“Realm vs Realm and Class focus” Part 2 – Tank love

The changes to the tanks have landed:

Armsman, Warrior & Hero Changes

Heavy tanks are considered the defensive juggernaughts of the realm they fight for, and as such, will be getting added abilities and improvements to their classes.

Note: These abilities are currently only available on newly created characters. All of these will be available on previously created characters in the near future. Functionality of some spells are not yet finalized and will be adjusted accordingly. Please feel free to include any feedback you have in a bug report while testing these abilities on Pendragon.

BattleCries – This is a new system that provides burst defensive bonuses to self and group for Heavy Tanks.

– Level 5 Shout – Taunting Shout: Frontal cone taunt that causes mobs to turn and fight the tank or at least increase the hate amount towards the tank. Re-usable every 60 seconds

– Level 30 Shout – Bolstering Roar: PBAE 250 radius attack that breaks root, breakable snares and mesmerization effects on group members. If the tank is CC’d (other than root) they will have to purge themselves or wait for CC to wear off, then fire this. Re-usable every 10 minutes.

– Level 40 Shout – Rampage: Group shout which increases the chance to resist debuffs by 35%. Lasts for 10 seconds. Re-usable every 5 minutes.

– Level 50 Shout – Fury: Self only shout which gives a 50% chance to deflect crowd control spells (similar to the RR5 Bonedancer ability), and increases resists to magic spells by 50% for 10 seconds. Re-usable every 15 minutes.

– Level 15 Spell/Ability – Metal Guard: Group buff which increases the ABS of group members by 3% excluding the caster of the buff. If there are multiple casters of this buff within the group, then this will stack up to a maximum of 9%. Other players can receive the benefit of this buff, but the caster of this buff cannot so it is possible for another heavy tank to have a bonus to his ABS if another heavy tank joins the group and casts this buff. Duration 20 minutes.

– Level 35 Spell/Ability – Climbing Spikes: Self castable buff which lasts for 30 seconds that grants Climb Walls. The player will have the ability to climb walls for a short duration of time. While climbing a wall, any hit that does more than 31 damage will knock the player off the wall. Furthermore, any hit which knocks the player off the wall will hit for double damage. If the buff runs out while the player is on the wall and he/she does not reach an area where they can walk again, they will be knocked off the wall. Re-useable every 60 seconds. (Note: Currently this spell does not have an icon which makes it unable to be used. This will be addressed in a future version of Pendragon.)

Passive benefits

– Upon choosing the path of a Hero, Armsman or Warrior, the player will be granted 50% siege resistance automatically. This includes all siege damage types including Boiling Oil.

– Upon reaching level 41, the Hero, Armsman or Warrior will begin to gain more hitpoints as they progress towards level 50. At each level beyond 41 they gain 1% extra Hit points per level. At level 50, they will have the full 10% benefit.

– Upon reaching level 41, the Hero, Armsman or Warrior will begin to gain more magic resistance (spell damage reduction only) as they progress towards level 50. At each level beyond 41 they gain 2%-3% extra resistance per level. At level 50, they will have the full 15% benefit.

On a first, quick read these were my comments:
I don’t like these at all. Too overcomplicated, too situational, too percent based. Not easy to use and understand. Not really “fun” based. Clunky.

Then I gave them some more attention, one by one.

The taunt cone and the root-breaking roar are good (I hope in decent animations). The “Rampage” is probably the more lacking, too short, weak and situational to be actually usable. Fury+Bolstering Roar is an interesting combination and may bring some more fun to the 8vs8 (with some actual combat instead of sudden deaths at a glance). Metal Guard is well planned for the stacking possibilities. The Climbing Spikes are an original implementation of the ladders often requested. What if a group of tanks climb a tower while it is undefended to go right to the lord?

The passive benefits are good.

I expect the other classes to start ranting a lot. It’s hard to figure out the balance implications without observing all this in the practice.

The changes to the larger RvR are severely deluding as expected, instead.

Still waiting for something “truly RvR” that would impact the game.

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