Tanking?
It has always been that way. You are fooling yourself if you think it isn’t. You THINK they are attacking you – that is why there is no Trinity in this game -the TANK can NEVER really hold ANY AGGRO. It always it the highest DPS or interrupter.
Tanking is ALWAYS situational in this game – any profession can do it, depending on the attacks.
I KNOW for a fact they’re attacking me because of the Evades and said rotation of bosses if I walk on a circle.
It’s just that it only happens on the highest damage – essentially the squishiest – characters, and entirely bypasses every other character type.
Nor has it always been that way, it was never an issue during the LS Season 1 period. The cleric specced guard for instance used to tank every dungeon it was in in the same way the thief is now tanking every dungeon it’s in. Now the current guard build no longer has any purpose outside WvW, and the thief suddenly has a second job added to it out of nowhere.
I’ve been playing all classes in entirely different builds/stats, and the shift appears to be extremely recent.
It seems now that the highest DPS is also always the designated zerg/raid tank. There’s definitely tanking in the game – except it has nothing to do with actually taking damage, and everything to do with timing every available evade and then some. Where PvT and such used to serve a greater purpose in drawing partial aggro off the tofu, the current aggro mechanics serve to put the glass specced players as the ‘do-everything’ roles, while any of lower damage potential are now essentially only there to be carried. The situation is quite out of balance.
Most distressingly and why I even bother enough to put this on the forums is that under the current mechanism, I no longer have much of a reason to play any other class but the full zerkspec thief. Healing is pointless if all of the damage is taken by all of the glassiest builds that don’t benefit from the Toughness multiplier. Non-full glass builds are pointless if taking that doesn’t stop any glassier builds from getting themselves downed. I liked all of my characters, but the change is shoehorning me into using the Condi Ranger for Triple Wurm Husks and Tequatl Turrets, and the Thief for everything else.
The other characters are gathering dust.
[Shinigami, NEC, WvW Condinuke] [Rekka, ELE, Fracs] [Tora, PS WAR] [Kageoni, THI] [Hayako, ENG]
(edited by Hayashi.3416)
I KNOW for a fact they’re attacking me because of the Evades and said rotation of bosses if I walk on a circle.
It’s just that it only happens on the highest damage – essentially the squishiest – characters, and entirely bypasses every other character type.
Nor has it always been that way, it was never an issue during the LS Season 1 period. The cleric specced guard for instance used to tank every dungeon it was in in the same way the thief is now tanking every dungeon it’s in. Now the current guard build no longer has any purpose outside WvW, and the thief suddenly has a second job added to it out of nowhere.
I’ve been playing all classes in entirely different builds/stats, and the shift appears to be extremely recent.
It seems now that the highest DPS is also always the designated zerg/raid tank. There’s definitely tanking in the game – except it has nothing to do with actually taking damage, and everything to do with timing every available evade and then some. Where PvT and such used to serve a greater purpose in drawing partial aggro off the tofu, the current aggro mechanics serve to put the glass specced players as the ‘do-everything’ roles, while any of lower damage potential are now essentially only there to be carried. The situation is quite out of balance.
Most distressingly and why I even bother enough to put this on the forums is that under the current mechanism, I no longer have much of a reason to play any other class but the full zerkspec thief. Healing is pointless if all of the damage is taken by all of the glassiest builds that don’t benefit from the Toughness multiplier. Non-full glass builds are pointless if taking that doesn’t stop any glassier builds from getting themselves downed. I like all of my characters, but the change is shoehorning me into using the Condi Ranger for Triple Wurm Husks, and the Thief for everything else.
The other characters are gathering dust.
It has always been that way and always will be. As I said, that is why a Trinity style build mechanic would never work in this game. Try being a support player, they get attacked more than even DPS. You are simplifying the mechanics of the game to the supercilious Trinity mechanics and those are the simplest out there. There is more going on, then you are thinking of.
Zerker is the glassiest build – Try that build with a World Boss, like Claw of Jormag, and you will find that you are downed constantly, if you don’t dodge, have damage mitigation or a heal.
(edited by Dusty Moon.4382)
I’m pretty sure many mobs prioritize low HP.
I’m pretty sure many mobs prioritize low HP.
This.
Ever go down and notice the mob comes straight to you? +person rezzing you.
yeah.
But different mobs might have different prioritization. To keep it from being too “obvious” or w/e.
But I think most target low HP.
Yea, go talk to the dungeon running groups. They have discovered a lot about aggro since they have more control over variables. I saw a post a few days ago in one thread that did state that low health will pull aggro and rezzing people will tend to always pull aggro. Damage done and toughness will also affect aggro.
That would of course also make sense .. especially since people always cry for better mob AI .. and i always laugh when people want that in a trinity game since trinity is simply total anti-AI else it wouldn’t work.
Anyone with the slightest bit of intelligence wouldn’t bash the guy with the most HPs
and highest mitigation that is constantly healed all the time, but instead just kill the
healer first .. or those glass cannons that dye in 1-2 hits.
Best MMOs are the ones that never make it. Therefore Stargate Online wins.
This game was released without any AI and ANet missed to fix it.
Seriously, if you think that anything has to do anything with aggro besides being in range of the mob, you are giving ANet too much credit for their mob design.
The Leveling & Open World Compendium
Well, boss monsters being one type that have different aggro rules.
Then there’s the other things that also affect aggro.
- Closest target to them
- Who is dealing damage
- Top damage dealers
- Who is using a shield / has more toughness and overall armor
- Others (see Tanking tactics)
Then including this one:
- While reviving an ally, downed or defeated
I assume that combo of these pretty much makes the aggro ratings.
As for tanking, I’ve seen some with players with Guardian kiting the Gravelings in AC, I recall they also had a shield equipped, but not fully sure about tho. And that times there was the hurry to destroy the mounds from which the Gravelings spawned on P1, I didn’t have much time to check out the gear, since it was usual speedy clear…
Then again, on Dry Top is the Colocal Queen, with my necromancer with Rabid gear, Undead runes and heavy condition build, I’ve noticed that I could break aggro by starting to run away from the boss monster, did it every time when the colocal started to heavily focus on me. (By running away, I mean that you stop attacking it, turn around and start running away from it)
Then on the recent LS chapter, when dealing with the Veteran Mordrem Hound that spawns when touching the wrong box, I had issues of shaking off the Hound, but then I was playing solo, so I was the biggest threat source present…
Most recent would be when I played Support Elementalist on world bosses, there I had no issues with aggroing nearby elites or champs, but the experience was quite limited, due to simple designs, lesser mobs being mostly slaughtered before they even spawned completely and that the world bosses don’t attack singular targets.
I’ve also experienced aggro due to high armor.
I rarely do PvP or Hard PvE, unless it’s organized.
(edited by FrostSpectre.4198)
This game was released without any AI and ANet missed to fix it.
Seriously, if you think that anything has to do anything with aggro besides being in range of the mob, you are giving ANet too much credit for their mob design.
AHH – prove that and you can’t. Oh, it is not a Trinity game, so there is no AI right? Sorry bud, wrong again – the AI in Trinity games is so simple it is mind-bogglingly stupid.
They have made some of the World Bosses harder and use different priorities when attacking players.
-“Getting a monster’s attention is also known as getting aggro. This
is a more advanced game concept and is explained throughout
the guide. For a general idea, consider that your enemies
sometimes have multiple targets to attack. Will they go after you,
your guardian buddy, or someone else?
To decide this, enemies quickly think about which target is
closest to them, which one is inflicting the most damage, and
whether any opponents are trying to revive allies. If you want
monsters’ attention, move into close range and hit them hard.
To avoid aggro, let others get the first hit, keep yourself at range,
and back away when something starts to run toward you. Give
your allies a chance to lure the monster’s attention back onto
themselves—or to kill the beast, slow it down, or otherwise delay
the enemy’s attack.”-
This is taken from the official game guide which is 2 years old.
lose a pip,win 2 pips,lose a pip,lose a pip…………..-
-Go go Espartz.-
The Colocal Queen is an especially bad offender, though it’s probably because it has a ranged attack (the line aoe) and charge. There was a time where I realised the Queen’s AoE doesn’t cross elevations (ie, fire from a slight cliff), but since in a zerg of 80 people meleeing it the CQ still attacks me even when I’m 900 units away, it became a cakewalk to stand on a ledge out of its normal melee range then shortbow AA/s2 it to oblivion. The Queen never attacks anyone else but me regardless of range, so at the point the only people taking any damage from it are the jokers who put themselves in the path of the line AoE.
‘Jokers’, because it’s pretty obvious where the line AoE will go given it does the AoE nearly 25 times in a row before it dies – always in my direction, and once that starts I no longer need to move.
Most other champions still do attack me more often than most, and nearly all the time in melee range, but that one stands out as the only one that insists on attacking me even when I’m far away and can’t be hit by any of its attacks.
The current iteration of aggro however seems to be ‘which target is inflicting the most damage, which target is inflicting the most damage and which target is inflicting the most damage’, with a pinch of ‘lowest HP pool’ perhaps – just a pinch, since Zerker Elementalists aren’t drawing the aggro off me, even though they’ve the same HP pool.
P.S. ‘Try that build with a World Boss, like Claw of Jormag, and you will find that you are downed constantly, if you don’t dodge, have damage mitigation or a heal.’ reflects that you haven’t read my original post at all, because I AM using that build on bosses up to the Triple Wurm and have clearly stated so. I’ve been doing so for more than a year on the thief and through different builds in different classes. That is kind of the reason for the post.
Maybe the change isn’t as obvious to people if they always run in full zerker parties in the exact same build in the exact same class, but ‘something’ changed recently with aggro that seems very clear to me given the diversity of builds I hold.
[Shinigami, NEC, WvW Condinuke] [Rekka, ELE, Fracs] [Tora, PS WAR] [Kageoni, THI] [Hayako, ENG]
(edited by Hayashi.3416)