Trinity, Companion Management, and Player Laziness

[quote="Aldemarran"]

Kai-Sun wrote:

...

(FYI, its not the amount of time spent blinking, its that blinking during a scan of status bars can cause you to miss one without realizing it until the next rotation. At one point I actually noticed that I was blinking in the same spot each time and leaving one person unhealed for quite a long time. )

Hehe, blink once if you need a heal, two if you're ok!

I'm really not trying to drag on other roles, and I know you're not trying to say I am, I just feel I really want to reiterate that any role can be a good leader Seen plenty of great healers that run raids, I just really love tanking sooo bloody much, and I'd have to say healing is right behind that in terms of enjoyment.

Maybe it's the fact you can play with people so much...lol.

Brings up another idea, those funny little quirks everyone has that's different from others in the same role.

Maybe not something limited to tanking, but I often randomly intervene people and scream something silly into vent while doing boss fights from time to time, or chase a healer with a boss on me that cleaves just to liven things up. (I'm SCARED, HOLD ME!! NOO STOP RUNNING I LOVE YOU, or something funny while half the raid dies lol.)

I also randomly spout "Space Balls: The Raid Warning" in big azz {Selven Profanity Filter Activated!!} orange letters by doing a raid warning. Always gets a good laugh if you time it right. lol

It's very true that DPS have less to worry about in general. There's no asking yourself if you're wasting that attack on this mob or if you should concentrate on this other mob, it's pretty straightforward in fact. There's also no real backfiring when doing nothing for a couple of seconds, because your role is admittedly usually the least important in percentage if you are a DD (then again, sometimes a couple thousands of damage by every DD more and maybe you wouldn't have wiped - which takes you to that problem that DD sometimes lay back even in raids thinking "ah whatever").

Nevertheless I have always tried to get the best out of my possibilities. I have adapted my rotations to the encounter and if possible/necessary the gear. During the encounter I tried to time my spells right to avoid ANY lag related time loss. Regardless of anything I was constantly theorycrafting and trying to find the best way to gear myself according to how I want to play the class. I had actually come up with a sort of "gear score" for myself, long before Blizzard introduced theirs (I quit before GS was introduced) which I updated all the time and with which I hoped to find the best piece of equipment for each slot (which was quite sometimes not the most common choice).
When haste first came out I decided to put a lot into it until I had reached a certain amount (more would have rendered it less effective due to a couple of often used spells hindered by the GCD).

Anyway, I totally forgot what I am even talking about. I guess what I'm saying is it's totally possible to push yourself as a DD too; but during the fight it is still likely to be the easiest task of the three roles.


What I'm trying to figure out for myself is what I'm gonna play in TOR. I really love to play (R)DPS because I just feel very comfortable with the situation (I like having everything on my screen and being a DD gives me the feeling of actually being engaged in the encounter). However it is true that it's sometimes dumbed down.
I have never played Healers in raids (only regular instances), most notably because of the gear "requirements" - I just never mustered up the courage to go through the gearing up process again once I had a raid char. And I never played a tank. That one just never appealed to me, but maybe it's just a prejudice.

Anyway, can you guys give me advice or even just describe what you like/dislike so much about your roles/other roles you've played but not anymore.

@Kai-Sun
I guess my purpose in writing yet another wall'o'text was to try and show the how and the why behind healers making good raid leaders.

@Grome
There's certainly a difference between "good" DPS and "bad" DPS, and as you describe, much of it is in being prepared and adaptable to the encounter.

Back in the "bad ol' days" Shaman healing came down to 1 choice, "Do I heal one target or three?" This gets rather boring rather quickly. Worse, at the time pretty much all the other healing classes were better at single target healing, so it was a matter of spamming chain heal as fast and hard as I could for the most part. (Ok, I've slightly over-simplified it, there were 2 direct heals, one slow and somewhat mana efficient, the other fast and not.) Since Vanilla they have greatly expanded the Shamanistic repertoire.

I have somewhat of a love / hate relationship with Priest healing. At any given time I need to choose correctly between the following options:

• Direct Heal, Fast but low throughput
  
• Direct Heal, Slow but high throughput
  
• Shield, absorbs damage but triggers three cooldowns, global, internal, and debuff on target
  
• Direct Heal on taking hit, bounces to other raid members
  
• AOE Heal, slow cast
  
• AOE Fast cast but on short cooldown
  
• Heal over time
  
• Either Channeled Direct Heal or % Increase in healing with death prevention (depending on spec)
  
• Remove Magic effects
  
• Remove Disease effects

Various of these heals have (depending on spec) impacts on cooldowns, mana replenishment, % damage reduction on target, initial burst healing or follow up heal over time, or cooldown reductions on other spells.

Having covered all of that we can now discuss the support spells available to preserve or replenish mana, block fear (on long cooldown), increase casting speed, reduce threat... etc.

As you begin to see, I pretty much always have the right tool for the job. The question is whether I can scan all the players, check my feet, remember what boss phase we're in, who i'm responsible, remember to check my own status, think through the problem and produce a solution in about 1.5 seconds. Oh wait, they added haste so I don't have that long anymore...

Grome, rather than me writing an entire essay about what I know of playing roles/classes in WoW, what kind of advice were you looking for? Perhaps what lessons I expect to carry forward into SW:TOR?

Aldemarran wrote:

Your own mana level vs. remaining duration of the encounter, as you'll need to decide to let people die so you have the mana to keep the tank alive until the end. Or conversely Priests have used on-death effects to continue healing through the last few seconds of an encounter when they were out of mana.

Ah the memories I have of angry /tells I have gotten from dps I had to let die at the end of an encounter to save the raid. I had been blessed with good tanks but with average at best dps that wanted to top the dps meter but didn't understand that a dead character does no dps. It was always my fault that they died, never their own for drawing aggro.

Godric_Barbarosa wrote:

It was always my fault that they died, never their own for drawing aggro.

You know, I'm starting to think that we should make a "DPS training squad" in TOR. DPS is all about timing and knowing when to "let go". Yet, people always think it's all about killing things as fast as possible.


Personal experience soloing a DPS - with a class not meant for that -

I remember soloing a Monk at level 10 in Guild Wars (and really soloing no henchies). Monk are healers/buffer with a bit of AOE burst damage skills on "long" cooldown, but they don't do that much damage on single target. I didn't have any problem with regular mobs, taking 5-6 of them at the same time...But then I met that warrior Elemental boss that could use the warrior heal and replenished his health almost at 100% each time it hit 25%. With no interrupt skills it was a pain to kill him, I actually abdicated at first, but once I respawned I decided to go kick is ass. Took 5 minutes, because I had to find the correct "rotation" to use my skills to take him low enough, but not too low, so my most powerful burst damage ability kill him. It required patience, not smashing buttons.

Ah, GW, good times. People sometimes trashed it for the "no more than 8 skills" thing but I actually liked that a lot. You had to think about what skills you were gonna use for this and that situation and a lot of ways to play a class were viable (no 1 spell spaming). Also liked that you had to go look for your elite skills.

Also remember that time when I "exploited" different areas with my Warrior/Monk thanks to a very specific combination of skills (you could easily AoE tank and kill an unbelievable amount of mobs - thanks to the skills it was: the more the better). Unfortunately the devs picked it up after a while.


What I am looking for is sort of a "why did I choose this class/role over the other ones and what is so great about it", if you can make it TOR related on top of that, sure!

Wouhahaha you played a Wammo....

Quote :

why did I choose this class/role over the other ones and what is so great about it

Depends on the game mechanics and my mood. I usually try a few characters before settling on a class. Also DPS, healing, tanking don't really mean much to me, it's really more the playstyle that matter. Personality also have something to do with it, I prefer to debuff or CC an enemies than hit him with more damage or act as a meatshield. Everything is in the "feeling" the class give me and sometimes my first impression are wrong (Vanguard in ME2, the class is crap for the first 2 missions, but I can't play that game any other way now: Charging, get down to 10% of health, Charging again to get your shield back up, unloading Shogun rounds, etc. Blood pumping class and fast paced).

Basically, I'm more into finding unorthodox way of using my character, then playing the FoTM of the month for that class. I tend to go toward the Jack-of-All-Trade Master of None more often then not, just to get access to more variety and be helpful in more then one way. I'm also independent and I don't want to be a burden, so I tend to pick class that can be self sufficient (when possible).

For TOR, I don't think we really know enough about the classes to really say "I pick this one" yet. I'm torturing myself between different spec, trying to see which one would be more fun for me.

Right now my eyes are on:

Scoundrel Scatter: Stealth to get close to enemies, scatter-gun to hurt them, lots of dirty tricks to finished them off. I never played a stealth class in a MMO though, so I might not like the class that much in the end, but I really want to try it. The Gunslinger look equality attractive with all their ranged "debuff" attack skills as well. I like utility and sometimes you can get really "creative" results (and the Smuggler seems to have quite a few "fun" skills).

Shadow Tank (Duelist?): AOE damage + tanking (the slow way of killing things). I also like how "Shadow Tank" sound. They also seems to be a high-risk, high reward spec as well.

Sage TK: This is were we are supposed to have the long range CC skills. Although, I'm starting to see the Shadow as more attractive. If the it play a bit like the Force Mage in DA2, I'm going to play this a lot. I just love controlling the enemies flow. I don't know, maybe because I'm "orderly" (but I love chaos too!!!).

Sentinel ?: The one focusing on mobility. That's for when I'm "brain dead", no need to explain that one and no I don't blame healers when I die...

Sniper ?: I will at least try it, when I was playing multiplayer CoD, I always tried to find the best spot to snipe people...but I have the feeling that class won't really play like that. Anyway, laying traps will be fun.

As far as classes go for me right now it's a battle between playstyle and Star Wars fantasy for me. I like playing ranged CC though I have know problem with healing. This would lead me towards Sage, probably a with a mixed spec. However, a Jedi that uses a lightsaber as a stat stick is an anathema to my Star Wars fantasy. Likewise a stealthy back-stabber is not my idea of a Jedi, so a shadow tank would be the most attractive. However, tank has always been my least preferred role.

Godric_Barbarosa wrote:

As far as classes go for me right now it's a battle between playstyle and Star Wars fantasy for me. I like playing ranged CC though I have know problem with healing. This would lead me towards Sage, probably a with a mixed spec. However, a Jedi that uses a lightsaber as a stat stick is an anathema to my Star Wars fantasy. Likewise a stealthy back-stabber is not my idea of a Jedi, so a shadow tank would be the most attractive. However, tank has always been my least preferred role.

I asked GeorgZoeller about a certain bit of info from the last update, specifically...

Quote :

The ‘Madness’ skill tree, shared between both the Assassin and the Sorcerer, has received considerable upgrades with the goal of creating a range/melee hybrid gameplay option

He mentioned the Sage/Shadow will get the same option, so we might not be forced to rely on our lightsaber as a stat stick after all =)

From the moment he confirmed this my main will be a Sage Hybrid.

Dresgar wrote:

I asked GeorgZoeller about a certain bit of info from the last update, specifically...

Quote :

The ‘Madness’ skill tree, shared between both the Assassin and the Sorcerer, has received considerable upgrades with the goal of creating a range/melee hybrid gameplay option

He mentioned the Sage/Shadow will get the same option, so we might not be forced to rely on our lightsaber as a stat stick after all =)

From the moment he confirmed this my main will be a Sage Hybrid.

I saw that response . I'm not surprised that the Consular/Inquisitor shared discipline is a melee lightsaber one. I always speculated it was the case (going against 90% of the official forum beliefs). Considering the shared discipline is a full viable spec in itself, it mean that Consular/Inquisitor can be full melee classes...using a single lightsaber. I think not a lot of people have realized this yet.

I also want to know more about how we get abilities and how the disciplines work. It look like Titan Quests, except that you spend points in ability ranks to increase the discipline level and gain access to higher level abilities. This mean, that you might not need to max or select all abilities in a level to pick the one higher, making it easier to make hybrids with specific specializations. All speculation done by looking at the Shadow discipline in the latest blog and one screenshot from PAX.

Build Wars: The Old Republic, coming soon(tm) to a computer near you.

azarhal wrote:

Wouhahaha you played a Wammo....

Well, amongst others and just for the farming part really. Later I changed the off-class back when it wasn't as useful anymore.

Dresgar wrote:

Godric_Barbarosa wrote:

As far as classes go for me right now it's a battle between playstyle and Star Wars fantasy for me. I like playing ranged CC though I have know problem with healing. This would lead me towards Sage, probably a with a mixed spec. However, a Jedi that uses a lightsaber as a stat stick is an anathema to my Star Wars fantasy. Likewise a stealthy back-stabber is not my idea of a Jedi, so a shadow tank would be the most attractive. However, tank has always been my least preferred role.

I asked GeorgZoeller about a certain bit of info from the last update, specifically...

Quote :

The ‘Madness’ skill tree, shared between both the Assassin and the Sorcerer, has received considerable upgrades with the goal of creating a range/melee hybrid gameplay option

He mentioned the Sage/Shadow will get the same option, so we might not be forced to rely on our lightsaber as a stat stick after all =)

From the moment he confirmed this my main will be a Sage Hybrid.

Huh, I saw this on the dev tracker. I read it as giving the shadow more ranged option than giving the sage more melee option, but I supposed it could mean either or both.

Great, that would be three trees I'm splitting my talent points between (TK, Heal, Balance). Yeah, if they don't allow us to dual spec my Sage is going to be a schizophrenic mess. I really want to beta test this so I can try different options out and suggest improvements.

You are kinda right though Az, it's not all about the role but also about how the class plays. i.e. e.g. "pure" dmg vs. dots. I'm interested in how the healing classes will be different and the tanks as well.

Godric_Barbarosa wrote:

Huh, I saw this on the dev tracker. I read it as giving the shadow more ranged option than giving the sage more melee option, but I supposed it could mean either or both.

Great, that would be three trees I'm splitting my talent points between (TK, Heal, Balance). Yeah, if they don't allow us to dual spec my Sage is going to be a schizophrenic mess. I really want to beta test this so I can try different options out and suggest improvements.

Part of me wants to believe that some reason for making the Consular a bit more hybridish was due to adding the tank skill set, where it would need some changes to make it different from the Guardian but still feel like it's own class. I know the Consular is supposed to be a mix, but I think they're trying really make the Shadow a really versatile AC regardless of what AC skill path.

It's making me rethink my main a bit, even if I think I may just stick with the Guardian. We'll have to see.