![274257-TD1[1].jpg](https://i.imgur.com/u5yXJeP.jpg "274257-TD1[1].jpg")
I have a problem with the "holy trinity" of healer/dps/tank. But more specifically, i have a problem with tanks. More specifically, i have a problem with this shit mechanic called "aggression", or "aggro" for short.
It's incredibly stupid. It might work with beasts and unintelligent enemies but are we supposed to believe battle-hardened humanoid creatures would actively choose to beat on the heavily armored warrior instead of the rogue next to him?
It's not just a matter of >muh realism, it's a matter of immersion, but ok, let's put that aside for a moment. This makes everything way too simple for each role because they can completely specialize.
Instead of having to choose wether to sacrifice some survivability for damage, you of course always go for damage. The tanks on the other hand, will always go for survivability. After all, that's all they will ever do.
This eliminates the tactical component. Positioning only matters for artificial "AoE phases" or specific boss moves. It doesn't fucking matter if you're 200 meters away or 2 meters next to the tank as long as that little aggro bar indicates that the enemy should hit the tank.
Here's a new (not actually new) idea. Positioning should matter. The frontline fighter or fighters or rogues should be focused on keeping the enemy pinned down. This is accomplished by mechanics like attacks of opportunity for moving and debilitating attacks. Mages and other casters should need to use crowd control constantly.
The healer himself is mostly fine, but it should be focused on more situational buffs (Oh our backline is being targeted by archers? Cast protection from arrows or some shit like that) so that the healer needs to do more than just stare at the fucking hp bars.
New roles could be healer/ranged dps/melee dps. Enemies will try to attack whoever looks more vulnerable, but they can't just walk through the melee fighters. the environment and choke points will be important.
>>331802196
>>331802291
Good to see you guys agree.
>>331802120
>It's incredibly stupid. It might work with beasts and unintelligent enemies but are we supposed to believe battle-hardened humanoid creatures would actively choose to beat on the heavily armored warrior instead of the rogue next to him?
yes because that guy keep insulting you and your family
>>331802560
So you start hitting him while ignoring his 8 buddies surrounding you? No you think of the best way to win the fight so that once you're done you can fuck his ass with all the time in the world.
And what if they don't even speak the same tongue/
>>331802387
Yeah, but I don't.
Speaking as having played a main tank and several types of dps, you're just wrong.
As a tank, you need survivability, yes. But only up to the point at which you are successful. Beyond that, you're not improving things. You can contribute to dps as well, assuming the game itself allows it. As a warrior tank, once I had the requisite stats, even in a raid, I could afford to swap out a few dps pieces. Lots of fights allow for opportunity to actually do some dps - and I could weapon swap and contribute (you know, when adds come, or we're swapping tanks mid-fight, or whatever). There was a lot more leeway in dungeon runs, although I tended to keep the survivability and make up for it by pulling at lightning speed.
As a dps, you can't just go glass cannon. You do need health, you do need those useful skills, you can't just stand in fire and fire away. Evasion tanking, or a dps taunting a mob off a healer, or a hunter's pet tanking an add... these things all happened.
Positioning was always important. Don't know what you're talking about. Crowd control was often used, but "constantly" is really pointless design. You might as well just remove the crowd control ability and have -1 mob.
>>331802387
Idk why you were expecting actual discussion on /v/.
But regarding your post, what about huge monsters like Onyxia? Are you just going to body block her from your healers? Because I think she'd bowl your whole group over.
>>331802827
the other 8 guys are pretty much standing 20 meters away throwing candies while that guys is actualy in front of you, and he keep telling them to notice how gay and oversized you are and that you probably don't even have a gf
>>331802732
▲
▲ ▲
>>331802827
sorry forgot to add
>And what if they don't even speak the same tongue
well like in those games filled with retards that don't know baisc english he just starts saying "gay gay retard gay fat fat gay retard" multiple times
>be playing with my mythic guild
>am one of the officers, recruit lots of people, a handful even stood long term and became core
>be there since wotlk, slowly progressed to becoming one of the pillars
>a guy that just got here a month ago, hasn't even got raider rank whispers me saying he has something of worth to ask me
>he says he's actually the officer of a heroic raiding guild and seeing how I perform I could give him some suggestion
>think to myself I'm gonna play along and pretend I'm interested in his pitiful guild
>say sure, give him the link to a post I made after editing it and fucking up rotation and gliphs
>the day after I log on
>he immediately whispers me screaming how he got kicked from the raid for doing sub par dps all because of my post
>tough luck kiddo
>whisper the GM of his guild, tell him how he's trying to jump ship to get into mine because he thinks you're lame
>he shits himself seeing my guild's name (top 5 worldwide)
>one minute later dumbo has been kicked out of his guild
>tell this in trade chat too adding some more details here and there to make sure no decent guild will ever add him again
>GM of his old guild even gives me his house address at my request
>tell this to Adam (GM of my guild) on Vent and we laugh it off
>he asks the retard to come on vent one day and invites him to our channel
>he's basically crying at this point asking me why I put all that effort into hurting him
>reveal to him that us elite mythic raiders are hardcore about everything we do
>proceed to swat him and his family 4 fun, dog got killed
>>331802863
>As a tank, you need survivability, yes. But only up to the point at which you are successful. Beyond that, you're not improving things
If you can afford to build damage as a tank when your damage is almost irrelevant next to the damage your dps do, the content was just too easy.
>You do need health, you do need those useful skills, you can't just stand in fire and fire away.
You could just build damage and then proceed to NOT stand in the fire. Also i'm not saying those utility tools didn't exist, they are great, but the "normal way of doing things" is just extremely boring and it doesn't need to be.
>>331803514
I'm just going to leave it at : You obviously don't know what you're talking about, and likely never experienced any cutting edge content. Bye.
>>331802120
What about a healer with range-dependent heals. Your most effective heals are shorter range, so you need to be closer to whoever you're healing to use them.
The healer should also still have long-range heals, but maybe they're less mana/resource efficient, take longer to cast, etc.
>>331802120
Guild Wars 1 created the 4th wheel to that cart, the CC (mesmer) and then fucked that wheel on the next game
I miss that class (not the purple faggotry it is nowadays)
>>331803029
>Are you just going to body block her from your healers
As long as you can stop her from flying, yes.
Though it would be interesting for these big guys to have some trampling attacks the players need to deal with somehow.
>>331803606
Bye faggot, maybe bring some arguments next time.
>>331802120
You stupid cunt.
If you have a tonk guy in front of you with a sword and shield and built like a linebacker all in your face i doubt your going to be "aggrod" by anything else, fuck me
>>331802120
play warrior with a pocket healer in bgs and you see players targeting you 90% of the time. Mobs are about as smart as the average wow player.
>>331803315
>he just starts saying "gay gay retard gay fat fat gay retard" multiple times
This is why I love 4chan.
>>331802120
Tfw used to play as a tank.
I could literally decide where the group went and what we did. Didn't feel like going off to a far place just to kill a shit optional boss for a quest I'd already done? Fuck that, we skip it. DPS crying about skipping it? Fuck him, he can leave, he'll be replaced in an instant.
Being a tank was based.
>>331803984
DPS is easy as fuck. You just NOT STAND IN THE FIRE, CC what you're supposed to, and most importantly, NOT DIE.
Tanking is nerve-racking when shit gets tense.
>>331803956
That's the whole point fucker, the enemies should TRY to move to the backline and the frontline fighter needs to make it so they can't get away, not just increase a magic aggression number that means he will prefer to attack him.
>>331803445
>things that never happened: the post
>>331803445
Sounds like my kind of guild, you still playing?
>>331803445
The stories and information posted here are artistic works of fiction and falsehood.
Only a fool would take anything posted here as fact.
gw2 already solved this problem its so much better when no one has a role and it makes crit and crit severity literally the only stats that matter and every single fight strat is standing on each other toes and facerolling all your buttons until its over.
>>331803672
>Movement on a class that requires you to be stationary to cast.
>>331803445
This has got to be the most infuriating shit I've ever read on this site.
Fuck you.
>>331805180
>requires you to be stationary to cast
Not necessarily.
>>331802120
A game has done that already. It's called Everquest.
>>331805292
>>331805326
Unless you're gonna rework the entire class then yeah it kinda is.
Almost all healing spells in wow are stationary casts. You really think it would be a good idea to have to run between dps and tank in an encounter with a lot of movement already?
Especially when your cheap heals can take a second or two to cast.
>>331803445
Nice paste buddy
>>331805712
No one is talking about WoW specifically, just the concept
>>331802120
The entire concept of video game combat is silly. Realistically, turning your back on someone is a good way to instantly be killed by a mace to the head. In a video game, though, you're just looking at some damage number. And with battles intent on being "exciting", that means everyone can necessarily take several hits before dying. As such, there isn't a method for a tank to prevent enemies from ignoring them outside mechanical means (e.g. aggro) or through massive buffs which make them as dangerous as the DPS they are trying to protect.
If you want to change things in an interesting way, give your "tank" a fairly sizable backstab bonus. Perhaps they do little damage facing an enemy and just have a chunk of HP, but if the enemy turns around (such as trying to get past the tank) then the backstab makes it a really bad idea. Throw in a few "slowdown" skills that prevent an enemy from simply sprinting by, and you have a tank that is dangerous outside just aggro.
You could have parties with two tanks (one provoking attacks and the other hitting from behind) or parties with ranged DPS hitting from behind front lines. And the slowdown skill, mentioned earlier, stops enemies from just rushing past to hit the ranges DPS.
Of course, you've forgotten one key component. The primary point of aggro is a mechanic to allow an enemy to know who to prioritize first. I would be far more complex to implement some sort of AI to every enemy in a MMO. It is far easier to assign each party member a number, which says when the enemy will attack them.
>>331803445
The only reason people hate the "Trinity" is because the majority of lazy shit wasting faggots play DPS.
Now here's the thing. I agree the long queues for DPS is bullshit, especially for DPS based classes. That's why if you're a DPS based class that does not have the option to tank or heal, you should have priority over every other lazy fucker (Boomkins and Shadow Priests)
>>331808036
oh yeah good job rolling class here cookie
There is not a single interesting and successful MMORPG that has not used the trinity.
>>331808991
>There is not a single interesting and successful MMORPG
You could've stopped right there.
>>331802120
kill yourself you autistic retard
>>331807573
The whole idea of tanking and DPS is ridiculous from a realistic point of view. That's why realism should not be used as a reference when design such kind of game.
>>331808991
You're retarded on so many levels.
>>331809087
But that's false.
>>331803445
I didn't know Jared played MMO's.
>>331802120
>I have a problem with dead games
ok
>>331809151
Way to counter the point, faggot. I take it you can't, then.
The only MMORPG that does not have tanking and was good for some time is Tibia. There's no aggro and blockers (tanks) had to do exactly that, block the enemy from getting to the back line.
The thing is that this goes beyond class design, as for something to block something else, the environment has to be used. Most MMORPGs have large open spaces, and you can walk through mobs and players as to not deny anyone the freedom of movement.
>>331809129
>That's why realism should not be used as a reference when design such kind of game.
True. However, I'm just pointing out that if someone wants to change things a bit based on "realistic" factors, there are still ways of doing so and keeping things interesting.
And it certainly better than just turning everyone into DPS because someone can't play a tank effectively.
>>331804124
Have you done any heroic (mythic) progression in wow prior to nerfs and/or item level upgrades? It really sounds like you haven't.
You shouldn't talk about shit when you can't even begin to understand how tightly things are tuned and I'd love to see you pass dps checks by doing optimal or near optimal dps and mechanics.
>>331802120
>shit this heavily armored guy seems threatening! let me focus my attention on him
>huh he's barely scratching me
>is this a joke? flailing around with his little sword and yelling at me
>fuck someone wielding a big-ass axe with 2 hands just fucking pounded my ass
>fuck someone with 2 daggers just shanked my dick
>fuck some brightly colored faggot with a tophat just launched a bolt of doom at me
>NOOOO THE CARDBOARD SWINGING HEAVILY ARMORED GUY IS THE MOST THREATENING
Agreed. Threat is stupid and doesn't make sense.
>>331810192
Argument from Realism should be an official video game fallacy.
>>331802120
>play as DPS
>takes 20 minutes to find a dungeon
>play as tank
>get a dungeon within 5 minutes
Just fuck up my dungeon finder blizzfam
>>331802120
Immersion is pointless for the fights, if you want immersive fighting, then an MMO is the last game for you. The holy trinity is a strategy built around, DPS is squishy, tank can take hits, and the healer is able to keep them all alive.
Aggro (threat is a better word and will be refereed to as threat from myself) is typically built by every action no matter what class you are. Threat allows the DPS in the group the ability to get in there without worrying about dying, as the tank is keeping the enemies attention. If the enemy targeted the DPS no matter what, then he would always be killed and a useless part of your team.
DPS classes already build an insane amount of threat (i'm mostly going off of FF14 as thats the one I know most about for tanking, don't know much of other MMOS but i'd imagine similar functionality)
1 threat per damage number
0.5 threat per healing number
and the tank needs to keep the attention of the enemy so these 2 delicate feathers don't die.
typically by having moves that allow more threat to be made, with simple provokes or by sudden burst damage or perhaps some sort of buff that gives him 3+threat per damage number. Tanks are built to be intimidating to the in game enemy AI. If you want things to actually target the DPS/healer due to it knowing the role then play PvP. Where a tank is almost ignored due to not being helpful since tank threat doesn't really exist and they don't excel at anything else usually.
Its a balance mechanic, since if the one targeted most often is the most vulnerable, then they will continue to become more and more vulnerable since now they're losing HP and nothing but somehow making yourself more vulnerable would shake him off the one already dying. Which is the purpose of threat, to keep the most vulnerable classes from getting their shit punched in and being useless.
>>331810534
Allowing your parents to reproduce and bring you into the world is even more fallacious tbqhwy (to be quite honest with you)
>>331810192
You should've just shut up.
The whole "dual wielding does more damage" is retarded as fuck
It really does not matter if it's a double-edged axe, a one handed sword or a freaking throwable spear. If it's lodged in your ass you're dead.
>>331803514
Reasons why clearing takes 1/10 longer the post.
>>331810860
hit that text limit.
If in the event you give the DPS more Tank like abilities like survival, then now you have a class that is objectively superior to both Tank and DPS. Off tanking is a class variety and can be a mix of tank and a few extra things, like tank-dps, tank-healer, etc. They aren't great at either part of what they're doing, but are handy to have around would the main tank or main healer goes down. But to use them as main tanks or main healers is typically a bad idea.
>>331802120
1. Dont criticize if you cant offer a better alternative.
2. Feel free to stop being a total mindless drone who only plays WoW and WoW likes when there are fucking plenty of MMOs where the trinity does not exist and the game works well without it
I miss tanking in TBC so much.
It was the height of my videogaming life.
>>331803695
It was still fabulous back in the day, just that when your bar looked bluish purple and rapidly sapped away fear settles in your soul. That and good interrupts fuck your normal combat flow. Now it's spam the illusion for 2 seconds, at least melee Mesmer was subpar interesting.
>>331811436
what was it like? I quit before TBC but prot warrior tanking in vanilla was the best tanking experience I've had by far
>>331802120
>It might work with beasts and unintelligent enemies but are we supposed to believe battle-hardened humanoid creatures would actively choose to beat on the heavily armored warrior instead of the rogue next to him?
The idea, at least to me, is that the tank isn't so much distracting the boss as they are actively protecting their party and standing in the way of attacks. It simply appears as the latter as a gameplay contrivance.
The "Holy trinity" is old and busted.
There is only one role: Reduce your enemy's Number to 0 before he can reduce your Number to 0.
Healers make your Number go up.
DPS make the enemy's Number go down.
Tanks make your own Number not go down as much.
Controllers/Mezzers reduce the enemy's ability to Number
Debuffers make the enemy take more Number from you, and also reduce their ability to Number.
Buffers increase your ability to Number
Logically there should also be a role that reduces the mob's ability to raise its own Number.
>>331803445
>>331812079
You can apply that same shallow logic to literally any game ever
this guy knows whats up >>331802863
this guy probably runs flex every week or plays some shitty zerging raid on a shitty MMO. Some tanks deal massive amounts of DPS while having their tanking duties on point. We would have Tanks deal more DPS than lower item lvl or undergeared dps and content was nowhere near easy. There is a diference between difficulties, too. In mythic, you usually get one shotted. You either dodge or die. On Heroic, you could afford to take some damage as long as healer's mana was fine. Rather then health and tanking stats on a DPS, i'd say the survival skills are way more important. Activating damage reduction CDs on a DPS while under heavy unavoidable damage (or a fuckup) is a key to keeping things going.
>>331803514
>>331803924
>>331812079
only whenever games try to subvert it it's either awful or just a clusterfuck of high survivability dps.
tryinity is the only formula that works for party-based MMOs
MMOs are deader than dead.
If only vindictus wasnt run by asian jews it would be the greatest game ever.
>>331812507
Vindictus is not an MMO
>>331812079
You don't need a role for that, that's just dispelling, lots could do it
>>331802120
OP what you're not taking into account is that the average MMO player is a retard, thanks to WoW.
So they have to make MMO's as retard proof as possible.
I think we need bosses with interesting Aggro reasons, Like choosing who he is going to attack based on a random race. Suddenly duo Tauren tanks aren't cutting it as the giant ass demon is wanting to step on the Panda's
>>331813115
Maybe with variable aggro counting or something, but just having a boss automatically target a specific race is kind of like saying that certain people can't go fight that boss, since they'll immediately die.
By "variable aggro counting" I mean something like pandas getting 1.2x threat while taurens get 0.8x, or something similar. So a panda would be more likely to be targeted and would build up threat faster, but it would be something the party could manage and account for.
>>331813475
I was more thinking where you are in a raid of 15 people. But I see where you are coming at since you would have a Raid with just elves.
>>331811891
You had more tools but it wasn't a cakewalk. Also Heroics were hard and cool as shit.
Chain-pulling the hardest heroics made me feel "special".
>>331802120
> It might work with beasts and unintelligent enemies but are we supposed to believe battle-hardened humanoid creatures would actively choose to beat on the heavily armored warrior instead of the rogue next to him?
Nothing about MMO combat makes sense. A few people have already pointed it out already but here is a example that would help more. If these games wanted a more realistic example, rogues wouldnt even exist in raids. Everyone would be an armor clad soldier with a broadsword or shield with maybe a few mages and archers.
A "rogue" running around with kitchen knives with no muscle is not going to even annoy a major raid boss like a dragon.
But not everyone wants to play the armored soldier, some people want to play a more assassin even though in a massive battle it would be less effective. So changes are made to make certain roles more fun and give a reason to play others.
>>331813670
If you raided with just elves against an elf-targeting boss, then it wouldn't be any different than with a standard boss.
Rather, if you were a panda DPS in a panda-targeting boss, then there's not much anyone could do. You'd be targeted and die instantly. The only options would be to get a panda DPS, or... you just not participate in the raid. And in most groups, it would probably be easier just to sub you out rather than find and gear up the appropriate tank for you to play properly.
And if that's the boss your guild is currently raiding? Have fun playing solo until they move on to the next one.
