Warden Changes and Feedback

[Sirlot]

First ... when will we see the new traceries? I am really hoping we will get some tanking specific ones, maybe they will make some of this better .....


Second - The heals are much better now, thank you.


Moral taps - bugged? Resolution says "Attacker gains 74348 moral" - testing i got max 10k sometimes as low as 1k.


Threat - Are there any actual "threat" skills currently? Or is it all back to dmg / force taunt? I generally used resounding challenge previously but this is no longer a +threat skill. Tying threat to dmg is a bad idea and has been tried before. Dmg is low for tanks even with +X% threat they will lose aggro (working on some testing for this). It also makes things like HH gauntlet impossible for warden (where we cant aoe dmg). We have to have non damaging taunts.


Note on testing - this was all done in tank spec, so dps will likely differ significantly in other specs.

Several new Warden skills will be ‘normal’ skills bound by cooldowns, rather than gambit skills requiring builders. These skills will have short, strong effects and moderate cooldown times.

This is just not true ... and is a serious problem for tanking. Part of the reason these were added (based on info given) was to provide emergency skills for tanks which we are seriously lacking.




Here are the issues with this mechanic as I see them.


1. Before we can use a "normal cooldown skill", we first have to use Desperate Combat to activate them.
2. Then once that is done we have to make sure we have used the correct "type" of other skill first before we can fire this normal (emergency) skill (fist/shield etc)
3. Assuming all that has actually happened, as a tank, i want my emergency skill sitting there ready to use but guess what! As a nice twist if you dont actually use the emergency skill it goes away and goes on cooldown for ~ 1min. (DesComb has a 1:30 cooldown, the skills stay available for 30s).


We need to be able to use these skills in an emergency, not after punching two other skills. We cant pre setup what we might need becuase if we dont use it we are locked out of the skill for a minute. At best for "emergency" we build 3AT and just wait. Emergency occurs and HOPEFULLY we can get off DC + required gambit + emergency skill .... before we die. Please make it so they stay around until used or the full 1:30 cooldown.


Another option (probably more complicated) would be to remove DC all together. instead just make the 3 skills (spear/fist/shield) usable at any time based on the number of ATs. Once you use one you get as many uses as current ATs. Once all "uses" are used up all three skills go on cooldown.


Could also keep DC, and just make all 3 skills useable once clicked (rather than one skill that changes based on gambit). Cooldowns would still need to be fixed though.


Every other tank has emergency skills they can use at will. They are not locked out of them for a cooldown if they DONT use them. And virtually every skill they have is better than ours even at MAX AT rank. We (warden tanks) need help with bosses at higher tier (3+), not trash mobs on landscape.


For what we have to do and how they work, they are not near strong enough


Fist - Force attack (not threat copy) ... this is our special skill for "tank", really? - Remember this costs 3 skills (DC + fist skill + DF) And is now on cooldown for 1m+. It also only has a 6m range, so if it isnt already attacking us it likely wont get hit.


Shield - A single one shot heal that sucks on bosses, its only "decent" with multi-mobs. This great emergency skill does a single heal for roughly the same amount as our 2 length gambit heal (which is FASTER to do) for a single mob. For multi mobs, not much better than a resolution, about double a single exultation pulse.


Testing -
For a single target DS healed for 445 ~ 8s (assuming you use all 4 pulses back to back)
Perservere healed 410k ~ 8s, Safeguard 564, Restoration 768k


I realize this skill is better for multi mob, but that isnt the wardens tanking problem, its single target dmg from bosses. Besides we have too many heals as it is. Id much rather have something that is + BPE/mits % or - inc dmg .


Spear - A single shot damage that does roughly the same damage as boot (2 length gambit), does apply a 3% inc dmg debuff to target that lasts 10s. It is a frontal aoe though some maybe better compared to boar/unseen - roughly equivalant to boar, more than unseen IF the mobs have no dots on em. (unseen does more damage for each effect removed)


Can you tell me which of these great skills is supposed to put us on par with other tanks? Its even worse when you consider that if we dont spend the time up front to buff our "normal" skill, then you only get to use one of them.




Mits - As far as i can tell there really isnt much difference between live/br .... except it takes less random buffs to get there.




Restorative shieldwork - This could be a nice skill, its available without doing anything but its mostly worthless. I assume you were going for something "like" the guards thrill of danger (which restores moral + power). Guard skill is 2.5% per hit without limitation (same 10s duration). Its mostly useful for multimob situations like doom where you can pretty much heal to full within a few seconds.


For the warden, the multi mob scenario doesnt work that well since its a max 50% heal (if you had all 3 ATs ready). For single mob it "sounds" like it would be better since its a 10% heal instead of 2.5. However at base its only 20% heal, you have to be lucky to have all 3 ATs ready when you need your emergency skill. Can we not remove the "X" times limitation? Is it really so bad that the warden might heal all the way up if they use the one on demand emergency skill they have? It also removes all your AT preventing you from using your "other" emergency skills except at base value (1 use)

[Jokeurthewise]

Warning Shot: Why is this skill being nerfed so hard? I can maybe understand removing the debuff, though I don't see the need and it was very handy on bosses, but buffing enemy attack when its used? Honestly, I always thought this skill was fine as-is and I only used it as a debuff on bosses and to pick up stray mobs in a pinch.

I thought there was a mistake when I read this the first time, but there it is in the second build of Bullroarer. From the tooltip of Warning Shot :

" A powerful toss which aggravates your target, forcing them to attack you, but briefly increasing their outgoing damage.

+ 5% Outgoing Damage
Duration 5s
Forced attack
Duration 5s "

I'm literally stunned. This is what we do now, buff our opponents so they can kill us better ? I understand the concept of "tradeoffs", but will we really be the only class that begs for more punishment? (When our main problem atm on live is staying alive?)

[Levanthalas]

A number of you have expressed disappointment at how gambit chains and AT feel when specialized for DPS. The small-large chains provide just enough benefit to make engaging with that system optimal, but force you into a rotation that feels bad to do so. In light of that, I'm exploring a few less-restrictive possibilities for gambit chains right now:





Option 1: Directionless Chains
Gambit chains no longer start with a small gambit. Any 2-length gambit gives chain piece 1. Any 3-length gambit gives chain piece 2, and any 4/5-length gambit gives chain piece 3. When you have all 3 pieces, they combine into an AT

Option 2: Directionless Chains, re-weighted
Gambit chains are built the same as above, but the 2- and 3-length gambits are lumped together, and 4-lengths gives the middle chain piece, 5-lengths gives the final chain piece (benefits of this being that there's a more even distribution of gambits in each 'pool' contributing to a given part of a gambit chain)

Option 3: Anarchic Chains
Any gambit gives 1 chain 'link'. After 3 gambits of any kind, you receive an AT. (benefit here being that it has almost no impact on a DPS rotation, and tanking wardens can access full gambit chain benefits at lower levels)


With any of the above, chains themselves would give no inherent bonuses, and would only serve as a mechanism to gate the rate of acquiring AT.

My biggest concern with option 3 (which I already see is getting pushed to test, so we'll see how it works, but I still wish to share my thoughts) is that it's not going to do anything to fix the current Warden issue of "always start with and refresh your highest damage gambits (4-5 icons) and only use 2/3 icon gambits when you have nothing else betterto do."
It seems counter to the concept of the class identity of "working towards bigger things" that the gambit system seems to have been originally designed to reward.

A proposal would be to keep the current chain build system for AT, and make the buffs for completing it more significant, so that it really feels like a setup/cashout system, rather than just a pure gate on AT. I understand that this could be tricky to balance so that it's worth doing, without making it either overtuned for players that can execute it consistently, or so necessary that it locks out some players from contributing meaningfully on Warden, so I have other thoughts that could help incentivize the chains, rather than just "do your strongest gambits," which just seems like casting regular skills with extra steps.


If you want to alleviate the "penalty" for having to start with a 2-icon, perhaps instead of clearing the gambit panel when executed, leave it filled, unless a gambit chain was completed. If the player wants to utilize all gambits in a single line, this makes the "click" penalty less. Assuming that masteries get used with no resets, a current 2-icon->3-icon->4-icon chain would take approximately some variation of (mastery +gambit, builder + mastery + gambit, 4 builders + gambit)=2+3+5=10 button presses, if the panel wasn't cleared, it would take (mastery + gambit, builder + gambit, builder + gambit)=2+2+2=6 button presses, and the same for the same 2->3->5 chain, with a mastery replacing the last builder. That's only 1 more press than manually building a 4-icon gambit currently is (mastery + builder + builder + gambit), and you get the whole chain.

This would make building a full chain of the same line quick and easy, alleviating the "DPS delay" to getting a set of DoTs applied. And swapping gambit lines while in the same chain can still be done relatively easily with the "Recovery" skill, if the player doesn't want to apply the whole line, or decides to swap mid chain.



Related, a way to make building complex or long gambits less difficult, and to minimize the penalty for swapping gambit lines under the above proposed new system would be reworking Battle-Memory to be essentially the opposite of what it is. Rather than gaining potency to save a gambit to be executed exactly as built later, the sequence could work as follows, with 2 possible situations laid out in parallel.


1. Have a gambit built in your panel.
Case A) The gambit was just used but not cleared, say Safeguard (212) when tanking. The whole group took damage, so you want to use Conviction next, especially with the bonus for finishing a chain, but do want to use Restoration or Celebration of Skill later for the big heal.
Case B) The gambit has not been used, say Surety of Death (3232) when DPSing. You are about to finish a chain, but want to apply both Desolation and Surety of Death for maximum DoT DPS.
2. Activate Battle-Memory. This Stores the builder sequence in Battle memory, without clearing the panel.
3. Continue playing.
Case A) Clear the panel with Recovery and build & execute Conviction (23232), gaining the benefits for using it as a finisher. Then start a new chain, perhaps the (23->232) line for additional defensive buffs, prepping the chain for a finisher.
Case B) Convert Surety of Death to Desolation, and execute it, gaining the finisher bonus. Then start a new chain, perhaps the (13->131) line for quick instant damage, prepping the chain for a finisher.
4. Execute a potency gambit, which then immediately loads the sequence from Battle-Memory into the Gambit Panel.
5. Utilize the loaded gambit icons
Case A) 212 loads. Add either 1 or 12 for Celebration of Skill or Restoration, as desired. Execute, also gaining the finisher bonus.
Case B) 3232 loads. Execute Surety of Death with the finisher bonus.

The above would make it faster to execute both the 4 and 5 length gambits in a single line, while also executing chains. If the other recommendation of only finishers naturally clearing the gambit panel were to be implemented, swapping lines would have a heavier penalty than is currently incurred, but returning to a previous icon state would be made easier through the Battle-Memory/Potency combo.

Those are obviously just my suggestions, and since I'm not a LotRO dev, I can't say how hard they'd be to implement, but I think they illustrate my idea of what the communicated Warden identity is: long-term payoffs, utility, and ability to flex reactively to changing circumstances, at the cost of a higher complexity than other less flexible classes.


The main point I want to make is that I think removing the order AND level requirements just encourages the current (poor in my opinion) gameplay style of utilizing high-icon count gambits, and not any shorter gambits unless all long gambits are active. At minimum, I think the level requirement should be kept, but I think that since the lines have been largely standardized in effect, but not numbers, across the line, keeping both level and order requirements would reinforce what makes warden unique, rather than turning them into Guardian or Hunter/Champ with extra button presses for the same effect level.

[PreemptiveRegret]

Can I ask why Brink of Victory had its range reduced to mirror Surety of Death instead of War-Cry, which has been the case for like the better part of a decade now?
Warden already involves far more actions and clicks to do anything compared to other classes, why are you taking away one of the few satisfying and snappy skills we have with widely accepted and celebrated uses and ruining them? People use Brink of Victory constantly to manage mobs both while DPSing and tanking, and the essential reason why this works is the fact it is the only 360 degree effect centered on the player that has a short animation, decent damage, and is convenient to build, so you can range some mobs while running through others and then hit all of them together without stopping or turning. I would dearly love to here what the justification for this change is because the only explanation I can imagine sounds crazy and looks like you intentionally want to inconvenience the already most inconvenienced players.
Do you actually think Brink of Victory was overpowered or something? Because meanwhile here is what Guard players see on their 360.

Even untraited the range on War Chant is equal to Brink of Victory before this completely unnecessary nerf, after it's completely superior. Honestly the only thing preventing me from getting upset about this change is the knowledge basically everything that makes it to BR is already set in stone, so there's no point in actually caring, historically it's less of a beta and more of a heads up when considering the future. All I can say is I'm glad I took the DPS portent instead of the tanking one, even though it should be inferior.

I thought there was a mistake when I read this the first time, but there it is in the second build of Bullroarer. From the tooltip of Warning Shot :

" A powerful toss which aggravates your target, forcing them to attack you, but briefly increasing their outgoing damage.

+ 5% Outgoing Damage
Duration 5s
Forced attack
Duration 5s "

I'm literally stunned. This is what we do now, buff our opponents so they can kill us better ? I understand the concept of "tradeoffs", but will we really be the only class that begs for more punishment? (When our main problem atm on live is staying alive?)

Why are you surprised? Many of the changes in this revamp are taking from Peter to give to Paul. We now have 'Suppression' which is a -5% damage debuff, so they removed it from Warning Shot. As long as they lowered the duration to match the force taunt it's not that bad. I suppose it begs the question of why bother reshuffling all these effects at all, myself I greatly preferred the old playstyle of maintaining buffs like Adroit Maneuverer, but here we are hostage to every passing Devs forced vision. Maybe Blue Warden will be viable now but I doubt it, since it doesn't actually bring much to the group and is generally inferior to other tanks who have not only stronger abilities for mitigating damage but much easier and more responsive ways to do these things on top of far superior group utility. So we now have a worse version of Warchant that takes more effort to apply and is counter-acted by anti-synergy on our single target Force Taunt. Of course, meanwhile here is what Guards see.

Better range, animation, and no downside, oh right and the actual force taunt duration would be twice as long if I had my tank LIs equipped here. Similar things can be said about Guardian Challenge vs our Defiant Challenge.
Of course most of Guard's other skills are generally better than ours. I mean look at...

Shield Tactics
Shield Tactics will give you a buff with Critical Defence rating and Tactical Mitigation rating. It will also still give you temporary Stun Immunity.
This skill will have a 1s cooldown, like other gambit skills. The Stun Immunity effect already has a cooldown, so there’s no reason for this gambit to have a cooldown as well.

Meanwhile here is what Guards see

A far better immunity that is functionally permanent and doesn't require any preparation or maintenance unlike the Warden.
When you compare the Warden's tanking kit to Guard's it is a joke. Don't even get me started on all of the BPE traits and buffs that require more maintenance for worse effects on Warden compared to what Guards get either instantly or passively, or even just the difference between clearing skills is night and day with Ignore the Pain removing 4 debuffs while First Aid removes 1 - the list goes on and on, but the best part of all of this is at the end of the day the disparity is actually far worse than described because outside of tanking skills Guards also have group skills like Break Ranks that are so incredibly good they often make the difference between completing and not completing high level content. Warden has nothing like this, Fire at Will is a complete joke in comparison, do I need to post yet another screenshot because we all already know this.

Warden is consistently more work and effort for less reward and effect. If you ask me this is completely stupid, it should be more effort for more effect. Why would you intentionally have the class with the skill ceiling through the roof underperforming even when played perfectly against the average performance of an easier class?

Its long desired blue warden spring but please consider making it castable/usable on move.
At his curent state to be able to use it, you need to stop for 1 second, which is too much and make it pointless to spend points in yellow.
Example - HoR boss 1. If you stop kiting for 1 sec, you are dead/ literaly
Im sure you will add more similar mechanics in future so please make this small change.

Warden really does need a sprint like ability, Adroit->Ambush is a half assed way to do it but I guess it is something. Of course this something is far and away inferior to Guardian's Charge or Captain's Make Haste which are without gating mechanisms, a long clunky animation, or the need for a target, and of course come with an AoE stun or a group wide buff respectively...but hey, that's in line with the general Warden dynamic of being a worse but more involved version of every other class.

Also PLEASE fix this / so i wont need to "test" on naked alt. It transfered ALL but my mains

"Greetings!
Your World Transfer is complete! Below is the information for your transfer on 2023-02-14 18:31:48:


FROM WORLD: Evernight
TO WORLD: Bullroarer

Other details:
Character Corgain did not copy.

#L926181
We encountered an error during your transfer.

If you have any questions or need assistance, please don't hesitate to contact us via Help.StandingStoneGames.com.

We look forward to seeing you back in Middle-earth!
The Lord of the Rings Online Team"

In general i rly like both warden and captain changes. Very promising and in some cases close to op.
Read other class changes too and none of them is bad.
I stil cant get it /even after reading your explanation/ why bother with power changes at first place, when there are many more things to fix and balance.
I can see the individual dps drop over 100k on long fights. Also roles meta shifts and some class picking over others just because they wont go power hungry midfight.
I guess you will have lot of work in the future updates

Keep the good work

Yeah I can't get my transfer to work either, very frustrating. I think this happens when they don't actually wipe the characters left over on BR from the prior testing phase.

[Sirlot]

Another possible bug ....


Restorative shieldwork - "Consume all of your AT to briefly improve your defenses"

Proactive shieldwork (trait in blue line) - Improves def bonuses by 10% when consuming full stack AT

However using RS with full stack gives me a bonus of -12% inc (Advanced Defense), but i dont get "improved defenses" from 1/2 stack (other than the heal/PB). Not sure if that is correct or not. Since it was 12% (+10 from trait) i assumed it would have been 2% without max stack.

Also randomly getting the -12% on war cry line (about 1/5 maybe) only when full stacks of AT. Also note if I have this buff already and use RS at full stacks i dont get it again from RS (or refresh time)


------------

Also noticed just for an amusing note. While we no longer seem to have any skills that directly increase threat, we do have deflection IN THE TANK LINE Determination, that reduces threat!


-------------

Warning shot .... REALLY ... our only single target force taunt, only lasts 5 seconds (10s cd), and now it BUFFS the mob too!?! Compare this with guard who has engage and fray for single target taunt.

Engage - 30s cd, Threat copy, 10s FT, run speed debuf on mob
Fray - 10s cd, Threat copy, 10s FT (can basically indefinitely keep one mob focused on tank) - also increases FM chance though thats useless at least it doesnt buff the mob


I play both guard and warden, and despite both being "tank" classes the differences are striking. This is getting worse not better for warden tanking. Has anyone tried an HOR/HOA T3 instance and tanked it with a warden? I suspect that answer is no as it stands I think it is still impossible.

[Plidak]

Threat - Are there any actual "threat" skills currently? Or is it all back to dmg / force taunt? I generally used resounding challenge previously but this is no longer a +threat skill. Tying threat to dmg is a bad idea and has been tried before. Dmg is low for tanks even with +X% threat they will lose aggro (working on some testing for this). It also makes things like HH gauntlet impossible for warden (where we cant aoe dmg). We have to have non damaging taunts.

"Resounding Challenge
Resounding Challenge has adopted the effect it currently has in Assailment, dealing AoE damage and applying a DoT to any enemies hit. When specialized in the Determination tree, it will also increase your threat over time."

Not sure how much this is a thing ...
Is not in any discription

Unless is this :
"Your challenge echoes in the ears of your enemies, dealing DoT on the several enemies at range"
But it have same discrion in red so ...

Also PLEASE remove the joke boss buff from Warning Shot.
Why i should feel punished after each taunt ?
This is not a RP game, RP ends at t2+
Again, pls remove 5% enemy dmg buff from WS

IF you want it to stay like this, unless make it 10s duration/threat coppy.
Then we have a deal.

Also can be changed to "To the warden" Not dmg buff in general.
Im aware of wrd dmg reductions you add/ but imagine if we need to off taunt the boss right before his aoe mechanic= 5% more dmg to entire raid = dead pepegas= kicked warden, or atleast not geting a tank spot on next run. We have it hard enough, dont make it worse.

[LagunaD2]

The new AT generation (any 4 gambits in any order) feels a lot less interesting. You might as well just give us an AT every N seconds we're in combat.

The old (2-3-4/5) system felt OK for tanking; what if (2-3-4) and (3-4-5) (but not 2-3-5) counted as a chain? That would make the DPS rotation more flexible without making the system completely brain-dead like it is on beta 2.

Also, what about "three of a kind" also giving an AT (e.g. 2-2-2, 3-3-3, 4-4-4, 5-5-5)?

So basically "a straight" or "three of a kind". Very intuitive and easy to remember, and will lead to interesting choices in gameplay.

[Plidak]

The new AT generation (any 4 gambits in any order) feels a lot less interesting. You might as well just give us an AT every N seconds we're in combat.

The old (2-3-4/5) system felt OK for tanking; what if (3-4-5) (but not 2-3-5) also counted as a chain? That would make the DPS rotation more flexible without making the system completely brain-dead like it is on beta 2.

Also, what about "three of a kind" also giving an AT (e.g. 2-2-2, 3-3-3, 4-4-4, 5-5-5)?

So basically "a straight" or "three of a kind". Very intuitive and easy to remember, and will lead to interesting choices in gameplay.

Its clunky even now, you want it more complicated ? Like we dont have 12 buffs to keep up in 1.3 min rotation? Are you serious?
It should be reduced to 3 gambits in any order imo. 4 is fine when you sit and tank and spank but what about when we need to kite ?

Wardens adjusting to u35 changes:

https://www.facebook.com/reel/1514487202393483

[Sindhol]

Notes on current BR:

- AT generation is much better. If you'd be willing to make further changes, I'd stil prefer my suggestion (because of course I do), but this will work.


- Advanced Defence procs every time you refresh AT 3. That means wardens are now at -24% incoming damage compared to live, which can be maintained as long as you can finish a chain (four gambits) every 10 seconds. That's a good buff (it's not that warden-themed, but okay). I like that it's not trivial to maintain 100% uptime, but it's still easy enough to keep it up most of the time, even for less experienced players. It also stacks well with For the Free Peoples, making that skill more viable. Cashing out for FtFP does leave a bit of a dip after FtFP runs out, since you won't have AT 3 to refresh at that point, but that's okay.

I think it'd be cool to trait these buffs into other things. I mean, the incoming damage buff is dependable and a good fall-back for when other stats don't apply, but it's thematically just about the least warden-y thing in the game. Adding some traits that allow the gambit buffs and Advanced Defence to be traded for (more) partial mitigations, partial avoidance chance, and outgoing healing would be great.


- Desperate Combat is still meh. I'd honestly just drop it. It's not needed and doesn't add much. You could also change it to a cooldown that grants +3 AT. (You can also have NS grant +3 AT).


- I'm not sure we have enough healing to be a self-healing tank. The relative power of heals-over-time feels good. Celebration of Skill feels weak, but it's worth casting because it stacks with everything else, so I guess that's its niche. It's mainly the overall HPS I'm concerned about. Going by the tooltips, my tank build heals around 45k per second (at level 130) with shield gambits. It'll be a little higher than that in practice (between incoming healing, heal-on-evade, and some morale-taps), but still only about 5-6% of max morale per second, which isn't enough to make a true self-healing tank.

I think it's really cool that power is coming back and that healing skills are big power drainers, but I would like to see the heals scaled up a little higher to make the power-for-health trade really punchy. There are a couple of things that could be changed to help scale heals:

- We don't get any outgoing healing/tactical mastery from agility; I think having 30-40% OGH (instead of 10%) would make the heals a little more viable, and it opens up the possibility of slotting OGH essences for those builds that need lots of healing (meaning it's not free healing--you have to sacrifice other stats [morale] to get it).
- As mentioned above, it'd be cool to trade the incoming damage buff from Advanced Defence for an outgoing healing buff via a trait. It needs to be a higher percentage than 12%: at least 40% and possibly even 60%. That's due to the way it stacks with traits and legacies--for example, the +80% healing from Way of the Shield only adds 40% to actual healing potency. Having the option to trade -incoming damage for +outgoing healing would allow for different specializations within the same blue line: one that's viable (but not great) in less warden-friendly fights, and one that's potentially great, if the fight is geared towards wardens. And if one trait turns out to be way better than the other, you only have to tweak the percentages to balance them.


- All previous suggestions regarding DPS traiting still apply (that's just to have a link handy--I know this BR couldn't have included them).

[Maelliel]

I have read through the forum and also had myself a similiar concern about ATs. Thing is for both Tank and DPS Warden you want to have your cd skills immediately when going into a fight and not have to spend 20-30s to get 3 AT to have it at full strength.
So i had a quick thought about it at first my idea was to add a 5min cd skill giving full AT. But then i had a better idea i mean you need to prebuff as tank and you can also do same as DPS but its minor there still useful so. So my idea was remove out of combat 9s timer for ATs and add 1 AT per 1x Battle Prep Gambit build.
This will lead to have to do 3 Gambits with Battle Prep bevore fight which both Tank will do anyways and DPS can also do and you can go in fight with 3 ATs for your first CD skill and then for your next CD you have to build it normally. This would solve a lot of issues for both specs just to remove ATs timer out of combat and add +1 AT for every gambit build with Battle Prep.
Tank will be in most unstable position when pulling mobs due to not having all heals/buffs up even with pre buffing so this will be fixed
DPS will have to DPS instantly in a raid with Oathbreakers for example in Bloody Threshold, Group wont wait for warden to get his dots nor his ATs up this will fix this at least partwise so you are not forced to press your CD skills without ATs up

[Kander]

Can I ask why Brink of Victory had its range reduced to mirror Surety of Death instead of War-Cry, which has been the case for like the better part of a decade now?
Warden already involves far more actions and clicks to do anything compared to other classes, why are you taking away one of the few satisfying and snappy skills we have with widely accepted and celebrated uses and ruining them? People use Brink of Victory constantly to manage mobs both while DPSing and tanking, and the essential reason why this works is the fact it is the only 360 degree effect centered on the player that has a short animation, decent damage, and is convenient to build, so you can range some mobs while running through others and then hit all of them together without stopping or turning. I would dearly love to here what the justification for this change is because the only explanation I can imagine sounds crazy and looks like you intentionally want to inconvenience the already most inconvenienced players.
Do you actually think Brink of Victory was overpowered or something? Because meanwhile here is what Guard players see on their 360.

Even untraited the range on War Chant is equal to Brink of Victory before this completely unnecessary nerf, after it's completely superior. Honestly the only thing preventing me from getting upset about this change is the knowledge basically everything that makes it to BR is already set in stone, so there's no point in actually caring, historically it's less of a beta and more of a heads up when considering the future. All I can say is I'm glad I took the DPS portent instead of the tanking one, even though it should be inferior.

Why are you surprised? Many of the changes in this revamp are taking from Peter to give to Paul. We now have 'Suppression' which is a -5% damage debuff, so they removed it from Warning Shot. As long as they lowered the duration to match the force taunt it's not that bad. I suppose it begs the question of why bother reshuffling all these effects at all, myself I greatly preferred the old playstyle of maintaining buffs like Adroit Maneuverer, but here we are hostage to every passing Devs forced vision. Maybe Blue Warden will be viable now but I doubt it, since it doesn't actually bring much to the group and is generally inferior to other tanks who have not only stronger abilities for mitigating damage but much easier and more responsive ways to do these things on top of far superior group utility. So we now have a worse version of Warchant that takes more effort to apply and is counter-acted by anti-synergy on our single target Force Taunt. Of course, meanwhile here is what Guards see.

Better range, animation, and no downside, oh right and the actual force taunt duration would be twice as long if I had my tank LIs equipped here. Similar things can be said about Guardian Challenge vs our Defiant Challenge.
Of course most of Guard's other skills are generally better than ours. I mean look at...

Meanwhile here is what Guards see

A far better immunity that is functionally permanent and doesn't require any preparation or maintenance unlike the Warden.
When you compare the Warden's tanking kit to Guard's it is a joke. Don't even get me started on all of the BPE traits and buffs that require more maintenance for worse effects on Warden compared to what Guards get either instantly or passively, or even just the difference between clearing skills is night and day with Ignore the Pain removing 4 debuffs while First Aid removes 1 - the list goes on and on, but the best part of all of this is at the end of the day the disparity is actually far worse than described because outside of tanking skills Guards also have group skills like Break Ranks that are so incredibly good they often make the difference between completing and not completing high level content. Warden has nothing like this, Fire at Will is a complete joke in comparison, do I need to post yet another screenshot because we all already know this.

Warden is consistently more work and effort for less reward and effect. If you ask me this is completely stupid, it should be more effort for more effect. Why would you intentionally have the class with the skill ceiling through the roof underperforming even when played perfectly against the average performance of an easier class?




Warden really does need a sprint like ability, Adroit->Ambush is a half assed way to do it but I guess it is something. Of course this something is far and away inferior to Guardian's Charge or Captain's Make Haste which are without gating mechanisms, a long clunky animation, or the need for a target, and of course come with an AoE stun or a group wide buff respectively...but hey, that's in line with the general Warden dynamic of being a worse but more involved version of every other class.


Yeah I can't get my transfer to work either, very frustrating. I think this happens when they don't actually wipe the characters left over on BR from the prior testing phase.

I think that this is my general feel during last years on warden tank fixes. We always get something that is inferior to what other tanks have, have to work more to build or use it and they add a counterweight to make it even worse. Tradeoff are good when the skill is really strong otherwise, for example it wouldn't be unreasonable if we get a skill that makes you and nearby allies immune to all damage for 30s and then you get a +%inc damage debuff after it expires to compensate. Having to work harder and longer than any other class to get our skills and buffs going is enough reason to have them be more rewarding and powerful, if you make them less powerful in general you're just creating a class that only tanks easy content when none of the true tanks are available.

As it stands now, with current long preparation mechanics, our emergency cooldowns should simply be more powerful than guardians and captains alternative, even being on par (which already would mean a huge buff compared to current build) is not even enough.

I know the AT is set in stone as it made it into BR and you're not even gonna consider not using this system but at least make the skills we use by it be worth it.

The problem with this update is that it changes a lot but doesn't fix anything in terms of tanking ability. And add new problems in keeping aggro (brink of victory, buffing enemies with warning shot...). If you want warden to be viable tank the buffs should be massive.

I remember last time wardens were balanced with other tanks (lvl 85 iirc), your gambits and abilities were strong. Self heals were similar to what a dedicated healer healed the guardian, guardian heals were almost nonexistent. In total in raids, your self heals+ healer heals - damage taken was similar in both guardians and wardens. Warden by far was best tank in avoids, literally almost capping everything with buffs and guardians could not even compare in this matter.

This is literally the only way to make wardens compete at all as tanks. And please, fix the joke you did with brink of victory and warning shot, particularly warning shot should just have its debuff it currently has in live servers, buffing enemy damage by forcing taunt is the most stupid mechanic you could do...

[PreemptiveRegret]

Imagine if Warning Shot instead of giving +5% damage to enemies gave them +25% Run Speed. Wouldn't that be much more interesting? It would be differentiating at least, and maybe even add a new dimension of utility. So of course we don't get that.

Most of these changes are strange to me because there's so many of them even with a new resource system, it's clearly ambitious, but it's also extremely generic and has a leveling effect of simplifying mechanics instead of reorienting them, that is to say there's little interest in making the gameplay interesting or novel despite all this ambition. Warning Shot is an example. Gambit chains that aren't actually gambit chains anymore is another. Another cooldown skill that just boosts damage is another.

Instead of differentiating Warden things are messed with that are working and that people like, like Brink of Victory's radius nerf or Seize the Moment's removal or spreading DoTs with sweep. I'd expect success and good design to revolve around building around the things people find good about the class instead of the opposite. It's so hard for me to imagine someone waking up one day and going "Warden needs more buff skills like Dance of War to maintain, more redundancies like Shield Mastery - especially as precasts before pulls" instead, yet here we very clearly are. It's funny in a way.

[Plidak]

Pls consider making stats buff gambit duration not expire out of combat.
We hafe like 6 main ones we need to prebuild before big pulls, and in time we mastery cast last one, first is already at hallf duration ...
And trust me i cast them fast.
As mentioned above, ppl have no patience to wait us to brew out magic and hunter arrow fly in second 2...
And again remove enemy buff from our taunt. Its .... i wont say it, but you know.
You guys still have time to make it better, and I am still a believer.

[Maelliel]

1. As many others mentioned above please dont remove all unique gambits additions like:
Desolation: Miss Chance/Fear
Brink of Victory: 360 and 10 Targets
Boars Rush: Stun on Crit
Onslaught/Wall of Steel Interrupt
and few others especially Brink of Victory change is bad as others wrote above it is very nice for landscape pulls/tank aoe threat/dps aoe as you could run through mobs
The change making all gambits duplicates of each other just feels bad
The idea of the update is making all gambits useful again --> Removing unique Gambit additions leads to making those gambits less useful --> which also means some gambits wont be used again --> which goes against the plan of the update also see point 5.

2. Warning Shot +5% is just a bug i guess as pointed out above aswell

3. Hiding 5% crit chance which is a must for DPS warden behind a trait which is useless giving +range bonus is just bad since you need to waste 3 skill points for 0 gain

4. Give Javelin of Deadly Force a lower CD it is the only aoe debuff and it has 1min cd which is way too long. Even currently on live 18s cds sometimes feel too long if you pull groups in lower tiers which die fast. Snap Shot can reset the cd but the trait itself is just bad for a 3 point forcing you to use Gambit Builders.

5. Gambit Goad and Defensive Strike are just bad cause of long animations compared to Deft Strike noone will ever use those as Potency Gambits anymore after removal of the DOT Goad Animation is never worth to use also see point 1.

6. Some skills like Wardens Triumph/Adroit Manoeuvre/Dark Bevore Dawn/Reversal have not their damage aligned with others skills in other words they have weak damage

7. Way of the Fist +15% dot dmg over time is nowhere close to real 15% its around 9% increase

8. Piercing Javelins 32k armor penetration is still useless since value is not updated and only works for ranged not melee

9. On the Offence Trait is not working at all since Offensive Strike lost hits morale tap

10. Make Rapid Techniques just 10s remove all cds or give it shorter duration but remove cds and then periodically is wierd to adjust to

[Plidak]

2. Warning Shot +5% is just a bug i guess as pointed out above aswell

Its not a bug. We dont speak only about the effect here.
Its intentional, as you can read in discription.
Which is sad. I had hope about the class balances and sh/t, but seeing this change, let me understand that the ppl behind those changes are just RP entusiasts.
With all my respect, but trying to bring the most hard to survive tank in par with grd and cpt, and in the same time adding sellf debuff efect to his only ST taunt is silly. And not just self debuff, but raid wide too. Its like lag dont tie our hands enough, not they got cuted from you too...
So yea, waiting for u35 build 3. If this goes live, i give up all hope

[Rockferin]

@Onn, Thanks for your work on the Warden and for jumping in for discussion.

Regardless of how competitive wardens will be in dps and tanking, there are quality of life remarks I would like to share.

* I've read it already mentioned, and really love the idea of having Forced March reapplying itself when going out of combat.
Maybe wardens could also get some speed fraction of it in combat too, why not through a trait maybe.
I know lore is a bad balance reason, but I feel that in combat run speed and evade make a compensation for medium only armor.

* I'm worried about the amount of buffs to apply before a fight and how repetitive and boring it feels.
I would rather not buy a macro-able keyboard to eliminate this chore, and spend my money for the game instead
It also brings a feeling (lore-wise again) of wardens being unprepared for fighting, and breaks immersion.

* I would like to engage combat with masteries too. Not only single builder. No sure of the implication though.
It feels wrong that I cannot attack an enemy directly with SpSh for example, especially with the single builders losing their buffs.

* Wardens are massively reporting how AoE radius and zone changes feel bad. I concur.
There already are many reasons for a gambit to fail like the death of that one target in the enemy group, the range, the lag (no offense but it's a reality whether due to the client, the network or the server).
It is a bit of relief to not pay much attention to an AoE cone. Some may argue it's just player skill. I agree to some extent.
However, I believe there are enough other points to focus for wardens to put one's skills at good use and we could be forgiving for this.

* Mainly in landscape, I find myself frustrated by the loss of incomplete gambits between fights. Same feeling about the urge to reuse the last successful one during the very short time it is kept available to me.
I know gambit building is inherent to the class. When a good chunk of them are lost it doesn't feel good either.

* The translation of "light" for damage type (and probably for the new names for DoTs ticks) is inaccurate in French in combat chat and tooltips
Currently it's "léger" meaning "not heavy". Please use "lumière" (as in sun-light)


Thanks!

[Jokeurthewise]

I have read through the forum and also had myself a similiar concern about ATs. Thing is for both Tank and DPS Warden you want to have your cd skills immediately when going into a fight and not have to spend 20-30s to get 3 AT to have it at full strength.
So i had a quick thought about it at first my idea was to add a 5min cd skill giving full AT. But then i had a better idea i mean you need to prebuff as tank and you can also do same as DPS but its minor there still useful so. So my idea was remove out of combat 9s timer for ATs and add 1 AT per 1x Battle Prep Gambit build.
This will lead to have to do 3 Gambits with Battle Prep bevore fight which both Tank will do anyways and DPS can also do and you can go in fight with 3 ATs for your first CD skill and then for your next CD you have to build it normally. This would solve a lot of issues for both specs just to remove ATs timer out of combat and add +1 AT for every gambit build with Battle Prep.
Tank will be in most unstable position when pulling mobs due to not having all heals/buffs up even with pre buffing so this will be fixed
DPS will have to DPS instantly in a raid with Oathbreakers for example in Bloody Threshold, Group wont wait for warden to get his dots nor his ATs up this will fix this at least partwise so you are not forced to press your CD skills without ATs up

Getting to keep your AT points until used would be a great change! Keeping them through defeat so you can use one of those cooldown skills at max strength just after getting up (when the situation is unstable and you need all the help you can get). They could also be built outside of combat (other builder / spender classes can do that too) or better yet, kept from your previous fight (which feels warden-ish, preparing in advance for what's coming next).

If we get to keep our AT points outside of combat, then I don't really mind which version of gambit chains we end up getting. At least we will be working towards a resource (AT points) that can be used when we need it (including at the start of the next fight).

[PreemptiveRegret]

Pls consider making stats buff gambit duration not expire out of combat.
We hafe like 6 main ones we need to prebuild before big pulls, and in time we mastery cast last one, first is already at hallf duration ...
And trust me i cast them fast.
As mentioned above, ppl have no patience to wait us to brew out magic and hunter arrow fly in second 2...
And again remove enemy buff from our taunt. Its .... i wont say it, but you know.
You guys still have time to make it better, and I am still a believer.

Why do Readied Blade and Shield up even exist? We already had Shield Mastery and Shield Tactics, why are there these 4 skills that be need to applied out of combat constantly that all resemble each other. Their effects are very strong of course, it's a bribe to force in awful design that adds nothing to gameplay except tedious chores. And this is from the same Dev who gave us Anthem consolidation? Haha. Why not just make the class fun? Why bloat it with high frustration and low engagement skills (Readied Blade and Shield Up), or low impact skills like Wall of Steel/Onslaught who were perfectly good with Staff Sweep. This new Warden is completely incoherent imo, like they turned Impressive Flourish into a mandatory buff to maintain to justify gambit chains, then they removed gambit chain bonuses and you know chaining itself basically, and now we are just left with the abomination that is Advanced Techniques, which adds nothing to the experience except frustration and is consumed by mostly useless skills (show me 1 person with a brain that likes Desperate Combat or even Restorative Shield work) that are far and away inferior to other tanks and DPS class big skills. Like, why? What is the point of all these meandering prerequisites while lowering the bar everywhere else? You can actually say the biggest accomplishment and difference maker to making blue warden viable this update are buffs from skills you apply out of combat, which now total what, 7? If that isn't a total failure of design what is?


And it's not like any of these things are difficult to improve, the improvements are so obvious, just do something novel and that is actually proactive, not set it and forget it chores that all resemble one another.
Imagine the following effects as alternatives to the current bloat and boredom we have to contend with.

Dance of War - gives you 10% run speed 10% evade 10% block 10% parry for 10 seconds
Shield Mastery - gives you a bunch of mitigation and incoming damage reduction lasts indefinitely until you take X number of hits, costs 10% of your current HP instead of power
Shield Tactics - gives you a strong absorb, also gives you a debuff that causes your next Mastery used to accrue a longer CD
Shield Up - gives you 10% block that lasts for 60s or until you get CC-ed, the buff is consumed to make you immune to this CC and others for 10s, has an exhaustion debuff that prevents reapplication for 30s
Readied Blade - absorb and reflect 50% of the damage you take in the next 4s, has an exhaustion debuff that prevents reapplication for 30s
Conviction - group wide HoT, stacks with itself, also now requires a target and does damage

I don't mention Goad as potencies are their own thing I guess.

There are so many interesting options that could be used to make our gambits feel impactful and iconic, none of them are used. Instead we get very strong and very boring and very repetitive buff maintenance. Big yuck.

[Sindhol]

Why do Readied Blade and Shield up even exist? We already had Shield Mastery and Shield Tactics, why are there these 4 skills that be need to applied out of combat constantly that all resemble each other. Their effects are very strong of course, it's a bribe to force in awful design that adds nothing to gameplay except tedious chores. And this is from the same Dev who gave us Anthem consolidation? Haha. Why not just make the class fun? Why bloat it with high frustration and low engagement skills (Readied Blade and Shield Up), or low impact skills like Wall of Steel/Onslaught who were perfectly good with Staff Sweep. This new Warden is completely incoherent imo, like they turned Impressive Flourish into a mandatory buff to maintain to justify gambit chains, then they removed gambit chain bonuses and you know chaining itself basically, and now we are just left with the abomination that is Advanced Techniques, which adds nothing to the experience except frustration and is consumed by mostly useless skills (show me 1 person with a brain that likes Desperate Combat or even Restorative Shield work) that are far and away inferior to other tanks and DPS class big skills. Like, why? What is the point of all these meandering prerequisites while lowering the bar everywhere else? You can actually say the biggest accomplishment and difference maker to making blue warden viable this update are buffs from skills you apply out of combat, which now total what, 7? If that isn't a total failure of design what is?

There are so many interesting options that could be used to make our gambits feel impactful and iconic, none of them are used. Instead we get very strong and very boring and very repetitive buff maintenance. Big yuck.

Agreed. I think the best we can hope for is mitigation of the impact of AT and just kind of... cast the boring buffs, I guess, but it should be noted that AT and the new shield gambit buffs are still bad. Much like the last blue warden rework, actually.

[PreemptiveRegret]

Agreed. I think the best we can hope for is mitigation of the impact of AT and just kind of... cast the boring buffs, I guess, but it should be noted that AT and the new shield gambit buffs are still bad. Much like the last blue warden rework, actually.

I don't see why anyone would want to play this class. I don't.

[Shoushi]

I realize that most of the discussion is from a raid/group perspective. However, I did want to add that from a solo perspective, Beta 2 is a significant improvement over both Live and Beta 1. Assailment now feels snappy and burst damage and the 3-second dots are great for landscape, missions, skirmishes, etc. The reduction of perseverance-line healing from live might be more problematic for tougher content, though the additional mitigation buffs will hopefully make up for that. I was able to comfortably solo a 3-man skirmish blue-traited, but since I had given up doing that on Live, I don't have a comparison for now.

For solo, Advanced Techniques don't seem to add anything useful (IMHO) in either trait line, so the gambit chains have no benefit that I can see no matter what their requirements are.

[Plidak]

Why do Readied Blade and Shield up even exist? We already had Shield Mastery and Shield Tactics, why are there these 4 skills that be need to applied out of combat constantly that all resemble each other. Their effects are very strong of course, it's a bribe to force in awful design that adds nothing to gameplay except tedious chores. And this is from the same Dev who gave us Anthem consolidation? Haha. Why not just make the class fun? Why bloat it with high frustration and low engagement skills (Readied Blade and Shield Up), or low impact skills like Wall of Steel/Onslaught who were perfectly good with Staff Sweep. This new Warden is completely incoherent imo, like they turned Impressive Flourish into a mandatory buff to maintain to justify gambit chains, then they removed gambit chain bonuses and you know chaining itself basically, and now we are just left with the abomination that is Advanced Techniques, which adds nothing to the experience except frustration and is consumed by mostly useless skills (show me 1 person with a brain that likes Desperate Combat or even Restorative Shield work) that are far and away inferior to other tanks and DPS class big skills. Like, why? What is the point of all these meandering prerequisites while lowering the bar everywhere else? You can actually say the biggest accomplishment and difference maker to making blue warden viable this update are buffs from skills you apply out of combat, which now total what, 7? If that isn't a total failure of design what is?


And it's not like any of these things are difficult to improve, the improvements are so obvious, just do something novel and that is actually proactive, not set it and forget it chores that all resemble one another.
Imagine the following effects as alternatives to the current bloat and boredom we have to contend with.

Dance of War - gives you 10% run speed 10% evade 10% block 10% parry for 10 seconds
Shield Mastery - gives you a bunch of mitigation and incoming damage reduction lasts indefinitely until you take X number of hits, costs 10% of your current HP instead of power
Shield Tactics - gives you a strong absorb, also gives you a debuff that causes your next Mastery used to accrue a longer CD
Shield Up - gives you 10% block that lasts for 60s or until you get CC-ed, the buff is consumed to make you immune to this CC and others for 10s, has an exhaustion debuff that prevents reapplication for 30s
Readied Blade - absorb and reflect 50% of the damage you take in the next 4s, has an exhaustion debuff that prevents reapplication for 30s
Conviction - group wide HoT, stacks with itself, also now requires a target and does damage

I don't mention Goad as potencies are their own thing I guess.

There are so many interesting options that could be used to make our gambits feel impactful and iconic, none of them are used. Instead we get very strong and very boring and very repetitive buff maintenance. Big yuck.

Im sure Readied Blade and Shield mitigations dont stack.
Also sure they are here to give us versatility in combat, while using masteries and depending of aoe or st fight.
Still both effects can be added to already existing gambit. Nm no complain here. its nice to have choises.
About sprint i LIKE the idea about yellow line talent. The downside i mentioned in prev post. Even if turn Ambush to be insta cast, it stil cant be cast while moving and you lost on sec waiting for animation to fire, pined in place = dead pepega in kite fights.
Stil i can see its potential in pvp. Will be uterly broken in duels and i expect lots of complains from creep side.
It stuns target while give the player movement sprint and posibility to get distance, now add to this the new javeling range tracery and you have nearly OP class just of 1 skill and tracery.
Back to PvE.
The BLUE silence about taunt keep me worried. I wish to hear devs opinion of it. Hope it wont be ignored.
The extra gambits we will survive somehow.

[FrauBlake01]

The BLUE silence about taunt keep me worried.

Why ?

This is not the revamp for blue warden, it's the one for DPS warden.
(Of course blue warden has to make some use of the new brilliant mechanic, thus some new skills tied to it.)

The real revamp for blue warden will come with the next pass of warden revamp.
Which will be - looking at the history of warden revamps - 2034. That's only about 580 weeks from now, so be a little patient,

[Plidak]

Why ?

This is not the revamp for blue warden, it's the one for DPS warden.
(Of course blue warden has to make some use of the new brilliant mechanic, thus some new skills tied to it.)

The real revamp for blue warden will come with the next pass of warden revamp.
Which will be - looking at the history of warden revamps - 2034. That's only about 580 weeks from now, so be a little patient,

The blue silence= no blue posts.

And no is not red wrd revamp. Its genereal.
Blue have same amount of changes if not even more.
Briliant mechanic ? Yes lots of new cool stuf but addin more burden to rotation wont make it easy
Also AGAIN, we buff mobs with our taunt ?!?....

[Elwha]

• Please buff both Cauterizing Steel & Unseen Strikes base and bonus damage. As of BR-2, these are not enough to assure we have a place as DPS in raid content. I would seriously double them and tune down from there unless you plan on giving us far more buffs to fire/light-type damage, like before this revamp goes live.
• If you don't plan to buff Recklessness, please consider at least removing the animation, entirely.

A number of you have expressed disappointment at how gambit chains and AT feel when specialized for DPS. The small-large chains provide just enough benefit to make engaging with that system optimal, but force you into a rotation that feels bad to do so. In light of that, I'm exploring a few less-restrictive possibilities for gambit chains right now:

Option 1: Directionless Chains
Gambit chains no longer start with a small gambit. Any 2-length gambit gives chain piece 1. Any 3-length gambit gives chain piece 2, and any 4/5-length gambit gives chain piece 3. When you have all 3 pieces, they combine into an AT

Option 2: Directionless Chains, re-weighted
Gambit chains are built the same as above, but the 2- and 3-length gambits are lumped together, and 4-lengths gives the middle chain piece, 5-lengths gives the final chain piece (benefits of this being that there's a more even distribution of gambits in each 'pool' contributing to a given part of a gambit chain)

Option 3: Anarchic Chains
Any gambit gives 1 chain 'link'. After 3 gambits of any kind, you receive an AT. (benefit here being that it has almost no impact on a DPS rotation, and tanking wardens can access full gambit chain benefits at lower levels)


With any of the above, chains themselves would give no inherent bonuses, and would only serve as a mechanism to gate the rate of acquiring AT.

Option 3 is probably what I would choose. However, the slog to AT-3 is somewhat boring and as others have mentioned, the improvement it provides is lacklust. AT-3 needs to be a clear buff vs AT-0.

• As you progress through AT-1/2/3 tiers it would be nice to have something visual, like an animation (around or above up the character, NO character movement that messes with rotation) or sound or both that clearly displays and keeps track of your current AT tiers.
• Make AT/3 worth it by buffing not only the stats but duration more than BR-2.