[Declined] Tactic: Focused Offense

[th3gatekeeper]

Focused Offense on tanks is current just a waste of a tactic slot. Lets compare with the other "version" of this tactic.

The premise behind these "hybrid making" tactics is to take an Archtype and make it not as good at that archtype but gain some additional benefits of another archtype.

So for example. "Divine Fury" (DOK/AM/etc. Tactic). "Gain 25% more damage, Heals are 20% less effective". This takes away from the DOKs Primary Arch type (heals) to give access to a secondary archtype (damage).

Now when it comes to something like Tanks, Focused offense only gives 15% more damage, but lowers your armor by 33%. Which, due to this game being an "armor meta" game, the 33% reduction is a MASSIVE increase in damage taken.... For instance. I did some testing with a Melee DOK (434 WS)

@4200 armor, he did 148 damage to me.
-33% of that armor = 2800. I couldnt get this number, so I chose 3k as close enough.
@ 3,000 armor, he did 239 damage to me. (This is a 61% increase in damage to what I took at 4200 armor).

So... What does this mean? Well it means focused offense is the equivalent to:
"gain 15% more damage but TAKE 61% MORE PHYSICAL DAMAGE!"

Now, people might be tempted to think "well yeah, but armor only impacts physical damage, there are tons of other damage types, and skills that bypass armor etc" Which is true... However I would easily wager that over half of the total damage dealt, is physical damage - which BTW is why armor pots/armor stacking and armor debuffs are all "meta". Things like AA (which typically make up ~30% of melee damage) are all physical non-bypassing armor. Even things like WE/WH only have a few handful abilities bypass armor, even the dreaded "Mara with Piercing Bite" only bypasses half your armor with attacks that require mutation... So even then its still a ton of physical damage where armor plays a HUGE role....

All this to say, I really think this tactic is just poor compared to its counter part "Divine Fury". Not to mention, a tanks "Archype role" isnt armor... its Guard. If it WERE armor, then classes shouldnt be able to use armor talis and armor pots to gain "tank archtype"... I mean shoot, as one example a Melee DOK who slots armor talis, can have as much armor as my tank as a base... however, even if I slot all strength talis (to even it out) I still dont do the same DPS he does AND he can heal himself too LOL..... So how does that work....

No, the "Archtype" of Tanks is Guard....So the "negative" of FO should be to make tanks worse at guard but gain damage.

So here is my proposal:
Focused Offense: Increases your damage by 15%, but requires a Great Weapon (2h). (NO armor penalty)

- Why is this fair? Because you already give up a TON swapping from SnB -> 2H. You lose block (for yourself) + the added "guard mitigation" block provides - which means you take a ton more guard damage. If you check your "damage" difference between SnB and 2H (with stats being equal) you only GAIN about 10% more damage - which doesnt make up for the HUGE defensive loss you sustained (around 20% less block chance with renown + base block). So F.O. could be a way to "even that out"- by bringing the damage boost up to 25% (10% +15%) in giving 2h tanks an additional 25% more damage over their SnB counterparts. They are by definition worse at "guard" already and MUCH less tanky (also losing access to things like HTL too).

- The idea this proposals being: Make them worse at their Archtype (Guard) via them taking more damage from guard (by making it a 2H tactic only, while gaining access to another Archtype (25% damage - via 10% with 2H + tactic's 15%)

This mirror/mimics the other healers ability to "hybrid" better - which would help 2H tanks have a more viable spot in groups where as right now they are often more a liability than a benefit....

Tanks give up a LOT to go 2H and frankly dont get much in return. Focused Offense I believe was intended to "bridge the gap" there - just like healers Divine Fury, but it costs FAR too much and doesnt give any substantial benefit in return.....


EDIT: I wanted to address the other thread. The only two classes that get "really high crits" already are SM and BO... These classes (when 2H) typically run GWM or Gud at big choppin - which gives 10% damage AND 5% parry. So making this 15% and 2H only, would mean that compared to that tactic its a tough call:
Gain 5% more damage over that, but lose 5% parry.... (compared to GWM/GBC). So it needs to be a "tradeoff" between those.

The other thread also didnt discuss making this 2H only - which i think is a MUST for making this even... THAT is the "downside" of this tactic - its 2H.... Otherwise SnB tanks will just rock full STR setups and F.O. and have the best of both worlds. This tactic should be the "equalizer" ofbenefits. Right now 2H tanks give up FAR too much for what they gain... F.O. can fix that - as an OPTION.

[wargrimnir]

There's already a Proposal pending on this.

viewtopic.php?f=100&t=18439

[Gerv]

Damage for the sake of damage is not the solution as argued extensively in the previous thread, the tactic, especially for classes like the SM and the BO and the IB and now BG.
Declined, pending the outcome of the previous topic.
Gerv.