead of changing it, make the legacies, traits and set bonuses that gives a bonus to any of the three instances also apply to way of the warden. This would make Helegrod full set to give a bonus to defense if way of the warden is used (the same as he would have in conservation instance), it would make extra icpr and/or extra icmr from legacy to apply on the stance (if more than one instance is giving extra icpr, just use the highest of course). If you dont like my idea, at least make the mastery skills only available when the instance is activated (would still be 'OP' imo tho...).

The whole point of swapping the masteries from 3 class traits to a single legendary is to give us more options on class trait builds by reducing the options for legendary trait builds.

Both changes cannot be seen independent of each other.
Reusing the current class mastery traits for the double builders is then only a logical consequence of the potency addition.

Whatever else WotW does or not does is - imo - secondary to the fact that one legendary replaces 3 class traits. And better to stick the masteries on an existing legendary instead of making a new one that only has then the masteries.

ETA:

Originally Posted by Farian

Deflection - Sounds promising, but its yet a new "gambit line" to memorize. We still have gambit lines not filled. Why not use 1-2-1-2-1. Sound easier to memorize and it completes the "1-2-1" gambit line (onslaught, wall of steel). Make it hit 3 times, a little harder than wall of steel, make it interrupt (maybe, not much necessary) but instead of giving parry it does a "threat bump", just as intended, or make him receive a -10% outgoing threat for 20 or 30 seconds (this way it would apply to the next mob if the current ones is killed quickly by your group). It's a long gambit, like unerring strike, conviction, etc.. but reducing threat would be something for the warden who is dpsing while thinking on the long run to not steal the tank's aggro.

Shield Tactics - On the same line of thought as before, this could instead be the finishing gambit for the Shield Mastery Gambit (2-1-3-1). Wardens tanking already keep this gambit up frequently because it gives block and evade for 1 minute, but by adding a fifth stroke to the gambit it could give the same thing and just add a 30s stun immunity. It would cost more power and take a little more time to build it instead of shield mastery, but this would be used by wardens who know the mob or boss he/she is facing stuns. If giving stun immunity like a LM is too much... and instead of adding (it only works once every 60 seconds), which adds complexity, why not make it say "Reduces stun durations by 50%"? Would work nicely. I don't see a necessity for tactical defense on it, (I would use for the stun buff mostly) but it wouldn't hurt to gain some I guess.

While it might make sense to have something like this on existing gambit lines having them on 3 builders makes them much more easily and faster accessible. Especially aggro drops is something you might want to do pretty fast.

Aggression - Maddening Strike, Dance of War and Conviction already does that. K, I know that Dance of War and Conviction does more than that, but Maddening Strike only does that already. No necessity for this gambit, we have enough gambits already in my opinion.

This is probably more like defiant challenge i.e. a snap aggro tool than the aggro transfer tools you mentioned i.e. also something you likely want on a short builder gambit.
This - depending how it will really be implemented - might render DC kind of useless then.
Probably aggression will be just a single target skill while DC is on effective a radius.

Smiling everytime I read the revamp notes

Originally Posted by Farian

Way of The Warden: This legendary is already good as it is, ...

No, it isn't. For tanking the loss of avoidance is (in my opinion) not offset by the extra ICMR and Attack Speed. In addition it should gain the bonuses from the individual Legacies that buff the other stances.

Originally Posted by Farian

Recklessness: I'm surprised this stance is not being mentioned, even though determination is receiving icpr and critical defense now. All wardens DPS in conservation, it doesn’t matter if they're soloing, grouping, doing instances or raids.

I use the stance for DPSing whenever the fight is short or "broken" with phases or has a substantial amount of running around where I'm not hitting stuff, e.g. last boss in Suri-Sarma, Poison Wing in OD, skirmishes, daily quests, ...

Originally Posted by Farian

Shield Four Set Bonus: More HoT pulses would be too much. If you want to boost our healing (which I don't thing that needs boost at all), boost the quantity please, not the duration.

More and weaker pulses = less time spent on healing gambits => more time for avoidance buffs, threat, or damage.

Originally Posted by Farian

Defiant Challenge: It spooked me to see this legendary wasn't mentioned also. There’s a big petition for it to change, please check the warden's forum for it. My suggestions are there also, so I wont post them here again (this got already big as it is haha). In any case, its not a good one to trait as it functions right now.

Problem is that some Wardens want to use it as a crutch and want it boosted others want to do away with it entirely. The only Wardens I have personally seen slotting it currently are using it because they are inexperienced or unskilled in the way to generate threat "properly" and thus they spend a lot of time building and firing this gambit instead of doing some Precise Blows, Conviction, or other useful gambits. As soon as it runs out they lost aggro to a dps.

Originally Posted by Glorietta

...

Problem is that some Wardens want to use it as a crutch and want it boosted others want to do away with it entirely. The only Wardens I have personally seen slotting it currently are using it because they are inexperienced or unskilled in the way to generate threat "properly" and thus they spend a lot of time building and firing this gambit instead of doing some Precise Blows, Conviction, or other useful gambits. As soon as it runs out they lost aggro to a dps.

The reflect is by far the best part about that skill. Although DC is not completely useless for the force taunt, the reflect is really what makes it worth slotting in PvP. I use it for threat reasons pretty much only in OD Fear, the 5 second buffer for me to build my threat back up is nice (if I have it already built).

Originally Posted by thunderchickn

The reflect is by far the best part about that skill. Although DC is not completely useless for the force taunt, the reflect is really what makes it worth slotting in PvP. I use it for threat reasons pretty much only in OD Fear, the 5 second buffer for me to build my threat back up is nice (if I have it already built).

I use DC in gortheron and some trash pulls to build threat on the cc'd mobs. While conviction always pulls it away from the healer in my group, usually they immediately go for the healer in the other group unless I use DC once or twice on them. It's still our only way to generate threat on a mob without damaging it.

Updated the thread with armor stuffs.

Edit: Orion announced new info for NS, updating that too

Originally Posted by Regero

Never Surrender-- This skill will become a Panic Button on a 15 minute cooldown. When activated the skill will apply the "Invincible" buff to you. If, during the 5 minutes that buff is on you, you drop beneath 5% morale, you are insta-healed for 75% of you morale and 50% of your power. After that the Invincible buff is removed and penalties are applied. These penalties are the same as the current Never Surrender and last 5 minutes. Note that the 15 minute cooldown on the skill begins as soon as you apply Invincible to yourself, resulting in basically 10 minute downtime on the skill.

After all... A warden gets a escape skill

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Originally Posted by Mysterion

Snip

What levels do we get these?

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Originally Posted by Mysterion

Traits: http://imgur.com/a/zJO25

have fun breaking those up Reg.

LOL no way, I was lazy and just heyperlinked

Thanks very much for the info though! added em to the compilation and gave you credit!

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Sheild tactics looks nice! So do the new javellin skill! Not sure about the aggression/dump skill, guess Ill have to wait and see. Anyone knows how aggression really works? (amount transfered, if its a temporary increase in treat or perma?)

Originally Posted by Mysterion

TEXT

Anyone mind putting up a simple hypobolic graph with those numbers? Been a while since I had math at high-school^^ Looks like the disminishing return hits us pretty hard (only a 8,3% increase from 4500 to 10500)

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Thanks Mysterion Like I said I added your stuff and gave you credit


The only thing I am still wondering about, and I'm not asking you do this now, you've done plenty and more, is what happened with the spear line bleed removals? Are those still around? Are they worthwhile?