BG need buff: long explanation.

[Sever1n]

After rework of ws and general nerfs to warlord set bg from working class became near nonexistant. Hard to illustrate why but i try at my best from experience i have while i played it pre/post rework in smallscale rvr etc.

2h spec.
As i mention before pure physical class cannot work without staking of armor penetration. All working classes have tools to do that trough sellfbuff and tactics to have arp lvl atleast near 60+%. If u dont have it, any armored heal, tank, or class with acces to armor stacking is just wasted time for those who dont have good lvl of ws magic dmg or armor ignoring tools.

From what i feel original design was to make 2h tank dps spec to be support dps with 80-90+% of damage in single target without high lvl of burst, and some tanks like Chosens, SM, Borks do this part quite well.

When it comes to blackguard - class does pure physical damage with no ways to boost his stats at all. Pre patch the CORE of dmg and survival was boosting as much weapon skill as thay could, to have decent arp and parry lvl at same time. Now after rework they need to choose - stack ws and dont live or stack it and dont. Also nerf of warlord set that provided ton of parry and detaunt on top was another nail to coffin.

On top of all this BG dps tactics and skills in 2h spec basically telling you - hey you shoud go crit also. Wound cutter that procs on crit, channel that generate more hate on crit. Summary bg can have 25% critboost from his skills and tactics. Normal targets run at -5% -10% chanses to be crit. And here come most important part, BG cannot alow himself to boost his crit+ws without huge lose in def needed to do his job as guard. WS+crit is very stat denanding mechanic that makes any char basically glasscannon.

It all could be forgiven if 2h bg provided utility similar to kotbs wich also had similiar mechanic of woundcutter and critbooster in 2h spec. Exept hes not doing it. Only reason 2h bg exist now is Crimson Death. Thats all. Only thing he do for warband is critboost. When i asked do i need to go crit for woundcutting answer was - no, chosens already have that skill for free. So only job was to spam crimson death and survive in 2h, wich is significantly harder than snb, and to do it all build was focused to gain as much parry as posible. WS/crit/ even warlord set was unafordable luxuries. Even for the witch king is not reachable cos bg lives on parry boosting tactic that he just cannot drop. Outside that 2h bg in terms of mass utility is mass snare - critdebuff- furious howl for -10% parry block.

But he have his second mechanic where he on pair with IB provide buffs for his 1 friend. So theoretically BG should be awesome suporter for his oatfriend as IB. Exept he is not and this is why.

List of all bg can do for his party and oatfriend:
Armorstrip - scales in 2h tree in snb its 800at max.
Toughness strip - common efects from any tri ring shams in aoe version.
Aoe parry-block strip - 10% uniq to bg.
Crit debuf - 10% uniq to bg
Critchanse reduser in st.
Mass snare.

Strength boost - very common effect that can be gain from many sources.
Toughness boost - very common buff.
Willpowerboost - actualy huge one, but for dps its only disrupt chance.

And dmg shield.

And only if he in snb:

Force of fury: huge anticrit and armor boost for friend. One of good examples of bodyguard skills.
Elite training - another bodyguard skill strong in smallscale and giving ap pump to whole group.
For the witch king - prob last reason why snb BG exist in WB.


Basically BG job is to maintain cycle of debuffs on key target, and buffs on his friend. Sadly his counterpart ib have almost identical
Armorstrip, critchanse reduser, snare, shield willpower buff, double str buff, toughness buff. Which basically copy all thing bg can give.

But unlike bg ib provide ton of very potent buff mechanics that he can maintain 24/7
150str + 10%critchanse boost with 100% uptime. (Thats in addition to crit what 2h kotbs give and bg mimics)
20%parry+150 ini buff with 100uptime- with ini rework its prob near 25+% parry and ton of anticrit on top.
Armorbuff and corporeal resistance - 100% uptime
Very potent ap gain mechanic for oatfriend better than elite training with short cd.
Autoatack booster for whole grp - we saw what miracles it does for WP and any autouser.
And optionaly snarebreaker, and pull cancel.

Just compare list buff that BG provide to IB. For dps when they see ib - they literally scream "marry me", when they see BG - they say "meh, i tolerate one, shammie need it for aoe heal spam"

Only 2 intsruments of bg is still potent and shine, punt into oblivion and 5sec stun. But if i was dps i would choose ib over bg 100% of time.

Its is hard to me to get whole picture in head, maybe im losing some details, but it all was my head sinse i started play bg, was witness of his rework, played 2h and snb on org warbands,sc, small-scale. Sadly, and this is not only my opinion, bg now the worst tank ingame atm, and i dont want to see him suffer anymore.