[Buff Suggestion] Some ideas to improve the quality of IB's in larger scale content.

[hammerhead]

Turning Ancestor's Fury to WS/crit would not be a good change since Watch n Learn already gives WS, it would be the same problem as currently with the str buff that they don't stack. Instead, it should be turned into armor penetration % for x length, so that would finally stack (or if sticking to the original tactic, turn it into melee power?)

My problem with Watch N Learn really is the length, 10s is 2 swings, but I understand that it can't be longer due to the AP battery effect. So what about decreasing the AP battery effect a bit to balance out a longer Watch N Learn?

And I like the idea. You just need to remake Watch N Learn as an active AoE skill that reduces WS for a 30 feet radius and removes the unnecessary AP component, leaving the same 10 seconds for a debuff.

And nowhere in the game, if my memory serves me, there is no tactics or ability that increases melee power. This is something very fundamental. So WS is almost the only and logical candidate for replacement for Strength in Ancestor's Fury.

upd. By the way, the new Watch N Learn will inflict Corporeal damage and compensates the weak AoE. So think about it.

[Earthcake]

Even if i really like the corp dmg aoe debuff for Watch n Learn, i think it should be made physical, at least in the beginning, because if Ancestor's Fury gives WS, we ll have a perma WS buff, which will buff our dmg. On top of having a new aoe attack with that new Watch n Learn.

Has to be tested like this before adding even more dmg i think.

[Ysaran]

Turning Ancestor's Fury to WS/crit would not be a good change since Watch n Learn already gives WS, it would be the same problem as currently with the str buff that they don't stack. Instead, it should be turned into armor penetration % for x length, so that would finally stack (or if sticking to the original tactic, turn it into melee power?)

My problem with Watch N Learn really is the length, 10s is 2 swings, but I understand that it can't be longer due to the AP battery effect. So what about decreasing the AP battery effect a bit to balance out a longer Watch N Learn?

And I like the idea. You just need to remake Watch N Learn as an active AoE skill that reduces WS for a 30 feet radius and removes the unnecessary AP component, leaving the same 10 seconds for a debuff.

And nowhere in the game, if my memory serves me, there is no tactics or ability that increases melee power. This is something very fundamental. So WS is almost the only and logical candidate for replacement for Strength in Ancestor's Fury.

upd. By the way, the new Watch N Learn will inflict Corporeal damage and compensates the weak AoE. So think about it.

To give melee power or armor pen to your oath friend is not an option, it's too op. WL cap strenght, reach insane lvl of melee power and has the strongest armor debuff. the same goes for WH with exception of the armor debuff, indeed WH ignore armor through feint positioning. Slayer cap strenght and reach 75% armor pen (the cap) in vanq/invader and deals a shitton of damage even without stacking melee power. order doesn't need a skill that grant melee power or armor pen to dps.
About watch an' learn i agree that it has quite short uptime and that's a bummer, but not every IB has Told Ya So slotted and so i don't think is a good idea to lower the AP given by watch an' learn.
IB isn't about AoE, devs will never approve a change that goes outside the role that a class has. in case of IB it's: strong ST buff, nice ST damage, mobility. IB isn't an AoE class, and if gods will, it will never be.
IB is a lucky class, it has a lot of different spec: AP battery, duel, dps, 2h utility and others. This is because most of IB's ability or tactic are somewhat worthy. the same doesn't go for other classes (e.g choppa/slayer use maybe 7 tactic shared between specs). I could pass hours listing skill/tactic of many classes that are completely useless and explaining why it is so. IB is underperforming? maybe. but the solution isn't twisting existing skill into new skills, it's slightly changing existing skill. Before Told Ya So was chenged (it isn't always been like this) IB was excluded by most of the organized WBs and used only in small scale. The Change on Told Ya So was minimal, but it had ad huge impact. I think that this is the way to go.
For example a solution to the short uptime of watch an' learn could be simply decreasing the CD

[Parallels66]

Turning Ancestor's Fury to WS/crit would not be a good change since Watch n Learn already gives WS, it would be the same problem as currently with the str buff that they don't stack. Instead, it should be turned into armor penetration % for x length, so that would finally stack (or if sticking to the original tactic, turn it into melee power?)

My problem with Watch N Learn really is the length, 10s is 2 swings, but I understand that it can't be longer due to the AP battery effect. So what about decreasing the AP battery effect a bit to balance out a longer Watch N Learn?

And I like the idea. You just need to remake Watch N Learn as an active AoE skill that reduces WS for a 30 feet radius and removes the unnecessary AP component, leaving the same 10 seconds for a debuff.

And nowhere in the game, if my memory serves me, there is no tactics or ability that increases melee power. This is something very fundamental. So WS is almost the only and logical candidate for replacement for Strength in Ancestor's Fury.

upd. By the way, the new Watch N Learn will inflict Corporeal damage and compensates the weak AoE. So think about it.

the AP part of watch n learn is literally 1 of 3 reasons why you're even taken at the moment...removing that part of the buff would MASSIVELY reduce the effectiveness of what limited stuff IB brings already...

[Dwarni]

Rename "Oath friend" to "Oath friends" and make it group-wide -> problem solved

[blechkautz]

Hello, from playing an IB and feedback from other notable IBs, ive put together a few things together in the hopes the class can get some changes and fixes to help with how they perform compared to other classes. as it is right now, there isnt really a reason to take a IB over a SM or KotBS in larger group play unless slayer stacking, smaller scale (6 or less) you can still possible find a roll for IB. but these are the changes i propose. feedback/comments obviously welcome!

1- currently blackguard can gain their equal of grudge through basic attacks while ironbreakers cannot. first change i propose is to change them to be equal, remove the tactic to gain grudge on attack and make it baseline for ironbreakers aswell. there doesnt seem to be a real reason to me as to why blackguard gets it baseline and ironbreaker doesnt, even if BG has more spenders its still incredibly easy to stay at 100 for them compared to IB, in some smaller situations where more magic users are involved, you cant even buff due to the spellcasts not generating grudge, even if its not as strong as BGs 5 per hit, maybe something like 3 per hit would be gamechanging to IBs so this would just be a standard quality of life change for solo/small scale IBs.

2- Currently ironbreakers knockdown requires a block/parry to use shield of reprisal, my proposal would be remove the parry/block requirement on the knockdown and increase the cooldown from 10 to 13 seconds. with how organised content can be, there is sometimes a chance that your guard may be targeted and you getting ignored/dps calling on a target on a healer and you may need to assist, having a on demand knockdown would GREATLY help SnB ironbreakers utility in larger group content.

3- Blackguards currently have a "spammable" AoE with monstrous rending, my idea would be up the cost of shield sweep from 10 to 20 grudge, remove the cooldown of 10seconds and remove the grudge building on it and make it do some form of magic damage. if the on hit grudge building was added to IB aswell, i think this would be a nice change to try and make the IBs AoE damage better, pretty much every other tank in the game does some form of magic damage, be it elemental or spirit etc while IB/BG doesnt have any, so this may be a nice Quality of life change to help with AoE damage output.

4- currently, IB has the *worst* punt out of any tank in the game, blackguards have a insane golfswing punt, BO/SM have AoE, chosen and kotbs have the huge airtime/length punt when tacticed while IBs is very very lacking. currently the IB punt doesnt even punt a target out of guard range half the time due to the low air height of the punt meaning the IB has to position more to use its punt effectively compared to other tanks who can just punt when needed due to the terrain and landscape and height defaults of their punt. a simple fix to this would be to make it more similar to the chosen/kotbs punts, give the IB punt more air time so they can punt targets out of guard range more consistantly even if for a moment.

5- An idea i had was to maybe make the IB buffs AoE around your oath friend something like 50yard range around your oath friend allied party members would also get the buffs, maybe at a slighly reduced quality? currently kotbs/chosen give buffs with higher numbers in an AoE while debuffing aswell compared to IBs single target buffs, a change like this would still keep the skill cap of maintaining buffs and keep oath friend swapping to maintain stronger buffs upon a target.

6- IB buffs currently do not stack with pots meaning alot of IBs effectiveness is greatly reduced/replaced by basic pots/linements, the engineers armor buff which stacks with pots currently due to it being a enchantment, with this i came up with the idea of making *some* of the IBs buffs into enchantments to increase the overall effectiveness of the buffs, making them more wanted/needed in a larger group enviroment rather than just being replaced by basic consumables.

7- Turn some of IBs damaging spells into some form of magic damage, currently IB/BG are the only tanks in the game which do 0 magic damage, with RoR compared to live the armor creep is much greater here due to armor pots not existing on live or armor talis not being as valued, so the combination of both makes it so anything doing pure physical damage is massively left behind due to reduction cap for physical being 75% reduction and magic being only 45%, so any tank doing some form of magic damage massively outscales pure physical damage tanks in a larger enviroment when fluff damage pressure is needed to hit that critical mass to get kills. even from a lore perspective it doesnt really make much sense IBs not having some form of magic damage due to them suppost to be using rune engraved and forged weapons and gromril armor.

8- Currently IB is the only tank in the game without proper debuffing tools, the only debuffs IBs have currently are the baseline tank armor debuff (which unless 100 grudge is negated by a basic armor pot) and a heal debuff which is talented, kotbs/chosen debuff just by existing, SM debuffs a flat % damage etc etc, it might be worth turning some of our buff tools into slight debuff tools aswell, as an example, vengeful strike buffs the IB and oath friends toughness by 75 default, why not add another element to it by debuffing the targets toughness by the same amount aswell. (just a quick off the top of head idea)

this is whats ive come up with so far for some basic fixes/changes for IB to help improve their abilities in larger scale content where they currently get left behind massively compared to SM/KotBS. Any comments/feedback on the changes above/ideas are obviously welcome. lets hope we can get some well needed changes inplace.

1. Since you were talking about larger scale, it's completly unnecessary to buff the grudge gain of ib in large scale. If you don't get hit and your of doesn't get hit, pick another one who gets hit and swap back after you are full with grudges. If the enemy is fighting back there should be no problem to get grudges. In smale scale, there occurs the situation, where you try to kill a healer or a dotting class and lack grudges, but for this we have the tactic. So as hard as it sounds, if you are in a fight of 6+vs6+ you should never have problems with grudges.

2. Again in larger scales (more than 6v6) where aoe gets used alot, you should have no problems to get the block/parry proc. Changes in smale scale but not the topicand snb ib in smale scale is suboptimal anyways. As it is now, it's the kd with the shortest cd (with a req but still) which is pretty strong and if you really feel like you need an on demand kd go 2h.

3.Give some fluff aoe to ib, why not? Will it change anything? Probally not, besides of a bit higher dmg of ib's in city scoreboards. But it should cost ap and not grudges if you ask me, or you would be feeding your grp +20 ap every gcd with told ya so. Would be way to strong.

4.Ib punt is completly fine. Especially if we are considering large scale, where you probally going snb and the ib is the only tank with 10s cd on punt.

6. Enchantment =/= stacking. Just an different buff type. You are asking to make some ib buff unique (so it stacks), but considering the cd of the buffs that would be way to strong. Engi (and Magus) armor buff stacks, but it's only a sellf buff for a light armor class. I'd say there are only 1 questionable buff form the ib, everything else has a good use. Armor, because armorpots are to present (no good alternatives for the pot).

8. The armordebuff is fine valuewise, only thing you could argue about is, that wl/mara debuff is higher than ib/bg one, but they have to specc for it. The hd is a decent tactic (kotbs is only 25%) but shines more in smaler scales. You can still go for driveby hd's if you see a healer next to you and you can reach withou leaving you guarded target. Also you didn't count in kneecaper, which is a great debuff aswell. I'd say the debuffs are fine and ib is more a buffing class with some debuffs and bg is more debuffing with some buffs. Not the same but both working concepts.

[oaliaen]

You guys know that if they're going to buff IB , they have to buff their Destro mirror class too right ?

[hammerhead]

You guys know that if they're going to buff IB , they have to buff their Destro mirror class too right ?

What's wrong with that? It should have been done this way even when BG was fix a couple of years ago.

[Parallels66]

You guys know that if they're going to buff IB , they have to buff their Destro mirror class too right ?

That is also incorrect. If one mirror is doing fine while other isnt there isnt a need. blackguards have huge debuff value and are taken regardless of pure physical dps for that reason. As everyone in the entire 24man warband in city benefits from their HUGE debuff value, theyre also best debuffing tank in the game while IB the buff mirror to it has little to no value or need EXCEPT if you have a slayer. Then youre taken specifically to feed the slayer AP and parry/crit. 1 person benefit compared to infinite scaling benefit of bg debuff as they have no player cap on who benefits from the debuffs.

Maybe BG needs some love in some places but overall theyre far more valued and wantes in small/larger/any group content comparitively. (Im also completely ok with them getting adjustments if they need them)

[Ysaran]

You guys know that if they're going to buff IB , they have to buff their Destro mirror class too right ?

This has always happened before so I don't really know how you came up with this statement. Last IB buff was not mirrored to BG, same goes for last Engine buff (Snipe reduced cast time tactic). just a couple of example, you know