Crabbok

Please stop posting here speweing misinformation about uncontested avoidance. Pretty much all bruisers have uncontested avoidance through MULTIPLE sources other than stances, including our mythical,, the STR line, and the Brawler portion of TSO AAs, which you obviously have no idea about.

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Imogan

I didn't include the mythical because I was talking about bruisers(brawlers) in general. But even the mythical doesn't change much. It give 5% uncontested.

The str line and Deflecting blow are deflection mods (aversion adds uncontested, but only to the stances...). Maxed out, those 2 are 22% together. So yes, a mythical'd bruiser doesn't lose all their uncontested in offensive, it goes from 35-40 in defensive to 6 in offensive. A plate tank with Dwarven shield goes from 35-40 to...35-40.

Could put a smart ass comment here. I'll just say that you seem quite dedicated to the class, which is the most important aspect of being a forum leader here.

Bruiser dps is fine for a hybrid tank. Bruiser tanking is also fine, it's the mechanics of the game that are broken. If you want to 'fix' bruiser tanking, either argue to fix the mechanic that unfairly effects bruisers (brawlers), or argue to lose a similar amount of survivaility as plate tanks in offensive (none).

EDIT: In fairness, if you had enough other deflection mods to get your base to upper 30's, that 6 would probably be a 7.

Prugor

The average bruiser without their TSO Raid Pattern Shoulders has 28% max for their Deflection Chance in defensive. I dont know where you got 35-40. Currently, there are probably two items that add to MDC, which is the Charm of Quellous I believe and the Raid Pattern Shoulders, which one gives +7 and the other gives +6. Also, in Offensive, you lose the +6 from Aversion, which is Def/Mid Stance only. So you are down to 22% MDC.

The Mythical adds +5 MDC, but that does not show up in the Persona window. /feedbacked that a few times.

Compare Shield Effectiveness to Minimum Deflection Chance and a brawler loses everytime. A plate tank can always have around 45ish Shield Effectiveness, regardless of stance and buffs. A Brawler will have 28% in Defensive Stance.

Imogan

Defensive M1 is 16% (was 19.2 on test after 'shield adjustment').
Aversion adds 6% base to Defensive and Mid.
Mythical is 5%

So, base minimum deflection in defensive, with Aversion and Mythical, is 16+6+5=27%.

8 pts of str4 is 16% mod, 5 pts in Deflecting Blow is 6%. Shoulders are 6% (8% on test atm).

So, 27*1.22=32.95. Add shoulders it's 27*1.30=35.1. Add Quellious charm, 27*1.37=37

If they ever add the 'shield upgrade' back those numbers go to 30.2*1.22=36.84, 30.2*1.3=39.26, and 30.2*1.37=41.37.

There are a lot more shield effectiveness items/buffs. But base Block is lower. Base block (not including any shield effectiveness mods) on the dwarven shield is 22. So, while it's easy to get much more +shield effectiveness than + deflection (due to itemization, another point that should be addressed), the base is lower to start with. I would say 45-55% is a typical shield effectiveness mod(even for instance geared tanks), which brings block with the Dwarven shield to 22*1.55=34.1. I'm not sure what the cap is for shield effectiveness, I suspect it's 100 (I can only test up to 65%), which would mean block this expansion will cap at 44% (unless they add a shield to the new X4 LS instance with a higher protection value than the Avatar shield...).

Prugor

Thank you for explaining a bit more into the math of those two skills.

Novusod

My experience in Offensive stance is that I do not get pwned by orange cons. I have tanked most of VP in offensive stance all the way up to Phara Dar. Staying alive is mostly about having healers that don't suck and knowing when to pop parry and mythical. Also knowing how to gear a toon for tanking also helps. I have 14% to 17% completely uncontested avoidance in Offensive. Band of Runed Flesh(2), Grunblig's coil(1), RE2 cloak(3), Mythical(5), and two fabled wrist adorns(6). Still not as much as avoidance as a plate tank but we are not real tank ATM so what can you expect.

To me it is our defensive stance that sucks because the DPS drop off is so huge that even single target agro becomes a problem. I only use this stance for recovery and quick tanking. But again not a real tank here. It sucked on Test too btw so plate heads still would have the advantage either way.

The problem with the bruiser class is that we have no direction. We are not real tanks and not real dps. Right now we are just some type of low utility add killer. That is the crux of this thread here. If we fail to choose a direction for the class than our role will only diminish further as it is becoming harder and harder to min/max on a class that wants to do everything. If the status quo stays then next expansion the min/max classes that are pure dps and pure tanks will get even further ahead of us. Fingure doing 60% the DPS of what a T9 rouge would do and tanking an even smaller fraction of the content a plate tank be will be able to tank.

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Crabbok

Our biggest problem is in the raid environment.

EQ2 has too many classes and only a 24 man raid system. EQ2 has 6 classes in a game that most of the time only requires one, and NEVER requires more than 4. Brawlers and Summoners are the red headed kids in a family of blondes (When it comes to raiding). Our class is never really needed. Sure some people like having a brawler for the raid buff, but we are never "needed" like other classes are.

Sure we can tank ok, and dps pretty good, but what I really want, is a change to the game that will truly allow a raid consisiting of all 24 classes, and for that raid to somehow be optimal. I don't know for sure how they could implement this though. Maybe by making all buffs raidwide, maybe by adding new 24-man HO's, maybe making certain amazing buffs that only work if one of each class is in the raid... who knows. Thats what I'd really like to see eventually though... no class left behind.

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glok

I feel the same way as Imogen tbh - I had to explain that to our zerker OT who constantly states there is no reason to ever use defensive stance for anything and wonders why I do.

And before I read your last post I thought the same thing btw - make it where your shield doesn't work while in offensive and VIOLA! They're in the same boat we are. They can choose to tank in offensive if they want (I do it for easier zones) - but they won't be able to do so without the same penalties we have to endure.

I agree on our specials, but have one caveat - Tower of Stone is 3 hit stoneskin vs anything, but it damages their shield (I know, I know.. carry junk shields, use mender bots etc). We have Stone Deaf (3 hits vs magic) and Inner Focus (2 hits vs physical)... While it's not as convenient as ToS as far as guaranteeing to catch something at a critical moment - I think the two combined are actually more powerful (aside from the recast of them).

Also, Impenetrable Will + the 10 second clicky on the mythical both are things that guards don't have at all... I feel we're in better shape than ever this expansion in regards to our tanking, honestly the last bastion that needs addressed is our inability to tank orange cons effectively due to having to choose between aggro or survivability (which is dumb).

I voted for hybrid. When I made my bruiser, I started as a fighter, and picked brawler at 10 because I wanted to be a hybrid. I fell into this class because they were what I WANTED to play, and it still is. I tank a lot - I've tanked every heroic instance in TSO and most of the raid content - but I like being able to FD split for chain pulling, DPSing when not needed to tank, etc.

I have a wizard alt who already does far more dps than my bruiser can, so if they make us into pure DPS - I highly doubt I'll even play my main anymore =(

glok

also - orange con raid mobs in VP are not anywhere near the same as orange con raid mobs in TSO

Imogan

I can't see them equalzing all classes, that's a complete redesign. Anyone who has played a MMORG before eq2 had to know right off the bat that with 6 tank classes and 24 man raids, there was going to be competition for spots.

This expansion has done a lot for fighters, for the first time there are encounters that benefit from 4 fighters. There are even encounters that have aspects that favor brawlers as tanks(i.e. Pentaclypse's disarm...one place where not counting on a shield for uncontested avoid is a good thing), but the screwed up mechanic that allows plate tanks to use offensive negates (or at least mitigates) the advantage.

SOE is never going to give brawlers enough DPS to compete toe to toe with dps classes. In this game there will always be 2-3 spots outside the MT spot that all the other fighters will have to compete for. At this point, excluding SKs, dps and utility are pretty much a wash, no class has a clear advantage over the other (by clear I mean enough to choose based on that). What is clearly different is the ability to tank, and that is solely because of the stance discrepency.

To put it another way, if brawlers had 10% more dps than all other fighters, would that be enough to justify a spot over the others if they lacked the flexibility to effectively tank? Perhaps in a HC guild with a set raid roster that never varies, but in a more typical guild where attendence is not so set, flexibility is a big deal. If you have 5 tanks on your roster, and you're never sure which 3 will show up (which is a lot more common than a set, every day roster), being able to fill any role is a big plus.

DPS gets lots of limelight, but it's not a make or break, especially when you're talking shades of grey.