Defender 2.0 beta nerf

[Njall]

Fighters still can tank some and still have more attacking power than a paladin.

 

I'm fine with the various deflection nerfs.  Tank and spank was a really broken tactic and that was largely because the tank side of things was too easy with high deflection.  When you could just sit in front of a dragon endlessly and almost never get hit, it's pretty clearly out of hand.  Combat should now be more lethal for both sides, which I think is good, it picks up the pace in minor battles, but also makes them a little more dangerous and hopefully makes bigger battles more interesting without tanking being so simple and effective.

 

Then they should have 1)nerfed all the tanks ( which they didn't ) and 2)nerfed the high end builds ( i.e. shields, you don't become unhittable without a shield ) rather than a stance that's usable by off tanks as well. 

This aside from the fact that you can still grab cautious attack and only suffer like a 7 points deflection loss instead of the 20 points one this nerf brings. 

All this nerf does is killing defender as a class ability and make tanks switch to better modals (and make them more susceptible to status effects in the process).

Edited August 9, 2015 by Njall

[Doppelschwert]

This aside from the fact that you can still grab cautious attack and only suffer like a 7 points deflection loss instead of the 20 points one this nerf brings. 

All this nerf does is killing defender as a class ability and make tanks switch to better modals (and make them more susceptible to status effects in the process).

Personally, I think this is exactly the reason why the ability got nerfed - to not have a strictly better version of cautious attack, so that there is actually a reason you might want to take cautious attack. Since defender is a modal after all, you're probably intended to use it mostly against large group of small, weak enemies now, where it is assumed that you don't necessarily need the additional deflection.

 

I get that everyone is upset because their precious abilities are nerfed (josh actually predicted that anything of the bigger things he will nerf after release will summon a reaction like that), but at the same time, consider the feedback the game got, especially here on the forums:

 

Tank & Spank is an easy strategy that trivializes the game and CC/summons are way too strong, CON sucks.

 

So what did they do now? Nerfing deflection across the board by changing the attributes while making CON slightly stronger, nerfing summons, nerfing afflictions partially, buffing party AI, nerfing strictly better talents for talents which have pros and cons.

 

For a tank, you ideally want to have both a lot of deflection and a lot of engagement capacity. The paladin keeps his high deflection but has issues with engagement, the fighter stays on top with engagement (if you want that) but is now slightly weaker in the deflection department (and that is considering that in a way you metagame your paladin to get the highest bonus, the comparison isn't even against the average paladin). Personally, I think it's a good thing the classes have slightly different ways to go about tanking now. I think from josh's point of view, that's a very smart way to go about his balancing goals to have nontrivial choices in character building while making the classes distinct from each other.

I don't think this was about 'Fighter as a tank is too strong, so we have to nerf him', it's rather 'Paladin and Fighter as a tank are too similiar, so we have to change them'.

[Njall]

 

This aside from the fact that you can still grab cautious attack and only suffer like a 7 points deflection loss instead of the 20 points one this nerf brings. 

All this nerf does is killing defender as a class ability and make tanks switch to better modals (and make them more susceptible to status effects in the process).

Personally, I think this is exactly the reason why the ability got nerfed - to not have a strictly better version of cautious attack, so that there is actually a reason you might want to take cautious attack. Since defender is a modal after all, you're probably intended to use it mostly against large group of small, weak enemies now, where it is assumed that you don't necessarily need the additional deflection.

 

I get that everyone is upset because their precious abilities are nerfed (josh actually predicted that anything of the bigger things he will nerf after release will summon a reaction like that), but at the same time, consider the feedback the game got, especially here on the forums:

 

Tank & Spank is an easy strategy that trivializes the game and CC/summons are way too strong, CON sucks.

 

So what did they do now? Nerfing deflection across the board by changing the attributes while making CON slightly stronger, nerfing summons, nerfing afflictions partially, buffing party AI, nerfing strictly better talents for talents which have pros and cons.

 

For a tank, you ideally want to have both a lot of deflection and a lot of engagement capacity. The paladin keeps his high deflection but has issues with engagement, the fighter stays on top with engagement (if you want that) but is now slightly weaker in the deflection department (and that is considering that in a way you metagame your paladin to get the highest bonus, the comparison isn't even against the average paladin). Personally, I think it's a good thing the classes have slightly different ways to go about tanking now. I think from josh's point of view, that's a very smart way to go about his balancing goals to have nontrivial choices in character building while making the classes distinct from each other.

I don't think this was about 'Fighter as a tank is too strong, so we have to nerf him', it's rather 'Paladin and Fighter as a tank are too similiar, so we have to change them'.

 

 

 

Sorry, but this nerf accomplishes nothing of the sort.

First, nerfing a class ability + a talent in order to make another talent more viable is pointless, a heavier investment should bring the better returns; second, if the net result is to nerf a class, then you're doing it wrong. There aren't a lot of "cautious attack" fans around, but I'm pretty sure there are a lot of people who like playing a good, viable fighter tank, and poured countless hours in a character they loved.So, if you're pissing off people in order to make a talent more attractive, you're off base.

 

 

Third, this isn't a change that promotes diversity, all it does is make the fighter a worse tank, especially now that better monster AI will make engagement less valuable as a mechanic. Making something strictly worse is the exact opposite of fostering diversity.

 

Fourth, if tank and spank is bad for the game, they shouldn't have promoted it in the first place by creating tanking classes that are as dumb as a brick and mostly passive, as far as tanking goes. Even if they nerf their survability now, the model won't change, you'll just need to spam more heals, you have to change the way the tanks are designed in order to make combat more challenging in that regard. That and better monster AI ( which they're doing already ).

 

Fifth, this isn't a tank nerf, this is a fighter nerf, otherwise they'd have nerfed paladins and chanters as well, and this isn't a slight nerf either, since now a fighter that uses defender is more or less as survivable as a Barbarian. 

 

So, again, I'm sorry, but I don't think any of your points apply, in this case. 

Edited August 10, 2015 by Njall

[Gary1986]

What was the point of nerfing Ring of Deflection to 9 from 10? It just seems silly.

 

Also the -5 deflection on the defensive ability defender is beyond stupid.

[MunoValente]

 

 

Also the -5 deflection on the defensive ability defender is beyond stupid.

 

It makes sense to me thematically, basically the fighter is protecting others at the expensive of themselves.  A fighter with -5 deflection is still going to have more deflection than whatever back row character the enemy would be attacking if it got past the fighter.  There are already a bunch of attacking abilities that reduce accuracy, don't see how this is much different.

[Njall]

 

 

 

Also the -5 deflection on the defensive ability defender is beyond stupid.

 

It makes sense to me thematically, basically the fighter is protecting others at the expensive of themselves.  A fighter with -5 deflection is still going to have more deflection than whatever back row character the enemy would be attacking if it got past the fighter.  There are already a bunch of attacking abilities that reduce accuracy, don't see how this is much different.

 

 

Nope, a fighter with -5 deflection has the same starting deflection as a cypher or a ranger, and has only 5 points over a barbarian or a rogue, but the barb has way more HP. Yes, he has more deflection than an unbuffed caster, but considering that high level casters can keep their lower level buffs basically up all day that's not much of an advantage.

Edited August 10, 2015 by Njall

[MunoValente]

 

Nope, a fighter with -5 deflection has the same starting deflection of a cypher, is 5 points behind a ranger, and has only 5 points over a barbarian or a rogue, but the barb has way more HP. Yes, he has more deflection than an unbuffed caster, but considering that high level casters can keep their lower level buffs basically up all day that's not much of an advantage.

 

 

But when you factor in gear, stats and other abilities, the difference in durability usually isn't going to be close.  Your cypher or DPS ranger isn't going to be wearing plate armor and a shield and will likely have lower CON and RES.

[evilcat]

 

 

 

Also the -5 deflection on the defensive ability defender is beyond stupid.

 

It makes sense to me thematically, basically the fighter is protecting others at the expensive of themselves.  A fighter with -5 deflection is still going to have more deflection than whatever back row character the enemy would be attacking if it got past the fighter.  There are already a bunch of attacking abilities that reduce accuracy, don't see how this is much different.

 

Much better would be:

Defender: +5 Deflection, +2 engagment

Wary Defender +5 to ref/fort/will

Balanced, giving enought punch for class ability.

 

Otherwise...why waste party slot for figher?

Just pick druid. Give him shield. Cautions Attacks, Hold the line. Casters anyway dont need talents. With high resolve and maybe some item concentracion should be fine.

There is several center on me healing spells on druids (and what brings fighter?), other spells brings some cc which is even better way of tanking, also if enemies are blinded this pumps deflection even higher, and having relentless storm just keep going.

It seems that fighters will not even be close to that.

 

Nature is addaptive, nerf one class, other will rise in that place.

Edited August 10, 2015 by evilcat

[Njall]

 

 

Nope, a fighter with -5 deflection has the same starting deflection of a cypher, is 5 points behind a ranger, and has only 5 points over a barbarian or a rogue, but the barb has way more HP. Yes, he has more deflection than an unbuffed caster, but considering that high level casters can keep their lower level buffs basically up all day that's not much of an advantage.

 

 

But when you factor in gear, stats and other abilities, the difference in durability usually isn't going to be close.  Your cypher or DPS ranger isn't going to be wearing plate armor and a shield and will likely have lower CON and RES.

 

 

Gear, stats and other abilities are a nonfactor; most other classes have an advantage in both utilities and DPS over a fighter, even when wearing heavy armor. 

Build them for defense and, if they're just as durable as a fighter as well as being better at DPS, AoE damage and utility, fighters are pretty much useless. 

They're already a class whose only strong point is defense, they're a second or third rate ( single target only )dps, they have a very limited range of utilities even for a tank ( look at paladins, who can heal and/or raise their companions and provide offensive or defensive party wide buffs, or chanters, who can provide a moltitude of buffs and summons, an insane high level AoE attack as well as AoE stuns and a slow party-wide heal ) and they're going to fall further behind as the level cap increases. 

There's really no need to hit their only strong point.

Edited August 10, 2015 by Njall

[Doppelschwert]

Sorry, but this nerf accomplishes nothing of the sort.

First, nerfing a class ability + a talent in order to make another talent more viable is pointless, a heavier investment should bring the better returns; second, if the net result is to nerf a class, then you're doing it wrong. There aren't a lot of "cautious attack" fans around, but I'm pretty sure there are a lot of people who like playing a good, viable fighter tank, and poured countless hours in a character they loved.So, if you're pissing off people in order to make a talent more attractive, you're off base.

 

 

Third, this isn't a change that promotes diversity, all it does is make the fighter a worse tank, especially now that better monster AI will make engagement less valuable as a mechanic. Making something strictly worse is the exact opposite of fostering diversity.

 

Fourth, if tank and spank is bad for the game, they shouldn't have promoted it in the first place by creating tanking classes that are as dumb as a brick and mostly passive, as far as tanking goes. Even if they nerf their survability now, the model won't change, you'll just need to spam more heals, you have to change the way the tanks are designed in order to make combat more challenging in that regard. That and better monster AI ( which they're doing already ).

 

Fifth, this isn't a tank nerf, this is a fighter nerf, otherwise they'd have nerfed paladins and chanters as well, and this isn't a slight nerf either, since now a fighter that uses defender is more or less as survivable as a Barbarian. 

 

So, again, I'm sorry, but I don't think any of your points apply, in this case.

 

Well, I'm just stating what I think are understandable reasons from the point of view from the devs. Feel free to disagree with them and critize the way it's been handled, but I think the changes they made fit the motivations I offered:

 

1) You may think its pointless, but it works as I described it. IF you want to make a tank fighter now, you WILL take cautious attack, whereas before you never did. You can't compare defender to cautious attack anymore because they make totally different things now, and as you can only maintain one at the same time, there is a choice where none has been before.

 

2) Well, understandably you are angry/dissappointed about the change. I don't know if 7 points of deflection really make or break a class, however.

 

3) I think it promotes the choice of diversity, because you only take defender now if you care about the engagement limit, whereas before you would've also taken it for fights against single enemies as the deflection alone made it valuable. Even if you wanted to only go for the engagement limit before, you couldn't.

If a class had A and B and another class had only B, i wouldn't call them diverse, I would think B is strictly worse.

If one has A and the other B, thats diversity because they are mutually exclusive. Thats exactly the situation with fighter, paladin, engagement limit and high deflection. Before and after 2.0.

 

4) I'm pretty sure the model will change. At the moment, you have a party of 6 and its totally viable to have one tank and the rest ranged DPS on most difficulties. If you increase damage taken enough, this will clearly shift to either requiring more tanks or more ressources into healing. Party setups and strategies shift that way.

 

5) I never said that this was a nerf to tanks in general. The attribute change is a nerf to tanks in general, thats about it. This change promotes cautious attack for fighters, which are the only class that had no reason to pick it up if they wanted to tank, so goal accomplished.

 

As I said before, I don't think you are supposed to use defender against small to medium hordes of enemies but against a lot of small, light-hitting ones. Since you have cautious attack to fill the gap that the old defender left, not much really changes. Take cautious attack instead of defender and only take defender if you think that engagement limit is useful (which is debatable).

 

Again, I'm sorry for your anger about this issue, but I think my arguments represent some realistic explanations for the changes.

[MunoValente]

Gear, stats and other abilities are a nonfactor; most other classes have an advantage in both utilities and DPS over a fighter, even when wearing heavy armor. 

Build them for defense and, if they're just as durable as a fighter as well as being better at DPS, AoE damage and utility, fighters are pretty much useless. 

They're already a class whose only strong point is defense, they're a second or third rate dps, they have a very limited range of utilities even for a tank ( look at paladins, who can heal and/or raise their companions and provide offensive or defensive party wide buffs, or chanters, who can provide a moltitude of buffs and summons, an insane high level AoE attack as well as AoE stuns and a slow party-wide heal ) and they're going to fall further behind as the level cap increases. 

There's really no need to hit their only strong point.

 

 

In the scenario where you'd be using defender gear and stats obviously matter, you aren't going equip your people the fighter is supposed to defending with heavy gear or pump up their RES/CON.   Whether other classes can handle front line just as well is a different issue.   The advantages fighter with have will be based on engagement, sustainability, and melee damage.  Whether Defender will be any good with this change will depend on how important engagement is, which is probably too early to tell at this point.

[Gary1986]

 

 

1) You may think its pointless, but it works as I described it. IF you want to make a tank fighter now, you WILL take cautious attack, whereas before you never did. You can't compare defender to cautious attack anymore because they make totally different things now, and as you can only maintain one at the same time, there is a choice where none has been before.

 

 

 

But now nobody will take Defender + Wary Defender. Why would you?  People will now just combo Cautious Attack + Hold The Line. All the devs have done is flipped the problem around. (I.E people taking one talent while ignoring the other). They havent solved any problems with this nerf.

 

 

 

.

[evilcat]

 

 

 

1) You may think its pointless, but it works as I described it. IF you want to make a tank fighter now, you WILL take cautious attack, whereas before you never did. You can't compare defender to cautious attack anymore because they make totally different things now, and as you can only maintain one at the same time, there is a choice where none has been before.

 

 

But now nobody will take Defender + Wary Defender. Why would you?  People will now just combo Cautious Attack + Hold The Line. All the devs have done is flipped the problem around. (I.E people taking one talent while ignoring the other). They havent solved any problems with this nerf.

 

 

There is also a small problem of Cautions Attack + Hold the line being both talents, so it will come to play later or will hold other defensive talents. And leave defensive fighters withour good abilities to take. Cant stack Guardian, Confident Aim not important and so on.

Maybe the Master Plan is to nerf fighter so Unbending / Unbroken will be useful. But it will not work that way.

Edited August 10, 2015 by evilcat

[Njall]

 

Sorry, but this nerf accomplishes nothing of the sort.

First, nerfing a class ability + a talent in order to make another talent more viable is pointless, a heavier investment should bring the better returns; second, if the net result is to nerf a class, then you're doing it wrong. There aren't a lot of "cautious attack" fans around, but I'm pretty sure there are a lot of people who like playing a good, viable fighter tank, and poured countless hours in a character they loved.So, if you're pissing off people in order to make a talent more attractive, you're off base.

 

 

Third, this isn't a change that promotes diversity, all it does is make the fighter a worse tank, especially now that better monster AI will make engagement less valuable as a mechanic. Making something strictly worse is the exact opposite of fostering diversity.

 

Fourth, if tank and spank is bad for the game, they shouldn't have promoted it in the first place by creating tanking classes that are as dumb as a brick and mostly passive, as far as tanking goes. Even if they nerf their survability now, the model won't change, you'll just need to spam more heals, you have to change the way the tanks are designed in order to make combat more challenging in that regard. That and better monster AI ( which they're doing already ).

 

Fifth, this isn't a tank nerf, this is a fighter nerf, otherwise they'd have nerfed paladins and chanters as well, and this isn't a slight nerf either, since now a fighter that uses defender is more or less as survivable as a Barbarian. 

 

So, again, I'm sorry, but I don't think any of your points apply, in this case.

 

Well, I'm just stating what I think are understandable reasons from the point of view from the devs. Feel free to disagree with them and critize the way it's been handled, but I think the changes they made fit the motivations I offered:

 

1) You may think its pointless, but it works as I described it. IF you want to make a tank fighter now, you WILL take cautious attack, whereas before you never did. You can't compare defender to cautious attack anymore because they make totally different things now, and as you can only maintain one at the same time, there is a choice where none has been before.

 

2) Well, understandably you are angry/dissappointed about the change. I don't know if 7 points of deflection really make or break a class, however.

 

3) I think it promotes the choice of diversity, because you only take defender now if you care about the engagement limit, whereas before you would've also taken it for fights against single enemies as the deflection alone made it valuable. Even if you wanted to only go for the engagement limit before, you couldn't.

If a class had A and B and another class had only B, i wouldn't call them diverse, I would think B is strictly worse.

If one has A and the other B, thats diversity because they are mutually exclusive. Thats exactly the situation with fighter, paladin, engagement limit and high deflection. Before and after 2.0.

 

4) I'm pretty sure the model will change. At the moment, you have a party of 6 and its totally viable to have one tank and the rest ranged DPS on most difficulties. If you increase damage taken enough, this will clearly shift to either requiring more tanks or more ressources into healing. Party setups and strategies shift that way.

 

5) I never said that this was a nerf to tanks in general. The attribute change is a nerf to tanks in general, thats about it. This change promotes cautious attack for fighters, which are the only class that had no reason to pick it up if they wanted to tank, so goal accomplished.

 

As I said before, I don't think you are supposed to use defender against small to medium hordes of enemies but against a lot of small, light-hitting ones. Since you have cautious attack to fill the gap that the old defender left, not much really changes. Take cautious attack instead of defender and only take defender if you think that engagement limit is useful (which is debatable).

 

Again, I'm sorry for your anger about this issue, but I think my arguments represent some realistic explanations for the changes.

 

 

 

Gear, stats and other abilities are a nonfactor; most other classes have an advantage in both utilities and DPS over a fighter, even when wearing heavy armor. 

Build them for defense and, if they're just as durable as a fighter as well as being better at DPS, AoE damage and utility, fighters are pretty much useless. 

They're already a class whose only strong point is defense, they're a second or third rate dps, they have a very limited range of utilities even for a tank ( look at paladins, who can heal and/or raise their companions and provide offensive or defensive party wide buffs, or chanters, who can provide a moltitude of buffs and summons, an insane high level AoE attack as well as AoE stuns and a slow party-wide heal ) and they're going to fall further behind as the level cap increases. 

There's really no need to hit their only strong point.

 

 

In the scenario where you'd be using defender gear and stats obviously matter, you aren't going equip your people the fighter is supposed to defending with heavy gear or pump up their RES/CON.   Whether other classes can handle front line just as well is a different issue.   The advantages fighter with have will be based on engagement, sustainability, and melee damage.  Whether Defender will be any good with this change will depend on how important engagement is, which is probably too early to tell at this point.

 

 

But you can grab Cautious Defender and Hold the line instead. Is one more engaged opponent worth 13 points of deflection?! Engagement wasn't important to begin with, now that opponents are smarter they'll just run around your fighter. Unless they decide to stop by and stomp him.

 

 

Sorry, but this nerf accomplishes nothing of the sort.

First, nerfing a class ability + a talent in order to make another talent more viable is pointless, a heavier investment should bring the better returns; second, if the net result is to nerf a class, then you're doing it wrong. There aren't a lot of "cautious attack" fans around, but I'm pretty sure there are a lot of people who like playing a good, viable fighter tank, and poured countless hours in a character they loved.So, if you're pissing off people in order to make a talent more attractive, you're off base.

 

 

Third, this isn't a change that promotes diversity, all it does is make the fighter a worse tank, especially now that better monster AI will make engagement less valuable as a mechanic. Making something strictly worse is the exact opposite of fostering diversity.

 

Fourth, if tank and spank is bad for the game, they shouldn't have promoted it in the first place by creating tanking classes that are as dumb as a brick and mostly passive, as far as tanking goes. Even if they nerf their survability now, the model won't change, you'll just need to spam more heals, you have to change the way the tanks are designed in order to make combat more challenging in that regard. That and better monster AI ( which they're doing already ).

 

Fifth, this isn't a tank nerf, this is a fighter nerf, otherwise they'd have nerfed paladins and chanters as well, and this isn't a slight nerf either, since now a fighter that uses defender is more or less as survivable as a Barbarian. 

 

So, again, I'm sorry, but I don't think any of your points apply, in this case.

 

Well, I'm just stating what I think are understandable reasons from the point of view from the devs. Feel free to disagree with them and critize the way it's been handled, but I think the changes they made fit the motivations I offered:

 

1) You may think its pointless, but it works as I described it. IF you want to make a tank fighter now, you WILL take cautious attack, whereas before you never did. You can't compare defender to cautious attack anymore because they make totally different things now, and as you can only maintain one at the same time, there is a choice where none has been before.

 

 

2) Well, understandably you are angry/dissappointed about the change. I don't know if 7 points of deflection really make or break a class, however.

 

3) I think it promotes the choice of diversity, because you only take defender now if you care about the engagement limit, whereas before you would've also taken it for fights against single enemies as the deflection alone made it valuable. Even if you wanted to only go for the engagement limit before, you couldn't.

If a class had A and B and another class had only B, i wouldn't call them diverse, I would think B is strictly worse.

If one has A and the other B, thats diversity because they are mutually exclusive. Thats exactly the situation with fighter, paladin, engagement limit and high deflection. Before and after 2.0.

 

4) I'm pretty sure the model will change. At the moment, you have a party of 6 and its totally viable to have one tank and the rest ranged DPS on most difficulties. If you increase damage taken enough, this will clearly shift to either requiring more tanks or more ressources into healing. Party setups and strategies shift that way.

 

5) I never said that this was a nerf to tanks in general. The attribute change is a nerf to tanks in general, thats about it. This change promotes cautious attack for fighters, which are the only class that had no reason to pick it up if they wanted to tank, so goal accomplished.

 

As I said before, I don't think you are supposed to use defender against small to medium hordes of enemies but against a lot of small, light-hitting ones. Since you have cautious attack to fill the gap that the old defender left, not much really changes. Take cautious attack instead of defender and only take defender if you think that engagement limit is useful (which is debatable).

 

Again, I'm sorry for your anger about this issue, but I think my arguments represent some realistic explanations for the changes.

 

 

1) who cares. You're still taking the better defensive talent, they just flipped defender ( a class ability, which should be competing with spells and other class abilities rather than talents ) and cautious attack. The button you're pushing to make you better at taking hits on the face doesn't make  for better or worse gameplay just because now cautious attack is the more viable action rather than defender. It's a pointless change in that regard. 

 

2) we're talking 7 points of deflection and 10 points to each other defense here ( aside from the engagement limit, useless as it may be ).

 

3)People will just go for cautious attack + hold the line, lower investment than defender + wary defender, less sucky choice. Here's your diversity.

 

4) Uhm, and tanking and spanking with 2 tanks helps how? Combats will just be slower, and the (lack of) tactic involved will remain the same, just with more tanks involved. 

 

5) again, who cares what button they push to make themselves harder to hit. A talent doesn't need to be inherently useful for all classes and builds, if they are, all the better, but making all classes and concepts viable is far more important than stroking a talent's inexistant ego. Nerfing a class in order to make a talent viable is a bad idea all around.

 

And nope, cautious attack does not fill the gap in terms of defenses, it just boosts deflection ( and less than talented defender did ). Also, cautious attack isn't free, and you'd have to take both (and you'd probably be better off just taking hold the line and not crippling your deflection in the process instead ).

I don't doubt that you think those are the reasons behind the changes, I'm just saying that this nerf is off base if those are the reasons offered.

Edited August 10, 2015 by Njall

[MunoValente]

misread something, nevermind

Edited August 10, 2015 by MunoValente

[Doppelschwert]

Well, I can get behind those points. I just think from the devs points of view, it now fits more into the general tone of the character system that the modal gives some 'advantage' (more engagement) for some disadvantage (less deflection). This is true for almost every modal (I can only think of the monk duality one that doesn't fit into this rule now).

 

We'll see if this is just a momentary picture during rebalancing or the intended situation when the expansion is released I guess. I agree that defender is subpar at the moment, but personally I also think that it was too much of a no-brainer before the nerf. We'll see if there can be a middleground through proper rebalancing.

 

If you have social media, you should just try to ask josh about it on his tumblr.

[Njall]

Well, I can get behind those points. I just think from the devs points of view, it now fits more into the general tone of the character system that the modal gives some 'advantage' (more engagement) for some disadvantage (less deflection). This is true for almost every modal (I can only think of the monk duality one that doesn't fit into this rule now).

 

We'll see if this is just a momentary picture during rebalancing or the intended situation when the expansion is released I guess. I agree that defender is subpar at the moment, but personally I also think that it was too much of a no-brainer before the nerf. We'll see if there can be a middleground through proper rebalancing.

 

If you have social media, you should just try to ask josh about it on his tumblr.

 

Nah, I avoid social media like the plague, I'll just see how it goes. I care, but while I care enough to discuss this on the forums, I'm afraid I can't be arsed to make a twitter or tumblr account just to pester a dev.

It's just that I've endured this kind of nerfs for years on various MMOs, but while I can understand them in the context of a (sort of) competitive multiplayer game, PoE is a single player game. I just don't like the idea that, whenever I start to like something, the next patch may come and take it away because of some arbitrary rebalancing going on. Patches and expansions should improve on things and add exciting stuff, you shouldn't be worried that they may come and take away the stuff you enjoy and on which you've invested your money and time, especially if you can't even opt out and keep your game unpatched because you bought the game on steam or want to play the new content the expansion offers.

Edited August 10, 2015 by Njall

[Valorian]

Make fighters happy again. 

 

Base deflection: 30

[Gary1986]

Can we get an official response on this nerf now that people have said how much they hate it?

 

Why not make it like this

 

Defender - 2 engagement & +5 deflection

 

Wary Defender - +5 all defenses apart from deflection

Edited August 10, 2015 by Gary1986

[MunoValente]

So has the attack speed penalty has been removed from defender as well?  Has it possibly been changed so it can be used at the same time as cautious attack?  What are the rules about what modals can be stacked or are there any? 

[Gary1986]

Still waiting to see if a Developer will join in this convo to explain the thinking behind this awful change

[evilcat]

Maybe it was just a typo. (- in place of +)

That would make a fun relief.

Edited August 11, 2015 by evilcat

[View619]

Still waiting to see if a Developer will join in this convo to explain the thinking behind this awful change

 

Maybe they think + 2 engagement limit is fine and they don't want it to add to deflection? Why would focusing your attention on multiple units not reduce your ability to more effectively defend yourself?

 

Thematically, it makes sense. Honestly, my only issue is the fact that they won't allow players to negate it with Wary Defender (+5 to every defense except deflection). I don't see a good reason to pick up Wary Defender if that's all it adds.

Edited August 11, 2015 by View619

[Kilburn]

So has the attack speed penalty has been removed from defender as well?  Has it possibly been changed so it can be used at the same time as cautious attack?  What are the rules about what modals can be stacked or are there any? 

 

 

Some of them do stack like the rogue reckless assault with any of the generic ones of your choice. Others wont stack. It's a mystery.

 

Anyways, it sounds like this has been nerfed into unplayability. Even with high defences it doesnt seem to prevent you from being stun locked by call lightning and wind elementals. The +5 is kind of useless compaired to the deflection lost.

Edited August 11, 2015 by Kilburn

[tinysalamander]

Some of them do stack like the rogue reckless assault with any of the generic ones of your choice. Others wont stack. It's a mystery.

 

I really wish they'd do something about it in PoE 2…