The most common critique of the Warrior class, as eloquently framed by a sharp player named Lunacresia on my server, is the lack of survivability of Warriors in PVP.
There are multiple factors which synergistically contribute to the lack of survivability:
- Damage by many specs/classes is not Physical, so Plate armor doesn’t provide as much value relative to other games
- Warriors do not share a built-in stat or mechanic that boosts their durability significantly compared to other games. E.g. there is no equivalent of WAR’s Toughness mechanic (which provided flat mitigation), which Warriors were able to stack in their spec
- Warriors deal their most effective damage and CC in melee range, but many Warrior specs lack CC breakers that enable them to consistently avoid getting kited
- Warriors lack either the escapability or self-healing capability of other classes
I have played durable melee classes in other games, including:
- LOTRO Captain (medium armor, very high HP, some self-healing)
- WAR Swordmaster (plate armor, high HP, high mitigation, and high on-use avoidance for 2H via Wall of Darting Steel)
- WoW Protection Paladin (plate armor, high HP, high mitigation)
While playing those 3 classes, other (intelligent) enemy players actively avoided targeting me if other squishier targets were available. That makes sense.
However, in Rift this is not the case. By 50, everyone seems to have figured out that Warriors have limited survivability, and players actively target Warriors to burn them down, even a high-HP shield-bearing player such as my Riftblade/Paladin Warrior.
There have been various suggestions made as to how to address the current lack of survivability. The simplest and most elegant solution I have read is to add an Elemental Resistance component to Plate armor. This would address issues #1 and #2 above, and increased durability would enable a Warrior to survive long enough for gap-closing cooldowns to be available for use which partially addresses issue #3 above. The lack of escapability and self-healing (issue #4) is a problem not easily solved. But by simply adding Elemental Resistance to make Warriors more durable, as they are in every other game I have played, would help address a lot of the frustration of the playerbase.
As a closing thought, I want to say that I enjoy my Warrior and love the spec that I play. But not everyone is willing to run as a 1H Riftblade/Paladin and that is completely understandable, and as a Warrior I want what is balanced and fair as a whole for my class, including specs which I do not play.
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So does that mean your rolling a rogue now, lol.
Hmmm? Why would you think that?
My take is that there is an issue with my class as a whole in PVP not with my particular spec.
Oh I was just kidding.
I’ve actually been very appreciative of your none QQ’r attitude across the MMO’s I’ve followed your work on.
This is one of many reasons that I’m currently leveling some alts. I’m not a complainer/QQer/sky-is-falling-er, and I love the game and I love Warriors. 1.2 will be another step in the right direction, but still doesn’t address what you’ve outlined here.
I like the idea. I personally see a lot of opportunities throughout a lot of the classes to implement more “Rifty” elements (where are “Rift” inspired Cleric/Mage souls?)… so giving warriors, say, “Rift armor” that sort of harmonizes with Plate. The idea being that if (and only if) you have Plate armor in every armor slot you are “at one” with your calling and the “Rift armor” is activated to provide elemental resistances (at the same time keeping people from equipping leather for stats).
I’m not generally a practitioner of armchair-dev’ing, but I agree with the point you’re making and I think my idea here is one of a million possible ways to make it work. Obviously somewhat inspired by what WoW has done recently.
Anyway, hope you’re still having fun with Warrior @50. Like I said, I’m taking a break from it, but one of the main reasons is simply waiting for a few friends/family members to hit 50 and play with me.
Anyway, hope you’re still having fun with Warrior @50
I am still having fun :)
Been collecting 1v1s and 1v2s from various warfronts for another video to talk about matchups and mechanics.
No Luna is dead on in her post. It forms the basis for the RB/Pally Spec. Use elemental damage to bypass armor. This is why I can usually take ont he big burst damage Champs and come out on top due to elemental damage + some snare/kiting. I think a small amount of elemental resist based of armor value would be helpful. 1% of total armor added to global elemental resist would really help.
I’m holding my tongue until I’m 50. It seems like that’s when it matters!
I must say, what’s with all the anti sword n’ board attitude on that thread? Do these people have no clue?
welll what about some talk about how dead Rift player base is, atleast in eu severs the game have already died to very low active players, and my best guess is in a few months its a forgotten game, sadly
On my server Harrow (US RP-PVP), the number of players seems to be about the same as it has been over the past month.
I’m not sure I’d agree there, they always say medium load until about 2am or so…
Easy way to fix this without ruining PvE balance. In the Vindicator tree there should be a free 10 point 1 hour buff ability for Magic Mitigation. I would suggest a 10-20% magic damage mitigation from PLAYER spells only with the same chance for a passive 100% damage spell reflect. This increases survivability considerably, makes warriors choose to use the PvP soul and prevents it from being used in PvE situations, therefore negating any changes to PvE armor balancing/stacking.
Warrior damage atm is not in a bad state, as stated, its purely a survivability issue. I honestly dont know if Trion are on the right track if a warrior can be 1-2 shotted by a pyro. The Pyro damage is large yes, but not game breaking. The chance to stun and be completely immune to CC is ridiculous. My solution to GoS is make it a buff on a 2-3min CD. Once activated it provides 20% damage mitigation and CC immunity for 6-8 seconds but is cancelled with any movement.
The issue atm is mages sitting there free casting on you and you beating on them to only take off a small percentage of thier health whilst they have the time to type “LOL, that tickles”.
I got hit by a 4.6k fulminate crit last nite, which stunned me and left me with 1k HP which got eaten straight away by the Cinder DOT. I was actually in melee range and hitting from behind and doing next to no damage and he simply turned around and 1 instant cast later i was dead.
That can’t be balance.
AP scaling needs to be addressed. With correct AP scaling the time to kill goes down, hence increasing survivability once again. A valid point is that you can dodge, parry, block and mitigate physical damage, but there is no defence against magical damage at all.
It would be cool if you could block spells a la WAR. Though this would buff the survivability of shield wearing clerics which they probably don’t need. Maybe just a lowish passive in the PvP tree that allowed it, would synergise well with the skill that allows warriors to block without a shield on the left side of the tree. This would have be used in conjunction with some other flat mitigation mechanic against spells though, as it would not be enough by itself. Also some shield based spell reflects (off the GCD 5s buff to reflect the next spell) would be a good addition to the warrior aresnal, and maybe talents that increase charges/duration. This would allow warriors to close gaps more safely, and mean mages would have to pay more attention who they are casting on lest they get a fireball back to the face.
That arent good news. I bought rift yesterday and wanted to play something like a wow blood-deathknight in PvP. Looks like I have to start with another class til those balance issues are fixed.