"Accepted" Imbalances - Blue Tracker

#0 - Sept. 8, 2009, 3:31 p.m.

I think over the course of this expansion, there has been much debate over tank balance. With 4 tank classes, it can get complex to balance the tanks and keep them "different" enough to make them unique (which is VERY important btw). But we are nearly a year into the expansion and we have come to a place where we (the community) have a fairly decent grasp on what tank balance "should" look like. I am not proclaiming to speak for the community, just basing that statement off of the more prominent and accomplished posters who back up their statements with hard math. Disclaimers aside, lets move to the point.

I think the community is willing to accept certain things being "Imbalanced" with certain caveats. For example:

DK's have no "block" mechanic
DK's have no AP debuff

Lets say for the sake of argument, that they were in a 10 man, that was thrown together, that didn't have a ret paladin, warrior, or feral druid or warlock. (I have been in such a 10 man on my DK pre-nerf). There would be no AP debuff on the boss. A DK, properly specced, geared, etc... would be at an obvious disadvantage. The disadvantage can be overcome with skill, but the disadvantage exists.

I think the community would be "ok" with DK's having an armor advantage to compensate for that. Not a game changing (30% less damage taken) amount, but enough to at least split the difference. That would give them a small advantage during fights where the AP debuff was present, but not cripple them when it wasn't.

Would this be "balanced?" No. Would the community completely rage about it, if this was the only advantage a DK tank? As long as it wasn't as powerful a difference as AD, I don't think it would be enough to write home about.

TLDR: The community will accept imbalances as long as they are not GLARING imbalances.

Ghostcrawler

#58 - Sept. 9, 2009, 5:05 p.m.

Q u o t e:
Basic Toolset: Relatively equal Hp, armor, some kind of block mechanic, attack speed reduction, ap reduction, and cooldowns.

For your list, you added attack speed and ap reduction. Other tanks might add on-demand AE threat generation or a single target snap aggro tool or a resource system not dependent on being targeted. The basic toolset isn't a universal truth. It's in the eye of the beholder.

Ghostcrawler

#59 - Sept. 9, 2009, 5:08 p.m.

Q u o t e:
I just do not understand why GC's stand on this issue is that, as long as a large statistical majority of tanks are not being replaced, there is no need for adjustment.

What would your test be for when adjustment is appropriate? Community consensus?

Ghostcrawler

#83 - Sept. 9, 2009, 5:44 p.m.

Q u o t e:
Tanks shouldn't have to rely on other tanks to apply debuffs. What happened to "bring the player, not the class?"

Fortunately, we don't usually ask you to solo these encounters.

Ghostcrawler

#99 - Sept. 9, 2009, 6:04 p.m.

Q u o t e:
Why did you give all tanks thunderclap? You could have allowed other classes to provide attack speed slow to a prot pally or feral druid since you don't "solo these encounters"...... but you didn't.

Thunderclap is used as an AE threat tool in 5-player heroics. We found certain classes struggled tanking those instances if they lacked certain tools. An AP debuff isn't really needed in the 5-player runs though. It is as mandatory as debuffs get in a raid environment, but there are plenty of ways to get it.

We are even less likely to homogenize the classes by sharing all of their tools around than we are to make the armor, health and cooldowns of the tanking classes identical. The point I was trying to make is that "The community generally agrees on what tanks need to be balanced" (essentially the thrust of the original quote I referenced) is a difficult point of view to support. There are constant threads of "We can't do our job without X." We don't just dismiss those concerns out of hand, but you need to argue from the stance that you literally can't do your job, not that everyone needs all of the same abilities, because the latter just isn't our goal.