Why is PvP Dominated by a Tank Meta?

JackDaniell

In the day and age of murkmire with heavy having been nerfed, and light and medium having recieved so many buffs, why do we still see a tank meta in PvP? Hope you guys enjoy my thoughts and the gameplay!

https://youtu.be/I5wqfkDeMLU

Joy_Division

I think you hit on most of it:

1. Players don't want to die
2. Poor server performance overly punishing on light/medium
3. Wearing light/medium requires active and skillful gameplay to survive

I would add one thing though, "heavy" does not necessarily mean tank. Those heavy beserkers sets like Fury and 7th Legion are legit damage setups and combine some of the resilience of heavy with potentially a lot of damage, especially when using bleeds, which do not care what armor you (or your opponent) is using.

That being said, it looks like you are referring to low damage tank builds and I think there are a couple of things at work here. If players zerg-surf, play in groups, or are not on their own, they can kill other players with low-damage tank builds, which gives them a misleading impression of the effectiveness of those sorts of builds.. There was zero way that warden player you fought at the end of your video was ever going to kill you on their own, yet they had a high rank, but I highly doubt that player usually is in those sorts of fights where they have to just rely on their own damage. Cyrodiil doesn't encourage the sort of open-world gameplay that you do, so it's totally possible to run narrow low damage tank builds and not really being challenged while accumulating a lot of AP.

I also think that with a lot of nerfs to offensive gameplay, it isn't easy to kill other players, especially on a build where you want to survive. As this has been a trend for years in ESO, it has pushed players away from trying to run the sorts of builds that you do, and instead to just use low damage builds and rely on proc sets to do damage as proc sets do not care about your stats or armor. I would also add it can be difficult to survive without using your gear because ZOS has also nerfed a lot of defensive class abilities like Blinding Flashes and eclipse, so that if you are not a Nightblade, it's really hard to rely on your class abilities for survival. It's just more efficient to rely on gear, and there are a lot of very strong options out there with Impregnable, Pirate skeleton, Reactive, etc.

It's just a lot easier to get AP and have a feeling of accomplishment building towards not to die. There really isn't a tangible reason to play the open world style that you do aside from your own enjoyment of it: you don't get a lot of AP, you're not really affecting the AvAvA scoreboard, and ZOS's balancing has not made it easy.

TBois

I agree with what has been discussed here and in the video. I would like to stress that there are plenty of options for medium armor builds that can take some damage (I don't know light armor options as well). With the new jewelry traits and trait changes, there are even more options for tanky medium armor now, and you are seeing this in a lot of build videos and high end player builds. I wonder if we start seeing even more YouTube medium armor and light armor builds at work, if we will see the pendulum shift any.

NBrookus

Lag is a factor, proc sets doing so much damage, and definately fear of dying. Why? There is zero death penalty. But people are afraid.

Heavy stamina has the trifecta: damage sets + proc sets, buffed healing, buffed survival. (Heavy magicka doesn't get the same.) You can stack more damage in medium or light, but you have to give up something for it. Building tanky is painfully easy to do. Plus I think a lot of newer players see higher resistance numbers and assume that equals better because it's a very clear metric whereas the value of things like penetration and crit is harder to quantify.

I'd add another reason: the game heavily favors numbers stacking at the moment. Surviving until a bunch of friendlies arrive to out number the enemy is an unfortunately very effective low-skill strategy.



That build looks like a ton of fun.

Sharee

I am mostly playing at primetime, with all 3 sides locked. That means medium = fossilize->leap->lash and i am dead before the server realizes i've been hammering that CC break button the whole time.

jaws343

Joy_Division wrote: »

I think you hit on most of it:

1. Players don't want to die
2. Poor server performance overly punishing on light/medium
3. Wearing light/medium requires active and skillful gameplay to survive

I would add one thing though, "heavy" does not necessarily mean tank. Those heavy beserkers sets like Fury and 7th Legion are legit damage setups and combine some of the resilience of heavy with potentially a lot of damage, especially when using bleeds, which do not care what armor you (or your opponent) is using.

This is pretty important. I have a two-hand Stamden build that uses both 7th and Ravager. Pretty solid resistances, but I am using the sets for their weapon damages proc more than I am using them for the resistances.

technohic

Yeah you touched on most of it, and like others have said; having bleeds and procs not care what you are wearing for armor to provide damage for you is a large part of it. I personally like medium and light myself for the reasons you mention; but also because I feel like I am more likely to secure a kill short of relying on procs and bleeds.

And for lag; it does suck more on a medium or light armor where you rely more on not getting hit or more on active defense in general, but I was thinking about it the other day. In the heavy lag where I cannot get my abilities to go off to kill a target, it has sometimes meant that others have probably not been able to get abilities off to kill me as well. It goes both ways, but your point still stands that heavy armor is better suited to survive when the abilities do fire off in your direction.

Ruckly

Medium armor works very well in cyrodill because dodge rolls and stamina regen. If by tank you mean a toon with 30k+ hp that might be because siege damage can only be mitigated by siege shields. You need enough hp to get through a breach in a wall. If by tank you mean higher resistances that might be because players don't want to be ganked/mowed down by a stack of EotF. But that has a downside which is immobilize/snare. Without the regen from medium armor you can force a heavy armor stamina toon to keep using dodge rolls or else get focus fired.

Magicka tanks exist because light armor doesn't offer much resistances and you need some defensive skill to survive in light armor.

The other reason why heavy armor stamina tanks might be prevalent is stamina toons don't have a skill like mutagen to start their ult generator. If a stamina toon is melee/melee then gap closer/light attack might be their best way to start ult gen. If they do that they will likely need high resistances.

zyk

Sharee wrote: »

I am mostly playing at primetime, with all 3 sides locked. That means medium = fossilize->leap->lash and i am dead before the server realizes i've been hammering that CC break button the whole time.

This is the biggest reason I switched from medium to heavy on a stam build over the summer. Heavy armor has a secret passive that grants 3000 ZOS'd Resistance.

UppGRAYxDD

I only wear hvy armor cause YouTube told me to...,

Vapirko

Medium is great right now, but with mobility being at its lowest point and snares being at their most predominant we’ve entered into an age where people go for the “who can stand in the AOE the longest” builds because they’re easy and generally require the use of only a few skills, no canceling, and no real knowledge of your class or other classes. There are fewer and fewer good players and guilds willing to teach newcomers and people have a weird aversion to dying in PvP. So you either get tanks or you get NBs. It’s really sad, PvP has never been less interesting. I had a 2v4 with a random player yesterday against a small group of 4 EP tank builds. I was able to stand in the middle of them without blocking while being hit with soul assault and two Templar executes and they couldn’t even get my health down a little. Just had to pop a vigor and do nothing else. And sure it took a while to kill them but they couldn’t even survive a 2v4. And I have to wonder where are they getting their build info from? Because they weren’t squishy enough to have PvE gear or to just be winging it, but on the other hand they were simply useless. Or do they just get off on being able to kill noobs while being invincible to half the players out there? This is not an isolated experience. It seems like the skill level has severely declined overall in the last year especially. And ZOS has definitely pushed people into slow moving tank AOE groups, as you are now brutally punished for going solo or small scale while all the advantages rest with larger groups.

Great video btw, and I just want to add that with the lag you’re absolutely right and most NA players don’t even know what it’s like to play from overseas. And it has gotten worse. I have to play with the lover mundus on my medium stamplar and bloodspawn becuse is I don’t I’ll die. You just can’t rely on evasion to work and you need that padding. So I might have 24k health but I’m over 30k resists with bloodspawn.

Kadoin

None of my PvP chars use heavy, and I can tell you that it is not a pleasant experience. One reason I might go heavy is because there are apparently super-tanky stam builds doing loads of damage with no sustain problems while I can barely sustain and do damage in light armor to them. If that's the case, why would I not become more tanky? That's literally the only way to stand a chance against those builds and the other defensive builds that do massive amounts of damage.

Blame ZOS for terrible balancing and too many nerfs to the core of classes leading to an armor meta where what type and what set you wear is literally deciding everything in PvP yet again! One Tamriel 2.0

NyassaV

Lemme just taking the healing ward change and use it.

If I lost my main ability to heal, wouldn't I want to mitigate damage I take rather than struggle to heal through it? You technically do more damage in heavy armor simply because you have time to apply counter pressure and on a medium armor build you'd be dodging and healing more. Similar with light armor.

The summerset Light attack buff also made EVERYONE DO SOME MUCH DAMAGE without even trying. TBH I find it really really annoying and while I don't mind it in PvE the PvP side of this change is really not that nice.

Magicka in particular keeps getting screwed over here since Stamina has better sustain via heavy attacks so the sustain issues that come with heavy aren't as important. I'd love it if fire staves had the same heavy attack time as a DW because DW feels so damn good to heavy attack with but literally every other weapon feels bad and sluggish.

I'm leaving some stuff out but I made my point.

arkansas_ESO

It doesn't help that all of the intended counters to tank builds (Oblivion damage, bleeds) are equally strong against light and medium armor as they are against heavy.

Haashhtaag

Damage is so high with minimal effort and battle spirit hasn’t been adjusted in a long long time.

Crown

TBois wrote: »

I would like to stress that there are plenty of options for medium armor builds that can take some damage (I don't know light armor options as well).

@TBois I play in 5 light the grand majority of the time on my Templar, though that also means hitting cleansing ritual every 4th-5th spell and using lingering health pots while in combat to compensate for extra damage taken. You can't play the same way as in heavy, but the damage and sustain is so much better in light that using heavy (as a magplar) just feels wrong.

When solo, I'm usually in two of kagrenac/spinner/bright_throat, and valkyn as the monster set. In small group where I heal more, I'll swap the valkyn to earthgore, and in larger groups/raids I'll run kag with gossamer or transmutation for group buffs.

Warpig6Delta

I play on an Xbox controller as I came from console to PC. I agree that the camera is noticeably slower with controller game play but it works out for me that way and I am accustomed to joystick rotations in an outnumbered fight. I run a medium armor old school build on my Stamblade. Eternal hunt IMO can be played offensive and defensive and can be used to control fights. I believe it is arguably the best set to use solo in open world as you get damage and immovable when kiting that has no cool down. It's based strictly on the players ability to use roll dodge and major expedition (bow bar) to kite and bait players into chasing. And with Shade, you have an immediate "exit" button if things get tough. With the night blades ability to reset fights, I can run circles around these heavy armor stun and chain builds while picking off the weak players in the back built as glass cannons. Then either make a decision to kite these heavy armor builds away from their snipers and spammers and wear them down or to simply hit an invis pot and move to another area.

Ruckly

Crown wrote: »

TBois wrote: »

I would like to stress that there are plenty of options for medium armor builds that can take some damage (I don't know light armor options as well).

@TBois I play in 5 light the grand majority of the time on my Templar, though that also means hitting cleansing ritual every 4th-5th spell and using lingering health pots while in combat to compensate for extra damage taken. You can't play the same way as in heavy, but the damage and sustain is so much better in light that using heavy (as a magplar) just feels wrong.

When solo, I'm usually in two of kagrenac/spinner/bright_throat, and valkyn as the monster set. In small group where I heal more, I'll swap the valkyn to earthgore, and in larger groups/raids I'll run kag with gossamer or transmutation for group buffs.

Some day I might try Jorvuld's Guidance/Skooma Smuggler templar with 100% up time on Annulment and 42 second warhorn. It seems that mist form would be absolutely needed to counter bow ganks and I might need to quick swap into heavy whenever I'm mounted. I'm not to keen on turning my templar into a vampire. This has to be the toughest armor/class combination except maybe light/warden.

IlCanis_LupuslI

NBrookus wrote: »

Lag is a factor, proc sets doing so much damage, and definately fear of dying. Why? There is zero death penalty. But people are afraid.

Heavy stamina has the trifecta: damage sets + proc sets, buffed healing, buffed survival. (Heavy magicka doesn't get the same.) You can stack more damage in medium or light, but you have to give up something for it. Building tanky is painfully easy to do. Plus I think a lot of newer players see higher resistance numbers and assume that equals better because it's a very clear metric whereas the value of things like penetration and crit is harder to quantify.

I'd add another reason: the game heavily favors numbers stacking at the moment. Surviving until a bunch of friendlies arrive to out number the enemy is an unfortunately very effective low-skill strategy.



That build looks like a ton of fun.

OH trust me there are death penelties..... Like every person runns and wants to bag 9/10 for every time I die... So yeah I'm definetly gonna make it very hard for those *****when they are chasing me with 4-7 people....

Skander

Heavy isn't good for outnumbered gameplay. But is good for overnumbering

That's why we have heavy "meta"

A lot of people are zergling and run heavy armor

Heavy armor per se is worse then medium and light

Lucky28

Heavy has a lot of good sets. putting that aside, a lot of classes got their heals gutted..... so, the bonus to healing received is welcome. ZoS makes changes to classes and abilities without really thinking about how said changes will effect other aspects of the game, that's really all there is too it.

and as joy said. "heavy armor does not mean tank" i mean stamplars run Ravager, it's heavy but not a tank set at all.

NBrookus

Mangeli200194 wrote: »

OH trust me there are death penelties..... Like every person runns and wants to bag 9/10 for every time I die... So yeah I'm definetly gonna make it very hard for those *****when they are chasing me with 4-7 people....

For teabagging to be a penalty requires that you think it means something or have any respect whatsoever for the kind of people who zerg and teabag.

Sarousse

JackDaniell wrote: »

In the day and age of murkmire with heavy having been nerfed, and light and medium having recieved so many buffs, why do we still see a tank meta in PvP? Hope you guys enjoy my thoughts and the gameplay!

https://youtu.be/I5wqfkDeMLU

Hi Jack, i'm a big fan of your channel but you have to realize 2 points :

- as your youtube channel states, you're a player that likes to pull people en 1v1 situations or run around a tower. Sorry mate, but PvPing in Cyrodiil is about fighting large armies. If you're not playing in heavy armor, with tons of mitigation, you just can't face 20+ pew pewers. You can't do *** in medium armor as a melee char when you have to deal with large groups. I'm playing in a small scale group (4 to 6 players), and we just can't fight 20+ groups if we don't equip heavy armor. Period.

- you should come and try playing on euro servers against strong players/guilds in VIVEC. You would just CRY while trying to survive in medium armor (unless you're a stamblade). I've been playing lately on US and EU servers, and I can tell that playing on US servers in Cyrodiil is like taking vacations. You can just WTFPWN anything just running around and spamming spin2win.


Long live the heavy armor meta, so we can fight in small groups against Zergs !

evoniee

4 HA = 20 med/light = balance

IxSTALKERxI

Powercreep. Both damage and healing are high. Combat is faster which is makes lag have a greater influence on the fight.



Heavy armor can be survivable and still do decent damage due to powercreep.

Medium armor can be survivable (high sustain whilst still doing good damage) due to powercreep.

I don't even think you went below 50% stam that whole fight lol. I don't see how that's any different to a tank. You're just tanking in a different way, but both are a result of a never ending powercreep lol. If you're gonna have that much sustain your damage / healing shouldn't be as high as it is imo.

Glory

I agree with some points, and disagree with many others.

One thing in particular that I noticed you didn't touch on (nor does most of the community) is the severe disparity in heavy stamina versus heavy magicka. It is so much easier to build a viable damage setup in heavy armor as a stamina spec than a magicka spec.

There are very few reasons to run heavy armor in magicka unless you're trying to build as a pure tank (such as healer spec, bshield templar, etc.). On the other hand, you can run 1 of a long list of heavy stamina sets and have insane weapon damage.

Not sure why this isn't noted more in these type of discussions.

DisgracefulMind

Glory wrote: »

I agree with some points, and disagree with many others.

One thing in particular that I noticed you didn't touch on (nor does most of the community) is the severe disparity in heavy stamina versus heavy magicka. It is so much easier to build a viable damage setup in heavy armor as a stamina spec than a magicka spec.

There are very few reasons to run heavy armor in magicka unless you're trying to build as a pure tank (such as healer spec, bshield templar, etc.). On the other hand, you can run 1 of a long list of heavy stamina sets and have insane weapon damage.

Not sure why this isn't noted more in these type of discussions.

wtb magicka 7th or fury >:D

On a real note, 100% this isn't touched on often, and really needs to be.

Vapirko

DisgracefulMind wrote: »

Glory wrote: »

I agree with some points, and disagree with many others.

One thing in particular that I noticed you didn't touch on (nor does most of the community) is the severe disparity in heavy stamina versus heavy magicka. It is so much easier to build a viable damage setup in heavy armor as a stamina spec than a magicka spec.

There are very few reasons to run heavy armor in magicka unless you're trying to build as a pure tank (such as healer spec, bshield templar, etc.). On the other hand, you can run 1 of a long list of heavy stamina sets and have insane weapon damage.

Not sure why this isn't noted more in these type of discussions.

wtb magicka 7th or fury >:D

On a real note, 100% this isn't touched on often, and really needs to be.

Because it’s not as great as you think it is. That’s why it’s not talked about much. Heavy armor is not what most people make it out to be. Not anymore. I much prefer playing in medium these days with the exception of Stamina DK which I believe synergizes very well with heavy. But most people just talk out of their ass when it comes to heavy armor. They get beat by someone they can’t kill and assume their opponent wore heavy or that it was the reason they couldn’t do enough damage. For all it’s mentioning Fury doesn’t stack that well. You need to take crit damage and most people have a very low crit chance. It’s hard to take enough damage fast enough in this day and age of eso to get fury up high enough to even surpass humdinger rage. 7th is a bit better, but you can easily argue that spell strategist is better than both. So stop complaining.

DisgracefulMind

Vapirko wrote: »

DisgracefulMind wrote: »

Glory wrote: »

I agree with some points, and disagree with many others.

One thing in particular that I noticed you didn't touch on (nor does most of the community) is the severe disparity in heavy stamina versus heavy magicka. It is so much easier to build a viable damage setup in heavy armor as a stamina spec than a magicka spec.

There are very few reasons to run heavy armor in magicka unless you're trying to build as a pure tank (such as healer spec, bshield templar, etc.). On the other hand, you can run 1 of a long list of heavy stamina sets and have insane weapon damage.

Not sure why this isn't noted more in these type of discussions.

wtb magicka 7th or fury >:D

On a real note, 100% this isn't touched on often, and really needs to be.

Because it’s not as great as you think it is. That’s why it’s not talked about much. Heavy armor is not what most people make it out to be. Not anymore. I much prefer playing in medium these days with the exception of Stamina DK which I believe synergizes very well with heavy. But most people just talk out of their ass when it comes to heavy armor. They get beat by someone they can’t kill and assume their opponent wore heavy or that it was the reason they couldn’t do enough damage. For all it’s mentioning Fury doesn’t stack that well. You need to take crit damage and most people have a very low crit chance. It’s hard to take enough damage fast enough in this day and age of eso to get fury up high enough to even surpass humdinger rage. 7th is a bit better, but you can easily argue that spell strategist is better than both. So stop complaining.

Mmm I think you should really not assume why someone has an opinion or not.

I wasn't really complaining, but I do think the fact that there are much stronger sets available to stamina builds through heavy armor than there are magicka options shows. You mention spell strat, but it's a light set, that's not what I was even responding about.

I'd also say you're not fighting the right amount of people to really get the full effect of fury. Both 7th and Fury are suuuuper strong. :-D

bmesi

@DisgracefulMind ur strong

NBrookus

Heavy armor Fury stamden is crazy strong.