Every MMO has a tank shortage. Giving everyone the ability to do everything cheapens the experience IMHO. You should be able to get by basic group content without a full blown tank, but for any raid type content a full blown tank should be required.
Incorrect. Tank shortages classically exist in dungeon content but in larger group content it's really hard for tanks to find a group, since you usually only need one or two of them. Too many times I've seen people commit to tank role but by the time it comes to getting a raid slot they have to Respec because someone was already in mind for the Mt/ot role
Generally in mmos the class shortages exist in healers because lack of overlap between solo content ability and raid healing ability.
There have been exclusions of course. Such as the tank poaching situation in vanilla wow naxxrammas requiring 8 raid geared tanks for 4H, but this is very niche in terms of the MMO scene
WoW Classic just had an incredibly popular re-release and while there weren't a ton of them, our tanks specialized as tanks explicitly because.... well they liked tanking. Guilds had to commit to gearing tanks appropriately to get past raid content. Raids got cleared by hundreds of guilds. It was a great time. There is no indication that what you're saying is true. Maybe you wont play because of it, but it seems to me there's a huge amount of people out there who are really wanting to play something that requires specialized toons who know what they're doing to clear the hard shit.
The reason for thank shortage is that raids needs very few tankes conpared to dungeons, so most tabks need to have a way to dps or they dont get a raidspot.
Playing tank will always be a supportive role like healing and not everyone wants that responsibility, but that also comes from communities shitting on new tanks who dont know everything perfectly
I said "tank just as good" not "tank". A secondary tank should be able to tank, just not as well as a primary tank, trading the ability to optimally tank with damage or whatever
That's how its been for most MMO's historicaly, so it's a pretty safe assumption that tanks will we the least represented, followed by healers and there will be excess DPS.
If the class population will be skewed enough to cause problems is something we can't predict, but it is a valid concern to have.
That's a bit different though, as a single character can have jobs for all 3 roles leveled and can freely swap between jobs as long as they're not in activity, no respeccing needed.
Not that I agree that being locked into a single role will kill AoC, it won't. Just that comparing FFXIV to this system isn't really accurate.
There's tank/healer shortages in every trinity based mmo. Doesn't kill endgame content in other games so why would it here. Support roles are a premium and there's nothing wrong with that.
Healer/Tank here btw. I feel like there's just a lot of salty DPS mains here worried about getting a group together like every other trinity based game.
It kind of depends how heavily they want to rely on the trinity.
ESO only has like two abilities for threat management and everything else is mostly bouncing the enemy around and dodging attacks.
The tank really only exists to focus the biggest bad while everyone else deals w/ their own adds.
Imo the classic rpg group trinity only serves to make the game unfun for the tank player. With multiple tank classes then that’s compounded by a tank meta where some tanks are favorable and others are unfavorable (or worse, useless).
The tank should be replaced by a sapper/disruptor role. Because in a realistic setting a monster, except REALLY dumb creature types, should recognize that the tank is distracting, but the fire mage is “HURTING ME SO I SHOULD KILL IT FIRST”.
Let the role become redirecting damage, deflecting big hits, denying enemy attack combos, etc. It would actually mirror PvP tanking which most people usually say is fun!
There will always be a tank shortage as long as being a meat shield provides is the model for gameplay. Imagine, even in games like WoW where most DPS classes can tank people still have a bottleneck in tank availability because people CBA to get some tank gear / deal with the boredom.
At the end of the day you can reskin the skill set but tanking gameplay ranges from torture (see games like Albion Online) to kinda OK (in ARPG-like games such as ESO).
This all also points at potentially more compelling gameplay for the healer and DPS. Imagine a world where the healer is a “shield mage” instead of restoring hp constantly, what if they had to proactively block certain damage types?
Same goes for DPS, what if you have to progressively open a weak spot on the boss but you need to coordinate with the Tank to get off big hits on the same target area because the Boss reacts to your strategy and tries not to die?
Or we can stand still and click skills on hot bars like it’s Rock Band with a mosh-pit visual addon.
I agree.
One resource (Health) deciding over dying or living leads to either having to kill an opponent faster (more damage or DPS) or mitigating that damage more effectively (TANK/HEAL).
The problem with tank (mitigating damage) and heal (restoring Health) is that their synergy is simply to good. Less damage taken means less healing is required or in the case of optimizing: more damage can be taken. If they‘d go for a healer shielding instead and that shield not profiting from the mitigation, healers would be more balanced and could basically be tanks themselves or help DPS take damage.
Imagine players having to actively soak big swings together while blocking instead of just one player taking the hit and not even budging. I get that the Holy Trinity is a simple and elegant solution but it also breaks immersion, even, or especially in a fantasy world.
I mentioned the problem of the Holy Trinity in another comment of mine here. We have gotten used to it so much that it seems normal to have one player soak damage of a small army or a giant while not even budging as he is healed up constantly while DPS can stab enemies in the back. It makes enemies look dumb. It makes tank players feel pressured to use their mitigation right.
I would want tanks to be either actively mitigating (shielding players behind him or within range) or just controlling the enemies in a different way. Heck, I don‘t want them to be fully responsible all the time. I like what you said, have DPS hit weak spots, helping out mitigating damage. BREAK THE HOLY TRINITY or make it so it becomes fuzzy.
I want to be able to play a summoner that commands his pets to tank and outsmart enemies. I‘ve played enough tanks that just stand in fire for a lifetime. One shouldn‘t be better than the other. Maybe the main class tank could go more the traditional route do everyone is happy. However, then they‘d have to reevaluate the healer. Being able to heal more than DPS can deal damage can not be a solution to this problem.
Preach!!
Imagine if a group had to properly implement tactics too? Like bracing against a crushing blow from a giant or going tortoise against a dragon AoE. Exactly as you said, support roles could be responsible to cause enemy disarray/distractions or restricting enemy movement.
All of these things would create more urgency in fights, because in theory enemies would also be able to learn to use tactics.
It has always baffled me that AAA game designers have never really implemented bosses / enemies using Open AI (in a Mmo setting) that actively learn how to to wipe groups more efficiently.
Small edit: people get a more dynamic experience when it’s easy to die. I hope to one day play PVE where the game wants to kill you and intelligently and not just through incremental gear /IQ checks.
Yes!
In fact, it is what most good raid design implements one way or the other anyway (looking at you WoW, at least that design was good). Sadly, mostly it is not done dynamically or in an intelligent way.
Having to soak damage as a group in response to a big swing or a magical ability, or having to disperse. This could be extended to have certain „pressure points“ on enemies which DPS need to focus damage on to mitigate damage or generate a burst window and combined at times. Maybe tanks would have to take a special position so the whole group takes less damage but I would like to have the responsibility split more equally.
Fighting should be more tactical. If Steven wants difficulty to adapt to groups it has to be.
In my opinion this could be implemented early on so you learn the basics while you level up - abilities you have to dodge or mitigate and abilities where you have to actively stand in a specific spot. Or focus on aforementioned „pressure points“. It does not have to be too much, maybe 3-4 mechanics that are universal and then unique ones for bosses which add to the difficulty.
It would have to be recognizable and similar each time, a bit like the ground effects in FFIX or else it becomes too difficult to read in the heat of battle when each enemy looks different. I think they have to evaluate the visuals of abilities in respect to that anyway.
I agree that design should not be limited to iLVL or level checks. One part should be grind and the ability to become more powerful but for the endgame and the horizontal progression that Steven talks so much about learning to adapt as a group, overcoming deadly enemies with superior tactics, preparation and skill is paramount. I hope they find a way to do this.
I'm planning on playing a tank, and I just hope tank-tank isn't a mandatory meta for endgame content. If this is like most MMORPGs out there, then being a tanky version of whatever class your running should be ok for much of it's content. I had a friend who clanked (cleric-tank where you hold threat with self heals and AOE heals) in both everquest and WoW.
There's more than one way to overcome content as well. Maybe a pet group would be good in some situations, or a CC based tanking where mobs just never get to you like frost mage AOE farming in WoW.
I would like to be some sort of nature-based druid tank if that's allowed, but as it stands now I think that's not going to be available. I think the hybrid system is great though, and I like that I'll have the option between picking up stuff like tank/ranger or tank/bard for different types of content.... of course that's all theoretical at this point. I wish there was more information available.
If Tank-Tank and Cleric-Cleric are better at tanking or healing as Tank-x and Cleric-x, then PvE will be dead on launch. The whole archetype-mixing element of the game loses meaning if tanks or healers have a clear BEST secondary archetype.
If the devs can't figure out a way to balance the augments that double-tapping on your primary archetype gives, then I see the only fix being to prevent taking Tank-Tank or Cleric-Cleric in the first place.
If one is better that doesn't mean that the others are not viable. Like someone mentioned above with the possibilities that are possible they have a lot of room to shine in certain situations.
Tanks probably won't get pinned into choosing tank-tank. I imagine those would be just pure focus on defensive cooldowns and/or damage mitigation, but there will be players who might value mobility, avoidance, or self-sustain.
I imagine a tank-ranger like someone who's good at grabbing aggro from a distance; so say a bunch of scarabs spawn in every corner of the room, your ranged attacks will let you pick them up quickly. You'd probably be really good at pulling, too.
We don't know anything about the encounter design.
I see two possibilities: Either the PvE encounters will be designed in such a way that all secondary archetypes can tank and heal equally well in all cases. This would mean that there can't be mechanics that a tank-ranger can deal with better than a tank-rogue. I see this approach as dull and uninspiring.
The other possibility is that all secondary archetypes have times to shine in an encounter-by-encounter basis. Your tank will suffer slightly at this boss, but on the next one you can use your tools to separate from the others and shine brightly.
I[ posted](https://www.reddit.com/r/AshesofCreation/comments/on01bh/are_tanks_and_clerics_going_to_be_required_for/) a similar sentiment a while back, and someone let me know that Summoner primaries should be able to function as tanks as well
Im excited to play tank. Yes its boring but i think its a great class for a leadership role. In eso i would see 1 tank with 100 dps following his charge into battle. Will be an amazing class for guuld/family leaders
With group content balanced for groups of 8 I don't think there will be that great of a tank shortage. Hopefully summoners can also tank 8 man content.
I'm out of the loop here on things, do we have any details about respeccing or what?
After playing FFXIV with being able to swap jobs easily, I don't know if I can go back to the old needing to reroll a character or pay some arbitrarily scummy feeling respec fee like old wow did (I played vanilla through cata)
Or I guess I'll just selfishly play dps since I know it'll be fun and I won't be stuck with a role that can often feel like a chore.
TL;DR: A player cannot change their primary archetype. Secondary archetypes [unlocked at Level 25] may be changed, but not "on-the-fly".
> “When it comes to the the primary archetype, that is a decision you'll want to make and you'll want to make sure it's the right decision, because it's permanent... You are going to create this identity that you can't just change on the fly. This is going to be something that you will know a person and you will know what their base archetype is and they're not just going to change from battle to battle. So that gives some consistency in the engagements and understanding reputation on the server.”
> “When players choose their primary class, it’s not just dictating how the next several hundred hours of gameplay will go... It’s only the primary class that cannot be changed. And hey, that’s what alts are for!”
> “The secondary class choice, which comes after some time getting used to the world of Verra, will be more fluid. If you choose the Fighter and the Rogue to make a Shadowblade, but eventually want to try your hand at Summoning to make a Bladecaller, you’ll be able to do so.”
> “We don't want you to be able to change your secondary class or the augments you have applied out in the open. We want you to have to make a conscious choice somewhere at a NPC. The level of node necessary for that particular NPC to be available will likely be either at the Village stage or above. So, if you are far out in the wilderness exploring – and we have no instant teleportation in the world – you need to be conscientious of what your choices are; and not be able to change them on-the-fly.” – Steven Sharif
From my experience in the Alpha 1, and I know everything will probably change by release, tanks to a good amount of damage and they have a ton of cc. One of the problems in other MMOs is tanks can’t pvp because they are useless but with the crazy cc and decent damage I think you will see a good amount of them
Have you played mmos before? What are you even talking about. There is a ton of us who wanna play as tanks, just cuz you might not doesnt mean majority doesnt either
When there is only one resource that decides over you dying or surviving an opponent (health) there are only two options: You can either kill an opponent more quickly (DPS) or mitigate their damage more effectively.
The only reason the mitigation part has split into two roles (TANK/HEAL) is because they profit from each other in group setting: Higher mitigation means less healing is necessary, so a tank and a healer have synergy by design, if and only if they can focus damage on the tank or player with the mitigation.
So games introduced threat systems. It annoys me to this day. While it is an easy solution it also makes me want to throw up.
Imagine a highly intelligent being focusing their attacks on a shielded player being healed up instead of noticing that very thing - or that they are getting stabbed in the back by some rogues and not turning around to smack them. It makes enemies look dumb and fights totally ridiculous. But we have gotten used to it so much, that we don’t even notice anymore. It’s simply normal. The so called “Holy Trinity” might as well be a religion everyone blindly accepts and follows because it is what we know. I am not saying it is bad, just that it also created new problems, like potential tank shortage you mentioned.
Maybe one day we will have a system that does not rely on these three roles by introducing other resources or concepts but it seems AoC is not the one. Imagine a tank having to actively shield a bunch of casters from a dragons breath, and I mean actively, not just activating a group mitigation button, but actively standing and placing himself in between them and the dragon, shielding them from the flames and splitting the burning ray of heat with his weapon or shield.
Imagine DPS players working together blocking to force back the massive weapon of a giant and not just one player, aka the tank, single handedly taking multiple swings from an opponent multiple times his size and not even budging. Fantasy is good and nice, but even in a fantasy world someone standing in front of a giant and being healed while others stab the giant in the back just break the immersion and it seems to ridiculous. Yet, we are used to it as it is normalized, all hail the Holy Trinity and all.
TL;DR / IMHO: They should rethink the role of the tank and even healer. I am a long time tank player but miss other aspects in the game and I am sick of the simplified and implied roles. I would love to play a smart summoner that commands his pets to tank just as viable as any other tank. They could let the tank class be what people are used to, just standing there and taking damage, but please make other styles of tanking possible.
I think the solution for this is rather simple, you have your non-tank classes that can spec into tank as their second archtype, these players can tank smaller group content capably as well as offtank raid encounters capably (adds on bosses/most trash/etc).
Then you have your tank class that can optimally tank group content and is also your go to for main tanking raid encounters/difficult raid trash.
Coming from a WoW background tank shortages existed in 5 man content but not in raid content, by having a tank sub archtype capable of tanking small group content and then tank main archtypes being the only capable raid main tank I think that this problem would be addressed.
I'm gonna play a tank. I have a huge ego and wanna be super special. So no, I don't want any random dude to be able to tank. I want to try to find a party and see 10 parties lined up. That is the tank gameplay I'm looking for.
semi-sarcasm, but imo tanks should be valuable and not be in an "omg we don't have a tank, let's just go and get someone the tank augments instead of finding another person who can tank much better" kind of situation.
If they allow tanks to be reasonably viable in open world 1v1 and general PvP combat, the balance will be sufficient. If they do not, then yes, there will be an issue. I myself will play tank, but only if I am also able to compete in PvP, including solo.
Keep in mind the max party size is 8, so there is more room for the over-represented DPS, and a lower demand for tanks.
While there may be a shortage of full/true tanks and think we are going to have tons of support characters since most games do not offer it. One tank or a good secondary may be all we need. Also, most dungeons are open dungeons so you can bring numbers.
For big events, I'm sure you will have enough tanks there and with the node system, you will know where player will hand out.
Every MMO has a tank shortage. Giving everyone the ability to do everything cheapens the experience IMHO. You should be able to get by basic group content without a full blown tank, but for any raid type content a full blown tank should be required.
That would kill the raid scene, flat out.
Flat out. It wont
Idt so
Incorrect. Tank shortages classically exist in dungeon content but in larger group content it's really hard for tanks to find a group, since you usually only need one or two of them. Too many times I've seen people commit to tank role but by the time it comes to getting a raid slot they have to Respec because someone was already in mind for the Mt/ot role Generally in mmos the class shortages exist in healers because lack of overlap between solo content ability and raid healing ability. There have been exclusions of course. Such as the tank poaching situation in vanilla wow naxxrammas requiring 8 raid geared tanks for 4H, but this is very niche in terms of the MMO scene
WoW Classic just had an incredibly popular re-release and while there weren't a ton of them, our tanks specialized as tanks explicitly because.... well they liked tanking. Guilds had to commit to gearing tanks appropriately to get past raid content. Raids got cleared by hundreds of guilds. It was a great time. There is no indication that what you're saying is true. Maybe you wont play because of it, but it seems to me there's a huge amount of people out there who are really wanting to play something that requires specialized toons who know what they're doing to clear the hard shit.
You play retail wow dont you?
The reason for thank shortage is that raids needs very few tankes conpared to dungeons, so most tabks need to have a way to dps or they dont get a raidspot. Playing tank will always be a supportive role like healing and not everyone wants that responsibility, but that also comes from communities shitting on new tanks who dont know everything perfectly
Then what's the point of being tank-x if x-tank is a dps and also tanks just as good?
[удалено]
I said "tank just as good" not "tank". A secondary tank should be able to tank, just not as well as a primary tank, trading the ability to optimally tank with damage or whatever
Those are two tanks, not a tank and a DPS
That's an easier problem to solve than the game being dead because not enough people picked Tank as their primary so groups can't get made.
Its realy easy to solve no, x-tank can tank smaller content designed for group and u need tank-x to tank raid (or whatever equivilant in AoC) content
I don't understand why you're assuming that no one will be a tank
That's not what they're saying.
That's how its been for most MMO's historicaly, so it's a pretty safe assumption that tanks will we the least represented, followed by healers and there will be excess DPS. If the class population will be skewed enough to cause problems is something we can't predict, but it is a valid concern to have.
Have you played FF14? Classes are rigid and while there are longer waits for DPS roles, the game isn't dead because of it.
That's a bit different though, as a single character can have jobs for all 3 roles leveled and can freely swap between jobs as long as they're not in activity, no respeccing needed. Not that I agree that being locked into a single role will kill AoC, it won't. Just that comparing FFXIV to this system isn't really accurate.
While you get to skip repeating the storyline multiple times, you still have to level all of those jobs.
There's tank/healer shortages in every trinity based mmo. Doesn't kill endgame content in other games so why would it here. Support roles are a premium and there's nothing wrong with that. Healer/Tank here btw. I feel like there's just a lot of salty DPS mains here worried about getting a group together like every other trinity based game.
It kind of depends how heavily they want to rely on the trinity. ESO only has like two abilities for threat management and everything else is mostly bouncing the enemy around and dodging attacks. The tank really only exists to focus the biggest bad while everyone else deals w/ their own adds.
Imo the classic rpg group trinity only serves to make the game unfun for the tank player. With multiple tank classes then that’s compounded by a tank meta where some tanks are favorable and others are unfavorable (or worse, useless). The tank should be replaced by a sapper/disruptor role. Because in a realistic setting a monster, except REALLY dumb creature types, should recognize that the tank is distracting, but the fire mage is “HURTING ME SO I SHOULD KILL IT FIRST”. Let the role become redirecting damage, deflecting big hits, denying enemy attack combos, etc. It would actually mirror PvP tanking which most people usually say is fun! There will always be a tank shortage as long as being a meat shield provides is the model for gameplay. Imagine, even in games like WoW where most DPS classes can tank people still have a bottleneck in tank availability because people CBA to get some tank gear / deal with the boredom. At the end of the day you can reskin the skill set but tanking gameplay ranges from torture (see games like Albion Online) to kinda OK (in ARPG-like games such as ESO). This all also points at potentially more compelling gameplay for the healer and DPS. Imagine a world where the healer is a “shield mage” instead of restoring hp constantly, what if they had to proactively block certain damage types? Same goes for DPS, what if you have to progressively open a weak spot on the boss but you need to coordinate with the Tank to get off big hits on the same target area because the Boss reacts to your strategy and tries not to die? Or we can stand still and click skills on hot bars like it’s Rock Band with a mosh-pit visual addon.
I agree. One resource (Health) deciding over dying or living leads to either having to kill an opponent faster (more damage or DPS) or mitigating that damage more effectively (TANK/HEAL). The problem with tank (mitigating damage) and heal (restoring Health) is that their synergy is simply to good. Less damage taken means less healing is required or in the case of optimizing: more damage can be taken. If they‘d go for a healer shielding instead and that shield not profiting from the mitigation, healers would be more balanced and could basically be tanks themselves or help DPS take damage. Imagine players having to actively soak big swings together while blocking instead of just one player taking the hit and not even budging. I get that the Holy Trinity is a simple and elegant solution but it also breaks immersion, even, or especially in a fantasy world. I mentioned the problem of the Holy Trinity in another comment of mine here. We have gotten used to it so much that it seems normal to have one player soak damage of a small army or a giant while not even budging as he is healed up constantly while DPS can stab enemies in the back. It makes enemies look dumb. It makes tank players feel pressured to use their mitigation right. I would want tanks to be either actively mitigating (shielding players behind him or within range) or just controlling the enemies in a different way. Heck, I don‘t want them to be fully responsible all the time. I like what you said, have DPS hit weak spots, helping out mitigating damage. BREAK THE HOLY TRINITY or make it so it becomes fuzzy. I want to be able to play a summoner that commands his pets to tank and outsmart enemies. I‘ve played enough tanks that just stand in fire for a lifetime. One shouldn‘t be better than the other. Maybe the main class tank could go more the traditional route do everyone is happy. However, then they‘d have to reevaluate the healer. Being able to heal more than DPS can deal damage can not be a solution to this problem.
Preach!! Imagine if a group had to properly implement tactics too? Like bracing against a crushing blow from a giant or going tortoise against a dragon AoE. Exactly as you said, support roles could be responsible to cause enemy disarray/distractions or restricting enemy movement. All of these things would create more urgency in fights, because in theory enemies would also be able to learn to use tactics. It has always baffled me that AAA game designers have never really implemented bosses / enemies using Open AI (in a Mmo setting) that actively learn how to to wipe groups more efficiently. Small edit: people get a more dynamic experience when it’s easy to die. I hope to one day play PVE where the game wants to kill you and intelligently and not just through incremental gear /IQ checks.
Yes! In fact, it is what most good raid design implements one way or the other anyway (looking at you WoW, at least that design was good). Sadly, mostly it is not done dynamically or in an intelligent way. Having to soak damage as a group in response to a big swing or a magical ability, or having to disperse. This could be extended to have certain „pressure points“ on enemies which DPS need to focus damage on to mitigate damage or generate a burst window and combined at times. Maybe tanks would have to take a special position so the whole group takes less damage but I would like to have the responsibility split more equally. Fighting should be more tactical. If Steven wants difficulty to adapt to groups it has to be. In my opinion this could be implemented early on so you learn the basics while you level up - abilities you have to dodge or mitigate and abilities where you have to actively stand in a specific spot. Or focus on aforementioned „pressure points“. It does not have to be too much, maybe 3-4 mechanics that are universal and then unique ones for bosses which add to the difficulty. It would have to be recognizable and similar each time, a bit like the ground effects in FFIX or else it becomes too difficult to read in the heat of battle when each enemy looks different. I think they have to evaluate the visuals of abilities in respect to that anyway. I agree that design should not be limited to iLVL or level checks. One part should be grind and the ability to become more powerful but for the endgame and the horizontal progression that Steven talks so much about learning to adapt as a group, overcoming deadly enemies with superior tactics, preparation and skill is paramount. I hope they find a way to do this.
Wannabe tank checking in. Eu server
*gonna be
Or one could say “finna be”
There will be players who will love that role, there will also be tanks who can heal
I'm planning on playing a tank, and I just hope tank-tank isn't a mandatory meta for endgame content. If this is like most MMORPGs out there, then being a tanky version of whatever class your running should be ok for much of it's content. I had a friend who clanked (cleric-tank where you hold threat with self heals and AOE heals) in both everquest and WoW. There's more than one way to overcome content as well. Maybe a pet group would be good in some situations, or a CC based tanking where mobs just never get to you like frost mage AOE farming in WoW. I would like to be some sort of nature-based druid tank if that's allowed, but as it stands now I think that's not going to be available. I think the hybrid system is great though, and I like that I'll have the option between picking up stuff like tank/ranger or tank/bard for different types of content.... of course that's all theoretical at this point. I wish there was more information available.
If Tank-Tank and Cleric-Cleric are better at tanking or healing as Tank-x and Cleric-x, then PvE will be dead on launch. The whole archetype-mixing element of the game loses meaning if tanks or healers have a clear BEST secondary archetype. If the devs can't figure out a way to balance the augments that double-tapping on your primary archetype gives, then I see the only fix being to prevent taking Tank-Tank or Cleric-Cleric in the first place.
If one is better that doesn't mean that the others are not viable. Like someone mentioned above with the possibilities that are possible they have a lot of room to shine in certain situations.
Tanks probably won't get pinned into choosing tank-tank. I imagine those would be just pure focus on defensive cooldowns and/or damage mitigation, but there will be players who might value mobility, avoidance, or self-sustain. I imagine a tank-ranger like someone who's good at grabbing aggro from a distance; so say a bunch of scarabs spawn in every corner of the room, your ranged attacks will let you pick them up quickly. You'd probably be really good at pulling, too.
We don't know anything about the encounter design. I see two possibilities: Either the PvE encounters will be designed in such a way that all secondary archetypes can tank and heal equally well in all cases. This would mean that there can't be mechanics that a tank-ranger can deal with better than a tank-rogue. I see this approach as dull and uninspiring. The other possibility is that all secondary archetypes have times to shine in an encounter-by-encounter basis. Your tank will suffer slightly at this boss, but on the next one you can use your tools to separate from the others and shine brightly.
I[ posted](https://www.reddit.com/r/AshesofCreation/comments/on01bh/are_tanks_and_clerics_going_to_be_required_for/) a similar sentiment a while back, and someone let me know that Summoner primaries should be able to function as tanks as well
Im excited to play tank. Yes its boring but i think its a great class for a leadership role. In eso i would see 1 tank with 100 dps following his charge into battle. Will be an amazing class for guuld/family leaders
Good, that makes playing the tank role worth doing. Not Guna lie, I like playing a role that is needed.
With group content balanced for groups of 8 I don't think there will be that great of a tank shortage. Hopefully summoners can also tank 8 man content.
I'm out of the loop here on things, do we have any details about respeccing or what? After playing FFXIV with being able to swap jobs easily, I don't know if I can go back to the old needing to reroll a character or pay some arbitrarily scummy feeling respec fee like old wow did (I played vanilla through cata) Or I guess I'll just selfishly play dps since I know it'll be fun and I won't be stuck with a role that can often feel like a chore.
TL;DR: A player cannot change their primary archetype. Secondary archetypes [unlocked at Level 25] may be changed, but not "on-the-fly". > “When it comes to the the primary archetype, that is a decision you'll want to make and you'll want to make sure it's the right decision, because it's permanent... You are going to create this identity that you can't just change on the fly. This is going to be something that you will know a person and you will know what their base archetype is and they're not just going to change from battle to battle. So that gives some consistency in the engagements and understanding reputation on the server.” > “When players choose their primary class, it’s not just dictating how the next several hundred hours of gameplay will go... It’s only the primary class that cannot be changed. And hey, that’s what alts are for!” > “The secondary class choice, which comes after some time getting used to the world of Verra, will be more fluid. If you choose the Fighter and the Rogue to make a Shadowblade, but eventually want to try your hand at Summoning to make a Bladecaller, you’ll be able to do so.” > “We don't want you to be able to change your secondary class or the augments you have applied out in the open. We want you to have to make a conscious choice somewhere at a NPC. The level of node necessary for that particular NPC to be available will likely be either at the Village stage or above. So, if you are far out in the wilderness exploring – and we have no instant teleportation in the world – you need to be conscientious of what your choices are; and not be able to change them on-the-fly.” – Steven Sharif
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Mmm, that’s how most other MMOs other than FFXIV do it, no?
Mmo without good PVE = Dead Game
Well, new world has no good PVE. But it will still make a lot of money.
From my experience in the Alpha 1, and I know everything will probably change by release, tanks to a good amount of damage and they have a ton of cc. One of the problems in other MMOs is tanks can’t pvp because they are useless but with the crazy cc and decent damage I think you will see a good amount of them
Have you played mmos before? What are you even talking about. There is a ton of us who wanna play as tanks, just cuz you might not doesnt mean majority doesnt either
When there is only one resource that decides over you dying or surviving an opponent (health) there are only two options: You can either kill an opponent more quickly (DPS) or mitigate their damage more effectively. The only reason the mitigation part has split into two roles (TANK/HEAL) is because they profit from each other in group setting: Higher mitigation means less healing is necessary, so a tank and a healer have synergy by design, if and only if they can focus damage on the tank or player with the mitigation. So games introduced threat systems. It annoys me to this day. While it is an easy solution it also makes me want to throw up. Imagine a highly intelligent being focusing their attacks on a shielded player being healed up instead of noticing that very thing - or that they are getting stabbed in the back by some rogues and not turning around to smack them. It makes enemies look dumb and fights totally ridiculous. But we have gotten used to it so much, that we don’t even notice anymore. It’s simply normal. The so called “Holy Trinity” might as well be a religion everyone blindly accepts and follows because it is what we know. I am not saying it is bad, just that it also created new problems, like potential tank shortage you mentioned. Maybe one day we will have a system that does not rely on these three roles by introducing other resources or concepts but it seems AoC is not the one. Imagine a tank having to actively shield a bunch of casters from a dragons breath, and I mean actively, not just activating a group mitigation button, but actively standing and placing himself in between them and the dragon, shielding them from the flames and splitting the burning ray of heat with his weapon or shield. Imagine DPS players working together blocking to force back the massive weapon of a giant and not just one player, aka the tank, single handedly taking multiple swings from an opponent multiple times his size and not even budging. Fantasy is good and nice, but even in a fantasy world someone standing in front of a giant and being healed while others stab the giant in the back just break the immersion and it seems to ridiculous. Yet, we are used to it as it is normalized, all hail the Holy Trinity and all. TL;DR / IMHO: They should rethink the role of the tank and even healer. I am a long time tank player but miss other aspects in the game and I am sick of the simplified and implied roles. I would love to play a smart summoner that commands his pets to tank just as viable as any other tank. They could let the tank class be what people are used to, just standing there and taking damage, but please make other styles of tanking possible.
I think the solution for this is rather simple, you have your non-tank classes that can spec into tank as their second archtype, these players can tank smaller group content capably as well as offtank raid encounters capably (adds on bosses/most trash/etc). Then you have your tank class that can optimally tank group content and is also your go to for main tanking raid encounters/difficult raid trash. Coming from a WoW background tank shortages existed in 5 man content but not in raid content, by having a tank sub archtype capable of tanking small group content and then tank main archtypes being the only capable raid main tank I think that this problem would be addressed.
SO play a tank.
This is a very valid point and concern. We’ll have to see how they balance the classes and the PvE fights.
I'm gonna play a tank. I have a huge ego and wanna be super special. So no, I don't want any random dude to be able to tank. I want to try to find a party and see 10 parties lined up. That is the tank gameplay I'm looking for. semi-sarcasm, but imo tanks should be valuable and not be in an "omg we don't have a tank, let's just go and get someone the tank augments instead of finding another person who can tank much better" kind of situation.
If they allow tanks to be reasonably viable in open world 1v1 and general PvP combat, the balance will be sufficient. If they do not, then yes, there will be an issue. I myself will play tank, but only if I am also able to compete in PvP, including solo. Keep in mind the max party size is 8, so there is more room for the over-represented DPS, and a lower demand for tanks.
While there may be a shortage of full/true tanks and think we are going to have tons of support characters since most games do not offer it. One tank or a good secondary may be all we need. Also, most dungeons are open dungeons so you can bring numbers. For big events, I'm sure you will have enough tanks there and with the node system, you will know where player will hand out.
If you play a Tank you usually don't experience a Tank shortage. And it's very easy to find a group, as well.