A sign of life - are we no longer ignored?

[alveoli]

From the dev chat logs, posted on eqforums:

Stren: I have a class-related question. Is the perception at Live that Berserkers and Rogues have about the same DPS when like-equipped/leveled/AAd? Or that one has more DPS than the other?


Prathun: I've recently been going through parses submitted to me by various guilds to get a wide variety of examples of real-world guild DPS and I'm going through them. My perception is that Berserkers do more damage than rogues, but this perception may change.

RashereEQ: Really high end berserkers.

RashereEQ: They're not quite as deadly at the average range



Occasus Numerus, Level 75 Stealth Assasin of D'Pikeys - Antonius Bayle (http://www.magelo.com/eq_view_profile.html?num=881147)

[Qutsmnie]

I think melee bursting needs a nerf. Our rep was talking about how he out damages rangers by 1000dps and I thought to myself no rogues do that on 10 minute melee encounters. Its the impact of melee bursting so that when you pass a certain threshold of dps in your guild melee and melee bursting starts looking like this huge proportion of your dps. The reason is that as encounters get shorter your melee spend more time as a percentage of the encounter in their prime bursting disc.

Now since its unlikely that every class is going to get bursting upgrades to match rogues and zerkers than its rogue, zerker, and monk bursting that needs a nerf.

I dont know how you would go about it though. Essentially you would be talking about putting assassine's discipline, duelist, dead eye, and frenzied stabbing all on the same timer for rogues, and doing similiar for the other melee.

At this point though the number one way to make rogues look like sick dps is to change the encounter from 10 minutes to 5 minutes =)

[Dalnoth_Vaz]

Yeah I could agree with that quts, If wizards weren't like a 12 minute version of assassin discipline now. The three main melee DPS classes should be able to burst considerably large amounts more than say rangers. They aren't a raw DPS class. And If your talking about me as the "rep" that was saying I outdamage rangers by 1000 DPS now, Our rangers don't have 2 new weapons yet. I do.

[alveoli]

In the follow-up of the thread there was sort of a common consensus that rogues should out-dps any other melee class when they have the rear arc by a significant margin. This consensus was not only from rogues but also from other classes.

[Feochadan]

Any link to this thread ?

[alveoli]

http://forums.station.sony.com/eq/posts/list.m?topic_id=105304 is where the whole thread can be found.

Occasus Numerus, Level 75 Stealth Assasin of D'Pikeys - Antonius Bayle (http://www.magelo.com/eq_view_profile.html?num=881147)

[Yang]

In the follow-up of the thread there was sort of a common consensus that rogues should out-dps any other melee class when they have the rear arc by a significant margin. This consensus was not only from rogues but also from other classes.

consensus doesn't matter.

[Menerian]

Slighty off topic but I've heard a lil rumor about something rogs might be getting come next expansion about converting hp to endurance...some bloodmagic thing. Anyone else hear about this?

[Dommin_DW]

When talking about DPS and DMG... I dont understand why people leave out necros... their CAN burst some serious DPS with all their pet AA's etc. Seriously, with the new ooc, AA's, and huge mana pools we are talking about casters have basically endless supplies of mana that they can ride out thru long encounters now.

The debate between burst and long term DMG is so incredibly pointless now. Just look at the over dmg out put for classes and you will see who is consistently on top and near the top.

[Aeralyn]

When talking about DPS and DMG... I dont understand why people leave out necros... their CAN burst some serious DPS with all their pet AA's etc. Seriously, with the new ooc, AA's, and huge mana pools we are talking about casters have basically endless supplies of mana that they can ride out thru long encounters now.

The debate between burst and long term DMG is so incredibly pointless now. Just look at the over dmg out put for classes and you will see who is consistently on top and near the top.
The reason no one recognizes necros is that while everyone can see a rogue's or wizard's damage, the necro is the only one who can see that dot damage.

[Kruzar]

Slighty off topic but I've heard a lil rumor about something rogs might be getting come next expansion about converting hp to endurance...some bloodmagic thing. Anyone else hear about this?

I am personally not concerned about having a way to convert endurance with the regen system. Most encounters that I am involved in, I still have plenty of endurance, but run out of discs to have going to burn it. I would much rather the devs put in more discs, or different timers some of our discs that we have already. Giving us more endurance is not going to help most people, I don't think.

[Dommin_DW]

HP -> END is pretty useless if we don't get a way to use our existing END pool. Even after long fights where i use 7 disc's multiple times... i still have some end left over even tho I am TE'ing any group that had melee dps. IF we got some AA which does a big DD with a small refresh like monks... that could eat up END fast and then the HP->END conversion would be nice.

[Cleptomaniac]

:horse

Move Twisted Chance to a seperate timer, add another dmg disc along the same lines as that and assassin, then add in some short re-use disc that can dish out razor-arc like damage while in mid fight without having to duck out of combat. Then I agree, hp--> end would be sweet.

[Rundler]

Conversion for HP to END is situational of course. Only a handful of fights do I run out of endurance and its the long ones. Events over 20min which are very rare.

However, I would probably use a conversion disc anytime I wasnt raiding. I definetly run down to 0% endurance after a while (tons of razorarcs and chaining dps discs) even with 13k+ endurance.

Im more interested at how they are going to change the Rogue dps and are the weapon ratio changes going to effect us?

Rundler

[brogett]

The last time I checked Lucy had a load of new lvl 75 discs for various classes. Despite being in the "live" set they're not in game yet AFAIK, but I'm assuming this is where the rumours originated. Maybe Sony accidentally leaked the beta spells file or maybe it has nothing to do with the beta at all. Either way it's on a public site so speculation based on its content seems fair game :-)

Looking at the info there, I don't see rogues getting hp to endurance "canni" - I see it on berserkers instead. Likely they'd get more use out of it too.

Instead for rogues what lucy shows (well showed, it appears to be down currently) was a backstab damage increase. More dps is always welcome and it doesn't feel right to be complaining, but please can we get dps that's NOT tied to backwards arc?

I'm getting fed up of an ever increasing percentage of my damage coming from a single overly specialist attack. Embershank further enforces this dependency. When will sony be happy? When 90% of rogue dps is the backstab key? It has to stop somewhere, so I urge any rogues in beta to comment to Sony if the lucy info is correct and they disagree with further increasing our positional dependencies.

Brog

[Yang]

nerf backstab


LOLOLO

[Bbakk]

I believe that a lot of the reason we end up with some of the goofy discs like toxicity or spell dodge is due to the ignorance of some of the Dev's. I'm not in any way saying they are stupid and I realise not every disc has to be a spectacular upgrade. I am saying I don't think they understand the class. I don't know if this is the case but could they just be following the patterns of the past? Even when we were the kings of dps we wanted more. At some point they wanted to let others catch up a bit and our upgrades from one expansion to the next were minimal at best. Has the trend continued so long that they have forgotten the original purpose? Maybe they have simply grown tired of hearing us repeatedly ask for dps and given us an AA snare so they can laugh behind closed doors about the rangers without bows.

I don't know where the idea came from to be able to backstab from the front. I do know that a lot of people think we land normal backstabs from the front as if we were behind the mobs. In reality it's much less common. I do appreciate being able to do more dmg from the front than I could without the aa's but over all it's still tied to backstab.

Many melee classes have aa's that give them the ability to flurry. Personally I would like to see that for rogues. From the parses I have run it seems that not including backstab dmg, our normal melee is about on par with most warriors. Monks have an endurance based nuke. I can see something like that for rogues as an endurance based poison. However, I would much rather be able to flurry from any angle than have some new disc that will simply go to waste on raids because so few mobs do we actually have a nice clear shot at their backs for any steady length of time.

The average rogue struggles to compete with monks, berzerkers and rangers for dps. Each of those classes have unique abilities that help define their class. Aside from rogues, do any of them have a "class defining" ability that ends up hurting their dps on most raids?

[Catweazel]

Aside from rogues, do any of them have a "class defining" ability that ends up hurting their dps on most raids?

Perhaps I have this to face in later content, but there isn't a single raid that I can think of (currently doing content up to OMM and Tunat) where backstab is "hurting" my dps.

I agree there is more work continually moving to find the rear arc, but poor mob positioning, lazy tanks, lag and occasional geometry problems affect guild dps not just rogue dps.

How boring would our class be with perma rooted, 360 degree arc "special attack" mobs? Lets just increase the size of the target box to zone wide then we can all go afk on raids and let a macro spam our discs in sequence from the zone in.

[brogett]

I'm at a similar progression - vish, coa, tacvi. Most mobs are OK, but trash is often hard to get in an optimal position for quickly (but less important). Some DoN mobs also turn around a lot, such as yar'lir and rikku. On those we lose dps too - I almost never beat berserkers on yar'lir due to this.

I have no problem with backstab being position dependent and for us to be losing dps when attacking from the front. It's simply a matter of scale and that the trend (even with weapon itemisation - see Embershank) is for a gradual move for our dps to be tied closer and closer to backstab. It used to be 35% or so back when I first started parsing. These days it's 45 or even 50% on a burn boss.

Even then, if our 50% backstab damage happened to be a true "bonus" then it's fine. Back in the early days monks ruled frontal dps and rogues rule rear dps. It seemed a fair trade off to specialise in one type of dps at the expense of general purpose dps. These days the general-purpose-dps classes (eg berserkers) are almost matching us even when we include the backstab into it, so it ceases to become a bonus and more of a weakness given that we essentially do equivalent dps, but only in special cases.

So yes, it's no suprise I call for reduction in backstab dps and an increase in general purpose dps (or for only an increase in general purpose dps if I'm dreaming) so that once again the balance of specialisation vs generalisation is restored.

Brog

[Aeralyn]

Perhaps I have this to face in later content, but there isn't a single raid that I can think of (currently doing content up to OMM and Tunat) where backstab is "hurting" my dps.
AMV is just about the perfect target to show off your DPS. On the other side of the spectrum though, we have mobs like Sendaii and Maggotmiser.

For Sendaii, once you actually start fighting her, she has an ae snare that you really can't avoid. So in my guild, we tried to balence DPS positioning around her. The problem with this is that if we didn't balance it right, we'd usually end up with too much in the front, and all of our rogues would suddenly be useless for the rest of the fight, because for *some* reason, we could never recover from that.

In all of my fights against Sendaii I never got over 600 dps, (On AMV I would show about 1200 to 1300) and i feel fairly safe blaming this entirely on our dependancy on the rear arc.

Maggotmiser on the other hand, was easier to get okay DPS on. Maggot has a 60 degree arc centered on his back that casts a big ae every few seconds (I recall it being 8,000 ish.. can't remember). As you can imagine, we usually put his rear in a corner (yes, he was designed by a six year old boy).

To overcome this, I had the tank put him in the corner, the move onto the wall himself. This gave me a few degrees to backstab from (I have none of the full backstab from the front aas).

There are tons of examples of things like that. A lot of them are fixable (such as Maggotmiser) and some of them really can't be controlled (yar lir). My point? We're dependant on the rear arc, and in only a select few real world situations can we live up to our potential (it sure fun is trying to though).

There's a good chance that you've already been through a situation where our dependancy on backstab lowered your dps, just didn't think about it. I know I for one think about getting to the rear arc, staying out of AEs (if needed), staying in the battle field, and timing when to disc. For yar lir, this means I spend most of my time getting close to her and timing backstabs so that it hits her tail side, and never really think about why she's flipping around, or how much dps potential i'm losing because of it.

[Dommin_DW]

IMO i dont think the dev's think that being rear arc dependent is a huge penalty. At least, It seems they think that it is not worth rewarding that position with more dps.

On the parses that I have seen in DW, Zerkers win DPS/total dmg output... Now granted these parese are usually on mobs that are less than 10mins, but ANY mob that takes more than ten mins. to kill is about adds and/or multiple phases... therefore it has to do with END management not DPS... and i hate to say this but it seems like both zerkers and Rogues can handle the management of their endurance pool enough so that they are able to keep their positions in overall DMG... so the end result is very similar to a straight 10min burn fight. Even if you look at optimal conditions for both the zerkers and the rogue... it is more of a toss up than rogues winning hands down. Flurry, Increase Crits, fast dly's and ungoldy base dmg, and the haste bonuses that are in the game now make zerker hit harder, faster and for more rep's than a 5s-6s dly'ed BS. This is how I interpret the data that is being posted now days.

What all this says to me is that rogue do not have enough compensation for being dependent on the rear arc in todays game.

[Catweazel]

What all this says to me is that rogue do not have enough compensation for being dependent on the rear arc in todays game.

I would certainly agree with this, but I am not reading a consistent message across the rogue community that suggests everyone is in agreement. The camp is split between reducing the dependency on BS (many ways that could be implemented) and increasing the BS damage so that it becomes an even bigger percentage of total damage.

Reducing dependency on BS IMO makes us blend into the Berserker class and generally dumbs down the skill (??) required to play a rogue. Although I appreciate frontal damage aa's for soloing, they do not address the core essence of being a rogue.

Increasing our damage in the rear arc stresses the importance of well designed boss encounters and also requires more imagination in itemisation from the developers. Coupled with novel design changes for offhand damage from the rear arc, better offhand items could solve more than a single problem.

[Dasgreif]

Backstab is one of the skills that make our class unique. It should be a defining part of our dps. Why dumb down the game more then it allready has been by turning us into mellee01.

If anything we need an increased boost in our backstab DPS to make positioning worthwhile. Behind a mob we should be THE highest dps by a substantial margin. Anywhere else we should take a hit. Its called balance.

Otherwise why be a rogue?

[DarthEnderX]

To be fair, it's not like there's organs you can stab from the back that you can't stab from the front.

A skilled enough rogue should be able to land the same critical strikes from any angle.

[Cleptomaniac]

Looking at the info there, I don't see rogues getting hp to endurance "canni" - I see it on berserkers instead. Likely they'd get more use out of it too.

Brog

Now this is something that concerns me. I hopeing for some major DPS increases for us if this is the case.

[Bbakk]

Increasing our damage in the rear arc stresses the importance of well designed boss encounters and also requires more imagination in itemisation from the developers. Coupled with novel design changes for offhand damage from the rear arc, better offhand items could solve more than a single problem.


I agree with that. The problem is that the dev's have clearly shown that they are more interested in other classes. Aside from that the encounters can't all be simple corner pin mobs or els most raiding guilds would simply walk right through each expansion. For variety alone encounters must be different. Sadly that means sooner or later we're going to run into mobs that we don't have full access to their backs.

When designing an encounter they have a lot more to worry about than just if rogues can stay behind the mob. The encounter should be challenging to most if not all players involved. As the players become more skilled and the get better gear the encounters need to be increasingly more difficult. What might make an encounter hard to one class my make it equally easier for another.

I am ok with not being the best dps from the front. I am ok with not being able to burst like a caster. I have no problem with other classes doing nearly as much dmg as me when I do have a clear shot at the mob's back. I like the competition, it pushes me to try that much harder to stay as far up the dps list as I can. I am not ok with equally geared monks and berzerkers often with less aa than me doing more total dmg and higher dps than me on corner pinned mobs.

I two box a rogue and cleric. My rogue tanks a lot and it would be nice to have more dps from the front. That is not why I suggestion flurry. As it stands my dps is just fine for tanking what I do and really don't care if we can do more from the front or not. I am more concerned with the fact that the Dev's seem to have no interest in boosting our backstab dmg as it is already significant. If they add some aa's to reduce our backstab timer that would be fine with me. I don't think they will. Flurry for a rogue would not be the same increase as it would be for any other class due to the lower weapon dmg we are stuck with on piercers. I don't know how much dps it gives warriors or monks but I can assure you it would be less for us. How much do we really need to bump us back to the top in the right situations? I would wager that most of us would do fine with an extra 5 - 10% depending on aa's and armor.

I don't care if I am tied to the rear arc of the mob provided I can actually do something worth the effort wile I'm back there. When I dump everything I have into a mob and barely break into the top 5 in the guild it really frustrates me. I know several rogues that struggle to make top 10 in their guilds. With a good corner pin mob that I can just burn my discs I am often number 2 for dps in the guild. Rarely does a rogue take the crown in my guild. Nearly always it's a monk it would probably be a berzerker but we don't have any berzerker mains that raid.

[SincroFashad]

I am ok with not being the best dps from the front. I am ok with not being able to burst like a caster. I have no problem with other classes doing nearly as much dmg as me when I do have a clear shot at the mob's back. I like the competition, it pushes me to try that much harder to stay as far up the dps list as I can. I am not ok with equally geared monks and berzerkers often with less aa than me doing more total dmg and higher dps than me on corner pinned mobs.
I am in 100% agreement with this statement. On a corner-pinned or rooted mob, there should be no melee class which approaches rogue dps.

[Dragynphyre]

I'd like to see rogues have a bit more [non-equipment based] damage avoidance, like higher caps on skills parry, riposte, dodge. Like warriors, rogues are weapons masters, we should be able to do some pretty fancy fighting and avoid getting hit.

Also need some more damage mitigation, make AC count for more - I am so tired of getting one-rounded by something like Nightshade, Porthio the 2nd Born's evil kitty - folks in guild think I have a death wish or something. I have a life wish, but like many wishes, it's one that hasn't come true. ;)

[reamas]

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[Catweazel]

The problem is that there is no consensus yet between rogues on what to do. This thread is a perfect example. There is no conclusion drawn, no summary observation from the class correspondent, no poll, just a range of differing views from "nerf backstab" to "give us offhand backstab".

That is basically what discussion forums are for. I assume once the time has been reached that agreements will also be reached, and that Dal will make an appropriate thread.

Why the hell should development react when they have no clear direction on what to react to? Going to EQLive and making the same disjointed, opinionated comments as individuals would add ridicule not action.

[reamas]

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[BjartBeartooth]

You're all living in some dreamworld imo

SoE cares about 1 thing - money. Rogues are small population and no one at SoE plays a rogue or gives 2 ***** about what happens to us. When it appears that they "fix" or "help" other classes it isnt because that class is more vocal its that that class is actually played by someone at SOE and they directly benifit from the change or that class is way more "essential" for encounters (like chanters) or some game-related mechanic is screwed. They have no clue what to do with us as evident everytime they add some gimp-ass zone with traps just to make a few of you feel useful and shut you up.

Look back at all the threads over the past few years complaining about our class and see much has changed or been fixed for our benifit, its just about nothing. The DK aug doesnt fit piercers, they say they will put a pierce version the next patch and it never gets done. In DK they put Beserker mods on their gloves (chain basic set item), monk mods on their wrist (leather basic set item) and the rogue mod on an all melee mask (our only slot with a class-only item -vish mask) and say putting it on our chain wrist would be overpowering. In Demi monks get Improved Block on their class item and we get a freaking frog illusion, yea thats balanced. Poisons are useless and have been forever and they still havent gotten it through heads that its worthless. They continue to say it helps our balance and utility and they will "fix" it whenever they get around to it. Backstab damage broken over 34, wait over a month for the next patch for it to get fixed. They just dont care what you think.

You have been replaced by Beserkers. Rogues are a secondclass after-thought and are treated as such, you are not essential and there would be no game-related issues if the class was completely removed.

[knaven]

If they removed rogues they would loose something my 4 accounts worth of money every month LOL

[Castina Solomnus]

I'd threaten to cancel my alts accounts... but I already did 6 or 7 months ago.

[Hirotoshi]

/agree Bjart ..

I have yet to see a single Dev/Guide/GM as a rogue most are casters and or Plate. So why would they care how much rogues complain it dont effect them in anyway.

The server I play the Rogue pool to recruit from is almost non existant. Most quit or changed classes. Even the berserker pool is getting bigger and closing gap on Rogues, guilds snatch them up quickly .. dont take much to gear up a Berserker like the work it takes for a Rogue.

[Rundler]

It takes the exact same amount of gear for a rogue as a zerker, except one thing, they have a 2h and we need an offhand. My guild has had 5-6 rogues active for the last 8 months~ and have had no problems. Its the zerkers that arent active enough on my server, few and far between.

Rundler

[Falconii]

You're all living in some dreamworld imo

SoE cares about 1 thing - money.

I laugh every time I read this. What did you think they were in it for? Your personal entertainment and sense of accomplishment?

Class balance = money for SoE. If it's about the relative numbers of characters in a class, why are (in some peoples' minds) Berzerkers getting all the love? Chanters run #3 or #4 in population and they are in a pretty sorry state right now.

[Orvis]

I'm an old rogue. Started back in mid 99 and been coming to this board ever since.

At the beginning we were broke. We could backstab for 1 point dmg, poison totally sucked, traps were non-existant, we weren't wanted.

Then backstab minimum got put in, then kunark brought us into the spotlight. Kunark also defined some other classes and their roles very well also.

Since that time the classes have slowly gotten muddled together, more classes added and more muddling.

This may sound alittle corny but we were like a great burger joint; Awesome burgers and fries with little else to add. Now we are being forced to diversify and our burgers and fries aren't as good anymore.

I enjoyed being the best class for melee dps with the limitations we have. If other classes can attain the same level of melee damage with fewer limitations, why would anyone want to come to our burger joint??

I see and hear more rogues getting put on a back burner to be pulled out in case of raid than anything. "In case of raid break glass".

They don't have to change alot of things to boost us some. Change a number here and change one there and wallah more dps. Make all the crit aa's affect backstab, says they don't affect special attacks so make them affect backstab as well. Put us on same dmg table as monks, takes care of frontal and normal attack upgrade there, no real need for triple attack.

Wow, so simple, yet so hard to achieve.

Laters,

[Girii]

And all chanters agree? I see what you are saying but....

I am betting that they will get something nice with next expansion. If they do, it is simply b/c they did an excellent job pointing out their concerns. Weather it is charm or just a bunch of new spells they will get something.

I'll take that bet...

[Cleptomaniac]

They don't have to change alot of things to boost us some. Change a number here and change one there and wallah more dps. Make all the crit aa's affect backstab, says they don't affect special attacks so make them affect backstab as well. Put us on same dmg table as monks, takes care of frontal and normal attack upgrade there, no real need for triple attack.

Wow, so simple, yet so hard to achieve.

Laters,

Now that is a great idea, but if we get crit AA's to affect BS you can bet Monks, Zurkers, and everybody else to start wanting the same thing. It would be a nice increase but if every one gets it I'm not sure if it would really put us back on top of the DPS pile. With the dmg tables monks get as well then maybe.

[zhivagoo]

dont zerkers have aas that affects their frenzy crit dmgs? think i saw that somewhere, n think its totally ******** that we dont get crits affecting out backstabs.

[Feochadan]

From guild parses (parsing Kumbaja), Frenzy is less than 8% of a zerker's damage in a fight, 85% being slashes. We are the only class depending so much on a special attack.

[Neijtisu]

The dev discussions on what they're thinking about doing with the poisonmaking revamp has me a little excited. This is relevant. If we get a revamped poison utility, we have something that zerkers can't steal. (I am quitting eq the day zerkers get poisonmaking skill) If they do it right, I think poisonmaking could add another 5-10% on our dps, this would reduce the % that is backstab dependant and help even us out a little bit. I hope the revamp is coming with next expansion. I know it isn't, but I'm hoping. We'll probably get it in the september expansion instead. They tend to put the work into those ones. Feb expansions are usually "Hey look at these 2 new things we learned how to code" But anyway, I'm going to wait and see what they do with poisonmaking, which has not had a single new recipe added in 5 expansions.

Neijitsu

[Hydein]

The fight between rogue and zerker DPS until recently was not something that was making me mad. My guild has one zerker, and I learned a while ago to always invite him to the DPS raid group because of their aura and other things they can do to help my dps.

Burn mobs, it was usually a fight between he and I as to 1/2 for dps. That all seemed to change about a month ago or so, when they had that little patch where they "fixed" backstab numbers or some such. Since then he is beating me on every burn mob, and the mob fights that are 5-8 mins he beats me. We are basically equally geared, and when we were always jockeying for top dps, i was without cleave. Have had fero5 for a while, and finally got dragonshade mask, figured with cleave 5 id be top DPS more often. As I said this is when the patch was put out, and suddenly hes beating me by 50-100dps on things like Keld, AMV and whatnot. Because we are always grouped, we are under the same buffs and whatnot so that is not a reason. Personally it sucks that i can't seem to beat the zerker anymore. Due to the lack of zerker's around, it is hard to findout if other rogues on server are experiencing this also.

As far as making poison better, sounds nice, but I know personally on current content, there are times i run out of buffslots. I have all 23 buff slots, and when you get all raid buffs, and i also grab WOD and whatnot. Then add in detrimental ae's, ae heals, dirty fighting buff and whatever else, I just don't have the buff slots to have poison on all the time. I have poison pots in bags, and raids theyre just not a good idea many times.

[Qmaus]

My thinking here is that rogues and zerks are both chain dps classes, but the devs really haven't nailed down the differences between the two. That's what needs to happen in order for things to get better.

My current thought (and this may be pre-mature and not well thought out because I only took about 4 seconds to come up with it) is that rogues should be tops, CLEARLY TOPS, and I mean FAR SUPERIOR, UNTOUCHABLE, UNAPPROACHABLE melee dps on individual mobs. No melee class, including zerkers should match or even approach our dps on a SINGLE mob.

So what then is the zerker role? I say take all the zerker super-dps abilities that do massive damage on a single mob, and spread the damage out somewhat so that zerkers are intended instead to be melee AE dps. They do less damage than a rogue on any individual mob, but they can damage several mobs at once with a single attack (or special attack, whatever).

And if they break mez and the enchanter dies, well, enchanters should start grouping with rogues instead, LOL.

Hey, like I said, this idea wasn't well thought out, it just sorta came to me in a flash. But even if the example I came up with sucks, I think the general idea here is that...

They really really really need to choose separate roles for rogues and berserkers, clearly define them, and work from there.

[reamas]

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[facundo69]

delete plz --- double post

[facundo69]

The dev discussions on what they're thinking about doing with the poisonmaking revamp has me a little excited. This is relevant. If we get a revamped poison utility, we have something that zerkers can't steal. (I am quitting eq the day zerkers get poisonmaking skill) If they do it right, I think poisonmaking could add another 5-10% on our dps, this would reduce the % that is backstab dependant and help even us out a little bit. I hope the revamp is coming with next expansion. I know it isn't, but I'm hoping. We'll probably get it in the september expansion instead. They tend to put the work into those ones. Feb expansions are usually "Hey look at these 2 new things we learned how to code" But anyway, I'm going to wait and see what they do with poisonmaking, which has not had a single new recipe added in 5 expansions.

Neijitsu

I am not nearly so optimistic. It was stated that the revamp would not help poison on raids, not that poison seems useful on raids anymore. After OOW it seems very little poison lands on any raid mob.

Even if poison does get revamped to where it adds dps on raid mobs, I don't want to be reliant on poisonmaking to beat other melee dps especially... IF .... poison is still going to be a pita to produce. We have how many subcombines to make multi-dose poisons? Compare that process to ummm any process that adds dps to other classes and poisonmaking is a huge timesink.

Unless the devs indicate a completely different direction for the poison revamp than what they have already I think poisonmaking will be little to no help in raid dps.

Fac

[Rundler]

Omaus, Im taking a big guess that since you are just picking up cleave5 that this new BS patch had NOTHING to do with you. It would only affect people who had obtained either Embershank or the FC dagger aug with a 2.5 aug'd out, or something like that.

He probably just learned to use his discs better, or maybe he just got cleave also. On my last Aro fight the top 6 were Rog, Rog, Rog, Rog, Zerker, Rog. That zerker sometimes comes on top, most times he doesnt.

Rundler

[Neijtisu]

I want to take an opportunity to respond to Fac, since you took the time to directly address my contribution. I will agree with you on one point: I am not so optimistic as to how any possible poisonmaking revamp can improve raid dps. Frankly, though, theres really no way that it could, and if you think about it rationally, no one should be expecting a large raid dps increase anytime soon. You know a speedboat changes course a lot faster than an aircraft carrier. When you think about the millions of damage we individually do over the course of a long fight, they're not gunna do anything thats gunna add big % gains onto that. Change to something of that scale will come in tiny increments, fractions of a percent at a time. Do I think that we may see single shot poisons with around 2-5k dmg? Yes, maybe even some necro sized dot poison? Also within the realm of possibility. Will those add up to much of anything on a 20 minute fight? Not a chance. Will they make grouping a lot more enjoyable? I think and hope so. Frankly, though, the future of poisonmaking utility imho will closely parallel that of twisted shank and blinding strike (our new blind proc, I messed up the name), poisonmaking was always really a tool for assassination, to buff us up and help us add an extra little oomph (at the cost of plat and prep time) to a rare named pop. I think, and honestly hope, that after the revamp it will remain just that.

[Wristie]

I could point to parses between me and my raid team's #1 Zerker, but we went from trading the 1/2 spots over the past few months, to me NEVER beating him in the past 2 months, regardless of mob. Even on AMV where I was king, I still lose to him by 20-50 dps. Other mobs he beats me by hundreds. (Case in point, last Yar Lir fight, he parsed at 2076dps, me at 1422dps - and I bet I outdamage most rogues i know on Yar Lir consistantly, because I know that if I position myself juuuuust right, I can get more back time in than the average rogue in my raid team or even most on the server (i would bet).

The zerk and I are in same group (so same buffs), etc etc - equally geared with weapons, me slightly better geared with armor and the like. I have more AAs (920 vs. 600) and I simply cannot out-parse him any longer unless he doesn't disc for some reason. Very, very sad.

If anyone came to me telling me they wanted to play a rogue because they wanted to produce killer DPS, I would tell them not to bother and make a Zerker instead. They do more DPS in most situations, and equal (or slightly more) in optimal rogue situations. They tank better, they have better utility, etc etc.

So even for raid corner pinning, I'd rather more Zerkers than more rogues.

Just my 2 cents...