More Guardian Thoughts

[zipfile]

...I don't even know where to begin...of all the things that were said over the years, all the info that was presented and shown...we get...this.

The Defender of the Free

Purchased Traits

Relentless Assault becomes Skilled Deflection: which would change out the finesse increases, and replace them with a flat bonus to your parry.

No.

The first step in doing this, is giving The Keen Blade an specialization perk. My current thought on this specialization is, to lean into the heavy nature of the guardian, while also using the changes to mastery. Along those lines the current thought is this: All outgoing healing is reduced significantly, and the physical mastery increases based off of your armour value. The trade-off here would allow for a measure of consistency in the combat hits of the red line guardian.

Better than nothing, I suppose. And its unique, so I'll give it that. If its comparable to classes that get critical rating from their main stat, sure, as Guardians struggle to get same ratings without severe drop in some other departments (or go the other way, remove critical rating from main stats, give everyone an equal field in that regard)

Our secondary objectives, are to make the red line guardian sustained damage more consistent, make burst damage more reliable, remove reliance on combat response events, and have a capstone that is beneficial to the fellowship.

Guardian already is consistent. Short cooldowns with bleeds ensure consistency. I would like an explanation for this part cause, in all my years, I've never heard of this class having "inconsistent" damage, nor have I experienced it.
I must be missing something....

Reactive Parry: Adjust the damage upward to give value to the trait.

...this is a DPS spec...
...you are not supposed to get hit...
...having a perk that requires you to parry a hit....
...is this enough ellipses?

Broad Strokes: moves up in the line but remains unchanged.

This is such a pointless change....Guardian at low levels is already two-three hitting landscape mobs, how is this even needed? Guess it gives you access to a bleed earlier....woooooo....?

Relentless Assault: Swapping positions from the blue line, this now increases finesse and increases the tick count on all guardian bleeds.

Aside from swapping positions as I've already mentioned, Orion can please look into the bleed base durations and the respective cooldowns on skills that apply those bleeds?
You'll notice something really cool....I'll spoil it for you and say "100% uptime".
Extra duration on Guardian bleeds is utterly pointless as you are already cycling the rotation every 10 seconds.
Any extra DOT tick counts do not serve a purpose when you know how to play.

Heavy Weapons: Flat mod on two-handed weapon damage by 2%/tier

So for the people that like running 1 S&B can save up 5 points I guess?
Don't change the trait, it's fine as it is.

Thrill of Battle : Damaging Attacks in combat increase your Critical Chance by 1%/tier, Caps at 5 stacks, Critically striking resets the benefit

Okay...that's fine. But I'd up it to 1.5% per tier instead (1.5/3/4.5/6/7.5%) as you'll be constantly resetting this due to Guardians low cooldowns. With a bit more powerful trait, you'll average out a higher critical chance which, combined with Warriors Blade, might bring it in line with 5% other classes get.

Thrust: While specialized in Keen Blade no longer requires a combat response

Base damage needs to go up considerably then, as it's currently benefiting from Parry Response tracery. Overall, alright.

Tireless Blows: 10% chance, on criticals, to reset Brutal Assault/tier

On any critical (excluding Bleed crits)?
Sure, better than just being tied to parry chain skills. I'll support this.

Invigourating Parry becomes Invigourating Critical: Restore 1% to your power on a critical strike

I imagine this is 1% per tier, correct? Uh...meh?
Okay, I'll admit, Guardian has extreme power issues in BR currently, especially in PVP, so it might not seem the worst.
However, I propose something stronger:

• Invigourating Combat:
  
  • Critical hits restore 1/3/5/7% power and 0.5/1/1.5/2% max morale. This effect has an internal cooldown of 3 seconds

Remove Warriors Heart healing in Red, as a DPS spec doesn't need it on top of other skills you have access to. Replacing with something that allows you to survive certain hits like puddles or un-cleansable effects seems better.
(Yes, I'll touch on Honourable Combat later on, relax)

To the Rescue: Tier 6 no longer functions on every skill - this shifts to just melee skills gain the crit chance.

I think this means that the 100% critical chance on the next attack only affects melee skills now, correct?
Okay...neat. Same for knock-down too?

Honourable Combat is Replaced with Rupture: To the King gains, remove all current bleeds for damage based on the number of deeds present, increases incoming damage on the affected target by 3% for 5 seconds/bleed removed.

...wh....wha.....why?

Okay, I like the idea, I'll say that. I think its neat.
However, why is this tied to To The King?
You will also not have all bleeds up on a target for the first TTK usage, so you'll have to stagger out TTK till you get 4 Bleeds, then TTK, which will undoubtedly harm your own damage.
Oh and it's also a nightmare for soloing...
I propose this:

• Honourable Combat:
  
  • Separate/independant skill, same animation as Honourable Combat
  • Remove all bleeds from the target, granting Guardian increased damage per bleed removed and increased damage taken on target
  • Guardian gains 7.5% damage per bleed removed for 20 seconds
  • Target takes 2.5% increased damage taken per bleed removed for 20 seconds
  • Skill has a 80 second cooldown.

Guardian lacks DPS offensive cooldowns, and as you've mentioned, you wanted to give Guardians some group utility. This is my proposal, as it would fit the goals perfectly.
I'll also mention things that need changes regarding Red below here:

• Reactive Parry
  
  • Change one: Critical hits with Sting grant Parry response (remove that stupid essence)
    
    • Allows to Guardian to effortless flow into Parry chains as you are already using Sting on cooldown, allowing for a very fluid rotation.
  • Change two: Force Opening causes the target to take 5% increased Critical damage for 10 seconds.
    
    • Some potent group utility, as Guardian doesn't even use this skill at all. Tying a good debuff to it could be a good choice.
• Protection By The Sword:
  
  • Fix the bloody bug with it already, it doesn't refresh in combat. This has been a thing since Fall of Khazad-dum update when Guardian got changes. Do this at the minimum
  • Changes:
    
    • Damage buff is no longer a pulse, but an aura with a 30m range.
    • Parry transfer range increase to 30m
    • Affects all damage types, not just melee
      
      • 10m range is far too short to be effective in 90% of encounters in this game.
• Bleed Them Dry:
  
  • Add a bleed damage increase to this, simply having an extra DOT tick is underwhelming
• Prey On The Weak
  
  • I...I don't know anymore. This is such a horrible capstone trait on so many levels that it's sad.
  • Damage is horrible
  • Damage is conditional
  • Proposed change:
    
    • Guardian deals additional flat damage to targets that are suffering from Terrible Wound.
    • Damage value scales with mastery and can critically hit.
    • Damage magnitude is around half value of Sting damage.
    • Internal cooldown of 4 seconds so it doesn't top the damage charts.
• Hammer Down - increase base damage and reduce cooldown to 20 seconds, remove the stun. Damage is a bit underwhelming at higher levels and cooldown is too long. Stun is a meaningless component. (change all the set bonuses to deal bonus damage instead)

As for Yellow....just make it a passive tree, don't fumble over some grand designs. The whole idea of "AOE focused tank tree" just makes people question the purpose of Blue, which...is already an AOE tanking tree.

[Ryvick]

I was afraid of this. Some hope that we would finally drop the yellow line across the board from classes, turn Blue into Tanking and/or Healing, and Red focus on DPS. Then couple this with dropping skill specific traceries and replacing them with extremely minor passive traceries to enable proper balance of all skills at all levels.

But nope. Instead the devs have decided to abandon a good idea for class balance and go back to ye olde "I don't know what to do with it"-ing the yellow trees and never being able to attain any semblance of balance with any of the classes.

Disappointing.

[Thunderblast]

First of all I want to thank you (Orion) for taking the time to freshen up the Guardian. The Guardian is my favorite class, and I have been slowly levelling (I abuse my Stone of the Tortoise) my Elf Guardian main, Manace over the course of 6-7 years. I am by no means the most experienced Guardian out there. I have no endgame experience, and only spotty grouping/raiding throughout the years, so read this with that in mind. However, the Guardian is my favorite class, both because Sam Gamgee was my favorite character from Tolkien's books, and because I find Guardian gameplay to be uniquely engaging, with the B/P response system. This fundamental feature of Guardian design makes it impossible to form a meta skill rotation that works best because block and parry responses are unpredictable, with lots of split-second decision-making. If War-chant comes off cooldown, but you get a parry at the same time and Whirling Retaliation opens up, do you War-chant right away to reduce Catch a Breath cooldown sooner, or do you wait until after the Whirling Retaliation so that Whirling Retaliation is affected as well? Through the rework, this fundamental mechanic to Guardian gameplay is the one thing that I hope is preserved above all else.

From reading your original post I gathered several things:

1) Red-line will recieve some work trying to make it LESS dependent on responses. Please do not do this. As it stands, the unpredictability of the responses (outside of Force Opening spamming) is what makes red-line Guardians not just feel like a badly geared Champion. Instead, if you want to make the response chain available more often, give red-line the following specialization bonus:
--------------
+5% critical chance
Scoring a critical hit now opens the parry response chain.
--------------
It would be similar to how blue-line Burglars open their critical chain by evading. It would not remove the engaging aspect, but it would make parries more frequent and more readily available to red-line Guardians in a group who don't necessarily have aggro and aren't getting attacked.

2) Blue-line will be, for the most part, unchanged. This is fine by me, as long as blue-line Guardians can still go into the yellow-line deep enough to get War-chant cooldown reduction and maxed-out Redirect. The two together are the only thing that Guardian main-tanks can do to help with big boss hits that are unavoidable.

3) Yellow will get a rework and will remain as a speccable trait line. Please do not do this! As much as I like the idea of Guardians, the original LotRO tank class, having not one but two tank lines, I think it will cause more problems than it will solve. Either the yellow line is a really good "AoE Tank" line, in which case it replaces blue-line Guardians and Blue-line Wardens in that role, or it remains as is (which is, to say, an expensive place for blue-line Guardians to buy Redirect).


The better fix would be to make yellow a supplemental trait tree, so that blue can still get War-chant cooldown reduction and Redirect, and tweak the blue and red lines to accomodate the change:

1) Make Fortifications each worth 3% mits, rather than 2%. Hear me out! At the same time, make blue-line Guardian mits unbuffable. At the moment, a maxed blue Guardian sits at about 75% mits in a group setting (60% from heavy armour, 10% from Fortifications, 3% from Herald of Hope, 1.5% from traceries, others). This would not change. However, what this would do is make Litany of Defiance a useful skill again. Right now, blue-line Guardians have a single tool for reducing massive boss hits: Redirect (which comes from yellow anyway). This would make a flagship blue-line skill (Litany) worth using because 15% Fortifications doubled gets you up to 90% mitigations, which is more worthwhile.

2) Rework Engage to be a ranged toggle that amplifies threat generated against the "Engaged" target. This would make it a niche skill only used for drawn-out boss fights but that's okay because it already is. Maybe give it an outgoing damage debuff or something. The idea here would be to save some of the spirit of Take to Heart .

3) Make Force Opening a level-earned (instead of trait-earned) skill. Given that Shield-blow is available to red-line Guardians, shouldn't its parry equivalent be available to blue-line Guardians? This is just a quality-of-life improvement though and wouldn't really alter the gameplay of the class aside from having it make more sense to newer players.

4) Add range, max targets, and threat generation to Shield-taunt as well as a miss chance debuff. Create a parallel skill, Blade-taunt, for the red line (to replace Force Opening as the second spec skill) that works in the parry chain. Blade-taunt generates threat as well (less than Shield-taunt) and reduces enemy avoidances. This would make blue-line Guardians use Shield-taunt more often (for reasons other than it has a faster animation than Bash) and would give red-line Guardians a way to temporarily build aggro for the main tank to copy later on, as well as a minor debuff. It makes some sense, Shield-taunt to make your enemies have a harder time hurting you, Blade-taunt to make your enemies easy for you to hurt?

5) Last but not least by any measure: give Protection by the Sword longer range so that it doesn't need to be re-cast whenever the tank (the target of PbtS who will generate parries) gets punted. PbtS is a very important tool for red-line Guardians to allow them to use their parry chain even if they don't have aggro, and it would be really really nice if it could work more reliably.


These changes would help solidify the current gameplay and personality of both the red and blue Guardians and resolve the current issue of a yellow-line that is the equivalent of a supplemental tree anyways. Trying to make yellow a second tanking tree would (best-case) have yellow Guardians join the already-crowded ranks of viable tanks (yellow Captains, blue Beornings, blue Brawlers, blue Guardians) and make it even harder for the more niche tanks (blue Wardens, blue Champions) to find group spots. Better would be to make yellow-line non-speccable and then pick up the pieces. It would require less work to implement, create fewer problems in the future, and make more sense.

Lastly, thank you for reading this. I definitely do appreciate the time you're spending to freshen up the Guardian class, as well as the fact that you're gathering input from the community. I've been playing the game for 6-7 years and have probably spent ~$80 on the game total. Do with this input what you will. I'm looking forward to seeing what you come up with!


~Manace, an Elf Guardian from Crickhollow

[SSG_Orion]

I was afraid of this. Some hope that we would finally drop the yellow line across the board from classes, turn Blue into Tanking and/or Healing, and Red focus on DPS. Then couple this with dropping skill specific traceries and replacing them with extremely minor passive traceries to enable proper balance of all skills at all levels.

But nope. Instead the devs have decided to abandon a good idea for class balance and go back to ye olde "I don't know what to do with it"-ing the yellow trees and never being able to attain any semblance of balance with any of the classes.

Disappointing.

Not at all. These are early thoughts and if it proves out that the yellow should become more utility than an actual line- then that is what will happen.

[Skohgar]

I you do decide to remove yellow would it be possible to refund your li since they would no longer be useful especially if you have a 2 handed tanking li as you can’t 2 hand tank on blue?

[zipfile]

I you do decide to remove yellow would it be possible to refund your li since they would no longer be useful especially if you have a 2 handed tanking li as you can’t 2 hand tank on blue?

Why?

Plenty of Tracery Rec scrolls around, easily earnable from missions.

Same for runes, you can get plenty by doing consistent dailies and instances.

[Skohgar]

Why-because it would be nice not to have to re-farm all the runes and a decent chunk of traceries again as even though it is easy it still takes quite some time to max them.

But you are right that you could empty the LI and then convert it to a red guard weapon since I think they went back on making it a 1 handed spec so the runes wouldn't be totally wasted.

Again this would be nice but not necessary if they do go down the route or removing yellow since probably only few people have dedicated yellow LIs.

[zipfile]

Why-because it would be nice not to have to re-farm all the runes and a decent chunk of traceries again as even though it is easy it still takes quite some time to max them.

But you are right that you could empty the LI and then convert it to a red guard weapon since I think they went back on making it a 1 handed spec so the runes wouldn't be totally wasted.

Again this would be nice but not necessary if they do go down the route or removing yellow since probably only few people have dedicated yellow LIs.

There aren't that many traceries that are worth for Yellow.

In fact, most are either useless, some used by Blue anyway.

Sure, sucks about enhancement runes, but it's a far cry from undoable. With every chest rewarding at least a Purple Rune on T2-5, and most T3+ rewarding Teals, not to mention every Gundabad daily gives a Purple on its own, it isn't a calamity at all.
You can also spend Ancient Scripts for basic/orange/low-rank Runes to get started.

[Bondamar]

I've had more time to mull over the changes, specifically thinking about yellow. I think as a tree it lacks in value, not necessarily identity. Unfortunately I don't think that the identity it has / is being proposed brings enough variation that would be useful in the style of game LotRO is. Thematically it sounds great on paper but in practice its - lower dps than red, less survivable than blue, potentially better capability for aoe aggro but blue guard is already filling that type of role for many players. Comparatively to bears or (live) wardens which have better aoe threat ability, they've both not been used in practice as much due to the other parts of the class lacking compared to guard.


Lets take a high level look at the state of support trees currently;

Brawler requires 50 trait points to fill the yellow tree and I would argue this is the least depth of any of the support lines. It has a few QoL buffs, some mettle generation bonuses and then skills that add some fellowship support but doesn't really add to the Blue or Red specialization. If no yellow traits existed would it change the function of Red or Blue much? I don't believe so.

Minstrel requires 85 points to fill yellow and has a bigger focus on specialization, bonuses to dps, healing or support. There is enough variety here to get extra dps, extra healing, or play full support. I liked the explanation of "don't think of it as losing yellow line, rather being able to play yellow without losing out from not being specced in Red or Blue." This allows more flexibility and player choice. Best of both worlds.

Warden on Live requires 53 pts to max out yellow tree and has +7 traits from earned. This wasn't enough to hold it as a separate identity that was worth taking other than niche use cases.

Warden on BR requires 79 points to fill the new yellow support. Providing some utility and the Range Dps functionality. It's still in beta obviously but I think this line will provide interesting playstyle variance. Like the 3rd stance for yellow mini but the tree adds a little less value for Red and Blue lines compared to mini.

Guard requires 53 points to max yellow. Alot of this feels like "filler" and even though mini has alot of "filler" it's all oriented around more red, blue or support. The filler here is 3 skills and then 15 points to increase their effectiveness (granted these are strong), 20-25 points of passive buffs depending on what could be considered passive, and a 4 traits = 10 points that interact with yellow specific mechanics. Cataclysmic shout feels pretty underwhelming for a capstone at 2m CD IMO. The earned traits are limited in their gameplay modification. The ability to use a 2H to block and slow upon failing to attack are the biggest ones. Then you have debuffs are stronger, debuffs are longer, and then debuffs are stronger again. Protection and light damage don't offer a ton of value in their Live state.

With this stated I believe keeping Yellow line as a spec-able trait tree would continue it being a second choice to blue line for tanking (end game) and couldn't hope to have as much dps as Red as a tank specific line.
I believe Guardian is a good candidate for yellow being a "support" line that falls in between what Mini and Warden support offers. Some of the ideas you have for Yellow I like, however if they were instead a support line giving both Red/Blue the ability for All melee skills to be AoE. Or for either to adopt light damage, or have your new TtH zone being a purchasable skill. Allowing the flexibility for either Red or Blue to adopt more of a debuffing role, or AoE role along with the QoL traits would provide interesting, content specific choice for both tank or DPS players without Yellow mains feeling like they've lost their preferred way to play. Now they can do so without losing survivability or DPS to play it. In the case of debuffs or AoE being too strong while specced as Red or Blue they could come with trade-offs. All skills deal AoE at the loss of x% dmg, or the ability for your skills to bleed. TtH you gain the ability to life siphon and debuff at the cost of mitigation or Damage Reduction. Neither option would take away from the existing playstyle but they would add the option for more variety to what would be useful in different content/circumstances. Yellow tree supporting in this manner would also "solve" (I use the term loosely) the fact that yellow has less survivability to make it a viable tank, or that it wouldn't have enough AoE damage to take over just going Red. I imagine that Yellow being used as an AoE tank would come about only in the circumstances of there not being better AoE tanks (BR Warden) and Blue being reworked to have less AoE capability.

I believe it is possible to keep/use the identity that Yellow offers and enhance the Tank/DPS trees that exist, like Warden/Mini rather than trying to do a different variation on the same role which in many classes have served to see those trees underutilized at best or not end game viable at worst. I think there is a place for variants on Roles in which both are viable: see Red/Yellow RK. I think this is a fundamental difference about the way tanks in MMO's work. Needing to be the frontline for the group means they have to have similar capability (barring niche/specific boss encounters) but their functionality can be different. For ex a Blue guard and Yellow captain both have the capability to main tank a boss, but the functionality that they bring to the group beyond that sets them apart and makes certain fights favor certain classes. The only way I see for Yellow Guard to stand as its own tree would mean it'd have to match the capability of other tanks, and provide a function beyond that that isn't done so by another tank. Blue guard is likely able to manage any AoE/add tanking scenario. So there would specifically have to be mechanics of boss fights or that Yellow Guard could offer to make it stand out as a better option to AoE tank. Being able to get aggro and survive an AoE tanking encounter is a capability Blue Guard, BR warden share with the proposed Yellow Guard, but what is it it brings that really makes it stand apart. Warden has life taps and self buffing/self healing. Debuffing enemies is of course useful, but in your proposed scenario you have all the enemies in a circle hitting you. So the debuffs become a tool for your capability to survive and lack the functionality for the rest of the group. Said in another way: To get a set amount of incoming damage taken you can self buff, or debuff enemies to get to the same Damage Taken values, but what functionality does the tank bring to the fight beyond that. That is what is most impactful.

[Godomir]

I don´t usually write in the forums, although I read them almost everyday.

As I always say, I leave the Blue line / Raid feedback to my fellows guards that have years of experience and play endgame everyday. Their opinion is most valuable than mine.

I only want to give my humble opinion about Red Guard, the only I play. Since the beggining of my Lotro experience, my main is guard and focused on red 2H Sword. I don´t mind the exact numbers, excels with lots of numbers or whatever. Is the class and style I like the most, and I have a 140 character of every class.

Whatever you do Orion, DON´T NERF ANYTHING in Red Line. I have readed suggestions about making Warriors Heart a only DPS Boost Buff losing its heal, and I can´t be more opposite to changes like that. Red Guards are not in a spot that they likely need nerf to compensate a DPS boost. If you tell me a Hunter, or RK or Champ is going to lose a bit of something to increase DPS, I´m fine with that, they are top level DPS classes, that have sense, but a Guard? No, a guard can receive a DPS boost and still will be years behind that classes, definitively don´t need a nerf to PAY for that buff.

If you are still thinking in nerfing, then better let the red guard stay as it is... That was made in the past with OVERPOWER stance and ended badly, very badly. You want to give us a little more DPS? Ok, I buy it, but not with a payback.

I could accept a minimum -X incoming healing as you said, but that is at my red line. I don´t see a PAYBACK in Hunter´s STRENGHT stance for example. Anyway DON'T CHANGE the function on Catch a Breath and Warriors Heart in Red Line. Is the worst of any possible ideas.

Respecting Yellow line, I would prefer too an Utiliy line as Minstrel, But if there are brothers Guards that play as yellow, then I would accept to keep it, because I respect any Guard, with any style, and any preference in this game.

But add in first yellow line, or first blue a MAX MORALE Trait would be very welcome. We are guards, we are supposed to have high morale pools, like in the past. Nowadays you can see even Minstrels with similar morale, and Heavy classes with more morale even. A 5 ranks trait with +5%,+10%, +15%, +20%, +25% Max morale would be awesowe if you ask me.

Talking about bleeds, I like them, I got used to them during these years. I would increase base damage of bleeds, add a few or 3 more pulses to them, with an overall base skill damage and I think you are done. I would be happy with that. Grant a RED STANCE, +X% damage and job done. In the worst of the cases as I said, -X incoming healing. Only that.

That´s all for my part, thanks for reading. I wish this feedback be useful for you. And hail for my fellow guards across the game.

[Rino90]

Whatever you do Orion, DON´T NERF ANYTHING in Red Line. I have readed suggestions about making Warriors Heart a only DPS Boost Buff losing its heal, and I can´t be more opposite to changes like that. Red Guards are not in a spot that they likely need nerf to compensate a DPS boost. If you tell me a Hunter, or RK or Champ is going to lose a bit of something to increase DPS, I´m fine with that, they are top level DPS classes, that have sense, but a Guard? No, a guard can receive a DPS boost and still will be years behind that classes, definitively don´t need a nerf to PAY for that buff.

If you are still thinking in nerfing, then better let the red guard stay as it is... That was made in the past with OVERPOWER stance and ended badly, very badly. You want to give us a little more DPS? Ok, I buy it, but not with a payback.

I also played a huge amount of time as a red guard, and used two-handed weapons to deal damage in raids since Shadows of Angmar. In Moria and Mirkwood, prior to the introduction of talent trees, overpower stance guardian was one of the best damage dealer in the game.
It seems to me that if the developers are aimed at actually changing the red guard, then it is necessary to improve it to the level of damage lines of other classes that are in demand on high raid tiers, and not be content with half-measures like a solo game or light group activities (this applies to changes to each class and their talent lines, no matter if they are tanky, healer or damage). And if for these purposes it will be necessary to change some key skills, then, in my opinion, these changes should be made.

[zipfile]

overpower stance guardian was one of the best damage dealer in the game.

It wasn't the best, far from it. But it wasn't bad at all, it was...decent. Had some drawbacks (First power penalty, then Armour I think), but it was decent.

[Godomir]

I also played a huge amount of time as a red guard, and used two-handed weapons to deal damage in raids since Shadows of Angmar. In Moria and Mirkwood, prior to the introduction of talent trees, overpower stance guardian was one of the best damage dealer in the game.
It seems to me that if the developers are aimed at actually changing the red guard, then it is necessary to improve it to the level of damage lines of other classes that are in demand on high raid tiers, and not be content with half-measures like a solo game or light group activities (this applies to changes to each class and their talent lines, no matter if they are tanky, healer or damage). And if for these purposes it will be necessary to change some key skills, then, in my opinion, these changes should be made.

I started playing at 2010. Sure you started before than me. 3 years make your opinion more valid? No. I respect your opinion but is as valid as mine.

You say that the changes should be made focus to raid players and not solo or whatever. Firstly I think exactly the opposite. raid players have a guaranted spot with blue, and any changes made for red will never make a "Guard-champ" so Champs/Hunters will still be Top DPS classes, and it´s fine for me. Secondly you are not giving any importance to other playstiles apart from yours. I started my post leaving blue suggestions to others, and saying if some people play yellow, then keep yellow tree.

You say that red guard also should be focused to raid because you raid with him. And that´s ok, but It will be a MAJOR ERROR, made changes with that in mind. Because RED is not intended for raid, is intended to progress across the rest of the game at a reasonable speed (Missions, skirmishes, 3 mans, moors, and open field).

Skills should NEVER be changed its function in RED, apart from INCREASE the damage, bleeds or pulses.

And when you say Overpower was fine. I disagree. First overpower was meeeh, ok, I buy it. But the reworked Overpower (The one with armour penalty) let a Glass-Canon Guard, hated by the majority, specially in the MOORS, where Creeps started to focus Guards even before than minis or rks.

There is life outside raids, you have to put on the table, like that playstiles or not, is not only "Solo" as you say, and I think red or yellow guard is there where need the major changes. Asking RED to be also focused in raids will be wrong. Sure that a DPS increase or good changes to RED could be good to fill a spot in a raid, but a champ or a hunter will always be prefered, and I repeat that´s ok.


So, I respect your opinion but I am totally in the opposite side, and disagree. It´s my humble opinion as valid as any other. No more no less.

Greetings my friend.

[zipfile]

Firstly I think exactly the opposite. raid players have a guaranted spot with blue, and any changes made for red will never make a "Guard-champ" so Champs/Hunters will still be Top DPS classes, and it´s fine for me

...okay. Stopped reading after this.

[Rino90]

I started playing at 2010. Sure you started before than me. 3 years make your opinion more valid? No. I respect your opinion but is as valid as mine.

I didn't try to downplay your point of view with my post. I just wanted to show Orion and other Guardians reading this thread that there is another opinion on the Red Guardian rework. And it seems to me that discussion and arguments in favor of a particular concept would be useful for developers.

You say that the changes should be made focus to raid players and not solo or whatever. Firstly I think exactly the opposite. raid players have a guaranted spot with blue, and any changes made for red will never make a "Guard-champ" so Champs/Hunters will still be Top DPS classes, and it´s fine for me. Secondly you are not giving any importance to other playstiles apart from yours. I started my post leaving blue suggestions to others, and saying if some people play yellow, then keep yellow tree.

It's not quite right. In Remmorchant, the Blue Guardian was not in demand, and having no alternative in the form of another talent line. Many Guardians had to play other classes, or put their raid in a deliberately weaker position.

You say that red guard also should be focused to raid because you raid with him. And that´s ok, but It will be a MAJOR ERROR, made changes with that in mind. Because RED is not intended for raid, is intended to progress across the rest of the game at a reasonable speed (Missions, skirmishes, 3 mans, moors, and open field).

Why will the changes never be able to equalize the Red Guardian with other top dps classes? Also, I don't think you fully understand the requirements for damage dealers in high raid tiers. It's not enough to just deal dps. Sufficient survivability and utility are also very important. When Guardians suggest adding crit or physical mastery from core stats or from armor, as Orion suggested, they want to be able to pump their mitigations higher at the expense of virtues and essences without losing damage, as the current damage dealers do. And when I talk about the necessary changes, this does not mean giving up all survivability for the sake of more damage. For example, if "Warrior's Heart" becomes a damage boosting buff, then the old heal effect from "Prey on the Weak" returns.

Skills should NEVER be changed its function in RED, apart from INCREASE the damage, bleeds or pulses.

But they have already changed many times before. For example, I liked the old concept of the red line more with 10 dots from crit, strong healing and "Hammer Down" and "Overwhelm" working differently. This is a highly subjective opinion, but it seems to me that many changes are acceptable if they are aimed at improving the state of the class and expanding its gameplay.

There is life outside raids, you have to put on the table, like that playstiles or not, is not only "Solo" as you say, and I think red or yellow guard is there where need the major changes. Asking RED to be also focused in raids will be wrong. Sure that a DPS increase or good changes to RED could be good to fill a spot in a raid, but a champ or a hunter will always be prefered, and I repeat that´s ok.

If the Red Guardian becomes relevant in the high tiers of raids, then he will have absolutely no problems in solo, skirmishes or light group activities. But at the same time, if one of the talent lines does not fall into the raid meta, then there will be a chance to participate in the raid by switching to another.

[MechanicalMan]

Our main objective with Fighter of Shadow is to define it's role more clearly. That is to say, not make this a supporting line, rather a line that gives the Guardian a third distinct role. That role is as an AoE Tank.

I have played since launch and been a guardian main since the Rift was introduced, and the yellow line has been my favorite spec for many years now. I love the idea of making this line an AoE tank and turning all the skills into AoE skills. I'd hate to see it just turned into a utility line that you can't spec into. The AoE spam of the current yellow line is a lot of fun. Crank that up!

[Technician46]

I have played since launch and been a guardian main since the Rift was introduced, and the yellow line has been my favorite spec for many years now. I love the idea of making this line an AoE tank and turning all the skills into AoE skills. I'd hate to see it just turned into a utility line that you can't spec into. The AoE spam of the current yellow line is a lot of fun. Crank that up!

The problem I see with this idea is why would you want 2 tank lines? We have a decent amount of aoe in blue line and there are many instances where single target damage is REQUIRED, this holds specially true when raiding. I believe that making the yellow trait line into a utility line will work better over all. Blue line by itself is a pretty dull line and I do agree that a lot of the yellow line trait is what makes blue line more interesting and worth playing. But a 2nd yellow tank line? Nah, its just a waste.

[Okendor]

I have traditionally preferred Yellow Guard for my solo and small group play as it seems like it struck a good balance between AoE damage and survivability. It's by far my favorite line, even with some of the changes that have taken place over the last couple years. I would love to see the Yellow Guard strengthened in this area, a hybrid between Blue and Red (basically what a Champ tank could be if it were ever viable). With my Yellow builds, I pull in some Red or Blue depending on whether I want a more DPS or tank focused build but with Yellow as the core.

I know people will say you can probably do the same thing with Red/Blue main lines and Yellow as a utility. In my little world, it doesn't quite work out the same.

Just my little 0.02.

[Godomir]

I didn't try to downplay your point of view with my post. I just wanted to show Orion and other Guardians reading this thread that there is another opinion on the Red Guardian rework. And it seems to me that discussion and arguments in favor of a particular concept would be useful for developers.



It's not quite right. In Remmorchant, the Blue Guardian was not in demand, and having no alternative in the form of another talent line. Many Guardians had to play other classes, or put their raid in a deliberately weaker position.



Why will the changes never be able to equalize the Red Guardian with other top dps classes? Also, I don't think you fully understand the requirements for damage dealers in high raid tiers. It's not enough to just deal dps. Sufficient survivability and utility are also very important. When Guardians suggest adding crit or physical mastery from core stats or from armor, as Orion suggested, they want to be able to pump their mitigations higher at the expense of virtues and essences without losing damage, as the current damage dealers do. And when I talk about the necessary changes, this does not mean giving up all survivability for the sake of more damage. For example, if "Warrior's Heart" becomes a damage boosting buff, then the old heal effect from "Prey on the Weak" returns.



But they have already changed many times before. For example, I liked the old concept of the red line more with 10 dots from crit, strong healing and "Hammer Down" and "Overwhelm" working differently. This is a highly subjective opinion, but it seems to me that many changes are acceptable if they are aimed at improving the state of the class and expanding its gameplay.



If the Red Guardian becomes relevant in the high tiers of raids, then he will have absolutely no problems in solo, skirmishes or light group activities. But at the same time, if one of the talent lines does not fall into the raid meta, then there will be a chance to participate in the raid by switching to another.

I understand you better now Rino. You have some good points. Although I still believe in some others of mine. Thanks for your polite answer.


-Zipfile. Member.

I stopped reading at this point XD

[Gamlieldar]

In the autumn of last year, I posted my initial musings on some alterations that I wanted to make to Guardians. There was a lot of good feedback and discussion, and though, I let the thread lapse, I have been keeping up with things and making some alternative plans based on the feedback I've seen.

And let me be another voice to say that I appreciate the work you're doing and the thought that you're putting into this, Orion. As someone who has played the game since 2010/2011, the guardian has been the class that kept me going back to the game during lulls, has been my first toon, and has been my favorite class. I've enjoyed everything from casual solo play to add-tanking in HoA T3. It's been enjoyable to see this class remain largely consistent and not too overloaded with revamps since the trait tree introduction. Having said all that, I've read through your post, your replies, and the replies of others, and I'd like to add my feedback to emphasize some points made by others while also providing an outlook that hopefully encourages you to choose the path that makes this rework extremely fluid for all.

A fair amount of people seem to agree with your thought process of not brawlerizing the Fighter of Shadow yellow line. Then there are others who wholeheartedly and passionately believe that yellow line should be brawlerized by all means. I am of the latter crowd, but I want to bring a few points to light to explain my perspective.

#1: It's very clear that making yellow line an AoE tank, as is stated in your main objective in the OP, is redundant when Blue Line already thrives as an AoE tank. On the Blue side itself, we have increased radius for Challenge AoE taunt (slightly larger radius than Brawler's Point Blank AoE taunt, which is second-best PBAoE if I'm not mistaken?), multi-targets from Shield-Smash, and Shield Taunt. Then we supplement the blue line with stuff from yellow to further enhance our AoE capabilities. To make yellow-line another AoE tank is redundant.

#2: With the above redundancy in mind, your perspective on the AoE debuffing component/theme of the yellow line can still be utility/brawlerized line that complements the red/blue guard build. This can be done without ruining people's enjoyment of the yellow line spec. I will explain this in more detail below. But first, to discuss blue line...

The Defender of the Free

On the surface, the blue trait line and the blue guardian is in pretty good shape. There are only a few minor changes that I think we want to make; and by minor, I mean really minor.

In general, I would agree that the blue line guard is in "pretty good shape." NOT excellent, but good. There's room for improvement, especially in terms of tankiness when BPE is not as effective in certain boss-fighting situations. However, contrary to some posts, I don't believe this requires massive overhauls/changes of certain abilities in blue line. Just some slightly-more-than-minor nitpicks here and there.

Purchased Traits

Relentless Assault becomes Skilled Deflection: which would change out the finesse increases, and replace them with a flat bonus to your parry.

So let's start with the Relentless Assault Change:

#1: Please keep Relentless assault as it is on live. Blue guards needs finesse to land more consistent hits with war chant on T3+ content, especially when it comes to picking up adds. Moving finesse to red would require us to get that finesse in red, and since we're already starved for points to maximize the strength of redirect/improved Thrill of Danger/Tenderize, AND since red guards are finding plenty of finesse on DPS gear, this change is not necessary. HOWEVER, since you're bringing parry chance into the Blue Line, let's discuss...

#2: Defensive Expertise -- allow this trait to include both block and parry chance increases by 1%/rank. I might also suggest that the final rank allows Shield Blow to open up a Parry Response in addition to the default opening up a Block Response to allow better access to the parry chain (and in that, better access to one of our big DR cooldowns).

#3: Disorientation -- As somebody has already mentioned, this trait is universally considered to be garbage. DPS players/guard tanks who need finesse are intentionally gearing themselves in such a way that they are NOT depending on enemy -% BPE/resist debuffs. This trait is pointless and needs a rework.

Suggestion #1: Renamed to Defensive Endurance: Successful Blocks and Parries have a 20/40/60/80/100% chance to reduce incoming damage by 5%. This effect stacks up to 3 times, and persists until the Guardian has left combat for 9 seconds OR the guardian is healed to 100% morale.

Suggestion #2: Keep disorientation as the name - NEW EFFECT - Critical hits with shield skills cause the struck target(s) to receive 2/4/6/8/10% miss chance and -4/-8/-12/-16/-20% outgoing damage for 15 seconds.

#4: Juggernaut -- considering the definition of Juggernaut as a huge, powerful, unstoppable force, it is clear that the guardian is unstoppable in that he cannot be stunned. But if an emergency calls for the guardian to be undefeatable, Juggernaut is not the skill for that. I suggest that for the duration, while block chance remains at 100%, the guardian also absorbs 100% of damage received. The guardian may also reflect a portion of the absorbed damage in addition to the thorns-like effect when the guardian blocks an attack.

#5: BREAK FREAKIN' RANKS -- Sorry, had to capitalize on the awesomeness of this ability -- But seriously, MAKE THIS EFFECT ITS OWN ABILITY! Redesign it in such a way that its more powerful if utilizing max stacks of fortifications similar to Litany of Defiance.

Example Description:: Cashes out fortifications to increase the damage of nearby raid and fellowship allies within 50m by 35% + 2% per cashed out fortification. Each cashed out fortification increases critical strike chance and critical damage of nearby allies by 2% and 4% respectively per fortification. Cooldown: 1 minute. Duration: 15 sec. Obviously, play around with the numbers.

The Keen Blade

Our main objective in adjusting the red line, is to get the damage output to a spot where it competes against other high DPS characters. Of course, we need to be careful to allow the guardian to keep all of their top line tanking - so there will be a trade-off.

The first step in doing this, is giving The Keen Blade an specialization perk. My current thought on this specialization is, to lean into the heavy nature of the guardian, while also using the changes to mastery. Along those lines the current thought is this: All outgoing healing is reduced significantly, and the physical mastery increases based off of your armour value. The trade-off here would allow for a measure of consistency in the combat hits of the red line guardian.

Our secondary objectives, are to make the red line guardian sustained damage more consistent, make burst damage more reliable, remove reliance on combat response events, and have a capstone that is beneficial to the fellowship.

I am happy to see that you want to increase red-line damage so that it is able to compete against other high DPS characters such as the champion, hunter, red warden, red brawler, etc. - However, I do not follow your reasoning on providing a -outgoing healing effect to compensate. If your concern is that the guardian's toolkit has too much survivability/healing in PvMP (and perhaps too much access to more if yellow line was brawlerized), then MAYBE this should be considered during later phases of testing. But I wouldn't go outright with setting up a -outgoing healing effect, with or without an armor = physical mastery buff.

As for removing reliance on combat response events, I think you mean to REDUCE (not remove) reliance on combat response events. Just wanted to clarify the wording if that's correct.

Earned Traits

Reactive Parry: Adjust the damage upward to give value to the trait.

Bleed Them Dry: Moves to 15 points deep in the line

Protection by the Sword: moves to 20 deep in the line

Prey on the Weak: Moves to 25 deep in the line

Brutal Charge: Moves to the capstone slow of granted traits and affects only melee-based skills

#1: Reactive Parry -- The damage boost is intended to make the damage comparable to red brawler's earned trait "Like a Stinging Nettle." This is a good change in solo play. I like it.

#2: Bleed Them Dry/Protection By the Sword/Prey on the Weak -- How does moving these earned traits help accomplish your vision for the reworked red guardian? I'm not following this.

As for the previously mentioned earned traits, some feedback:

Prey On The Weak: As others have said, this trait is absolutely impotent. Please look into this. I'll settle for any of the previously mentioned suggestions for Prey on the Weak, but, definitely look into this.

Protection By The Sword: Redesign recommendation -- Buff's the target's -incoming damage % , +outgoing % melee damage, and +% parry chance (because protection by sword). Allies within 50m gain a +5% damage bonus to melee/ranged/tactical skills.

Bleed Them Dry: In addition to its current effect, Bleed damage has an X% chance to reset the cooldown of Hammer Down and increase its critical damage by Y%. Not exactly something I think is needed to enhance red line's damage, but would make the rotation a little more fun and unpredictable.

Purchased Traits

Broad Strokes: moves up in the line but remains unchanged.

Relentless Assault: Swapping positions from the blue line, this now increases finesse and increases the tick count on all guardian bleeds.

Heavy Weapons: Flat mod on two-handed weapon damage by 2%/tier

Thrill of Battle : Damaging Attacks in combat increase your Critical Chance by 1%/tier, Caps at 5 stacks, Critically striking resets the benefit

Thrust: While specialized in Keen Blade no longer requires a combat response

Tireless Blows: 10% chance, on criticals, to reset Brutal Assault/tier

Invigourating Parry becomes Invigourating Critical: Restore 1% to your power on a critical strike

To the Rescue: Tier 6 no longer functions on every skill - this shifts to just melee skills gain the crit chance.

#1: Relentless Assault -- Your initial thoughts was to have this trait in red line. I insisted it stays in the blue line. Now, in lieu of this, I recommend replacing red line's skilled deflection (grants % parry chance on live) with an effect called --> Skillful Assault: Increases critical strike chance by 1%/rank and also increases the bleed ticks/rank.

#2: Thrill of Battle -- Correct me if I'm wrong, but essentially at maximum rank, this effect has the potential to grant you +25% additional crit chance at max stacks. However, this maximum potential will hardly be reached because all stacks will be canceled and set to zero upon a critical hit from you. Perhaps at lower levels a guardian will find good benefit at traiting this 5/5 ranks, but a guardian that is crit capped at 25% before other bonuses apply will probably find 3/5 ranks sufficient. If you want to encourage all guardians to cash in max ranks on this trait, I suggest allowing the effect to tier up to max ranks before causing critical hits to cancel the effect. Overall, I like this idea. I really do. It's TIGHT, as Ryan George would say.

#3: Thrust -- No longer requires a combat response in red line. This is a VERY interesting change that allows for flexibility in maintaining bleed uptime. I'm happy that retaliation/whirling are still needed to unlock overwhelm.

#4: Tireless Assault -- Are the criticals discussed in this trait ALL criticals or the criticals of abilities?

#5: Invigourating Critical -- From what I'm reading, critical hits with ALL Abilities restore power instead of just parry reactive abilities. This helps with power management moderately. Good suggestion. Keep this one.

Honourable Combat is Replaced with Rupture: To the King gains, remove all current bleeds for damage based on the number of deeds present, increases incoming damage on the affected target by 3% for 5 seconds/bleed removed.

Okay, so this one is a doozy on the feedback I have. Make like a Beorning and bear with me.

So, given that the guardian currently can perform 4 bleeds maximum on a target and, combined with Bleed Them Dry and your version of "Relentless Assault," keep uptime on them VERY easily, executing rupture at four-bleed capacity should be super easy, bearly an inconvenience. However, as others have mentioned, To The King is NOT a good ability to apply rupture towards, as it is one of our constantly used heavy hitters to keep uptime on the damage buff. To that, I suggest applying the rupture effect to...

FORCE OPENING!!!! Okay, sort of. Force Opening on live is a skill that every guard hates because of its low damage and slow animation. Without the Hiddenhoard Red Guardian 4-set, this skill was your dreaded last resort in getting a parry response chain started. So here's the deal: with the 4 piece bonus in mind, I propose this solution for rupture

#1: Force Opening in its live form is deleted. Rupture becomes a capstone skill instead of a passive that deals pretty huge damage (comparable to Hammer Down) and shares Force Opening's Icon.

#2: If traited in Keen Blade, Guardian's Ward opens up a parry response. This therefore inherits the original function of Force Opening. Guardian's Ward deals a lot more damage on live and has a smoother/faster animation than Force Opening.

#3: In doing this change, the Hiddenhoard 4-set bonus would instead cause To The King to Grant a Parry Response.

This would be one way of allowing Rupture to be used without disrupting the red guard's rotation. But you also mentioned letting Rupture apply to Hammer Down. If you decide to go that route, I must ask a few questions:

Question #1: What is the proposed uptime for the +Incoming Damage % debuff on struck target? Is the uptime similar to Blue Beorning's Rending Blow? Or is it similar to Gut Punch with an internal 70 second cooldown per target? Or middle of the road in adherence with the 40 second CD on Hammer Down?

Question #2: If you decide against sacrificing active bleeds for the +incoming damage % debuff? Allow rupture/Force Opening/Hammer Down to deal 100% damage/bleed removed + 15% increased critical chance/damage per bleed removed?


Overall Concluding Thoughts on Red Line Rework:

These proposed ideas are a step in the right direction, and I think you're catching on to the vision to see the Red Guardian being a bleeding edge damage dealer with some powerful group utility while carrying some powerful group utility (not too much to overshadow a red captain, which deals less damage in return while in support stance). Keep at it!

The Fighter of Shadow

Our main objective with Fighter of Shadow is to define it's role more clearly. That is to say, not make this a supporting line, rather a line that gives the Guardian a third distinct role. That role is as an AoE Tank.

As I said before in my introduction, I don't think yellow line needs to be a separate line to specialize in. I'm with others when they say that it would be too much hassle for trying to make yellow guard work as a second tank. Still, I would keep its playstyle available as a brawlerized utility line. And if yellow ends up being brawlerized, the earned traits would have to be purchasable somehow.

Specialization Perk

Attacks against targets affected by Take to Heart, have a 50% chance to restore 5% of your max morale. Cannot occur more than once every 5s.
All melee skills become AOE.

Earned Traits

Take to Heart: Usable outside of combat, loses toggle status and becomes a visualized hotspot with a duration, maximum size, and maximum targets to affect.

Flash of Light: Damaging skills executed by the guardian become Light damage.

Disabling Strikes, Manifested Ire, Incapacitation, Mark of Permanence: Only applies to targets within the Take to Heart effect.

Take to Heart: A beautiful re-iteration of the current captain-esque toggle (which I find those types of toggles annoying to begin with). I'd like to see this be used universally between red or blue if yellow goes as a utility line, and maybe have the effect vary if specialized as either red or blue. Example could be: Blue Line Take to Heart causes enemies to have -Physical and Tactical Mitigation % while Red Line Take to Heart causes enemies receive +incoming damage % increase). The Miss Chance from the Original Take to Heart would instead go to War-Chant.

Flash of Light: If yellow becomes brawlerized, Flash of Light could serve as a DPS cooldown in redline that increases outgoing damage by 10-20%, converts all damage to light damage, and allows nearby allies to deal 5% additional damage as Light Damage. I know that Light damage support is very poor. If Flash of Light is used in Blue Line, it allows shield skills and blocks to restore 3% of the guardian's morale, and healing allies within 50m of the guardian for X% of the morale healed. Either effect would last 15 seconds on a 1 minute cooldown. The blue line effect would probably need some balancing - imagine a Blue Guard popping this ability and juggernaut at the same time. *pog*

Disabling Strikes/Incapacitation: Have these passive earned traits be built into the respective abilities. No trait lines required, no trait points required. Basically, as soon as you get Engage and Stagger, they both start and end with -50% target run speed.

Manifested Ire: Renamed this to Purifying Light -- when enemies enter into the Take To Heart ground effect, they lose a corruption every 3 seconds. Access to this purchased trait would require having purchased Take to Heart (Therefore, the trait would read "Requires: Take To Heart (1/1)") On live, Manifested Ire provides a slow if enemies fail to attack the guardian, but if we make Engage and Stagger both AoEs (I know, can't do that without the yellow passive all melee skills become AoE, read on for my solution), Manifested Ire is redundant. So this is a suggestion to make this earned-trait-turned-purchasable more useful.

Mark of Permanence: I know that you've mentioned wanting to work on this because of how abusive this trait can be, if I'm understanding correctly. I think one way to go about this is to allow the Take to Heart effect to trigger an effect every 5 seconds that increases the duration of guardian debuffs by 30-45 seconds. I would have this effect be the second rank of Purifying Light mentioned above.

Purchased Traits

Radiate: Increases the range of Take to Heart by 1m Increases affected Targets by 1

Insult to Injury: No change, as of yet, but we have our eye on you.

Numbed Senses: Adds 1 second to the cooldown of Ignore the Pain, + 1 Increases to Debuff Removal

Radiate: How many targets base would you expect Take to Heart to effect? And what would happen to the Take to Heart ground effect if the maximum number of targets hits it? Would it simply stop working new, oncoming targets? Or would the effect disappear? What's your thinking with the target count?

Insult to Injury: So if Yellow Line becomes Brawlerized, the passive Yellow-Line bonus of all melee abilities becoming AoE is lost, because you can't spec into Yellow Anymore. This is where we put Insult to Injury to Use, and we give it a new name

New Effect: Reverberating Light Requires: Take to Heart (1/1) Using Engage, Stagger, Singular Focus (Passive), and War Chant on a target under the effects of Take to Heart causes all targets under the effects of Take to Heart to receive the debuffs from these abilities and additionally increase their light damage taken by 2/4/6/8/10%. The Light Damage effect can only be applied once per target.

Numbed Senses: I'm not understanding what you mean by the description. Do you mean to add an extra rank that increases the cooldown of Ignore the Pain by 1 second while increasing the number of debuffs by 1? Or is it a 1 and 1 per rank, up to 3 ranks as what we have on live. If the latter, I would be completely against this proposed change. One big niche of the Guardian is being able to dispel multiple debuffs in a short amount of time. This niche is what made them extremely valuable in tanking Cold-Worms in Hiddenhoard as well as the Candles in the Den of Pughlak Vision. Please don't touch the cooldown unless you intend on not having Cold-Worms/Candle Swarms/future content be so debuff intensive.


Some Final Thoughts: I have some thoughts on Cataclysmic Shout and Singular Focus to make them more desirable for group content. Cataclysmic shout could cause heavy damage, and all struck targets will take +20% incoming damage for 10 seconds, keeping the 2 minute cooldown the same or slightly decreasing it to 1.5 minutes. Singular Focus could also be affected by Reverberating Light. But neither abilities' durations could be refreshed by Mark of Permanence. Also, with every other tank specialization carrying a +% morale boost, including champs and wardens, it may be worth looking into giving Guardians a nice little morale % boost upon speccing in blue or putting 2/4/6/8/10% morale increase in yellow line's trait "High-Spirited." Whatever works.

Thanks again, Orion!

[Tepee]

Dear Orion, and fellow Guardians,

This is my first post here in the forum, but I'm excited about reworking my favourite class, so I wanted to share with you all what I was thinking about it.

First of all, I think I can state that the small majority of Guardians here would like to get rid of the yellow spec, because they want a more interesting blue/red spec in exchange via a more flexible yellow trait tree. And would say, many things become less and less exciting about the Guardian, sometimes it just feels too "stock", and there is very little room for customization. If you do not play by the "meta" traits, it is just weaker then, and not a bit more fun in exchange.

However, a substantial minority also said, that they want the yellow line to stay, because they want sometimes higher survivability for solo, maybe trying to solo some older landscape group content (which is fun stuff), and doing 3-6 men casual instances with a 2-hander, simply because choosing blue over yellow is not required there, and your group progresses much faster because of your higher damage. I also have use of the yellow-line for these reasons in the current game.

But the thing is, yellow has very few unique mechanics, and it's official role is "high damage AOE tank". I honestly don't see why would be a good choice to keep this spec alive, when the blue is a tank, the red is a dps, and yellow is a "somewhere-in-between"? But, as a supplemental tree it would have a great opportunity to spice up what it feels like being a Guardian either blue or red.

First things first, there are approx. 4 types of Guardian players:

Blue Main Tank with 1h and shield: most popular on endgame, but less useful nowadays compared to some other tanks.
Red DPS with 2h: can be a dps in a group, but not that wanted, also the most popular leveling style.
Yellow Tank/Solo with 2h: not that popular, slower for leveling, not enough tanky for main tank, but fun sometimes, and has a fan group.
Red Solo with 1h and shield: not that popular nowadays, but some people want to level faster so do red line, but they don't want to throw away their shields. Dwarves mainly.
(And yeah also the Yellow 1h and shield style, but the last time I saw one the dodos weren't extinct yet.)

If doing any major rework to this class, I think you (the developers) should keep all these groups in mind, and try to make all of them happy. I have some vague ideas how to get rid of the yellow spec without making any of these groups angry.

The Fighter of Shadow (utility)

This line should focus on keeping alive the niche playing styles, but also improving the Blue Tank (shield) and Red DPS (2h) experience.

Force Opening: becomes a level-up skill. No need to restrict blue from having this skill. So basic, 2 out of 3 lines have it, not mandatory all the time, but always nice to have a force trigger.

Protection: becomes a level-up skill. I like the idea that Guardians should have an unconditional support toggle that can be placed on the healer in blue line, and on the tank in red line. Increase the range to 40-50m, etc, should become something like the Captain's "Brother" skills. More on this later.

Purchased traits:

Insult to Injury: instead of refreshing debuffs, it applies a new debuff (something like "Salted!" hehe) that increases the potency of bleeds by 20-50% and guardian debuffs by 50-100%. The second part would save the current "Disabling Strikes" and "Incapacitation" yellow set traits, while the first part would bring back the big role this trait had at the Helm's Deep-era red guardians. Also, increase the apply chance to 30-50% for consistency.

Take to Heart: I like your idea really, should be first row 2 points trait. Maybe a bit lower healing, but all in all, as others said, by removing the healing from Prey on the Weak, the guardian has no consistent self-healing now, so I doubt it would be too OP.

Radiate: again, your idea is okay, but move down a row and unlocked by Take to Heart. Also you mentioned that in (your) yellow line, all skills would become AoE. I think this would be a bit overkill, but I think a trait that gives "all single-target skills will damage all targets affected by Take to Heart" should be nice, maybe Radiate would be a nice choice for it. Max rank would be for 50-100% damage, include bleeds somehow. Again, I'm not sure if this would be the best trait for it, or we need a new one.

Flash of Light: increments to 5, max rank gives 25-50% light damage (War-chant sure need a bit more dmg), first rank gives the light damage to Take to Heart. Unlocked by Take to Heart, the position on the tree is not clear in my mind.

High-spirited: fine, fine, but send it to the blue line. Also, Guardian tanks need a bit of morale atm, so I think it would be the nice spot to place an incrementing 10% max morale, or some vitality along with the current incoming healing.

Numbed Senses: I can understand why it needs a nerf, because it is by far the best debuff removal in the game. For now, I agree with your proposed change. Maybe move it to blue line, not sure.

Bolster, Tenderize: let them trigger from Protection, that's for sure.

Thrill of Danger, Bring on the Pain: I think it is fine as it is, maybe move it to blue line, not sure.

Strong Bursts: sounds meaningful with the new mastery update, but move it to red line. Also it could give some +AoE target count.

Redirect, Vicious Rebuttal: nope, no need here. Only tanks use this, and yes, it is pretty useful, but it doesn't even trigger To the King (for a reason I think), red line wouldn't need it, so move them to the blue line, in similar place, everyone will be happy, honestly.

War-chant, Demoralizing Anthem: both blue and red line needs this skill so much! However, the added threat that comes with it is not nice if you are dps-ing in a group in red, so remove it, unless you trait:

Manifested Ire: adds back the threat to War-chant, and gives the snare stuff. A little utility for tanking. Also... Finesse debuff for War-chant maybe? Or something like that. Should be helping at high level I guess.

Warrior's Fortitude (yellow): the least useful of the Fortitude skills. I think it is nice to see it gone, and replaced by:

Improved Protection: gives you the ability to respond to your Protection's target's blocks and parries.

Singular Focus: this can be a capstone... at least it can be made one. First of all, move it to the red line, and give it some meaningful debuff. Armor is okay, or mitigations, but make it flat %-based like the Rune-Keeper has. This would make a desirable utility against bosses.

Cataclysmic Shout: this is just useless now. Even when I play yellow to solo some landscape group content I never use it, and if I do, it doesn't really change the outcome of the fights. The only use for this skill that I can think of is that it would be the trigger ability for the "Break Ranks" capstone in blue line. The result in the tooltip would look like the Champion trait and skill "Unbreakable" and "Mighty Roar". Also, half the cooldown to match Break Ranks, and remove the debuff spreading ability, but the stun can remain. Reasons why it's so fitting:
- Neither Shield-taunt nor Smashing Stab is useful to trigger Break Ranks becuse they have their own use cases.
- Class fantasy: breaking the ranks in a cataclysmic shout, to indicate fellows now is the time to go full brr. Also very loud and visible, good choice for indicating this.
- The AoE stun gives the opportunity to quickly build back Fortification, at least against trash mobs.
All in all, I think it would be very fitting choice.

Light-touched: this is the name? I just looked it up... maybe it could use a name change. Anyway, this is currently the trait that gives you the ability to block with a 2-hander. I think it would make a good yellow capstone with the following:
- Gives the ability to block with a 2-hander obviously. Gives some survivability to red line, and gives the ability to go 2h tanking in the blue line.
- When specced in blue line, gives the ability to build Fortification via parry skills too. That still wouldn't be enough for 2h tanking, so I guess Guardian's Ward too.
- When specced in red line, Reactive Parry can trigger on blocks too, also on the Protection's target!
- Gives you a unique buff depending on whether you use a 2-hander or sword and board. Similar to Champion "Weapons Master" trait, crit dmg + attack speed for 2h and flat dmg + block chance for 1h would be nice I think.

The Defender of the Free

Earned Traits

Most of the current line is nice, however:

Shield Wall: is useless. Remove this skill entirely, and replace it with:

Protection by the Shield: Protection transfers 5-10% threat from the target, and 10-20% damage the target takes (after the target's avoidances and mitigation) to the Guardian. This would make a good toggle that you place on the healer or the other tank if you're running 2 tanks.

Purchased Traits

Relentless Assault: needed in red too, so move it to yellow line.

Guardian's Pledge, Juggernaut: these two skills gives the same effect basically: avoidance-based emergency. There are two situations when you try to use them:
1. Invincibility. If the attacks of the enemy you face can be avoided, you avoid all of them.
2. Basically nothing. Your enemy either has unavoidable attacks, or has tactical attacks, that cannot be bpe'd.
Sice Guardians can reach 65-75% full avoidance (depending on whether Adaptability is on or not), these skills are overkill in endgame in the first case, and useless in the second case. I propose separating these two skills with distinct effects:

Guardian's Pledge: instead of avoidance increases, it maximizes the damage the Guardian can take from any damaging source at 15-10% of their max morale for its duration. (I hope you can understand this, if something would hit you for higher than this, it would hit you for that percentage instead. Damage cap if you will.) Can be decreased to 9,5-4,5% with tracery. This would give an emergency button against bosses specifically.

Juggernaut: also gives 50-100% resistance. If attacks can be avoided, avoid them properly, from every source.

Shield-smash, Follow Through, Improved Shield Spikes: move them to yellow line, so red shielders can access it.

Disorientation: I'm not sure that this debuff is meaningful or not. I propose it should move to red line, and since Overwhelm has the same icon, I think it is fitting that that skill gives this debuff 100% of the time at max rank. Also, it should decrease resistance too, helps with bleeds, and again, avoidance should apply to every source.

Break Ranks: as I mentioned in the yellow line, Cataclysmic Shout is a fitting skill for this trigger, this trait should give the skill too.

The other stuff here are okey-ish.

The Keen Blade

I agree, red line needs a specialization perk. It should be nothing else, but "critical hits trigger a parry response". End of story. This would be much similar to blue line Burglar, where Burglars get a reactive element in addition of the class usual proactive nature, and the reverse would apply the Guardian here. I cannot imagine anything other than this that would solve the parry skill consistency issues that Guardians have right now.

Also, in my mind the current parry chain is sacred. Removing the Thrust from the chain would generate more problems than it would solve. The above parry chain trigger change would solve everything we need.

If Forced Opening would become a level-up skill, red line would need another skill that unlocks immediately, and that should be:

Brutal Assault: currently needs 11! trait points to unlock it's full potency, and other than its bleed (which also very poor at higher levels, even with DoT traceries, as every Guardian bleed right now; just tested on Bullroarer) it is useless. 11 trait points for a skill that gives a short bleed and the base damage just slightly better than Sting? So I propose it should give 5% critical chance for the same duration (10 sec) as it's bleed, triggered by its critical hit (same as Champion's Wild Attack). This ability should either bestow upon you as soon as you specialise, or attached to Tireless Blows. In the latter case, Brutal Assault needs to get its bleed instantly, level 2, after spec. The thing is, currently nothing, again, nothing encourages me to trait Brutal Assault and Tireless Blows until I can also trait Haemorrhage. This should change!

Earned Traits

Reactive Parry: your proposed change is nice, but only if it could pair with Protection (by the Sword). Make it meaningful, make it cool, and make it relevant if someone else is tanking in the group.

Protection by the Sword: Not a separate skill, but instead it enhances the general Protection. Reactive Parry applies to the target's parries too. The melee damage aura radius should be increased significantly. (Improved Protection in the yellow line gives the current effect.)

Bleed Them Dry: make it something meaningful. At Helm's Deep it doubled the Guardian's Bleed max stack from 5 to 10. Make this trait that much meaningful again.

Brutal Charge: do not dare to touch it! It is the only cool thing red Guardians have currently from their Golden Age in Helm's Deep. Infinite duration on the next skill stun was broken, I admit, so I agree with that change, and I agree with the "only damaging melee skills can trigger it", as your current change with it's critical strike when traited. Aside from that, leave it alone, it's fun, it's cool, and it is not broken, it never was. Beornings and Champions have the same skill anyways, I know they are slower, but still, it is good as it is. And it shouldn't be a capstone, capstone should be, as always:

Pray on the Weak: of course, not in it's current form. Back in Helm's Deep, it gave self-heal and damage based on the bleeds on the targets when critically hit. Nobody wants back the self-heal aspect, it was so much broken... But I have an idea how it should work now. Critical hits with skills would trigger a "free" bleed tick on the target suffering from any of the Guardian's bleed. The free means the same damage as the bleed, but doesn't tick down the duration. This should finally give the damage red Guardians need, and it would simply based on the old system, where a decent portion of the damage came from this trait.

Purchased Traits

Thrill of Battle: red line needs a bit of self-heal atm (compare it to red Champions, they have much more now!), so this should be the same trait in essence. However, needs some change, first of all, this should give 1% crit chance per tier. Not conditional, not temporary, but flat, passive 5% crit at max rank. Secondly, the cooldown should be decreased, or removed, depending on a lot of things. Thirdly, it should apply to every critical hit you make with skills, not just response skills.

Skilled Deflection: nice! I always trait it for landscape. But a red Guardian in a group don't need it. A blue Guardian in a group might need it. Move it to yellow, everyone would be happy.

Heavy Weapons Training: As much as I love your proposal that would make the red line more 2-hander oriented, those shielder dwarves would cry for it eternallly. Leave it as it is I think. Or. Make it so, that it is really a heavy weapons training, and it gives it modifiers only to axes, clubs, hammers and swords. Why these? These are available for 1h and 2h versions too, and includes all type of weapon that a race has damage buff. Maybe a unique buff for each type of weapon would be nice (like the suff Wardens have), in that case, the damage modifier should not be higher than 5% at max rank.

Invigourating Parry: tested on Bullroarer, this is horribly not 1-4%. If it were, it could maybe stay as Invigourating Parry, but changing it to Invigourating Critical, as you proposed is also seems okay.

Tireless Blows: if and only if the specialization perk is what I (and some others in this forum) proposed, then it can stay the same as it is now. If not, your proposal for crits to trigger it is okay.

Haemorrhage: should be increased potency to 20-50%, or some other bleed related stuff. As mentioned, I would be happy if Brutal Assault would give it's bleed always, without this trait, so it should give some meaningful bleed-related stuff.

Rupture: the thing you proposed, and nope. At least nope to To the King, leave that skill alone. Everyone wants to spam TtK every time, nobody wants to give it bleed removal. However, Hammer Down on the other hand... would be nice for the job. You can remove the stun, not really useful for this skill I think. But Hammer Down isn't part of a chain, has long enough cooldown, and high damage, it can be the ultimate finisher and group damage buffer you proposed. Rupture as a trait should not exist, Hammer Down should give it's effects instantly. If you remember, I proposed "Singular Focus" to be here as the second capstone instead, but then what about:

Honourable Combat: oh, what a shame of a skill this was always... Even in the Golden Age of Helm's Deep (more like West Gondor, when it was added), nobody used this. But, I think this can be made viable. Move it to yellow line capstone place, and give it the ability to remove ALL Guardian bleeds and debuffs from all targets it affects, and give it a fellowship-wide heal-over-time, with it's potency depending on the number of bleeds and debuffs removed. It would give Guardians a useful group utility, while also very very nice class/skill fantasy, that for a breif time, "we leave you alone, you leave us alone". This could save this skill, and give meaning, use, and fun to it.

Closing words

I don't expect or hope that any of these changes I proposed would make it to the live. My goal with this post was to share my image what should be the purpose of reworking the Guardian, and presenting an example how it could be achieved. Of course, there are thousands of other solutions for this, but I think every solution should include these elements, as my "proposed" changes do:

- Making every type of player happy, and give every one of them something they would enjoy.
- Since the yellow spec hasn't got any real viability, removing it, and using the line to keep it's current fans happy, along with giving identity to the Guardian class as a whole.
- The identity should be that the Guardians make the enemy weaker in groups, mainly by decreasing the enemy's offences, hence protecting others from harm, even if they aren't the main tank of the group.
- Instead of giving the blue line dull buffs, and giving the red line flat damage increase (as it happened in the last rework), make them viable via interesting new mechanics and the group utility yellow line has currently.
- Make red line one of the best solo experience in the game, as it was in it's Golden Age, but of course without making it insanely overpowered. Just make it fun again, that's all. I'm sure that there is a solution that would make the current red and yellow line solo users both happier.
- Instead of giving the class new and unconnected effects, trying to revive some old elements, and keeping the current or old "feel" of the class.

Thank you all who got interested enough to read this, and I hope many of you supports the perspective I took on this lovely class.
Cheers.

[Gamlieldar]

Some Final Thoughts: I have some thoughts on Cataclysmic Shout and Singular Focus to make them more desirable for group content. Cataclysmic shout could cause heavy damage, and all struck targets will take +20% incoming damage for 10 seconds, keeping the 2 minute cooldown the same or slightly decreasing it to 1.5 minutes. Singular Focus could also be affected by Reverberating Light. But neither abilities' durations could be refreshed by Mark of Permanence. Also, with every other tank specialization carrying a +% morale boost, including champs and wardens, it may be worth looking into giving Guardians a nice little morale % boost upon speccing in blue or putting 2/4/6/8/10% morale increase in yellow line's trait "High-Spirited." Whatever works.

Thanks again, Orion!

Just another Final thought I wanted to add - this point has been previously mentioned.

Stoic 6/6 in Blue Line provides a -20% Damage Reduction effect when Stoic's Bubble is active. But when it is gone, we have a huge morale pool with no active Damage Reduction to go with it. Fix Stoic so that the damage reduction lasts for the duration of Warrior's Heart instead of only the bubble. It may mechanically make sense to move this Damage Reduction effect into Blue Line Warrior's Fortitude purchased trait.

Out of all of my suggestions/feedback, I think Blue Line will be VERY well off in the -incoming damage/absorb damage field if:

1. The -20% incoming damage is applied to Warrior's Heart regardless of Stoic Buff.
2. Shield Blow grants parry response, allowing us to more liberally access Redirect.
3. This one is optional, but I'd like to see it added just to make the Guardian, you know, an ACTUAL Juggernaut. Absorb 100% of incoming damage for the duration.

[Bromlin]

I just like to stress how much I like the idea of a one-hand and shield dps build. This would be something that makes the guardian exceptional and would enhance its class identity. To me red guardian always was something of a poor man's champion, although I see it has completely different mechanics and a good rotation flow, it always felt generic and uninteresting to me. Missing much needed class fantasy.

I don't know if you should get rid of the two-hander guardian concept or just make snb a really competitive option. Maybe this could be achieved with a rework of the yellow line. I see snb dps as the prime soloing/questing build. While not as fast as champion, still fast enough to allow comfortable questing and being very, very hard to kill.

[Thunderblast]

Dear Orion, and fellow Guardians,

This is my first post here in the forum, but I'm excited about reworking my favourite class, so I wanted to share with you all what I was thinking about it.

First of all, I think I can state that the small majority of Guardians here would like to get rid of the yellow spec, because they want a more interesting blue/red spec in exchange via a more flexible yellow trait tree. And would say, many things become less and less exciting about the Guardian, sometimes it just feels too "stock", and there is very little room for customization. If you do not play by the "meta" traits, it is just weaker then, and not a bit more fun in exchange.

However, a substantial minority also said, that they want the yellow line to stay, because they want sometimes higher survivability for solo, maybe trying to solo some older landscape group content (which is fun stuff), and doing 3-6 men casual instances with a 2-hander, simply because choosing blue over yellow is not required there, and your group progresses much faster because of your higher damage. I also have use of the yellow-line for these reasons in the current game.

But the thing is, yellow has very few unique mechanics, and it's official role is "high damage AOE tank". I honestly don't see why would be a good choice to keep this spec alive, when the blue is a tank, the red is a dps, and yellow is a "somewhere-in-between"? But, as a supplemental tree it would have a great opportunity to spice up what it feels like being a Guardian either blue or red.

First things first, there are approx. 4 types of Guardian players:

Blue Main Tank with 1h and shield: most popular on endgame, but less useful nowadays compared to some other tanks.
Red DPS with 2h: can be a dps in a group, but not that wanted, also the most popular leveling style.
Yellow Tank/Solo with 2h: not that popular, slower for leveling, not enough tanky for main tank, but fun sometimes, and has a fan group.
Red Solo with 1h and shield: not that popular nowadays, but some people want to level faster so do red line, but they don't want to throw away their shields. Dwarves mainly.
(And yeah also the Yellow 1h and shield style, but the last time I saw one the dodos weren't extinct yet.)

If doing any major rework to this class, I think you (the developers) should keep all these groups in mind, and try to make all of them happy. I have some vague ideas how to get rid of the yellow spec without making any of these groups angry.

The Fighter of Shadow (utility)

This line should focus on keeping alive the niche playing styles, but also improving the Blue Tank (shield) and Red DPS (2h) experience.

Force Opening: becomes a level-up skill. No need to restrict blue from having this skill. So basic, 2 out of 3 lines have it, not mandatory all the time, but always nice to have a force trigger.

Protection: becomes a level-up skill. I like the idea that Guardians should have an unconditional support toggle that can be placed on the healer in blue line, and on the tank in red line. Increase the range to 40-50m, etc, should become something like the Captain's "Brother" skills. More on this later.

Purchased traits:

Insult to Injury: instead of refreshing debuffs, it applies a new debuff (something like "Salted!" hehe) that increases the potency of bleeds by 20-50% and guardian debuffs by 50-100%. The second part would save the current "Disabling Strikes" and "Incapacitation" yellow set traits, while the first part would bring back the big role this trait had at the Helm's Deep-era red guardians. Also, increase the apply chance to 30-50% for consistency.

Take to Heart: I like your idea really, should be first row 2 points trait. Maybe a bit lower healing, but all in all, as others said, by removing the healing from Prey on the Weak, the guardian has no consistent self-healing now, so I doubt it would be too OP.

Radiate: again, your idea is okay, but move down a row and unlocked by Take to Heart. Also you mentioned that in (your) yellow line, all skills would become AoE. I think this would be a bit overkill, but I think a trait that gives "all single-target skills will damage all targets affected by Take to Heart" should be nice, maybe Radiate would be a nice choice for it. Max rank would be for 50-100% damage, include bleeds somehow. Again, I'm not sure if this would be the best trait for it, or we need a new one.

Flash of Light: increments to 5, max rank gives 25-50% light damage (War-chant sure need a bit more dmg), first rank gives the light damage to Take to Heart. Unlocked by Take to Heart, the position on the tree is not clear in my mind.

High-spirited: fine, fine, but send it to the blue line. Also, Guardian tanks need a bit of morale atm, so I think it would be the nice spot to place an incrementing 10% max morale, or some vitality along with the current incoming healing.

Numbed Senses: I can understand why it needs a nerf, because it is by far the best debuff removal in the game. For now, I agree with your proposed change. Maybe move it to blue line, not sure.

Bolster, Tenderize: let them trigger from Protection, that's for sure.

Thrill of Danger, Bring on the Pain: I think it is fine as it is, maybe move it to blue line, not sure.

Strong Bursts: sounds meaningful with the new mastery update, but move it to red line. Also it could give some +AoE target count.

Redirect, Vicious Rebuttal: nope, no need here. Only tanks use this, and yes, it is pretty useful, but it doesn't even trigger To the King (for a reason I think), red line wouldn't need it, so move them to the blue line, in similar place, everyone will be happy, honestly.

War-chant, Demoralizing Anthem: both blue and red line needs this skill so much! However, the added threat that comes with it is not nice if you are dps-ing in a group in red, so remove it, unless you trait:

Manifested Ire: adds back the threat to War-chant, and gives the snare stuff. A little utility for tanking. Also... Finesse debuff for War-chant maybe? Or something like that. Should be helping at high level I guess.

Warrior's Fortitude (yellow): the least useful of the Fortitude skills. I think it is nice to see it gone, and replaced by:

Improved Protection: gives you the ability to respond to your Protection's target's blocks and parries.

Singular Focus: this can be a capstone... at least it can be made one. First of all, move it to the red line, and give it some meaningful debuff. Armor is okay, or mitigations, but make it flat %-based like the Rune-Keeper has. This would make a desirable utility against bosses.

Cataclysmic Shout: this is just useless now. Even when I play yellow to solo some landscape group content I never use it, and if I do, it doesn't really change the outcome of the fights. The only use for this skill that I can think of is that it would be the trigger ability for the "Break Ranks" capstone in blue line. The result in the tooltip would look like the Champion trait and skill "Unbreakable" and "Mighty Roar". Also, half the cooldown to match Break Ranks, and remove the debuff spreading ability, but the stun can remain. Reasons why it's so fitting:
- Neither Shield-taunt nor Smashing Stab is useful to trigger Break Ranks becuse they have their own use cases.
- Class fantasy: breaking the ranks in a cataclysmic shout, to indicate fellows now is the time to go full brr. Also very loud and visible, good choice for indicating this.
- The AoE stun gives the opportunity to quickly build back Fortification, at least against trash mobs.
All in all, I think it would be very fitting choice.

Light-touched: this is the name? I just looked it up... maybe it could use a name change. Anyway, this is currently the trait that gives you the ability to block with a 2-hander. I think it would make a good yellow capstone with the following:
- Gives the ability to block with a 2-hander obviously. Gives some survivability to red line, and gives the ability to go 2h tanking in the blue line.
- When specced in blue line, gives the ability to build Fortification via parry skills too. That still wouldn't be enough for 2h tanking, so I guess Guardian's Ward too.
- When specced in red line, Reactive Parry can trigger on blocks too, also on the Protection's target!
- Gives you a unique buff depending on whether you use a 2-hander or sword and board. Similar to Champion "Weapons Master" trait, crit dmg + attack speed for 2h and flat dmg + block chance for 1h would be nice I think.

The Defender of the Free

Earned Traits

Most of the current line is nice, however:

Shield Wall: is useless. Remove this skill entirely, and replace it with:

Protection by the Shield: Protection transfers 5-10% threat from the target, and 10-20% damage the target takes (after the target's avoidances and mitigation) to the Guardian. This would make a good toggle that you place on the healer or the other tank if you're running 2 tanks.

Purchased Traits

Relentless Assault: needed in red too, so move it to yellow line.

Guardian's Pledge, Juggernaut: these two skills gives the same effect basically: avoidance-based emergency. There are two situations when you try to use them:
1. Invincibility. If the attacks of the enemy you face can be avoided, you avoid all of them.
2. Basically nothing. Your enemy either has unavoidable attacks, or has tactical attacks, that cannot be bpe'd.
Sice Guardians can reach 65-75% full avoidance (depending on whether Adaptability is on or not), these skills are overkill in endgame in the first case, and useless in the second case. I propose separating these two skills with distinct effects:

Guardian's Pledge: instead of avoidance increases, it maximizes the damage the Guardian can take from any damaging source at 15-10% of their max morale for its duration. (I hope you can understand this, if something would hit you for higher than this, it would hit you for that percentage instead. Damage cap if you will.) Can be decreased to 9,5-4,5% with tracery. This would give an emergency button against bosses specifically.

Juggernaut: also gives 50-100% resistance. If attacks can be avoided, avoid them properly, from every source.

Shield-smash, Follow Through, Improved Shield Spikes: move them to yellow line, so red shielders can access it.

Disorientation: I'm not sure that this debuff is meaningful or not. I propose it should move to red line, and since Overwhelm has the same icon, I think it is fitting that that skill gives this debuff 100% of the time at max rank. Also, it should decrease resistance too, helps with bleeds, and again, avoidance should apply to every source.

Break Ranks: as I mentioned in the yellow line, Cataclysmic Shout is a fitting skill for this trigger, this trait should give the skill too.

The other stuff here are okey-ish.

The Keen Blade

I agree, red line needs a specialization perk. It should be nothing else, but "critical hits trigger a parry response". End of story. This would be much similar to blue line Burglar, where Burglars get a reactive element in addition of the class usual proactive nature, and the reverse would apply the Guardian here. I cannot imagine anything other than this that would solve the parry skill consistency issues that Guardians have right now.

Also, in my mind the current parry chain is sacred. Removing the Thrust from the chain would generate more problems than it would solve. The above parry chain trigger change would solve everything we need.

If Forced Opening would become a level-up skill, red line would need another skill that unlocks immediately, and that should be:

Brutal Assault: currently needs 11! trait points to unlock it's full potency, and other than its bleed (which also very poor at higher levels, even with DoT traceries, as every Guardian bleed right now; just tested on Bullroarer) it is useless. 11 trait points for a skill that gives a short bleed and the base damage just slightly better than Sting? So I propose it should give 5% critical chance for the same duration (10 sec) as it's bleed, triggered by its critical hit (same as Champion's Wild Attack). This ability should either bestow upon you as soon as you specialise, or attached to Tireless Blows. In the latter case, Brutal Assault needs to get its bleed instantly, level 2, after spec. The thing is, currently nothing, again, nothing encourages me to trait Brutal Assault and Tireless Blows until I can also trait Haemorrhage. This should change!

Earned Traits

Reactive Parry: your proposed change is nice, but only if it could pair with Protection (by the Sword). Make it meaningful, make it cool, and make it relevant if someone else is tanking in the group.

Protection by the Sword: Not a separate skill, but instead it enhances the general Protection. Reactive Parry applies to the target's parries too. The melee damage aura radius should be increased significantly. (Improved Protection in the yellow line gives the current effect.)

Bleed Them Dry: make it something meaningful. At Helm's Deep it doubled the Guardian's Bleed max stack from 5 to 10. Make this trait that much meaningful again.

Brutal Charge: do not dare to touch it! It is the only cool thing red Guardians have currently from their Golden Age in Helm's Deep. Infinite duration on the next skill stun was broken, I admit, so I agree with that change, and I agree with the "only damaging melee skills can trigger it", as your current change with it's critical strike when traited. Aside from that, leave it alone, it's fun, it's cool, and it is not broken, it never was. Beornings and Champions have the same skill anyways, I know they are slower, but still, it is good as it is. And it shouldn't be a capstone, capstone should be, as always:

Pray on the Weak: of course, not in it's current form. Back in Helm's Deep, it gave self-heal and damage based on the bleeds on the targets when critically hit. Nobody wants back the self-heal aspect, it was so much broken... But I have an idea how it should work now. Critical hits with skills would trigger a "free" bleed tick on the target suffering from any of the Guardian's bleed. The free means the same damage as the bleed, but doesn't tick down the duration. This should finally give the damage red Guardians need, and it would simply based on the old system, where a decent portion of the damage came from this trait.

Purchased Traits

Thrill of Battle: red line needs a bit of self-heal atm (compare it to red Champions, they have much more now!), so this should be the same trait in essence. However, needs some change, first of all, this should give 1% crit chance per tier. Not conditional, not temporary, but flat, passive 5% crit at max rank. Secondly, the cooldown should be decreased, or removed, depending on a lot of things. Thirdly, it should apply to every critical hit you make with skills, not just response skills.

Skilled Deflection: nice! I always trait it for landscape. But a red Guardian in a group don't need it. A blue Guardian in a group might need it. Move it to yellow, everyone would be happy.

Heavy Weapons Training: As much as I love your proposal that would make the red line more 2-hander oriented, those shielder dwarves would cry for it eternallly. Leave it as it is I think. Or. Make it so, that it is really a heavy weapons training, and it gives it modifiers only to axes, clubs, hammers and swords. Why these? These are available for 1h and 2h versions too, and includes all type of weapon that a race has damage buff. Maybe a unique buff for each type of weapon would be nice (like the suff Wardens have), in that case, the damage modifier should not be higher than 5% at max rank.

Invigourating Parry: tested on Bullroarer, this is horribly not 1-4%. If it were, it could maybe stay as Invigourating Parry, but changing it to Invigourating Critical, as you proposed is also seems okay.

Tireless Blows: if and only if the specialization perk is what I (and some others in this forum) proposed, then it can stay the same as it is now. If not, your proposal for crits to trigger it is okay.

Haemorrhage: should be increased potency to 20-50%, or some other bleed related stuff. As mentioned, I would be happy if Brutal Assault would give it's bleed always, without this trait, so it should give some meaningful bleed-related stuff.

Rupture: the thing you proposed, and nope. At least nope to To the King, leave that skill alone. Everyone wants to spam TtK every time, nobody wants to give it bleed removal. However, Hammer Down on the other hand... would be nice for the job. You can remove the stun, not really useful for this skill I think. But Hammer Down isn't part of a chain, has long enough cooldown, and high damage, it can be the ultimate finisher and group damage buffer you proposed. Rupture as a trait should not exist, Hammer Down should give it's effects instantly. If you remember, I proposed "Singular Focus" to be here as the second capstone instead, but then what about:

Honourable Combat: oh, what a shame of a skill this was always... Even in the Golden Age of Helm's Deep (more like West Gondor, when it was added), nobody used this. But, I think this can be made viable. Move it to yellow line capstone place, and give it the ability to remove ALL Guardian bleeds and debuffs from all targets it affects, and give it a fellowship-wide heal-over-time, with it's potency depending on the number of bleeds and debuffs removed. It would give Guardians a useful group utility, while also very very nice class/skill fantasy, that for a breif time, "we leave you alone, you leave us alone". This could save this skill, and give meaning, use, and fun to it.

Closing words

I don't expect or hope that any of these changes I proposed would make it to the live. My goal with this post was to share my image what should be the purpose of reworking the Guardian, and presenting an example how it could be achieved. Of course, there are thousands of other solutions for this, but I think every solution should include these elements, as my "proposed" changes do:

- Making every type of player happy, and give every one of them something they would enjoy.
- Since the yellow spec hasn't got any real viability, removing it, and using the line to keep it's current fans happy, along with giving identity to the Guardian class as a whole.
- The identity should be that the Guardians make the enemy weaker in groups, mainly by decreasing the enemy's offences, hence protecting others from harm, even if they aren't the main tank of the group.
- Instead of giving the blue line dull buffs, and giving the red line flat damage increase (as it happened in the last rework), make them viable via interesting new mechanics and the group utility yellow line has currently.
- Make red line one of the best solo experience in the game, as it was in it's Golden Age, but of course without making it insanely overpowered. Just make it fun again, that's all. I'm sure that there is a solution that would make the current red and yellow line solo users both happier.
- Instead of giving the class new and unconnected effects, trying to revive some old elements, and keeping the current or old "feel" of the class.

Thank you all who got interested enough to read this, and I hope many of you supports the perspective I took on this lovely class.
Cheers.

YES! I like everything said in this post! Especially the "crits trigger parry chain" feature, and the Cataclysmic Shout Break Ranks.

The few things that I'm not quite on the same page as Tepee on is the Honorable Combat group-heal (imo group healing shouldn't be a thing for Guards, that should be maybe one of few couple things that Captanks are better at) and the High-spirited max morale increase (morale bloat is a second thing that Captanks should do better than Guardians, Guardians should have less morale but lose the morale that they have so much slower that they are slightly better off in the long run).

I love the idea with the new Guardian's Pledge damage-capping, however I would rather see this effect go to Juggernaut. Guardian's Pledge is a core skill and has been around for a very long time, so I'd rather leave it be and let Juggernaut be the boss cd skill. But that's just me.

Another thing that I want to stress is that, at least to me, the block/parry chains are the thing that makes Guardians unique. Defender of the Free should be focused on the block chain, and Keen Blade should be focused on the parry chain. Peeling skills away from the chains and making them available all the time (as is proposed for Keen Blade-spec Thrust) would remove some of the class identity and would make the Guardian class feel more pointless, with all of the buttons available and you just kind of push the best ones when they're off cd. This sounds like it would make Guardian gameplay more like Champions, Burglars, and Lore-Masters where all decision-making is made before the fight (arranging your rotation and practicing it so that it's second-nature) as opposed split-second decisions mid-fight that make it impossible to design a meta rotation (as is the case atm with the response chains and such).

[Elmagor]

Please if someone have huuuuge post, don't quote whole post. It's bad style and too hard scroll whole text to see answer