@Sparkle
I would like to make a case and request for upping the Shield of Steel passive in defense.
The defensive tree in AA has always been very very weak. Even with very high tier defensive stats (12k+), DPS players are still able to heavily apply damage to many tank spec'd players. As a result, being a tank hasn't always been the most viable thing, and has largely, in fact, been a joke. Many tanks have given up and moved onto being DPS instead. The only real "tanks" left are stam/spirit based healers, and they only qualify because they can heal themselves.
The problem with 3.5 and the defensive tree is that shield of steel used to apply 900 defense (not great, but not the worst either). Now it only applies 6% defense. That means you'd need to get all the way up to a whopping 15k defense, in order to get the +900 points passive. Which, at 15k defense, that is already so heavily mitigated, it doesn't even equal a 1% damage reduction. However, +900 is also no longer viable, given the upgraded gear, ancestral skill modifiers and how much MORE damage battlerage can doll out now (as if it needed any to begin with)
At minimum, that requires fully epic plate + tempers. That is a crazy high requirement.
I would like to request that instead of 6%, Shield of Steel gets a +15% defensive upgrade instead. Here's why:
Defense was first and foremost put into place to counter Battlerage. As it stands, it barely does that. The passives and CC granted by the battlerage tree are already so out of control that unless you are a 100% plate abolisher (note, who also has battlerage, which is the best way to counter battlerage) you are basically screwed.
The ability to DPS stack and defense bypass already far outweighs the capabilities to stack defense. Note that there are zero *stats* that provide you physical defensive bonuses, and only 5 things that provide you actual defensive stats/abilities:costumes (which are unreliable and a pain in the ass) phys defense gems, shield block/evasion gems, skill damage reduction accessories, and of course, your armor and shield (which are basically the same thing, "armor").
There are technically 7 ways to increase your attack if using battlerage (which is the entire point of this post): Costumes (again, unreliable but still another way), Puncture (for removing 2k defense [holy shit]), 2H bonus (nullifying 50% of users shield defense, again another FU to shield users), Longspear proc (10k defense gone), then of course your Str stat, Skill damage accessories, and armor/weapon stats (which aren't really the same thing, but lets lump them together under gear)
Oh, and another big FU to shield users is Focus (for bypassing someone's shield block/parry/eva rates) for increasing your hit chance, which is severely detrimental to shield/defensive users
All in all, instead of being able to counter battlerage, defense/shield users are largely at the mercy of 2H battleragers. That "Shield of Steel" is more like a Shield of Paper at this point, largely being a placeholder to try and stave off at least one of the myriad of ways defense is stripped from defensive players, which, in essence, it still doesn't really do.
+15% would at least provide a reasonable amount of physical defense against people running around with divine/epic 2h weapons and 2tapping plate armor wearers.
I would like to make a case and request for upping the Shield of Steel passive in defense.
The defensive tree in AA has always been very very weak. Even with very high tier defensive stats (12k+), DPS players are still able to heavily apply damage to many tank spec'd players. As a result, being a tank hasn't always been the most viable thing, and has largely, in fact, been a joke. Many tanks have given up and moved onto being DPS instead. The only real "tanks" left are stam/spirit based healers, and they only qualify because they can heal themselves.
The problem with 3.5 and the defensive tree is that shield of steel used to apply 900 defense (not great, but not the worst either). Now it only applies 6% defense. That means you'd need to get all the way up to a whopping 15k defense, in order to get the +900 points passive. Which, at 15k defense, that is already so heavily mitigated, it doesn't even equal a 1% damage reduction. However, +900 is also no longer viable, given the upgraded gear, ancestral skill modifiers and how much MORE damage battlerage can doll out now (as if it needed any to begin with)
At minimum, that requires fully epic plate + tempers. That is a crazy high requirement.
I would like to request that instead of 6%, Shield of Steel gets a +15% defensive upgrade instead. Here's why:
Defense was first and foremost put into place to counter Battlerage. As it stands, it barely does that. The passives and CC granted by the battlerage tree are already so out of control that unless you are a 100% plate abolisher (note, who also has battlerage, which is the best way to counter battlerage) you are basically screwed.
The ability to DPS stack and defense bypass already far outweighs the capabilities to stack defense. Note that there are zero *stats* that provide you physical defensive bonuses, and only 5 things that provide you actual defensive stats/abilities:costumes (which are unreliable and a pain in the ass) phys defense gems, shield block/evasion gems, skill damage reduction accessories, and of course, your armor and shield (which are basically the same thing, "armor").
There are technically 7 ways to increase your attack if using battlerage (which is the entire point of this post): Costumes (again, unreliable but still another way), Puncture (for removing 2k defense [holy shit]), 2H bonus (nullifying 50% of users shield defense, again another FU to shield users), Longspear proc (10k defense gone), then of course your Str stat, Skill damage accessories, and armor/weapon stats (which aren't really the same thing, but lets lump them together under gear)
Oh, and another big FU to shield users is Focus (for bypassing someone's shield block/parry/eva rates) for increasing your hit chance, which is severely detrimental to shield/defensive users
All in all, instead of being able to counter battlerage, defense/shield users are largely at the mercy of 2H battleragers. That "Shield of Steel" is more like a Shield of Paper at this point, largely being a placeholder to try and stave off at least one of the myriad of ways defense is stripped from defensive players, which, in essence, it still doesn't really do.
+15% would at least provide a reasonable amount of physical defense against people running around with divine/epic 2h weapons and 2tapping plate armor wearers.
