Thread: The state of the reaver

My reaver is or used to be my main creep, it's always been a bit tough out there in the Ettenmoors being front line fodder, now as in SoA. The signature reaver skill 'Charge!' has always been a fast way into trouble with no way out, as a reaver you're soon bombed with the full arsenal of crowd control, slowed to a crawl and on everyone's target, and you're pretty squishy to boot. Still it used to be sort of fun, with decent damage output and using the element of surprise and charge, a reaver could cause havoc solo, 1v1 was at least something worth trying, and reavers thrived in a small groups with support.

Last few updates though, reavers have lost what little luster they had. It already wasn't great with RoI: in addition to the usual burgs and guardians going "you can't hit me" at will and all the other freep shenanigans, champions and minstrels were propelled to overpowered status, freep mitigations went up, creep mitigations went down for a while, immediate & maybe fast skills were changed I assume for a good reason, but the attack speed of the reaver went down in the process. Still, I endured.

With audacity and the latest batch of freep updates though (RKs, wardens, first age weapons becoming common also), I've found myself playing my reaver less and less, and now not at all anymore. Besides two more classes reaching outrageously overpowered status when played at potential, damage has gone down across the board, which has several consequences for reavers:
- Getting first hits doesn't matter as much anymore, the same goes for charge as less damage can be done in the duration of it.
- Anything with more healing than a reaver which is essentially all freep classes but hunters gained a further advantage
- Bringing freeps to half morale for devastating strike(s) takes that much longer (or downright impossible because of the previous point) which doesn't play at all in favour of the reaver obviously.

While a few improvements were made to the reaver class in the same patch, it has felt like a case of one step forward, two steps backwards to me.

Large crowd situations were never an option for me due to playing on an old computer (can't even land anything in melee, too low framerate, too much warping), and I never liked the idea of sparring, which left solo roaming and small groups for me. I find solo roaming has become pretty pointless for me as well now. A reaver is no match for well played freeps, that's nothing particularly new here, but it has come to the point where I'm struggling to beat even mediocre freeps who got themselves half decent gear. Minstrels can easily outheal my damage output, no way I can go through a guardian's b/p/e, mitigations, pledge and heal(s), same for champ and their bubbles and self heals, not much gets through a burg's evade buff either, and they have plenty more options should that not be enough, RKs can pretty much zap me to death using skills at random, cappies can last a siege, wardens who haven't learned about Defiant Challenge will usually spam self heals or pop never surrender should they be spear traited. Then there's racial abilities to go through (this isn't sparring, my opponents will almost invariably pop everything they have if they need to) ... Apart from the odd LM and most hunters who don't know how to deal with their inductions with a melee class in their face, there isn't much of anything for me to fight out there.

I'm extremely disillusioned about my reaver, maybe I suck at playing him, but I'm currently enjoying my black-arrow a lot more who at least stands a better chance against mediocre freeps, is more survivable and for those reasons is ultimately more useful in small groups as well (plus I can pew pew when it comes to that).

I'm not quite sure I have a point with this thread other than as venting, so I'll stop here. I believe the reaver class needs a lot of love from Turbine however.

I'm thinking Turbine intended reavers to be weak, if not the weakest. Why?

New player rolls creep. See's he's very weak. Buys most skills and traits. Realises it's ####.
New player buys another class.

Repeat.

More money for them.

It is since the f2p members have been allowed to play as the Reaver, it's a marketing plan.

Originally Posted by Stevo6

I'm thinking Turbine intended reavers to be weak, if not the weakest. Why?

New player rolls creep. See's he's very weak. Buys most skills and traits. Realises it's ####.
New player buys another class.

Repeat.

More money for them.

Sounds about right to me.

Originally Posted by Fridley

It is since the f2p members have been allowed to play as the Reaver, it's a marketing plan.

I would hope this isn't happening.... How ever i agree that the reaver needs serious buffs asap.

Reavers were beast mode for a while. Look back at BAoS daily stats site. High ranked reavers were the most dominant creeps for a period of time. While everything else got buffed and updated, reavers have fallen back and the stats site shows population declining. Reavers down, wargs and BAs up. People don't like to struggle, people like easy. Why do you think the number of minstrels has bounced way up? They're incredible now. Hunter population is down too... they're not fun either. Remember how bad weavers used to be? Once they got buffed a while ago, their population nearly doubled. Its not a coincidence.


When its easy, powerful and dominant whether its freep or creep, people will play the class. When its difficult, weak, and sucks people look elsewhere. End of story.


All that being said, reavers are definitely not what they used to be. They could use a few more tools imo.

Originally Posted by Fridley

It is since the f2p members have been allowed to play as the Reaver, it's a marketing plan.

Nothing else to say.Money and just money

Originally Posted by Fridley

It is since the f2p members have been allowed to play as the Reaver, it's a marketing plan.

Then its a very bad marketing plan. If turbine want to generate more $ they should make reavers much stronger, so new f2p player will think "hmm this game is fun! im gonna buy sub and check another creeps!". You dont offer your worst to attract customers, you offer them the best you have.

In my opinion Reavers are the weakest creep class by a measurable margin. It's a shame really because they used to be my favorite fights.

Originally Posted by gunlang

Then its a very bad marketing plan. If turbine want to generate more $ they should make reavers much stronger, so new f2p player will think "hmm this game is fun! im gonna buy sub and check another creeps!". You dont offer your worst to attract customers, you offer them the best you have.

That's what Arenanet is doing. However Turbine doesn't seem to think that.

They may have a different marketing plan.

New creep: OMG freeps are way better, I'm going to subscribe to win!

More money for turbine.

Nothing beats the feel of destroying people on a reaver, imo. Love the class, love the style... too bad they have no role right now.

RIP Ravage/Disarm/Thrash/Gut-punch devastation.

Imgaine how i feel

Reaver = punchsack.

Originally Posted by kurrency420

Imgaine how i feel

beatle, your still a beast XD

but yea, reavers are pathetic atm. esepcially with low audacity :/. i absolutely despise PVE, but even i have been playing my cappy way more than any of my creeps, and honestly it makes me sad to see the reaver how it is atm.

Good opportunity to finally make severing strike a skill people use. Y'know, before everyone (anyone who's left) quits.
Can nearly attain the damage of a r10 reaver on a R4 BA, makes me wonder why bother.

IMO the class skill wise is about perfect. Meaning with blade toss slow, wrath not needing deafeat response, resilience being usable anytime etc... I cant think of anything else Id want or need as far as utility. Took 5 years but the class to me is finally complete. The issue with the reaver is quite simply, lack of dps. What should be and has always been the highest dps for creeps is now 3rd. Now any idiot can see creeps need a dps boost across the board and reavers need some on top of that. I reckon 15% for all and an additional 10% for reavers would help the situation. Yes I said 10% more for reavers because in 5yrs of this game if I had aggro of an npc I didnt lose it and now !@#$% wargs come prancing in after im a full 2 rotations in and pull off me in 10secs.

Originally Posted by AngusMcleod

IMO the class skill wise is about perfect. Meaning with blade toss slow, wrath not needing deafeat response, resilience being usable anytime etc... I cant think of anything else Id want or need as far as utility. Took 5 years but the class to me is finally complete. The issue with the reaver is quite simply, lack of dps. What should be and has always been the highest dps for creeps is now 3rd. Now any idiot can see creeps need a dps boost across the board and reavers need some on top of that. I reckon 15% for all and an additional 10% for reavers would help the situation. Yes I said 10% more for reavers because in 5yrs of this game if I had aggro of an npc I didnt lose it and now !@#$% wargs come prancing in after im a full 2 rotations in and pull off me in 10secs.

Exactly. And I completely disagree with people who say that wargs "should" have better dps than reavers. Wargs are hardly any squishier than reavers. Wargs have escape skills, an arsenal of debuffs, and some CC. Reavers just have dps buttons to mash and a couple debuffs.

Is reaver still the only class that is free to play? Cause that was definitely the kiss of death for reavers. When audacity came out I was lucky enough to have stacks of stones and could get my reaver to full audacity in a couple of weeks without too much effort. Then for a short period of time i enjoyed a rose tinted life of actually being able to kill people again, that was until till they got their audacity to max, then reality kicked in and it was back to getting nuked in seconds whilst fighting with 2 feather dusters. Reaver DPS is shocking. According to LOTRO reaver main role is burst DPS..........you what?!?!?! I have seen a bubble do better burst damage.

My birthday is coming in the summer so for my birthday I would like turbine to get me a decent update on reavers.

1. Bring our racial and corruptions in line to at least our level(they look like they are still lvl 50) if not improve them too.
2. Better DPS for reaver.
3. Blade Toss to actually knock freeps off horses too, since freep horses with their go faster flags are near impossible to catch now even in charge.
4. Better survivabilty for reavers.
5. Dying Rage to be looked at as its near pointless now, since most freeps use tactical damage these days and can 1 shot you in DR.
6. Some new skins, or cosmetic armour as creeps are like attack of the clones(those anniversary ones were shocking, err fat zombie look or stretched ET look. No thanks!)

Im not asking too much am i? It is for my birthday remember.

Oh can i have a sigil or 2 please as well i have been grinding since they came out and still nothing and if we were to go by your alleged drop rate, then i should have at least 25 by now.

Originally Posted by Romper

Is reaver still the only class that is free to play? Cause that was definitely the kiss of death for reavers. When audacity came out I was lucky enough to have stacks of stones and could get my reaver to full audacity in a couple of weeks without too much effort. Then for a short period of time i enjoyed a rose tinted life of actually being able to kill people again, that was until till they got their audacity to max, then reality kicked in and it was back to getting nuked in seconds whilst fighting with 2 feather dusters. Reaver DPS is shocking. According to LOTRO reaver main role is burst DPS..........you what?!?!?! I have seen a bubble do better burst damage.

My birthday is coming in the summer so for my birthday I would like turbine to get me a decent update on reavers.

1. Bring our racial and corruptions in line to at least our level(they look like they are still lvl 50) if not improve them too.
2. Better DPS for reaver.
3. Blade Toss to actually knock freeps off horses too, since freep horses with their go faster flags are near impossible to catch now even in charge.
4. Better survivabilty for reavers.
5. Dying Rage to be looked at as its near pointless now, since most freeps use tactical damage these days and can 1 shot you in DR.
6. Some new skins, or cosmetic armour as creeps are like attack of the clones(those anniversary ones were shocking, err fat zombie look or stretched ET look. No thanks!)

Im not asking too much am i? It is for my birthday remember.

Oh can i have a sigil or 2 please as well i have been grinding since they came out and still nothing and if we were to go by your alleged drop rate, then i should have at least 25 by now.

Yes on point 4 and 6 you are asking to much both are not needed. The other points are solid and if whoever works on creeps wasnt incompetent theyd allready be that way. What I'm looking for is a base dps increase for creeps and for the reaver to get a defensive and offensive stance which is where extra dps would come from. I guess the defensive stance would hit on your point 4 with possibly a loss to dps. Who am I kidding what I meant was the defensive stance would keep your dps the same since its allready gimp and just add heartiness by way of armour/bpe or whatever. Then the dps stance would be just that +?%dps with nothing else lost or gained. So you would always be in a stance with no benefit to going stanceless. Someone should start a thread on reaver stances and pool together some ideas....GO

As previously stated, reaver would be fixed with a ~10% increase to dps the least and say 5% more mits.
Severing strike is the most useless skill, either fix the animation, increase the damage or add some utility to it like e.g refresh and increase current dot by Laceration or something useful.

Severing strike, rank 7 skill... Does anyone have it on their quickbars? It should at a minimum also bypass Evade and have a cooldown of no more than 10 seconds. That way it could be a useful skill against some short duration defensive buffs, while the damage it deals would still be ~10% lower than Sudden Strikes (50% of Ravage) and at a higher power cost, and equal to Serration (which is aoe on 15s cooldown) in damage/power cost.

Or make it bypass bubbles, ignore mitigations or whatnot. In its current state I'd recommend everyone to not spend 2000 commendations on it. I haven't actually tried it myself of course, but from all I can see of it.. it does not look appealing to me at all. Is there a hidden secret?

---
I realised today that my r6 Weaver has 1425 damage on Drink Deep while my similarly r6 reaver has 1337 damage on Devastating Strike.

Of course dev strike has that -50% healing modifier while Drink Deep has the selfheal (1091),
devstrike requires below 50% target while Drink Deep requires 5 venom pips
devstrike has 30 sec (60 sec without trait) cooldown, Drink Deep has 20 seconds.

I'm not sure if that counts as 'Devastating' anymore (apart from the debuff).

Originally Posted by AngusMcleod

IMO the class skill wise is about perfect. Meaning with blade toss slow, wrath not needing deafeat response, resilience being usable anytime etc... I cant think of anything else Id want or need as far as utility. Took 5 years but the class to me is finally complete. The issue with the reaver is quite simply, lack of dps. What should be and has always been the highest dps for creeps is now 3rd. Now any idiot can see creeps need a dps boost across the board and reavers need some on top of that. I reckon 15% for all and an additional 10% for reavers would help the situation. Yes I said 10% more for reavers because in 5yrs of this game if I had aggro of an npc I didnt lose it and now !@#$% wargs come prancing in after im a full 2 rotations in and pull off me in 10secs.

On this issue we can 100% agree Gii. Well said.

A warg should not even approach a Reaver in pure DPS output for one simple reason. Stealth. Nothing more to say about the warg factor there.

But yes. Reavers, by all appearances ahve a nice suite of skills now They just need a bump to their raw hitting power and they'll be solid adversaries AND a value add to creep groups again.

Additionally healing needs looked at, and that IS a factor when talking about the pure dps classes....so yeah...

I completely agree with the OP.

My Reaver doesn't really feel like a... Well, Reaver anymore. I miss the idea of the Reaver being a Soldier who is not afraid of death, once youre in trouble there is no getting out again... This just doesn't really function anymore when a tactical class can do about the same DPS as you with their melee auto-attack.

We used to have High DPS with high morale, at the cost of being very kite-able, and no chance of escaping something that doesn't look promising, now we have (Very) Low DPS, high Morale (We die from focus-fire in 2 seconds anyway), we are not as kite-able as we used to be as we now have -35% Hamstring, but it can still be done quite easily, we can get away now, sort of, when the slow immunity on Resilience actually works...

I'm not saying I want an escape skill, because I don't, I love my Reaver exactly the way it is... It's just pointless to fight anything as you can hardly scratch it, unless you are rank ~12+(Finesse being the big factor here). All I'm asking for is a DPS increase, a big one.

Originally Posted by TizianEnel

I'm not sure if that counts as 'Devastating' anymore (apart from the debuff).

Yeah it hasn't been devastating for a while. Don't forget, this is after Turbine increased the damage for the skill in the last update. Although I will say that the -50% incoming healing debuff can be critical against self healing classes.

Severing strike hasn't been on my toolbar since I got it...worst..skill..ever. A hobbit spamming Stoop for Stone could probably beat a reaver spamming severing strike.

I agree that reaver doesn't need more survivability. They are a class which is like "i'll die but i'll take at least one with me" and I liked it that way.

I just miss when a high rank or well known reaver charges into a freep raid and freeps become scared and move back or something. These days they'll just think something like "oh another free renown"

Problem is not just the lack of reaver's dps but also some freep class got more survivability and freep's overall excessive healing.

Originally Posted by fastdive

I just miss when a high rank or well known reaver charges into a freep raid and freeps become scared and move back or something.

We never moved back because we were scared.. we moved back because we wanted to make him follow us, so that his charge ended with him still within our raid, so we could lock him down and blow him up, without having to charge at the creep raid

Now we just blow him up during the charge, no need to lock down outside of heal range

I think we are in a really good place right now however since the update to freep mitigations with Isengard it does take a lot longer to kill them, a slight damage boost would be appreciated.

Having said what I did experienced minstrels and wardens do seem impossible to beat if they use every or some vital skills in their arsenal.

Originally Posted by Muzzard

I think we are in a really good place right now...

...says the R15 reaver. I imagine it is not the same for most reavers though.

Originally Posted by Stevo6

I'm thinking Turbine intended reavers to be weak, if not the weakest. Why?

New player rolls creep. See's he's very weak. Buys most skills and traits. Realises it's ####.
New player buys another class.

Repeat.

More money for them.

Ding ding ding!

It's all about the Benjamins baby...

I like the reaver, as others have stated above, we are in a good place, skill wise. BUT we need a generious DPS boost. I use to tank CGs, for my groups but now I cant hold aggro for anything. a warg, BA, or even a WL does 2 hits and there goes my aggro.

-Itty

Originally Posted by Derpon

I like the reaver, as others have stated above, we are in a good place, skill wise. BUT we need a generious DPS boost. I use to tank CGs, for my groups but now I cant hold aggro for anything. a warg, BA, or even a WL does 2 hits and there goes my aggro.

-Itty

WLs pull aggro off reavers because WL skills generate increased threat. I agree though that a dps increase would be good for reavers. Back to my point though, reavers are not tanks, or even close to tanks. They have less mitigations than EVERY other creep class. They're actually the squishiest creep class mitigation-wise. Shadow wargs with armour boost slotted have about the same mitigations that a reaver has.

Reavers are by far the weakest PvMP class. Any decent f-raid has enough ranged dps to bring down even a fully powered warleader in seconds. Ideally, Reavers should be able to get in fast, do some serious damage, and get the hell out. Charge! allows reavers to get in, but it dosn't allow enough time for a escape. Also, the reaver dosn't have enough burst damage to make a serious impact in it's few seconds of life. Reaver is a PvE class, plain and simple.

Reccomended changes: +8s Charge! duration, double outgoing damage during charge, make resiliance a rank 1 nontrait skill, replace resiliance's class trait skill slot with a escape skill (preferaly with a 2m or less recharge), maybe add a stunted sneak option like the warden's carefull step.

Originally Posted by Iarkrad

Reavers are by far the weakest PvMP class. Any decent f-raid has enough ranged dps to bring down even a fully powered warleader in seconds. Ideally, Reavers should be able to get in fast, do some serious damage, and get the hell out. Charge! allows reavers to get in, but it dosn't allow enough time for a escape. Also, the reaver dosn't have enough burst damage to make a serious impact in it's few seconds of life. Reaver is a PvE class, plain and simple.

Reccomended changes: +8s Charge! duration, double outgoing damage during charge, make resiliance a rank 1 nontrait skill, replace resiliance's class trait skill slot with a escape skill (preferaly with a 2m or less recharge), maybe add a stunted sneak option like the warden's carefull step.

charge was meant to get you into the fight. was never designed to get you out. charge is fine as it is. no to the resilience change, as you can get R5 in a week nowadays. as to the escape skill, again the design of the reaver class just goes against it. and if reavers ever got any sort of stealth, it would ruin the class, there already too much stealth in the moors.

plain and simple, reavers need a DPS boost, and some skills tweaked. i am personally loving the new resilience. would love it even more if slows didnt go through the immunity though. severing strike needs something, ANYTHING done to it to make it worthwhile. its a skill i dont even put on my quickslots. it has a horrendously slow animation, as well as pathetic damage.

Personally, I don't want escapability and I sure as hell don't want mini-stealth on a reav. Like others have said, I think reav is in a pretty good place utility-wise.

I just want the ability to shred things. Charge in, blow someone up, then roar in ppl's faces as I go down swingin.

Being an avid 1v1'er and often a soloer, enough dps to give minis a run for their money would be nice, too.

Originally Posted by harman097

I just want the ability to shred things. Charge in, blow someone up, then roar in ppl's faces as I go down swingin.

Being an avid 1v1'er and often a soloer, enough dps to give minis a run for their money would be nice, too.

agreed +rep screw escape skills

Originally Posted by harman097

Personally, I don't want escapability and I sure as hell don't want mini-stealth on a reav. Like others have said, I think reav is in a pretty good place utility-wise.

I just want the ability to shred things. Charge in, blow someone up, then roar in ppl's faces as I go down swingin.

Being an avid 1v1'er and often a soloer, enough dps to give minis a run for their money would be nice, too.

I agree of course reavers need a serious dps boost but if you gave them enough to bring down the broken class that is a minstrel we would be maybe the most overpowered toon in lotro history. Because even a 300% dps increase or (3 reavers) a well geared good mini can tank kinda easy. Bad and/or undergeared minis you can still kill however a good one can, if they choose to, kill me without 1 point of morale gone.

Originally Posted by AngusMcleod

I agree of course reavers need a serious dps boost but if you gave them enough to bring down the broken class that is a minstrel we would be maybe the most overpowered toon in lotro history. Because even a 300% dps increase or (3 reavers) a well geared good mini can tank kinda easy. Bad and/or undergeared minis you can still kill however a good one can, if they choose to, kill me without 1 point of morale gone.

It wouldn't have to be a straight dps boost, but enough burst to potentially land DS and get the inc healing debuff might do it. Unfortunately, you're probly right, regardless. Maybe an inc healing debuff on severing strike or something, too.

I hate playing a class that has absolutely no chance against certain other classes, regardless of whether you do everything perfect and they don't. I realize this game isn't balanced with soloing in mind, but that doesn't change the fact that I'd like to see it happen.

Originally Posted by harman097

It wouldn't have to be a straight dps boost, but enough burst to potentially land DS and get the inc healing debuff might do it. Unfortunately, you're probly right, regardless. Maybe an inc healing debuff on severing strike or something, too.

I hate playing a class that has absolutely no chance against certain other classes, regardless of whether you do everything perfect and they don't. I realize this game isn't balanced with soloing in mind, but that doesn't change the fact that I'd like to see it happen.

Well, I always loved a class like spear wardens and overpower guardians and how they could in big fights work as a healer harasser and pretty much not get target due to their tanking, with the new warden set bonus they can now do that as effective as it never was, and that's a kind of class that Creep side doesn't have. I never played an overpower guardian but I believe they musn't be in a good spot right now (mainly for yours and Daedros' absence, and for wargs bypassing BPE including pledge)

On topic, reavers could get some sort of more tanking stance, one that made them at least as tankish as BA's and Flayers, tankish enough to make a freep think "Oh this guy is not gonna get blown up quick, I better change target". And they could get some debuffs on Inc Healing among others types along with the tanking, that would be a trade off for a little less DPS. (Or if you consider Wargs got a new tanking stance, and a DPS stance, and they both do their job way better than the former warg, they could just put a new DPS stance for the reaver too and don't nerf any DPS on a tanking stance.) Also, note that Orion has done this new thing with stances that they can absolutely change every or most skills. (See Warden, Minstrel, Warg)

Originally Posted by harman097

(snip)I hate playing a class that has absolutely no chance against certain other classes, regardless of whether you do everything perfect and they don't (snip)

Enter: The Hunter!

I remember the days of seeing reavers charge in for me when i hit 50% morale and thinking wow this isn't going to turn out well.


Now i just think "Aww thats cute".