Who tell me that he have very good DMG in rwz just a lier or a troll. He have not bad DMG for tank and thats all, and he paying the price for this not bad dmg his survival, but this price disproportionately hight.

And the overall damage shown by scoreboard is overrated because us Shadow Tanks, use extensive amounts of AoEs (Thanks Time Slow !). Our single single-target output probably doesn't exceed the half of what's shown in the end.

And not only we pay this fluff damage with survival, but playability because a part of our attention is dedicated to our skills (KW stacks, Particule proc to maximize HS stacks) while others like, let's say, a VG can afford to throw skills pretty randomly, and focus on taunts, CC, guard swapping.

At this I'd add that our group utility through tank debuffs are less than useful : -5% accuracy and -5% damage... Take PT and Guardians, even in DPS specs, and chances that these debuffs are already thrown at ennemies when you'll use Force Breach and Time Slow are high.

And the overall damage shown by scoreboard is overrated because us Shadow Tanks, use extensive amounts of AoEs (Thanks Time Slow !). Our single single-target output probably doesn't exceed the half of what's shown in the end.

And not only we pay this fluff damage with survival, but playability because a part of our attention is dedicated to our skills (KW stacks, Particule proc to maximize HS stacks) while others like, let's say, a VG can afford to throw skills pretty randomly, and focus on taunts, CC, guard swapping.

 

At this I'd add that our group utility through tank debuffs are less than useful : -5% accuracy and -5% damage... Take PT and Guardians, even in DPS specs, and chances that these debuffs are already thrown at ennemies when you'll use Force Breach and Time Slow are high.

Between shadow and vanguard 17% DR, 17%! Vanguards also have -5% dmg debuff, smoke grenade(awesome thing) and DMG the same, vanguard had better AOE DMG and shadow better direct DMG. Self healing better at vanguard, cause he healing better when it needed, not shadows crap healing, always stuned or waved when u using ur telekinetic throw. And what point of ur self healing if u will dmg'ed same what u've healed in next few seconds? Guardian? He is just best PvP tank, nobody can be compared with him.

No, because all it's doing is encouraging the Shadow to only ever use KW for KB stack generation. As long as you have KB stacks, you would never want to refresh KW, which renders the entire *point* of having KW redundant in the first place. KW is interesting because it requires you to pay attention and reactivate it at just the right time to get maximum effect because KB and KW are synergistic (Shield + Absorb). By turning KB into DR, all you're doing is turning KW into a resource that you're trying to burn through to get access to the max number of KB stacks.

 

You might as well just outright *remove* KW and replace it with 8% flat DR.

 

Like I said, it's a *simple* solution, but that doesn't mean it's an *effective* one.

Fair enough. How would you fix Shadow tanks?

Fair enough. How would you fix Shadow tanks?

Same way I've been saying since pretty much the beginning and has been brought up numerous times over the course of the discussion.

Increase passive K/E DR by 4-5% (whether by flat increase or 35% armor buff) and either reduce Defense by 5% (removing the acc debuff from Force Breach or applying a 5% defense debuff while in tank stance) or reducing self healing by ~40% (remove self heal from CT and reduce HS self heal from 2% to 1.5%). My preserved method would be to reduce the self healing, but both methods preserve the same level of mean mitigation Shadow's currently have while reducing spikiness enough for Shadows to still be considered "spiky" while not being subject to RNG death.

Same way I've been saying since pretty much the beginning and has been brought up numerous times over the course of the discussion.

 

Increase passive K/E DR by 4-5% (whether by flat increase or 35% armor buff) and either reduce Defense by 5% (removing the acc debuff from Force Breach or applying a 5% defense debuff while in tank stance) or reducing self healing by ~40% (remove self heal from CT and reduce HS self heal from 2% to 1.5%). My preserved method would be to reduce the self healing, but both methods preserve the same level of mean mitigation Shadow's currently have while reducing spikiness enough for Shadows to still be considered "spiky" while not being subject to RNG death.

Rly? Reducing self healing? He have crap self healing in pvp and with ur suggestion shadow will loose anything self healing. Cause enemy does not allow him tunneling telekinetic throw (vs good players) and only thing is CT and BR healing. BR have 2 min CD. Ur suggestion is poor and do not fixing shadow problem. For 4-5% DR he loose 5% defense and self healing nice! Worst what i ever seen. Shadow is not only PvE tank. He have problems in PvP too.

Shadows kinetic combat nerfing and re-balancing almost every patch since 1.3, in 2.0 they rebalanced this tree. Other 2 tanks have a very good buff in their tree's. And now with this nerfs and re-balancing shadow is worst tank. He need a buff not a regular re-balance. Only blind or shadows hater didn't see this problem.

Rly? Reducing self healing? He have crap self healing in pvp and with ur suggestion shadow will loose anything self healing. Cause enemy does not allow him tunneling telekinetic throw (vs good players) and only thing is CT and BR healing. BR have 2 min CD. Ur suggestion is poor and not fix shadow problem. For 4-5% DR he loose 5% defense and self healing nice! Worst what i ever seen. Shadow is not only PvE tank. He have problems in PvP too.

Actually, this would improve things a lot in PvP in all cases except the 1v1 against a less knowledgeable opponent who doesn't know how to stun/knockback. Mitigation would be much more reliable. As you said, telekinetic throw channeling is essentially never permitted. That nerfs shadow on-paper survivability by almost 20%. Imagine taking some of that and turning it into a mechanism that can't be countered.

Also, regarding the defense nerf, that would be even *better* for PvP since player damage tends to be very yellow-heavy, which devalues defense a lot and puts significantly more emphasis on pure DR. This is trading 5% defense for 4% DR, which was a valuation chosen based on PvE ratios (which are much more skewed toward high value defense). The ratio of mitigable damage in PvE is about 80/20, which gives us the following equivalence:

0.05(0.8) = 0.04

These weren't arbitrary values. Kitru chose them such that mean mitigation would remain the same while becoming slightly more reliable. I have some doubts as to whether or not this will resolve the issue (as an example, an ability which hits today for 32k would hit for 30k under this change), but it's at least not a complete overhaul of the essence of the shadow class (a spiky tank with higher-than-average healing efficiency and an emphasis on active mitigation).

For 4-5% DR he loose 5% defense and self healing nice! Worst what i ever seen.

It's not *both*. It's one or the other. Either reduce self healing *or* reduce defense. Reading comprehension please.

As to your comment about the current self healing being terrible in PvP, said 4-5% DR buff would actually be *more* useful than the existing self healing is in PvP because it works against spike damage whereas self healing does almost nothing. In addition, getting rid of CT's self healing has less impact upon self healing than the 25% reduction in HS's healing effects and, because you cannot reliably get the full TkT channel off thanks to stuns/pushes, it actually has *less* of an effect upon PvP survivability than it does upon PvE survivability.

As such, *think* about what you're saying rather than (1) misreading what I actually wrote and (2) making a reply that completely ignores the *actual* effects of the changes based upon your own flawed understanding of the given mechanics and balance structures.

The changes I mentioned have been well debated and discussed. They would make life *easier* in PvP and PvE without affecting mean mitigation. The only time the self healing would be *better* is when you're dealing with low levels of incoming damage, which isn't any time you should actually have to worry about.

These weren't arbitrary values.

Comically enough, in the beginning, the def->DR change *was* just an instinctive "this seems about right" arbitrary assignation. It was only after we got more into discussing the explicit mathematical equivalence between the two that we found it actually ended up being the exactly right amount.

The self healing amount, on the other hand, was chosen specifically *because* it creates the proper mathematical equivalence while reducing reliance upon an unreliable, reactive, non-scaling mitigation mechanism. That one *wasn't* chosen arbitrarily in the least and is *still* my preferred method.

As to the 32k into 30k hit, I think that's *just* enough of a change. A 50k pre-mit hit is *supposed* to deal a crapton of damage and, at the moment, that hit is *just* hard enough to wipe out a Shadow at what *should* be an acceptable level of hp (~80%). Very rarely are the deaths from Terminate/Thrasher spike more than 1-2k overkill. That 2k less damage (coupled with the *slightly* more stable incoming damage profile) means that Shadows are *still* going to spike hard and fast, but they're *much* less likely to get RNG gibbed because their mitigation decided to crap out while they were at 80% hp.

Shadows don't need a *major* overhaul to their mitigation profile. Hell, the wonky mitigation profile is one of the reasons why Shadows are so fun to play. What they *do* need is a slight shift from an RNG and reactive heavy mitigation profile to a more static and/or less reactive damage profile. It doesn't need to be much since the RNG gibs that are so worrisome are *right* on the borderline of acceptable. Bumping up our DR by 5% would do *world's* of good without overpowering us.

Actually, this would improve things a lot in PvP in all cases except the 1v1 against a less knowledgeable opponent who doesn't know how to stun/knockback. Mitigation would be much more reliable. As you said, telekinetic throw channeling is essentially never permitted. That nerfs shadow on-paper survivability by almost 20%. Imagine taking some of that and turning it into a mechanism that can't be countered.

 

Also, regarding the defense nerf, that would be even *better* for PvP since player damage tends to be very yellow-heavy, which devalues defense a lot and puts significantly more emphasis on pure DR. This is trading 5% defense for 4% DR, which was a valuation chosen based on PvE ratios (which are much more skewed toward high value defense). The ratio of mitigable damage in PvE is about 80/20, which gives us the following equivalence:

 

0.05(0.8) = 0.04

 

These weren't arbitrary values. Kitru chose them such that mean mitigation would remain the same while becoming slightly more reliable. I have some doubts as to whether or not this will resolve the issue (as an example, an ability which hits today for 32k would hit for 30k under this change), but it's at least not a complete overhaul of the essence of the shadow class (a spiky tank with higher-than-average healing efficiency and an emphasis on active mitigation).

Oh nice only good thing is if he not shielded attack he deflected. And he can put accuracy debuf to live little longer vs white attacks. Smashers are just annihilate him cause low DR and 4-5% will not save but it'll be better. And if reducing his self healing and defense i think if we will see shadow tank in NWZ or RWZ we must to printsreen that and scream "Hey! They are still alive!"

It's not *both*. It's one or the other. Either reduce self healing *or* reduce defense. Reading comprehension please.

 

As to your comment about the current self healing being terrible in PvP, said 4-5% DR buff would actually be *more* useful than the existing self healing is in PvP because it works against spike damage whereas self healing does almost nothing. In addition, getting rid of CT's self healing has less impact upon self healing than the 25% reduction in HS's healing effects and, because you cannot reliably get the full TkT channel off thanks to stuns/pushes, it actually has *less* of an effect upon PvP survivability than it does upon PvE survivability.

 

As such, *think* about what you're saying rather than (1) misreading what I actually wrote and (2) making a reply that completely ignores the *actual* effects of the changes based upon your own flawed understanding of the given mechanics and balance structures.

 

The changes I mentioned have been well debated and discussed. They would make life *easier* in PvP and PvE without affecting mean mitigation. The only time the self healing would be *better* is when you're dealing with low levels of incoming damage, which isn't any time you should actually have to worry about.

As i said he don't need a regular re-balance he need a buff. 4-5% will not makes him imba in PvP but it'll be better. I think it is a minimum what need to do.

Oh nice only good thing is if he not shielded attack he deflected. And he can put accuracy debuf to live little longer vs white attacks. Smashers are just annihilate him cause low DR and 4-5% will not save but it'll be better. And if reducing his self healing and defense i think if we will see shadow tank in NWZ or RWZ we must to printsreen that and scream "Hey! They are still alive!"

 

 

As i said he don't need a regular re-balance he need a buff. 4-5% will not makes him imba in PvP but it'll be better. I think it is a minimum what need to do.

You are arguing with two of the single most intelligent and helpful people on this forum. Your arguments make no sense for 2 reasons: they are based upon false pretense gained by skimming and not thoroughly reading through, and with English so broken and bad that it is practically a new dialect. At least take some time to proofread, use some proper grammar, and make sure that what you're saying is exactly what you're trying to. I don't tend to highlight people's grammatical mistakes, but when you get to the point where I can't understand you, it becomes a problem and all that you say becomes null and void.

I support the aforementioned suggestions, by Kitru and KBN. They provide a feasible fix for some of the issues that shadows face in both pvp and pve. You accuse other people of being blind and a shadow hater but it seems only that you are blind and hating the shadows who actually do something. It is fitting that your name is Helpmewin, because you're never going on your own if these arguments are any indication.

I don't like to do flame posts. But enough is enough. Kitru and KeyobardNinja are practically gods in these forums. Back off.

You are arguing with two of the single most intelligent and helpful people on this forum. Your arguments make no sense for 2 reasons: they are based upon false pretense gained by skimming and not thoroughly reading through, and with English so broken and bad that it is practically a new dialect. At least take some time to proofread, use some proper grammar, and make sure that what you're saying is exactly what you're trying to. I don't tend to highlight people's grammatical mistakes, but when you get to the point where I can't understand you, it becomes a problem and all that you say becomes null and void.

 

I support the aforementioned suggestions, by Kitru and KBN. It does provide a feasible fix for some of the issues that shadows face in both pvp and pve. You accuse other people of being blind and a shadow hater but it seems only that you are blind and hating the shadows who actually are blind. It is fitting that your name is Helpmewin, because you're never going on your own if these arguments are any indication.

 

I don't like to do flame posts. But enough is enough. Kitru and KeyobardNinja are practically gods in these forums. Back off.

This gods are changed something in shadows kinetic combat tree? Nope. They just la-la-la and theorists. And if we didn't support many of these threads didn't advanced our suggestions, devs did'nt saw this threats so back off u! I don't care about grammar. Just writing as I can. Так что лососни тунца дружище.

As i said he don't need a regular re-balance he need a buff.

And what grounds are you using to support this buff? Shadows *already* have the best mean mitigation and excellent utility. Buffing them would simply provide them with an even *larger* mean mitigation advantage, which is, if you can't tell, a bit overpowered.

The problem with Shadows is not, nor has it *ever*, been a lack of mean mitigation. Shadows have *always* had amazing mean mitigation. The problem is in the mitigation *profile*, which is what KBN and I are looking to fix. We're leaving mean mitigation *alone* while fixing the profile so that Shadows don't just fall over to unlucky RNG or burst DPS.

If you want to get technical, the change to the mitigation profile that we're discussing *is* a buff. It's just not a buff to mean mitigation. It's a buff that explicitly addresses a significant Shadow weakness without any collateral effects (i.e. it only affects spikiness).

And, no, self healing does *not* provide a meaningful benefit for Shadows in PvP. It's a joke. CT is barely noticeable and you can't even rely on TkT for the healing. Both of them could be removed *completely* as far as PvP is concerned and you'd likely never see any real difference, at least when you're facing competent players.

And what grounds are you using to support this buff? Shadows *already* have the best mean mitigation and excellent utility. Buffing them would simply provide them with an even *larger* mean mitigation advantage, which is, if you can't tell, a bit overpowered.

 

 

The problem with Shadows is not, nor has it *ever*, been a lack of mean mitigation. Shadows have *always* had amazing mean mitigation. The problem is in the mitigation *profile*, which is what KBN and I are looking to fix. We're leaving mean mitigation *alone* while fixing the profile so that Shadows don't just fall over to unlucky RNG or burst DPS.

 

If you want to get technical, the change to the mitigation profile that we're discussing *is* a buff. It's just not a buff to mean mitigation. It's a buff that explicitly addresses a significant Shadow weakness without any collateral effects (i.e. it only affects spikiness).

 

And, no, self healing does *not* provide a meaningful benefit for Shadows in PvP. It's a joke. CT is barely noticeable and you can't even rely on TkT for the healing. Both of them could be removed *completely* as far as PvP is concerned and you'd likely never see any real difference, at least when you're facing competent players.

If bioware don't thinking about buff only re-balance i hope changes will not come. Let it remain as there are. Re-balancing as they call it makes only worse. Other get buff and only shadow re-balanced. No more thx. This re-balance does not answer to reality of 2.0 patch what I meant.

would a bit armor not help or will that make us OP again??

they nerfed us there twice maybe the 2nd 1 was just a bit to much

You are arguing with two of the single most intelligent and helpful people on this forum.

I don't care about intelligence.

I care about playability.

Since I have a slight Dyscalculia, I'll NEVER listen to all of these mathematical outcomes.

ALL that matters to me is playability.

And my intuition is probably a bit more developed than in a lot of other people. You have deficites in one area, but train another area to outweigh that. That's why blind people have often quite acute senses.

I had an other idea which would be a change in Kinetic Bulwark. The talent would be something similar to this :

Activating Kinetic Ward will now grant you Kinetic Bulwark, which will make unshielded attacks have it damage reduced by 10%. Last 8 seconds.

First of all, these 10% are multplicative damage reduction, not additive. Basically, that's a weak shield for when shield didn't work. In my original idea, it wasn't a 8s buff but 8-stack buffq that are used when receiving an unshielded attatck, but I thought it would go beyond my mathematical concept.

So here why I think it could be good :

If I take these value for Shadows mitigation : 35% DR, 50% shield chances, 31% absorb, 5% average bulwark, then average damage will be : (shielded part is in green, unshielded part is in red)

65% * 50% + 65% * 64% * 50% = 53.3%

If I change bulwark, removing the 5% of average absorb bonus, and consider it it will be up only half of the time (8 sec every 15) so that instead of having 50% of plain unshielded attatcks we have 25% of these, and 25% with Bulwark, then average damage will be : (same colors than before, but "half-shieled" part in yellow)

65% * 90% * 25% + 65% * 25% + 65% * 69% * 50% = 53.3%

So if you just randomly throw Kinetic Ward each 15 seconds with this new Bulwark, the average mitigation doesn't change.

The overall profile of Shadows don't change. It doesn't make the RNG deaths suddenly disappear. There will be instants when the Shadow will still be as spiky as now. But these instant will only be half of the time, so it will drastically lower the chance of a RNG death. And that's it if you throw it "randomly".

If you use it while aiming at critical instants, when the boss hits very hard, if you have lucky RNG and all attacks are shielded, it will be as good as now, but if you have bad RNG, let's say none of attacks are shieled, since the -10% damage will work it will be like if you have 6.5% of DR bonus putting the 35% DR shadow at a virtual 41.5% DR.

In average situations (50% of shielded attacks), during the Bulwark duration the "virtual DR" will be somewhat equivalent to the 38% of DR with the old Bulwark :

65% * 90% * 50% + 65% * 69% * 50% = 51.675%

62% * 50% + 62% * 64% * 50% = 51.8%

This change will shine for when bosses have big attacks that are not avoidable, and not shieldable.

I think my idea is half-way between the "status quo" and Kitru's idea. I don't adresss spikiness all the time but half of the time, and let players a chance to make things even better by buying themeself a very efficient insurrance in critical instants, and letting spikes have a chance to happen when it's the least dangerous. And if we consider that the boss has a pretty "flat" damage profile, then RNG death will still have a drastically lowering of chances to occur.

I had an other idea which would be a change in Kinetic Bulwark. The talent would be something similar to this :

Activating Kinetic Ward will now grant you Kinetic Bulwark, which will make unshielded attacks have it damage reduced by 10%. Last 8 seconds.

 

First of all, these 10% are multplicative damage reduction, not additive. Basically, that's a weak shield for when shield didn't work. In my original idea, it wasn't a 8s buff but 8-stack buffq that are used when receiving an unshielded attatck, but I thought it would go beyond my mathematical concept.

So here why I think it could be good :

 

If I take these value for Shadows mitigation : 35% DR, 50% shield chances, 31% absorb, 5% average bulwark, then average damage will be : (shielded part is in green, unshielded part is in red)

 

65% * 50% + 65% * 64% * 50% = 53.3%

 

If I change bulwark, removing the 5% of average absorb bonus, and consider it it will be up only half of the time (8 sec every 15) so that instead of having 50% of plain unshielded attatcks we have 25% of these, and 25% with Bulwark, then average damage will be : (same colors than before, but "half-shieled" part in yellow)

 

65% * 90% * 25% + 65% * 25% + 65% * 69% * 50% = 53.3%

 

So if you just randomly throw Kinetic Ward each 15 seconds with this new Bulwark, the average mitigation doesn't change.

The overall profile of Shadows don't change. It doesn't make the RNG deaths suddenly disappear. There will be instants when the Shadow will still be as spiky as now. But these instant will only be half of the time, so it will drastically lower the chance of a RNG death. And that's it if you throw it "randomly".

 

If you use it while aiming at critical instants, when the boss hits very hard, if you have lucky RNG and all attacks are shielded, it will be as good as now, but if you have bad RNG, let's say none of attacks are shieled, since the -10% damage will work it will be like if you have 6.5% of DR bonus putting the 35% DR shadow at a virtual 41.5% DR.

In average situations (50% of shielded attacks), during the Bulwark duration the "virtual DR" will be somewhat equivalent to the 38% of DR with the old Bulwark :

 

65% * 90% * 50% + 65% * 69% * 50% = 51.675%

62% * 50% + 62% * 64% * 50% = 51.8%

 

This change will shine for when bosses have big attacks that are not avoidable, and not shieldable.

 

I think my idea is half-way between the "status quo" and Kitru's idea. I don't adresss spikiness all the time but half of the time, and let players a chance to make things even better by buying themeself a very efficient insurrance in critical instants, and letting spikes have a chance to happen when it's the least dangerous. And if we consider that the boss has a pretty "flat" damage profile, then RNG death will still have a drastically lowering of chances to occur.

I really don't understand why need all this calculating? All of you are trying to invent wheel. Suggestion is very simple - just increase DR(mb increase DR when using ability on X sec) or HP, or both if necessary. Delete this, give that...brrr. Nice u have 35% DR in PvE we have 31.73% in full conq. Smash dmg 7k-8k crit ,dispatch if not shielded 7.5 - 7.9k crit.

I really don't understand why need all this calculating? All of you are trying to invent wheel. Suggestion is very simple - just increase DR(mb increase DR when using ability on X sec) or HP, or both if necessary. Delete this, give that...brrr. Nice u have 35% DR in PvE we have 31.73% in full conq. Smash dmg 7k-8k crit ,dispatch if not shielded 7.5 - 7.9k crit.

In order to prove that the average mitigation won't go skyrocketing, and show practical numbers of optimal use.

Shadows are in situation where they can't just be given something without being taken something else. Shadows are tanks that have a very good average survivability, but their problem is that it's only "average". We can't just give them something more, because in order to make them playable when bad things happens, you'd overtune them for average or good situations.

And yes, in PvE you can be near of 35% DR. In PvP you're alreay near 32%, PvE sets gives you 2% from set bonus and have higher rating. 35% is something that can be attained.

Since you're bringing PvP, my solution also works in PvP. Like I said, it shines when you can't shield. PvP has lots of situations where you can't shield, for exemple an auto-crit smash.

If you're taking an auto-crit smash and you have my new Bulwark up, with your 31.73% DR you passively have, you'll take damage like if you'd have 38.557% DR instead. 8K hits will turn into 7.2K hits. It has the side effect of turning Shadows in the tank who have the best mitigation of Elemental/Internal damage, since none can be shielded, instead of being at the same level than others.

You're saying that we're trying to invent the wheel, but that's necessary. You can't balance things with just concepts. That's because the devs cared too much about concepts and not numbers that Shadows ended in this situation (unable to withstand random occurance that are too likely to happen, being too relient of PvP-unfriendly mechanics aka healing, avoidance and shield)

I've been toying with an idea for how Assassins might be improved without making them more like the other types of tanks. One of the attractive features of the Assassin is the high mean mitigation vs the spikes of damage (currently, the cost benefit of this is negative).

I've seen calls to reduce the self healing in favor of damage reduction. I feel this would take away one of the aspects that make a sin fun to play. I'll admit self heals are useless in PVP, but I think with a few tweaks they can be useful in PVE and PVP and help balance out the Shadow/Assassin.

Here is what I propose. Please note I haven't done any hard number crunching on this theory to back it up (but I might when I have some time). I also love the self heal as a mitigation strategy and nerfing that in an attempt to fix the issues with Assassins/Shadows, for me, takes away one of my favorite aspects of the class.

Dark Charge/Combat Technique

The fact this triggers on attack is counter-intuitive (and limiting on Kelsara during NiM Dread Masters). Sometimes it may trigger while you have full health, and trigger your mending relic... wasting heals.

I propose this now proc based on taking an unshielded hit. It should immediately heal you for a percentage based on the damage received. This percentage can be increased using the talent that currently increases dark ward charge proc chance.

If this is too over powered, it could have a chance of activation on an unmitigated hit, but this puts us back into the RNG game and I am trying to avoid that.

This makes Dark Charge heal us only when we most need it, and couple it with the mending relic we have a very nice synergy that only fires when we get massively hit. It also allows the spikiness to continue, because for a 20K hit, we are still taking the full 20K (then healing some % of it) so we need to be topped off, but lessens the burden of the healers and helps with back to back unmitigated hits.

Lightning/Throw

This thing sucks. It is one of the biggest factors in our self healing, yet with the amount of trash and bosses that have stun and knockback abilities, it is only usable when we have 3 seconds to just stand there when we know we aren't going to be knocked back, stunned, or have to move which limits our ability to use it when we need it. Additionally, this ability adds no value in PVP unless the other team is not paying attention (and if interrupted, you have to build those stacks all over again).

I propose a change to the way it works. For each charge (up to three), reduce the time to cast by one second for each charge. It would work like alacrity, in that at three stacks you would unload every heal and damage tick almost at once, so the damage and heal profile doesn't change; it is merely compressed.

Why is this a good idea? It allows us to use our biggest source of self healing as a cool down when we need it without fear that we might waste half of it because we will have to move or might get interrupted.

Dark Charge/Combat Technique

 

The fact this triggers on attack is counter-intuitive (and limiting on Kelsara during NiM Dread Masters). Sometimes it may trigger while you have full health, and trigger your mending relic... wasting heals.

 

I propose this now proc based on taking an unshielded hit. It should immediately heal you for a percentage based on the damage received. This percentage can be increased using the talent that currently increases dark ward charge proc chance.

 

If this is too over powered, it could have a chance of activation on an unmitigated hit, but this puts us back into the RNG game and I am trying to avoid that.

 

This makes Dark Charge heal us only when we most need it, and couple it with the mending relic we have a very nice synergy that only fires when we get massively hit. It also allows the spikiness to continue, because for a 20K hit, we are still taking the full 20K (then healing some % of it) so we need to be topped off, but lessens the burden of the healers and helps with back to back unmitigated hits.

I was hoping for a little clarification on this, are you saying that the heal would be applied before or after the damage from the attack is applied? Either way it raises some concerns from me (although take it for what it's worth as I'm not an expert with how everything works in detail). I see that if the heal is applied before the damage is applied it could be useful, but it will depend on how much healing is applied, how much healing could actually be used and how big the attack is. If the heal is applied after the damage is dealt it may not be helpful if the tank is taking a big enough spike it won't help at all. Overall what I see is that this might help with healers keeping the tank topped off, but as I said I'm not a super expert with this so if anyone can tell me where I'm right/wrong I'd be appreciative.

Lightning/Throw

 

This thing sucks. It is one of the biggest factors in our self healing, yet with the amount of trash and bosses that have stun and knockback abilities, it is only usable when we have 3 seconds to just stand there when we know we aren't going to be knocked back, stunned, or have to move which limits our ability to use it when we need it. Additionally, this ability adds no value in PVP unless the other team is not paying attention (and if interrupted, you have to build those stacks all over again).

 

I propose a change to the way it works. For each charge (up to three), reduce the time to cast by one second for each charge. It would work like alacrity, in that at three stacks you would unload every heal and damage tick almost at once, so the damage and heal profile doesn't change; it is merely compressed.

 

Why is this a good idea? It allows us to use our biggest source of self healing as a cool down when we need it without fear that we might waste half of it because we will have to move or might get interrupted.

I like this idea, but I don't know what full effects it will have overall. Personally I've never had much problem getting most if not all of my Telekinetic Throw used, but I have limited experience with current Nightmare Modes (haven't gotten past Writhing Horror). What I see from this is a really fast damage spike and a decent sized heal in a very short time. My gut says this might cause some balance issues in pvp, but I don't pvp at all so I'm out of my element. Honestly I don't know what this would change as I mentioned never having a problem with the channels, but I'm open to hear what I'm missing.

Here is what I propose. Please note I haven't done any hard number crunching on this theory to back it up (but I might when I have some time). I also love the self heal as a mitigation strategy and nerfing that in an attempt to fix the issues with Assassins/Shadows, for me, takes away one of my favorite aspects of the class.

 

Dark Charge/Combat Technique

 

The fact this triggers on attack is counter-intuitive (and limiting on Kelsara during NiM Dread Masters). Sometimes it may trigger while you have full health, and trigger your mending relic... wasting heals.

 

I propose this now proc based on taking an unshielded hit. It should immediately heal you for a percentage based on the damage received. This percentage can be increased using the talent that currently increases dark ward charge proc chance.

 

If this is too over powered, it could have a chance of activation on an unmitigated hit, but this puts us back into the RNG game and I am trying to avoid that.

 

This makes Dark Charge heal us only when we most need it, and couple it with the mending relic we have a very nice synergy that only fires when we get massively hit. It also allows the spikiness to continue, because for a 20K hit, we are still taking the full 20K (then healing some % of it) so we need to be topped off, but lessens the burden of the healers and helps with back to back unmitigated hits.

If I'm understanding this correctly, it's effectively a DR/armor buff being called a different name (especially if it's scaling with hit size). I very much agree with your determination of the problem, but it sounds like a complicated way to buff DR.

Rly? Reducing self healing? He have crap self healing in pvp and with ur suggestion shadow will loose anything self healing. Cause enemy does not allow him tunneling telekinetic throw (vs good players) and only thing is CT and BR healing. BR have 2 min CD. Ur suggestion is poor and do not fixing shadow problem. For 4-5% DR he loose 5% defense and self healing nice! Worst what i ever seen. Shadow is not only PvE tank. He have problems in PvP too.

Shadows kinetic combat nerfing and re-balancing almost every patch since 1.3, in 2.0 they rebalanced this tree. Other 2 tanks have a very good buff in their tree's. And now with this nerfs and re-balancing shadow is worst tank. He need a buff not a regular re-balance. Only blind or shadows hater didn't see this problem.

But you're missing the point: passive mitigation is increased to make up for the reduced self-healing: the issue isn't that mean mitigation is low, but that the spikes effectively render the high mean mitigation useless since you're not alive long enough to use it. Increasing passive mitigation while reducing self heals maintains mean mitigation while shifting the mitigation from reactive self-heals to passive mitigation, which is not reactive. It's a straight buff, to be honest, since it reduces spikiness while maintaining mean mitigation.

The self-heals in PvP are not reliable anyways: you're just as prone to get blown up in both PvP and PvE at the moment. The proposed changes will make you less likely to get blown up. HS-TkT is a reactive mitigation mechanism and does not necessarily prevent you from getting blown up (especially in a PvP setting), it delays it. Shifting the mitigation to be more passive will help you avoid the whole "getting blown up" bit. Plus, in PvP environments most people know to use KBs/stuns to stop HS-TkT, effectively limiting your self-healing. The changes will allow you to mitigate damage throughout those stuns and KBs.

Im really sorry to interrupt such "deep game mechanicks" debate, but i want to ask you only one thing...

How you guys feel yourself in low-level tanking assassin/shadow?

Im asking this question becouse mainly you discuss only high level content, which i (probably) will never even see.

What about assassins/shadows before 30-40 levels?

Im sorry if my question is noobish.

How you guys feel yourself in low-level tanking assassin/shadow?

Shadows are most definitely the worst low-level tanks for a number of reasons.

The biggest one is that Shadows rely *very heavily* upon their tank stats and, since you don't see appreciable amounts of any of these under your mid-30s or later, Shadows are *substantially* squishier than the other two tanks because all that a tank really has at the low levels is their K/E DR and Shadows just don't pack *nearly* as much as the other tanks.

The second reason is that a *vast* majority of Shadow self healing is loaded into a single deep talent (Harnessed Shadows). Since self-healing comprises such a *large* amount of total Shadow mitigation, Shadows are missing out on a *large* portion of their total mitigation until they hit their mid-30s-40s when they finally get HS and Slow Time.

Essentially, Shadows are *really* squishy compared to the other tank ACs until they've almost finished out their tree, wherein they spike up in survivability to to reach parity, due in part to *finally* getting tank stats on gear and *finally* getting access to a vast majority of their self-healing.

Increasing DR in the desired manner would do a *lot* to make low level Shadow tanking better. Increased armor or outright DR would both almost assuredly be attached to Combat Technique, which means that you would have access to them as soon as you can start tanking. If the self healing were reduced, the necessary spike up in survivability when you finally get Harnessed Shadows wouldn't be as prevalent which smooths out performance, making life easier before you get there.

Quality of leveling is something that often gets lost in a lot of these discussions. I always try to keep it in the back of my mind because I remember quite well how much of a chore leveling up my Shadow was compared to all of the other ACs. The 2.0 change to Force Breach makes it *much* easier already, but the mitigation problems at low level are *still* present since Shadows just don't have access to the ratings that constitute a majority of their survivability whereas the other tanks do (armor rating as opposed to Def/Shield/Abs rating). Swapping over to more DR would assuage those low level mitigation problems a lot.