So, we've confirmed the kite meta is intended right?

I’m genuinely confused by this one. Every single tank class is currently being forced to kite for the vast majority of every single high key M+, for almost every single trash pack, every single week. I don’t know about you guys, but that is actually amazing to me.

It’s amazing because that is not remotely what most tanks are designed to do, it’s not fun, there is no diversity of experience, no consistency in other classes to facilitate the only workable meta, and dozens of other reasons.

Is it asking too much to allow tanks to tank, say, at least 75% of the time? Why have high M+'s been relegated to the corner of the game in which content can only be cleared through exploitation of lesser known game interactions? Don’t get me wrong, I love the creativity and resourcefulness, but we’ve blown past the point where creativity can even exist as it pertains to some of the fundamental aspects of the game. Instead, all creativity begins with the premise that mobs are simply not tankable past a certain point, and that all elements of the game which are built upon mobs being tankable no longer apply.

It’s such a bizarre thing to force on players, and the fact it’s been a part of so many xpacs, and has lasted so long, seems to imply that something close to what we are experiencing is desirable by Blizzard.

Imagine if we were facing a similar issue with another role, take DPS for the sake of simplicity. What if mobs simply had too much HP, and therefore were not even worth damaging through conventional means? If there’s another workable option (environmental exploits, broken class synergies, mechanic oversights, etc.) then players will find it and perfect it. The part where players take the challenge into their own hands is awesome, and I wouldn’t dare request the game remove this component of the experience, but the part that dictates their creativity begin from a point antithetical to their expectations of their role in the game is ridiculous and nonsensical beyond belief.

EDIT: To all those players who need to conflate is with ought in order to prove something about yourself, your feedback is not the least bit helpful to the discussion. We are already aware that people like you exist lol. We’re having a discussion about how to best pose a difficult challenge in one of the progression systems of the game, not about how it’s POSSIBLE, or even common to succeed in the current system.

Seriously, this discussion has been had a million times and it blows my mind that people cannot understand this. Literally no one cares if your “friend” can do HoA 17 without kiting. The question you need to be asking yourself is, “is it okay that I feel my best contribution to this conversation is to inform people of the outliers they’re already fully aware of?”. The issues of the topic at hand are not UNIVERSAL TO EVERYONE AT ALL TIMES. Again, we already know this. You’re essentially creating forum filler.

Is my thread suddenly more valuable if I mention that I can still find plenty of success with the current system, even if it weren’t changed in the slightest? No, lol. I can, and I will continue to push high keys with success, the problem is what’s involved in the process…

Thanks to everyone who is actually contributing.

EDIT 2 (Possible solutions?): What if we gave all long-duration CC’s a Barghast Shade-style component which increases the damage their targets take the longer they are CC’d, up to a maximum? The problem with CC has long been the loss in efficiency, so how do we incentivize it better? Also, it couldn’t hurt to simply move much more mob damage into telegraphed, dodgeable abilities that tanks could move from in intervals, instead of constantly. Lastly, what about a Travelers Pledge base mechanic for tanks which decreases damage taken the longer you are standing still, and slowly depletes shortly after you begin moving?

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It is annoying but at least for VDH isn’t really nothing new for them, they have been forced into it back in BFA. At least they have the tool kit and experience doing it.

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That’s just factually false. My friend tanks as guardian, zero kiting required. The reason VDH is OP is because of their damage out put not because of kiting.

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Yeah on a +2

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Pretty sure it’s an attempt to make CC more useful. Don’t have to kite if your are only actively fighting half of a pack.

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Timers and CC don’t go well together

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Blizzard: We don’t want degenerate gameplay like AoE spam.

Also Blizzard: What if tanks not tanking was the optimal strategy?

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I didn’t say it was a good idea. Just that im pretty sure that’s the idea behind it. Just make sense when you consider the other changes that happend. Like target caps to stop massive pulls.

This. Plus, kiting is only needed until dps has the gear to burn trash faster. Couple of weeks, I’m betting you won’t see this strat as much.

Hmm, well you might want to get your friend to write a guide on wowhead on this then because the the majority of tanks above +10 need to kite, not every pack granted but a majority of them. I also main guardian and would like to know his secrets because pulling between cooldowns / not kiting is a death sentence.

Kiting is a fun mechanic, in small doses… not having entire dungeons designed around them, that’s just the devs being unfathomable levels of lazy, instead of correctly creating encounters to challenge players they just ramp the numbers up and call it good.

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Blizz didn’t create the strategy, players did.

I would guess Blizz wanted us do smaller pulls or CC but we found a way around it…that guess also supports the AOE cap, that had almost no effect on how we pull

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They would have to rework the entire mechanics of how trash work (especially on the trash buffed weeks) to accommodate for tanks to do active mitigating aka using skills to survive that are not just running and slowing/rooting.

I think it is just the nature of top end M+ content. The overall system would have to be dramatically changed or they would have to add in a multiplier to tank survivability at a certain key threshold and just outright give them more stats or make them take reduced damage (the easiest option)

Would that be any more or less fun though ? You’d still be chain pulling most packs kiting a majority so they die off as you’re pulling the next.

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Its simple. Any mistake, poor programing or outright bad decisions are “Working as intended.”

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Maybe but considering that kiting to avoid CC so we can just AoE everything down is a tactic also used on Classic WoW, they probably should have seen it coming.

Especially with the timers.

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lol this.

Even geared bears have to get out of dodge ( /kneeslapper ) on higher keys. I’ve not done anything above a +16 (let’s not talk about that +17 that took… well let’s not talk about it), and I’m certainly not just standing there face tanking once I’m out of defensives.

it’s all relative to gear though. Yea, I can do a sub +10 and never kite. but if I were sitting at 200 ilvl? I’d probably have to kite even on lower keys.

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I much prefer kiting than standing in one spot doing a boring rotation

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Sure they do.

People just have this mindset that the only “real” form of CC is the Vanilla/BC dungeon strategy of trapping/polymorphing/sapping 5 mobs in a 6 mob pack and killing them one at a time.

The current meta is basically nothing but CC.

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What is your friend doing, +4?

Paladin, warrior, and DK are all dead in under 5 seconds if they don’t have an active cooldown to use and stay in melee range without one. They all suffer from the same issue on this front as well, while DH has short 1 minute or less cooldown, the other tanks have very long cds that are not available every pull. DK and Paladin don’t have much in the way of mobility either so gaining distance without a perfect group comp is a nightmare. Warrior threat is abyssal and even if they leap away there’s no way for them to keep aggro.

Doing high keys for every tank other than DH is an extremely unfun experience, and the completion rate shows it. Monk only has a small presence because they’re good at running away too. Over 70% of the meta is DH, ~25% monk and less than 5% are the other 4 tanks combined.

Personally between the loot and the terrible M+ experience as a tank, I’m ready to just quit this game once and for all. I’m tired of playing a beta until season 3 of the xpac.

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I don’t agree with you, because I think tanking by running away like a scared kid isn’t fun, but that’s ok and that aside…

I love your name. idk why, but it just makes me laugh every time I see it.

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Just saying.

Timing all 15s gets you about 1200 io.
Timing all 20s gets you about 1600 io.

The tank class with lowest io is prot war with 1800 io…

DK is close with like 1850
Pally is like 2k
Druid is like 2k
Monk is like 2.2k
And DH like 2.3k

So considering every tank class can get to the m+22 range that’s not that bad lol.

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