Skank Tank = Tank with dps gear.

Shank Tank = Dps with guard, classes like jug, pt, or assassin.

 

Fyi: I don't care what you wanna call it, both are skank tank in my eyes. Whatever. You wanna call it skank, spank, shank, potatoes, do so. Bottom line a wannabe tank being a dps is a hybrid imbalance, period.

 

On topic: This debate and issue been ongoing for long time, now it's as bad as it gets with countless players playing this hybrid overturned class abomination.

 

Snave had a interview on this June 2016 among other issues and even Musco agreed and even commented the combat team knew the issues with guard and tank problems and agreed this was a serious issue for balance changes needed. Snave and Eric agreed a bandaid first is take away guard from dps, then Snave said exactly how to fix tanks is by making absorb or shield rating co exist for pvp where tanks actually can be tanks. Making guard only usable with a certain amount of shield rating or absorb boom fixed.

 

Link to interview Snave and Musco skip to 24:20

 

My question is to Eric Musco, or any Dev who reads these forums for feedback.

 

Question: Are you going to address this issue in 5.4 and if not then, when?

 

Thanks.

Edited August 14, 2017 by Caeliuxrules

 

On topic: This debate and issue been ongoing for long time, now it's as bad as it gets with countless players playing this hybrid overturned class abomination.

 

 

Are you actually talking about skank tanks, or merc/sniper dps?

 

Jokes aside, don't care about tank nerfs in case all 3 tank classes get a solid DPS spec that is viable both in solo and group ranked. Right now the closest one to being viable is deception assassin which is laughable.

Edited August 13, 2017 by DerSchneider

Are you actually talking about skank tanks, or merc/sniper dps?

 

Jokes aside, don't care about tank nerfs in case all 3 tank classes get a solid DPS spec that is viable both in solo and group ranked. Right now the closest one to being viable is deception assassin which is laughable.

 

Tanks with dps gear being able to guard, anyone being a dps and trying to tank was and is redundant.

 

Guard and shield needs tuned where you have to have a absortion or shield rating to equip.

 

Taking guard from dps and doing as such as I mentioned solves the problem.

Edited August 13, 2017 by Caeliuxrules

Right now the closest one to being viable is deception assassin which is laughable.

 

You w0t m8?

 

Just because the tank spec is horribly OP doesn't mean Deception is a joke.

I understand why people get skewed points of view given all they play is OP specs,

however Deception is anything but unviable.

Edited August 13, 2017 by Evolixe

You w0t m8?

 

Just because the tank spec is horribly OP doesn't mean Deception is a joke.

I understand why people get skewed points of view given all they play is OP specs,

however Deception is anything but unviable.

 

I agree it is not a joke, but it is not very good either; "average" at best.

I agree it is not a joke, but it is not very good either; "average" at best.

 

It just depends on the player. As it should.

I agree it is not a joke, but it is not very good either; "average" at best.

 

What we talking about here, assassin deception just being average?

 

It's really good pve and in pvp as a node guard, or sap node steal artist the best. Not to mention it's burst is pretty dam good now. Solo ranked it's still pretty good and in 4's you can't determine what is good in 4's and be biased why a meta is better than other specs and classes. Not sure why anyone would say it's average.

 

Can we stay on topic boys lol. 😂

You w0t m8?

 

Just because the tank spec is horribly OP doesn't mean Deception is a joke.

I understand why people get skewed points of view given all they play is OP specs,

however Deception is anything but unviable.

 

I probably spelled it wrong. Joke is that only one of 6 dps specs (of pt sin and jugg) is borderline viable, and only in solo ranked. I've seen probably 4-5 deception sins that are performing good in high elo bracket on TRE, while most decent ones are stuck in 1200-1500. In team ranked vengeance jugg probably can compete with FOTM merc/sniper/mara dps meta, but that's it.

So before nerfing skank tanks all tank classes should get a balanced dps spec (unless FOTM classes are going to get nerfed, but that's not happening), otherwise such classes will become total garbage. Also all healing specs should be nerfed hard, otherwise each trinity arena will become an acid fest (which is frequently happening now).

 

About regs I really don't care, neither should anyone. If defensive stats will be actually working, the heal+tank imbalance will become even worse. If the problem is damage, it's probably a l2p issue.

Edited August 14, 2017 by DerSchneider

It just depends on the player. As it should.

 

When discussing/designing balance it is always, except when measuring new player experience, based on "players of equal skill".

 

...any BS can be justified with comments about skills.

Guard needs to be restricted to tanks again, and something needs to be done about skank tanking. Maybe restrict tank specs to tank gear and make them not benefit period from dps mods.

Tanks with dps gear being able to guard, anyone being a dps and trying to tank was and is redundant.

 

Guard and shield needs tuned where you have to have a absortion or shield rating to equip.

 

Taking guard from dps and doing as such as I mentioned solves the problem.

If a dps geared toon is going to guard, just dps them (tank spec included). They will likely remove guard fast to keep from taking extra damage. They shouldnt last very long as it is.

 

If the scenario you are complaining about primarily involves a healer, that is not a guard issue but a healer issue.

Edited August 14, 2017 by olagatonjedi

sigh, guardian tank main here, again... i feel like i should save this as a word document so i can stop having to type it repeatedly...

 

Anyway... I have played tank, skank tank, and vigi guardians in PVP.

 

A. DPS specs shouldn't have guard in my opinion. There is no matchmaking in PVP anyway. So why make tanks less useful? I will say, to make up for the lost utility and because they are squishy as crap anyway dps PTs and guardians need better defensives. By the way, a merc or sniper can just sit at range and pew pew away until we're dead unless we can LOS, in which case my running around trying to avoid the merc or sniper slaughtering me sort of hurts dps. Also dps guarding can be easily destroyed by dumping one dps on them while the others are on the healer. If i'm being too stupid to pull the guard taking 1.5x damage slaughters my squishy dps guardian.

 

B. Why bother regular tanking? the gear doesn't add any survivability and means you do less damage. Make tank gear do something and guess what? I'll go back to pure tanking.

 

C. I do agree skank tanking is OP at the moment. Killing tank dps will also kill tanks ability to properly hold aggro in PVE. I therefore strongly disapprove of nerfing tank damage.

 

So summary: give guard back to tanks, make dps survivability better for dps specs of tank capable classes, and make tank gear do something.

Why can dps specs guard to begin with? what *********** genius at bioware thought this was a good change? the fact they locked stances to specs so people couldn't do this was one of the best changes they've ever done.

 

Why is it acceptable that sin tanks can do 4k-5k dps quite easily. (Good tanks anyway, Molra/Valek/Etude/Marzi)

 

Why is tank damage so high in the first place for a support role???????????????? Bring back old combat dev, the new dude who got hired for 3.0 is brain dead.

 

Tank dps needs to be gutted or guard needs to be removed from this game like holy ****.

Edited August 14, 2017 by brishae

Why can dps specs guard to begin with? what *********** genius at bioware thought this was a good change? the fact they locked stances to specs so people couldn't do this was one of the best changes they've ever done.

 

Why is it acceptable that sin tanks can do 4k-5k dps quite easily. (Good tanks anyway, Molra/Valek/Etude/Marzi)

 

Why is tank damage so high in the first place for a support role???????????????? Bring back old combat dev, the new dude who got hired for 3.0 is brain dead.

 

Tank dps needs to be gutted or guard needs to be removed from this game like holy ****.

 

As i mentioned just above, in tank gear, damage is not as high. In a raiding environment i'm generally pulling around 2.5-3k as a tank (guardian). As a skank in pvp idk i really haven't been paying attention but since i have killed some people 1v1 i'm assuming it's higher. because dps gear. I hate skanking, i absolutely despise the entire concept, but like a real hypocrite I do it because I hate being squishy more. My three recommendations from above (and from virtually everywhere else on these forums) would solve the problem. People that want to tank, would actually tank if they were the only spec that could guard and tank gear meant something. People that want to dps would dps if the dps spec did more than die first every round. even with a healer.

 

Literally all nerfing tank damage will do is kill threat generation in pve. and make already tight dps checks even worse. so please no. fix the gear and defensive balance on classes.

Edited August 14, 2017 by KendraP

Skank tanking is a direct result from two things. One tank stats are all but worthless in PvP. Two most of the tank classes PvP builds are unperforming by a good deal in PvP because their defenses are poor.

 

DPs who can guard is an issue, dps who can heal might be as well.

 

But lets be honest while skank tank (a redundant term meaning scrapper-tank tank (from CoH)) is solid they aren't dps champions and most of the OP classes can and do handle them. Its just they give the classes that are currently struggling a build they can compete with.

 

In a perfect world skank tanking wouldn't be super effective but because right now the only tanking stat that matters is health it is effective/. Since you can max out your health using dps mods and enhancements and go with end/power augs you can be the best possible tank while hitting pretty hard. The game simply doesn't know how to make a tank, a pure tank, useful in PvP so while you can try and take away skank tanking all you will be doing is knee capping the tank classes for any sort of PvP at this moment. And lets be honest, skank tanks aren't the biggest PvP issue going. Healing, Mercs defenses, Ops, and Gunslingers are far more pressing matters.

Skank Tank = Tank with dps gear.

Shank Tank = Dps with guard, classes like jug, pt, or assassin.

 

Fyi: I don't care what you wanna call it, both are skank tank in my eyes. Whatever. You wanna call it skank, spank, shank, potatoes, do so. Bottom line a wannabe tank being a dps is a hybrid imbalance, period.

 

On topic: This debate and issue been ongoing for long time, now it's as bad as it gets with countless players playing this hybrid overturned class abomination.

 

Snave had a interview on this June 2016 among other issues and even Musco agreed and even commented the combat team knew the issues with guard and tank problems and agreed this was a serious issue for balance changes needed. Snave and Eric agreed a bandaid first is take away guard from dps, then Snave said exactly how to fix tanks is by making absorb or shield rating co exist for pvp where tanks actually can be tanks. Making guard only usable with a certain amount of shield rating or absorb boom fixed.

 

Link to interview Snave and Musco skip to 24:20

 

My question is to Eric Musco, or any Dev who reads these forums for feedback.

 

Question: Are you going to address this issue in 5.4 and if not then, when?

 

Thanks.

 

Can you please write this thread in general discussion topic? Devs actually dont read pvp forum.

Anyway, as a guy who plays pvp very much in this game, and playing on different servers i can tell for sure that a skank-tank is a very big advantage... Teams with a skilled skank-tank who swaps guard winning those teams which doesnt have a skank-tank. Whilst being able to save group members from big dps, save healers which are pretty opped in this game, skank-tanks are also capable of doing huge dps, and often getting to ranked 1-2 dps boards (especially pt skank-tanks). This ruins warzones, makes it less dynamic since no one is dying in a team with a skank tank, and if both teams have skank tanks it's just gets ridiculous (1-2 killing blows per whole warzone).

Edited August 14, 2017 by omaan

Can you please write this thread in general discussion topic? Devs actually dont read pvp forum.

Anyway, as a guy who plays pvp very much in this game, and playing on different servers i can tell for sure that a skank-tank is a very big advantage... Teams with a skilled skank-tank who swaps guard winning those teams which doesnt have a skank-tank. Whilst being able to save group members from big dps, save healers which are pretty opped in this game, skank-tanks are also capable of doing huge dps, and often getting to ranked 1-2 dps boards (especially pt skank-tanks). This ruins warzones, makes it less dynamic since no one is dying in a team with a skank tank, and if both teams have skank tanks it's just gets ridiculous (1-2 killing blows per whole warzone).

 

And now take a look at leaderboards, how much overpowered PTs managed to hit tier 1 in this stupidly long season?

12! In whole game. Easy to guess they are all skank tanks. Pls nerf. Or just remove this class from the game, the effect will be the same.

And now take a look at leaderboards, how much overpowered PTs managed to hit tier 1 in this stupidly long season?

12! In whole game. Easy to guess they are all skank tanks. Pls nerf. Or just remove this class from the game, the effect will be the same.

 

I hate to say it but in my opinion PT skanks are the weakest of the skanks. Their DC are still not a match for many pure dps class dc and their dps is lower. But they are in a better place then PT dps....but still......

Why can dps specs guard to begin with? what *********** genius at bioware thought this was a good change? the fact they locked stances to specs so people couldn't do this was one of the best changes they've ever done.

 

Why is it acceptable that sin tanks can do 4k-5k dps quite easily. (Good tanks anyway, Molra/Valek/Etude/Marzi)

 

Why is tank damage so high in the first place for a support role???????????????? Bring back old combat dev, the new dude who got hired for 3.0 is brain dead.

 

Tank dps needs to be gutted or guard needs to be removed from this game like holy ****.

 

I'm with ya. Makes no sense to me.

 

Tanks should get mitigation from shield and absorb and shield rating. Why in world wouldn't that be a hot fix is baffling to me for PvP. And allowing tanks to use DPs gear in PvP is beyond imbalance. Makes no sense what so ever allowing hybrid tanks in PvP.

 

Again easy fix rip guard and taunt from DPs, make tank spec only gear actual tank gear then pvp will have a real trinity.

 

Until then game is broken.

If a DPS is guarding, he can be destroyed instantly. If they are smart, they wont start out guarding and then wait for the uncleansable stun etc. They need to be switched to but likely you have a healer coming out of stun into a white bar. If the healer has interrupt protection then you don't get to kill the skank that cycle.

 

So keep focus on the healer and let this dmg soften the skank, then soon as white bar is up/interrupt protection is off, switch back to skank and control the healer.

 

You keep doing that until either healer or skank dies, typically skank dies. Takes about 30sec-1min.

 

Skank tanks who do great damage vs teams that do mediocre dmg seem like god-mode, I do understand this.

 

Skank guarding is high risk and thats why I think its ok.

 

True tanks in DPS gear is a whole different matter. I do not think they should be putting out the numbers they are and I think you fix this by making tank gear work in PVP somehow. That will pull their stats out of mastery/crit and into defensive stats. Now give their damage abilities some sort of positive effect by defensive stats and you'll be good to go.

 

TL;DR, its a problem of poorly designed true tanks that are causing the problems you experience with Tanks in DPS gear and skank tanks. Additionally, it causes a very hard set divide in instances of skill gap. Low skilled DPS have no chance against any tank or tDPS with healer, regardless, so they're gonna blame it on something.

Edited August 14, 2017 by Wimbleton

If a DPS is guarding, he can be destroyed instantly.

Everything you're saying about how risky skanking is is completely true and an equally good group with someone in actual tank spec will reliably walk all over a group without one. But the reality is that PVP in this game is not filled with enough observant DPS with tanks of their own to dominate skanks. It's filled with bad, unobservant DPS and far too many healers. You'd be right to point out that skanks are not at fault for those problems but they undoubtedly thrive because of them so it behooves us to ask: what benefit does easy skanking provide, exactly? It's not clear to me how they make the game any better while clearly providing an enormous advantage because of what the queue is like.

True tanks in DPS gear is a whole different matter. I do not think they should be putting out the numbers they are and I think you fix this by making tank gear work in PVP somehow. That will pull their stats out of mastery/crit and into defensive stats. Now give their damage abilities some sort of positive effect by defensive stats and you'll be good to go.

The issues with mitigation gear are less important than the fact that just going tank spec and putting on a shield make you tanky enough to do that role effectively in most situations. As long as you can usually get away with using DPS gear choosing to put on mitigation gear (no matter how much they improve it in PVP) will be tantamount to choosing to ruin your damage with little or no benefit a lot of the time. There are a variety of ways they could make running DPS gear in tank spec foolish but just buffing mitigation stats in PVP isn't going to do the trick.

 

Tanks definitely do too much damage -especially AOE- but I personally will be relatively disinclined to care much until bioware does something about TTK on mercs, snipers, and maras.

Edited August 14, 2017 by yellow_

If a DPS is guarding, he can be destroyed instantly. If they are smart, they wont start out guarding and then wait for the uncleansable stun etc. They need to be switched to but likely you have a healer coming out of stun into a white bar. If the healer has interrupt protection then you don't get to kill the skank that cycle.

 

So keep focus on the healer and let this dmg soften the skank, then soon as white bar is up/interrupt protection is off, switch back to skank and control the healer.

 

You keep doing that until either healer or skank dies, typically skank dies. Takes about 30sec-1min.

 

Skank tanks who do great damage vs teams that do mediocre dmg seem like god-mode, I do understand this.

 

Skank guarding is high risk and thats why I think its ok.

 

True tanks in DPS gear is a whole different matter. I do not think they should be putting out the numbers they are and I think you fix this by making tank gear work in PVP somehow. That will pull their stats out of mastery/crit and into defensive stats. Now give their damage abilities some sort of positive effect by defensive stats and you'll be good to go.

 

TL;DR, its a problem of poorly designed true tanks that are causing the problems you experience with Tanks in DPS gear and skank tanks. Additionally, it causes a very hard set divide in instances of skill gap. Low skilled DPS have no chance against any tank or tDPS with healer, regardless, so they're gonna blame it on something.

 

Good post and agree with all your points.

 

Sure not so great DPs has problems, but even the great players notice the difference and if it looks like a duck and quacks like a duck its a duck.

 

Meaning, the problem does exist, tanks in this game needs revamped and hot fixed for pvp balance. Even the combat team knows it coming from musco...

Edited August 14, 2017 by Caeliuxrules

To add,

 

The real reason why we having these problems is bolster. I think its a pain in *** for them to make tanks be actual tanks cause of way bolster is. Back then without bolster tanks could be tanks cause of expertise and mini maxing. Now with this handicap bolster system if they revamped the way tanks should be I believe it would be a over balance with tanks.

 

Now this goes into reason why bolster should be ripped away, have a mastery cap where you have to be capped with starter PvP gear to play. Have ranked gear separate with its own mastery cap where ranked gear can not be used in regs.

 

Just like old days, a system where warzone gear is needed and ranked gear is grinded. I mean why not, RNG is complete trash and bolster is garbage as well.

 

You hit 70, on spec you wanna be, you get free PvP gear to start. Bring back venders, bring back a grind.

 

Allow pvpers to feel like pvpers again!

 

Its only way for this game to thrive again and balance should be across the board. Since bolster been introduced it has caused too many problems, and has allowed this game to be dictated by poor judgment calls for casual players.

 

Bolster is sole reason why tanks have no mitigation in 2017..

 

@Bioware

Good post and agree with all your points.

 

Sure not so great DPs has problems, but even the great players notice the difference and if it looks like a duck and quacks like a duck its a duck.

 

Meaning, the problem does exist, tanks in this game needs revamped and hot fixed for pvp balance. Even the combat team knows it coming from musco...

 

It isn't just tanks but their DPS builds that need fixing. Right now the most viable build is a skank because their dps builds lack defenses equal to those of other dps. Heck it can be argued that even as skank builds they lack the defenses of some dps.

 

I'm sure a problem exists I'm not sure everyone posting either knows what it is or agrees on it.

 

DPS who can guard (dps builds of shadow/vangard/guardians) who do guard are in for a beating. Seriously the only class of those three who have really decent defenses is the shadow and if he guards he will get popped out of stealth every time his guard target gets hit, so not a good choice. If a vangard guards as dps guards...well I am proud of them for trying so hard but any serious attempt to kill their guarded friend will kill that vangard super fast. A guardian can get away with it from time to time and might be the best dps to use guard but and I have to mention this guardians have likely the second worst set of defenses as dps, they will not be able to sustain guarding anyone for an extended period of time.

 

Is DPS who guard a problem? Maybe but I bet DPS who heal have a much greater effect on the game. I've seen scoundrel dps break 1 million heals that is far more game breaking than the short time a dps can survive guarding someone.

 

Skanks, to build a proper skank takes time and effort. Just throwing on DPS gear will not work for you very well. To build it right and be effective you need tank armorings, a shield, high enduarance dps mods, high endurance dps enchants, end/power augments, dps relics, dps implants, and dps ear. All this and you have someone not worth bringing on any PvE content because you can't really tank and your dps will be too low, although you will steal threat because you have increased threat generation. Now all this done you ARE NOT matching a dps in damage, not AoE damage not single target damage. So to sum it up you just burned one set of tank gear, made mods and enchancements to replace the tank ones, and augmented it all with augments you would never want to use anywhere else. That's a lot of effort in the end. You are doing subpar dps but much better than a tank and you can tank about as well as a tank.

 

Tanks....well they are tough....but their augments need to be different than what you would use for PvE.....and well your tough......

 

And this brings us to another issue is you can build a dps or healer that is very capable for both PvE and PvP. But you can't really do the same with tank. So even if you plan on being pure tank in PvP you will need two sets of gear to pull it off. That's a bummer and if you are building a second set why would you build a tank and a skank will tank just as well and do more damage? Tank stats not being worth your time in PvP is an issue to be sure.

 

Anyway as I see it we have way more than one problem.

 

1. Healing

2. DPS defenses for the tank possible classes (Guardian and Vangard, shadow is fine)

3. DPS of the tank possible classes (except for infiltration all the dps builds are on the low end)

4. Maybe DPS who guard and DPS who heal

5. Tanks....tank stats do little good.

6. Maybe Skanks....maybe if they were just a mid point between dps and tank they would be fine in my veiw.

It isn't just tanks but their DPS builds that need fixing. Right now the most viable build is a skank because their dps builds lack defenses equal to those of other dps. Heck it can be argued that even as skank builds they lack the defenses of some dps.

 

I'm sure a problem exists I'm not sure everyone posting either knows what it is or agrees on it.

 

DPS who can guard (dps builds of shadow/vangard/guardians) who do guard are in for a beating. Seriously the only class of those three who have really decent defenses is the shadow and if he guards he will get popped out of stealth every time his guard target gets hit, so not a good choice. If a vangard guards as dps guards...well I am proud of them for trying so hard but any serious attempt to kill their guarded friend will kill that vangard super fast. A guardian can get away with it from time to time and might be the best dps to use guard but and I have to mention this guardians have likely the second worst set of defenses as dps, they will not be able to sustain guarding anyone for an extended period of time.

 

Is DPS who guard a problem? Maybe but I bet DPS who heal have a much greater effect on the game. I've seen scoundrel dps break 1 million heals that is far more game breaking than the short time a dps can survive guarding someone.

 

Skanks, to build a proper skank takes time and effort. Just throwing on DPS gear will not work for you very well. To build it right and be effective you need tank armorings, a shield, high enduarance dps mods, high endurance dps enchants, end/power augments, dps relics, dps implants, and dps ear. All this and you have someone not worth bringing on any PvE content because you can't really tank and your dps will be too low, although you will steal threat because you have increased threat generation. Now all this done you ARE NOT matching a dps in damage, not AoE damage not single target damage. So to sum it up you just burned one set of tank gear, made mods and enchancements to replace the tank ones, and augmented it all with augments you would never want to use anywhere else. That's a lot of effort in the end. You are doing subpar dps but much better than a tank and you can tank about as well as a tank.

 

Tanks....well they are tough....but their augments need to be different than what you would use for PvE.....and well your tough......

 

And this brings us to another issue is you can build a dps or healer that is very capable for both PvE and PvP. But you can't really do the same with tank. So even if you plan on being pure tank in PvP you will need two sets of gear to pull it off. That's a bummer and if you are building a second set why would you build a tank and a skank will tank just as well and do more damage? Tank stats not being worth your time in PvP is an issue to be sure.

 

Anyway as I see it we have way more than one problem.

 

1. Healing

2. DPS defenses for the tank possible classes (Guardian and Vangard, shadow is fine)

3. DPS of the tank possible classes (except for infiltration all the dps builds are on the low end)

4. Maybe DPS who guard and DPS who heal

5. Tanks....tank stats do little good.

6. Maybe Skanks....maybe if they were just a mid point between dps and tank they would be fine in my veiw.

 

Great points mate, I agree with all of it. Game has more than a tank problem..