Set the pace.

Normally, the success of a group isn't measured by how many enemies they beat, or how good the XP per hour is; merely how fast the team perceives itself as moving through spawns.

Don't get me wrong. When I'm gaining multiple bars of XP per mission, leveling more than once with the same group post lvl 20, yeah, that group is badass. However, in general, the teams I remember most are the ones on which I felt like I was unstoppable.

Now, as awesome as my Blaster (Police Drone TH) is, he is made stronger by good teammates. Specifically, Tankers and Defenders.

Now, this isn't some post extolling the virtues of the "Holy Trinity" (Tank/Healer/Mage). Instead, I'm saluting the people who control how fast the team rolls. In CoH, it's the Tankers and Defenders. Tankers who eat alphas and manage agro, and Defenders who buff (not heal).

Tankers get a bad rep sometimes. They can be regarded as glory hounds, or seen as trying to do all the work just to show off. However, the real strength of a Tanker is in his ability to embolden the team, and make them strike harder and faster, having faith in the Tanker to keep the agro off them while they rain hell. This applies equally to all classes, not just "Mages". It's safer to debuff once a Tanker has moved in. It's safer for a Scrapper with a mandatory agro aura to engage the foes. Additional agro is less of an issue if the primary spawn is being adequately managed. Tankers, when performing their job properly, help set the pace at which a team does it's job. The better the Tanker, the faster the pace, without team safety being sacrificed.

Any player can tell you that they feel much stronger when an Empathy/Thermal/Pain Manip/Kinetic/etc buff is cast on them. The very nature of buffing powers in CoH lends huge strength to a team. Strong characters are bold ones, and a buffed team is more confident going into battle. While they may still be numerically inferior, they will most times still press on, putting faith in that extra +18.5% def the Defender gave them, or the extra +500% regen the whole group has. Knowing that they are backed by a vigilant Defender (no pun intended), a team is more likely to stand it's ground when people start to fall. More likely to keep fighting when they would otherwise run away. I've seen more team wipes resulting from premature retreat then from failing to run away fast enough.

When solo, I know my own limits. I can ride the razors edge, and tackle odds far greater than most other players. Most players perform better when solo, as they only have themselves to consider in any given situation. When teamed, everything changes, because up to seven other people can be impacted by what you do. When teamed, I have to exercise restraint, since more than my own fate rests in the balance (and usually, the odds are vastly stacked against me). However, when teamed with the right people, when there is the right combination of agro management and buffing, I can once again become the engine of death that I know I am. And this applies to the rest of the team as well.

"We don't team with your kind here."

With the release of Issue 16, Defenders were given access to the Assault Rifle secondary set. My heart leaped with joy when I found out I could finally roll up an Empathy/Assault Rifle Defender, so first chance I got, I did.




At the time, I had been trying to find a way to turn this picture into an outfit, as a way to lure a friend of mine into playing CoH again. In the process, I fell in love with the idea of playing a medic from a Warhammer 40K or Starcraft scenario, so I rolled up Combative Medic (and I changed the outfit, along with color scheme).

Combative Medic is now level 26, blasting and buffing his merry way through all manner of task force, AV battle, and general tomfoolery. I'm still trying to find my inner Defender, but having a Council Assault Rifle to blast my way to said inner Defender with helps.



So, yesterday, after having some trouble finding a team, I end up grouped with two Controllers, whom we will call Icey Pants 1 and Icey Pants 2. Both were Ice Control/Cold Domination 'Trollers from the same SG. Upon joining them, the leader (Icey Pants 1) laments how few people are within our level range, and how none will join. I comment that I have a friend who will join us, to which the leader reacts favorably. After a few minutes of plowing through Sky Raiders at +1, I mention that my friend is now ready, with his Tanker.


And so it starts.

Icey Pants 2: Oi vey.

Icey Pants 1: No tankers, no scrappers.

Combative Medic: As a policy?

Icey Pants 1: SG rule. We don't allow them.

::After a few moments of politely testing the waters of the issue (while
still performing my job admirably), I address it directly::

Combative Medic: So do you also exclude Brutes, Stalkers, Blappers, and
Kheldians?

Icey Pants 1: No, just tankers.

Icey Pants 2: And tankery storm defenders,

Combative Medic: Why?

Icey Pants 2: We deal with enough of it on PUGs, so we don't allow it when
our SG runs a team.

Icey Pants 1: Chasing a tank around as it runs blindly into spawns get old
fast.

Combative Medic: Why not ask them not to, and boot them if they refuse?

Icey Pants 1: Have you ever asked a tank to listen to you?

The rest of the conversation is more of the same, but you get the gist. Rather then exclude all melee or melee capable classes, they simply exclude the two ATs most suited to deal with the damage they will inevitably take (I love my blapper to pieces, but anything less than perfection when I play him at +4 results in bloody violent death for moi). And this exclusion isn't truly against the ATs, simpley how some people chose to play them. But rather than having 30 seconds of patience with a player to see if they will play nice with others, they discriminate against a large portion of the player population, then lament that there aren't enough people around to join their team.

In the end my response to them was this: I will give almost any player and any AT a chance. Unless my team absolutely does not need, or will be hurt by the presence of a particular AT (a team with 6 blasters doesn't need a 7th), there is no reason not to include another player. If said player causes issues via their play style, I speak with them. If they adapt to the needs of the team, they can stay. If they refuse, I politely ask them to leave, and failing at that, I simply boot them myself. Conversely, when I play my Tanker, or any other AT for that matter, I almost always defer to the judgement of the team leader. If he has a problem with something I'm doing, I'll stop. Sometimes this means I end up doing stupid shit cause the leader sucks, but other times it means that I help the team running better by accepting the fact that my way isn't always the best way. Maybe I should be corner pulling on a Nemesis map, or maybe I should be on the opposite side of the AV from the team to protect them from melee cones (these are things I already do, btw, but that many Tanker neglect).

However, at no point can I ever expect another player to accommodate to my wishes if I refuse to do it in turn. Icey Pants 1 & 2 refuse to play with 40% of the available ATs, based on what they perceive as an issue with the classes, when in truth it's an issue with play style (one that can be found in every AT, Red or Blue side). I have no time for people who discriminate, but at the same time, to their credit, Icey Pants 1 & 2 were very polite, and answered all of my questions. So, rather than leave in a huff, I finished the mission with them, politely excused myself, and went off to team with my Tanker bud who had been left out.


This applies equally to all classes, ATs, professions, in any game, MMO or otherwise.

"'Burailion' Red!" or "I dream of heroes"

Last night I had a dream, in which I came into possession of a decoder ring. However, it matched up catchphrases in addition/instead of keycodes. As I examined the ring, I saw that one of the movable options was "'Burailion' Red!"

Needless to say, this stopped me dead in my tracks. I then spent the rest of my dream trying to get in touch with NCSoft or someone from Paragon Studios, so that I could collect my royalties.

Good times.

<---Original outfit, sans Piston Boots

Battle Suit Justice Burailion

An insane anime mecha, Burailion has almost no IOs slotted up, but is still one of my favorite characters. I went Invulnerability/Energy Melee because I wanted him to be a PvP character, but interest in him PvPing gave way to mild RPing with him.

This isn't his original outfit, but it's my current favorite (mainly because most of the pieces didn't exist when I stopped playing). It's a combination of Cyborg (arms, legs, shoulders, belt, hat, face plate, and chest plate), Enforcer (gauntlets, chin piece), and Techbot pieces (torso and head), with Piston Boots tossed in for good measure.

I'll be adding some binds and macros to him later, fleshing out the whole deluded crazy robot angle. Such catchphrases to be added:

• "Burning finger!"
• "Battle Suit Justice beatdown!"
• "I've seen this episode; it's the one where I kick your ass!"
• "Last time on Battle Suit Justice Burailion: I was awesome!"
• "Battle Suit Justice Burailion has high insurance premiums."
• "You are a fly in the soup of justice!"

That last one seems more in the vein of what the Tick would scream out, but you get the idea.

Taking 103: Warrior DPS and IAS

Most warriors I encounter within the game, alliance, and my guild, seem to think they must choose between dealing damage, and taking it. They either spec into what they feel is an overwhelming offense, or into something they hope is a faultless defense (sadly, despite their specialized builds, quite often neither is true).

However, it is quite easy to deal damage and take it while on the front line. Now, you may not be as tough as someone who devotes all eight of his skill picks to survival, and you'll never outshine your teams Ele; but you can contribute substantial and vital DPS to what your team is already generating, allowing you to quicker deal with things like bosses, enemy casters, or loose agro.

• IAS: IAS stands for Increased Attack Speed, and it's the easiest way to jump-start your DPS. Even though the stance says it increases your attack speed by only 33% (which is the cap), that translate to you attack 50% more. That means you do 50% more damage (and gain 50% more adren, steal 50% more life with a vamp weapon, etc). If you were doing 30 DPS before, now you're at 45 DPS, by simply using one skill (which also helps you generate more agro, since you've now become a bigger threat to the NPC).


• Attack Skills: The place most warriors go wrong. You don't need six attack skills, ever. Even assassins, who are dependent on chaining attacks skills, don't need that many. In general, don't take more than three. If you're tanking, your elite should be tailored to that end (Gladiator's Defense, Defy Pain, Obsidian Flesh, etc). Too many warriors use elite attacks cause they're OMGWTFBBQ awesomesuace on the battle field. Too bad your dead teammates don't agree. If you have to use an elite attack, use one that helps you tank (Dragon Slash is a good example, as it can feed skills like "Save Yourselves!"). Less is more with attack skills. Simply adding Power Attack to your skill bar can give you a boost of up to 14 DPS (which, plus the 45 you already have, give you 59 DPS, which is actually quite good considering). Being able to add you damage to that of your team against tough targets can create shorter battles, meaning that your team has more resources left when it's over, making the next battle that much easier (if you help end a fight even 5 seconds faster, consider how much energy your monk or ele didn't have to spend casting).


• Conditions: Warriors have the ability to apply almost every single condition in the game, with the exception of Cracked Armor, Poison, Disease, and Burning (and all of these can be found from a secondary profession). Degeneration can be a great boon, especially against high armor targets, or ones that ignore damage (Mist Form, certain PvE only boss skills). Each pip of degen equals two HP a second lost, meaning Bleeding adds 6 DPS, Poison 8 DPS, Disease 8 DPS, and Burning 14 DPS (degen caps out at 10 pips, or 20 HP a second). A W/R running Power Attack, Flail, and Apply Poison could easily net 67 DPS. Deep Wound is even more fun, as it reduces your targets total health and ability to heal (a valuable and often overlooked feature). It will reduce a targets health by 20% (maximum of 100 HP). What most people don't realize is this not only affects maximum HP, it affects current HP. That means an attack that adds Deep Wound can deal up to 100 damage over the listed value, that ignore ALL damage reduction and armor.

Warriors shouldn't ever be relegated to the role of meatshield. Warriors should be mobile little tanks that run around slicing, chopping, and smashing everything in their path, while their team rains down holy hell on their foes. A warriors high armor gives them the unique ability to go deep into the enemies backline and raise hell; an ability that is all to often overlooked. Just today I was running Eternal Grove with a guildmate. Each of us took up defense of a separate ramp. While he engaged the foes with his minions and heroes, I flagged mine to stand guard by the tree, while I ran out and played with the Luxons. At one point I found myself holding agro against a Siege Turtle, three Luxon Rangers, two Luxon Warriors, and two Luxon Elementalists. I killed them all in time to run off and catch the next turtle. All in all, we only lost a single Tree Singer, even when we experienced half a team wipe and Afflicted flooded into our base.

In my opinion, every warrior should be able to do what I did and more.

Tanking 102: Builds and Skills

At the request of Greg (my guild and alliance leader), I'm adding some more specific info on tanking. There are several key skills that can assist the playing of a tank, depending on whether or not you spec for Strength or Tactics, and whether you spec for energy or adrenaline use:

• Strength/Adrenaline: Defy Pain (+hp, +AL, -DR), Lion's Comfort (self heal, +adren), "For Great Justice!" (double adren gain)
• Strength/Energy: Warrior's Endurance (+energy), Flourish (+energy, skill rech), I Will Survive (+regen), Endure Pain (+hp), Dwarven Battle Stance (+IAS, interupt)
• Tactics/Adrenaline: Auspicious Parry (100% block, +adren), "Watch Yourself" (+AL), Bonetti's Defense (75% block, +energy), Riposte (100% block, +dmg), To the Limit! (+adren), "For Great Justice!" (double adren gain)
• Tactics/Energy: Gladiator's Defense (75% block, +dmg), Protector's Stance (75% block), Deadly Riposte (100% block, +dmg), Victory is Mine! (self heal), Bonetti's Defense (75% block, +energy)

Signets were not listed because they don't cost adrenaline or energy. Dolyak Signet and Healing Signet are the two most common signets you'll use as a Warrior. Keep in mind both have very serious draw-backs. Dolyak Signet makes you nigh-immoble, so make sure you won't need to move once you use it. If you feel you will need to reposition after casting it, bring along a shadow-step skill (Death's Charge works). Running Warrior's Endurance, Dolyak Signet, and Death's Charge will turn you into a teleporting infinite energy tank. Healing Signet causes -40 armor. For those who don't know how armor works, that means it doubles the damage you take while casting it. Makes sure you're running a block stance while casting it (and make sure that it won't end on skill activation).

Skill synergy is paramount too. Consider running a hammer tank, with Gladiator's Defense, Protector's Stance, and Renewing Smash. Now you can keep up near infinite block, and protect your team too (requires you to stand with the backline, so it's better as an off-tank, or when facing enemies without AoEs). Running Brawling Headbutt and Steelfang Slash in any adrenaline fueled build will give you a constant boost in adrenaline gain, and give you a solid interupt on nasty enemy skills. A Warrior/Paragon build that uses Spear of Fury along with Barbed Spear and Blazing Spear can jack up the teams DPS, while being able to spam "Save Yourselves!", with either a Strength or Tactics spec.

For tanks that run energy intensive builds, the use of a Zealous weapon is highly recommended, especially if you are using an IAS stance (keep in mind, you can only activate one stance at a time; you'll need to decide whether or not attacking faster is more important than blocking). Even though most IAS stances list an increase of 33%, that translates to 50% more attacks. Blunty, if two identical warriors, without attack skills, auto-attack the same target, the warrior under the effect of a 33% IAS stance will do 50% more damage. So, for terms of DPS, no skill is more important to a warrior than one that provides IAS.

I prefer to run Strength/Adrenaline builds. I'll run Flail, Enraging Charge, Lion's Comfort, Defy Pain, "For Great Justice!", "Save Yourselves!", plus two attack skills, either energy based, or the Brawling Headbutt/Steelfang Slash combo, to increase the rate at which I spam "SY!". In my opinion, Defy Pain is the best and most versatile warrior primary tanking skill. With a 20 second duration, it's easy to keep in up indefinitely durring combat. At 16 Strength, it gives +314 HP, +20 AL, and -11 DR. All from one skill. This puts the average tank at 120 AL vs physical, 100 AL vs Elemental. Math time:

NPC deals 100 physical damage with attack 1, and 100 elemental damage with attack 2 to Tank A, who is wearing max AL armor. Tank A takes 50 damage from attack 1, and 70.71 damage from attack 2. The same NPC then attacks Tank B, who is wearing the same armor, but is also running Defy Pain at 16 Strength. Attack 1 does 24.36 damage, while attack 2 does 39 damage.

Now, “SY!” is also, in my opinion, one of the best ways to protect your team:

An NPC boss hits your team with Searing Flames, at 20 Fire Magic, dealing 230 damage (130 base, x2 for boss damage, and we’ll pretend the whole team is on fire because you’re in lava). You monks, mesmers, ritualists, and elementalists all take it on the chin at the listed damage. You assassins and dervishes get hit for 193.41 damage. You paragons and fellow warriors take 162.63 damage, while the rangers laugh it off at 115 damage.

The boss hits you team again, but this time, you’ve cast “SY!”. The monks, elementalists, ritualists, and mesmers all giggle as they take 40.66 damage. The assassins and dervishes tell knock-knock jokes while they take 34.19. The paragons and warriors have an arm wrestling match while they take 28.75 damage, and the rangers shed a single silent tear for the boss as they take 20.33 damage.

The above assumes that no one wears a shield or has native damage reduction, and doesn’t use insignia that boost AL. “Save Yourselves!” is a warrior PvE skill gained from either the Luxons or the Kurzicks. It’s +100 AL for your team, for 4 to 6 seconds, at the cost of 8 adrenaline. It’s pure hotness.

I’ll add more tidbits as they present themselves.

Tanking 101: Playstyle and Aggro Management

Playing a "tank" in any MMO is pretty simple. You aggro first, you're expected to hold said aggro, you take the majority of the damage for the team, you're not expected to put out massive DPS. However, simple does not always equal easy. The specifics vary from game to game, but I'll be talking about Guild Wars for the time being. I'll touch on City of Heroes later.


1. Aggro Management

Tanking in Guild Wars is one of the most challenging tanking scenarios I've dealt with in an MMO. There are no clear aggro guidelines to be found in game. The only thing you really know for sure is your aggro radius, indicated by your compass/minimap in the top right corner of your screen by the transparent white circle center on your character.Any enemy that enters earshot of you will be aggroed. However, this doesn't necessarily mean they will attack you. The AI in GW evaluates targets, and picks them based on priority. At the top of that list are players with low armor and low HP. Essentially, the very people you're trying to protect get attacked first. Certain actions on your part will move you up that list. Body-blocking an enemy, quite literally getting in their way and becoming an obstruction increases your own aggro. Attacking, and activating skills against an enemy increases your aggro. Thusly, a good tank (in most, but not all situations), should always be moving and attacking, getting the enemy's attention. Beware, moving too much can cause the enemy to re-evaluate aggro, moving you back down that list. This is especially true is you're under the effect of an IMS (increased movement skill) skill, you will lose aggro very fast.



2. Surviving Aggro

Now that you can better manage aggro, you need to survive it. Either you're keeping yourself alive, you're receiving support from your team, or a combination of both. Don't feel that you can't do your job without a monk, but learn to trust them when they support you. Breaking from a fight for fear of dying will get your whole team killed. Think about it: if you with your high armor and high HP can't take that aggro, how is your team going to hold up when it gets put on them? Be willing to die on the front lines, rather than run away and draw the aggro into your backline. If you need to run, side step your enemies. Run to your left or right, not backwards. This way, when the follow, you're putting more distance between your team and the enemies.

Whatever you do, make sure that your antics on the frontline don't attract the attention of other enemy spawns. Careless side stepping or repositioning can cause you to aggro neighboring spawns, making the situation drastically more dire.


3. The Informed Tank

I had considered writing up a section on gear and skills, but I decided against that. Being aware of what you enemies do and how they do it should dictate what gear and skills you set your tank up with before each mission and quest. When facing large amounts of physical damage, go with blocking stances. When facing large amounts of elemental damage an spell casters, go with +AL and +DR. When facing large amounts of degen, or armor ignoring damage, go with large amounts of HP.

When in melee, sometimes you'll be expected to call targets for the rest of the team, so they can target through you. Try to target especially dangerous foes, or annoying ones, like enemy Elementalists or Monks. Knowing which enemy caster is spamming Empathy on your versus knowing which enemy caster is summoning minions can be the difference between victory and a teamwipe.


4. Tank DPS

As I mentioned earlier, you're not expecting to generate huge DPS. This doesn't mean you shouldn't or can't. Bringing attack skills can not only make managing aggro easier, it will help the team kill faster. Remember, killing a foe gives your team 100% DR to that target.

Conditions allow most warriors to add large amounts of DPS to a team. Even if you're only adding a skill that inflicts bleeding to your skill bar, consider the fact that this negate the inherent regen most bosses have.

It helps to bring attack skills that don't use the same "fuel" as your tanking skills. For example, if you're running Gladiator's Defense, plus one or two other stances that cost Energy, bring attack skills that run off of adrenaline instead. If your tanking skills run off of adrenaline, it's not as bad having attacks that do the same, but attack skills will slow the rate at which you can activate them (Adrenaline skills "charge" as you attack. They all charge at the same rate. Once you have built up enough to activate a skill, the icon lights up, allowing you to click it. Using an adrenaline based skill deducts one point of adrenaline from each other skill, requiring you to connect with another attack, to replace lost adrenaline before activating another skill. Spamming adrenaline based attack slows the rate at which other skills recharge.). Just be aware. For example, I have a build made to spam the skill "Save Yourself!", a PvE only shout that grants my team +100 Armor for 5 seconds. At a cost of 8 adrenaline, I bring Power Attack and Counter Attack, so that "Save Yourself!" charges faster, giving my team more protection (also, since it keeps my teams armor so high, it helps me keep aggro).


None of these are hard and fast rules, but keeping them in mind can allow a novice warrior to preform admirably on the frontlines.