by Normy » Thu Apr 30, 2009 4:16 pm
When i see SK's effectively out-tanking warriors on raid targets, I'll cry nerf. For the time being, warriors are still the kings of tanking, and a good warrior can out-DPS a knight. Now in reference to group gear, if you are referring to SoD group gear, then yes a knight will likely outtank a warrior on group content. This comes down to the AC being absolute crap on the group gear, but knights have more ways to mitigate for not having the AC. Warriors are much more gear dependent and lots still go the mostly HP route.
Therefore they are taking greater hits than a knight unless they are under defensive disc in group gear. Paladins and SK's have ways of self healing that makes us appear to be taking less hits, plus we are much more likely to be using a shield than a warrior while tanking.
Getting into fight where the minimum damage of a mob is so great, like raid targets, and that is where warriors with their discs and natural mitigation will typically shine. I'm not complaining about our ability to tank, I'm complaining that in order to do it we give up our already dismal DPS and have to sacrafice some of our self-healing ability. Or we can keep some of our self-healing, but have to sacrafice some of our agro-generation.
A paladin can tank, nearly anything in the group game at the moment, but for other tanks there is distinct advantages to having them. Warriors are typically very stable tanks, can AE taunt if things go bad, keep very consistant agro, and put out a respectable amount of DPS; all at the same time. Sk's are good tanks, can AE agro if things go bad, have good single target agro, help to keep themselves alive effectively, can pull in a pinch, and put out a little less DPS than a warrior on average; all at the same time. Paladins are good tanks, can single target agro extremely well, can group heal, we can put out a little less DPS than a warrior on average against undead mobs only, and can help keep themselves alive effectively; here is where we lose though, we can only do 1-2 of those at a time. Self heals cost us our DPS and agro management. DPS costs us our self healing and agro. Agro costs us our self healing and DPS. Our group heals are good, but most have noticed that they have not scaled well with the gear that is commonly available, so their usefulness has waned a bit.
This all goes back to the ongoing debate of class balance. I'm not interested in nerfs, nerfing the SK won't change the fact that I'm limited to only being able to do what I can now. All it will do is piss off the SK's and still do nothing for us. Maybe just up Blessing of Life by a bit of ranks, make it compareable to the hefty heals from ToTC, but make it cost at least the same as what the SK's had to spend on it.