Triad tank/heal/dd - is archaic?

Parasaurolophus

This thread is not so much about teso as about tank / heal / dd systems in general. I will say that I do not want to criticize anything and do not propose to change anything in the game. However, teso is a good example of the disadvantages and pros of separation of roles. This thing became interesting to me some time ago and I thought:

1) Fighting bosses in dungeons and trials, did you get the feeling that each role seemed to have its own life? As if in one battle there are 2-3 completely different games that hardly intersect with each other?

2) Huge dependence on dps. DD are the kings of the game. However, I'm not sure if this is really a teso problem or a tank / heal / dd triad problem. But I like how it works in pvp, when we really have to butt not only about our damage but also about survivability. This makes the gaming experience more varied and more fun.
Also, I liked the armor system of the companions. This allows for more fine-tuning of the build, while the player in pve just is locked in one type of armor.

3) Search for a group. Finding tanks is always much more difficult than dd. Sometimes I wonder how wonderful it would be to just call any of your friends and go to conquer the content. Now in teso, this problem is not so acute for old players, since many have tanks or heal alts. But for new players, casuals, and everyone who uses the group tool, long queuing times are a big problem right now.

4) Impossible to balance content for everyone. This is one of the reasons for the overly casual and easy overland content in the game. Heals are not relevant in dungeons in teso. Solo arenas require a complete rebuild from such and healers, which is very inconvenient.

The general idea is that the tank / heal / dd triad only separates the players. Rather destructively rather than enriching the gaming experience. Previously, I also did not understand the tendency of modern MMOs to get rid of different roles. But now I can see it. Yes, such a system has its drawbacks:
1) Characters lose their identity.
2) Developers are likely to find it more difficult to develop content without the principle of separation of roles.
But still, it seems to me that these are not such significant disadvantages.
3) Synergies of different classes can also lead to the requirement to play for a certain class in group content.

What do you think about this? What was your MMO experience without roles?

BlueRaven

In the beginning eso tried to break this.

Tanks can deal damage a bit!

Healers should contribute to overall damage on bosses!

Dps can switch to heals/tank fast as other party members revive fallen players!

(Etc.)

Now tanks and healers have had their damage nerfed considerably. And damage dealers have to use both bars for their rotation.

The original concept was nice and would have been sustainable, but tank-y and healer pvp builds basically put a stop to it.

Hybrid (multi role) builds are out.

Super specialization is in.

/shrug

Ippokrates

Here is an interesting video of one of my favourite content creators

https://youtu.be/vh5tauvFB3I

Sure, I would love to see different settings implemented into dungeons & trials systems, like division between tanky melee boys that could kill anything at hand but are shattered by archers & mages, stealthy nightblade-alike guys that can pass through defenses, unlock gates and kill anything from range or surprise melee attack but in close range they would die of one shot & mages that can die if anything physical hit them, but they are only one to conduct "magical" warfare with magical mobs & bosses that cannot be touched by physical boys BUT i do not think that such system would work well, because it is too complicated and it would required very detailed knowledge about system as a whole and mechanics of particular challenge

Grandchamp1989

We used to be able to do more but then the whole proc nerf thing happened.

Now its pretty much cemented with the MMO trinity.

Healers are a bit more versatile..

But yeah I have had the same thoughts, if they made a system for dungeons based on "solo builds" people who can all sustain themselves, deal damage, self heal and got okey(ish) resistances. Basicly 4 brawlers.

But they would have to get rid of all the one-shot mechanics in vet for it to truely be viable for the masses.

Amottica

1. Not sure what your talking about.
2. Damage is always an important aspect in a fight where the goal is to defeat the enemy.
3. Rarely have an issue finding a tank. I just ask in guild and get a tank.
4. Dungeons and trials have three different difficulty levels to help balance the game for everyone. Few are not able to clear the normal difficulty though there are some that seem challenged with telegraphed mechanics.

The triad does nothing to separate anyone. It merely helps organize a group for maximum efficiency. It allows for creating fights with greater difficulty.

Dojohoda

I apologize if I am not understanding the topic, but I view the roles as being necessary for teamwork for the harder content in PVE.

Organized PVP teams can be more creative with roles.

_adhyffbjjjf12

it is archaic in PVE, but in reality its only really a factor in highly turned PVE raid like encounters. Anywhere else there is flexibility to have hybrid builds. In Highly tuned content the devs typically tune to a 'typical' party configuration, so its self prophesising, devs target X tanks, so x tanks are optimal etc. What muddies the waters is party leaders that don't adapt and only think about the above configuration regardless of the tuning of the encounter, for e.g low level raids and 5 man fights.

Aznarb

It'll never be archaic. W/o trinity all you made is boring gameplay. Even gw2 have a trinity.
Druid, Firebrand, Scrapper, Tempest, scourge can be build as healer depending on the content from pve to pvp.
Chrono was for a long time a Tank/Support with ministrel gear.
etc..

That just the easiest way for dev to creat fun, engaging and challenging content.
W/o trinity all you'll end-up with is zerg content since all you'll have to do is dps..
And gw2 like teso are both heavily focused on dps when it come to end-game already and most people can't do it.

It's just logic, really.

Reverb

Healers are still desired for vet trials and in pvp, but in dungeons they are only needed for underperforming groups.

I’ve always played support roles in MMOs, and I was pretty happy in the role of heal-buff-debuff bot in ESO pve for years. I was happy contributing to dps while I performed that role. But now high performing groups prefer to go without a healer so they can have more dps.

I think there are a few reasons for that. One is the power creep that has led to my spot being easily replaced by an 80k+ dps damage dealer which enables the team to melt bosses so fast healing isn’t needed.

Second is Zeni’s heavy use of “spread out” mechanics while at the same time narrowing heals. If your party members are all over doing (or avoiding) mechanics, but your heals only go in front of you, and you can now only have one orb or spring active, you can’t reach everyone and your DDs and tank need to rely on clutch self-heals, so why bother with a healer spot.

A third is the continued introduction of avoidable 1-shot mechanics. Most of the vet dlc dungeons have these, avoid the mechanic and be fine, fail to avoid the mechanic and die. No gradual incoming damage, and nothing the healer can impact. Better to make sure everyone knows the mechanics and bring a third DD to burn through more quickly.

We even saw this in one of the official ESO Quakecon streams when they put Nefas and Olibeau in a race. Neither team had a healer, and when Gina asked about that the answer was pretty much “duh! The goal is to clear as fast as possible, a healer would slow us down”.

TL;DR - years of healing nerfs and damage buffs combined with mechanics that don’t need healers have made Tank+3 DD the optimal group. Triad is dead.

Aznarb

Reverb wrote: »

Healers are still desired for vet trials and in pvp, but in dungeons they are only needed for underperforming groups.

I’ve always played support roles in MMOs, and I was pretty happy in the role of heal-buff-debuff bot in ESO pve for years. I was happy contributing to dps while I performed that role. But now high performing groups prefer to go without a healer so they can have more dps.

I think there are a few reasons for that. One is the power creep that has led to my spot being easily replaced by an 80k+ dps damage dealer which enables the team to melt bosses so fast healing isn’t needed.

Second is Zeni’s heavy use of “spread out” mechanics while at the same time narrowing heals. If your party members are all over doing (or avoiding) mechanics, but your heals only go in front of you, and you can now only have one orb or spring active, you can’t reach everyone and your DDs and tank need to rely on clutch self-heals, so why bother with a healer spot.

A third is the continued introduction of avoidable 1-shot mechanics. Most of the vet dlc dungeons have these, avoid the mechanic and be fine, fail to avoid the mechanic and die. No gradual incoming damage, and nothing the healer can impact. Better to make sure everyone knows the mechanics and bring a third DD to burn through more quickly.

We even saw this in one of the official ESO Quakecon streams when they put Nefas and Olibeau in a race. Neither team had a healer, and when Gina asked about that the answer was pretty much “duh! The goal is to clear as fast as possible, a healer would slow us down”.

TL;DR - years of healing nerfs and damage buffs combined with mechanics that don’t need healers have made Tank+3 DD the optimal group. Triad is dead.

Yup, it all fun and game when you love healer, but once you and your team reach high level of play, even me as a healer starting to see I was useless to the group and start to make a dps. That incredibly sad tbh. Your reward as getting good with your group of friend is you as healer becoming useless.
Even in many raid 1 healer is enough...

So yeah, I've swap a bit to tank, leave the game for a while, and now than I'm back, I'm working on a DD to be my main...
Healer only have raid to have fun in this game..

Reverb

Aznarb wrote: »

Reverb wrote: »

Healers are still desired for vet trials and in pvp, but in dungeons they are only needed for underperforming groups.

I’ve always played support roles in MMOs, and I was pretty happy in the role of heal-buff-debuff bot in ESO pve for years. I was happy contributing to dps while I performed that role. But now high performing groups prefer to go without a healer so they can have more dps.

I think there are a few reasons for that. One is the power creep that has led to my spot being easily replaced by an 80k+ dps damage dealer which enables the team to melt bosses so fast healing isn’t needed.

Second is Zeni’s heavy use of “spread out” mechanics while at the same time narrowing heals. If your party members are all over doing (or avoiding) mechanics, but your heals only go in front of you, and you can now only have one orb or spring active, you can’t reach everyone and your DDs and tank need to rely on clutch self-heals, so why bother with a healer spot.

A third is the continued introduction of avoidable 1-shot mechanics. Most of the vet dlc dungeons have these, avoid the mechanic and be fine, fail to avoid the mechanic and die. No gradual incoming damage, and nothing the healer can impact. Better to make sure everyone knows the mechanics and bring a third DD to burn through more quickly.

We even saw this in one of the official ESO Quakecon streams when they put Nefas and Olibeau in a race. Neither team had a healer, and when Gina asked about that the answer was pretty much “duh! The goal is to clear as fast as possible, a healer would slow us down”.

TL;DR - years of healing nerfs and damage buffs combined with mechanics that don’t need healers have made Tank+3 DD the optimal group. Triad is dead.

Yup, it all fun and game when you love healer, but once you and your team reach high level of play, even me as a healer starting to see I was useless to the group and start to make a dps. That incredibly sad tbh. Your reward as getting group with your friend is you as healer becoming useless.
Even in many raid 1 healer is enough...

So yeah, I've swap a bit to tank, leave the game for a while, and now than I'm back, I'm working on a DD to be my main...
Healer only have raid to have fun in this game..

I don’t want to sound so doom and gloom about it. I am sad for the state of group healing because I love playing healer. But adaptation is the key, and it’s easier than ever to build a high performing dps. There’s a meta of course, but it matters less than ever (unless chasing scores). Running a build of whatever flavor you want can still get high dps with a solid rotation, and it’s fun to melt bosses in seconds. Don’t dispair, just dps!

Damnationie

The concept of the trinity was copied because WoW had it, and look how much money they are making! But even in WoW when I played it, there were issues with it, many of which have been inherited my ESO. And often have become worse - WoW could work around some of the issues because they had the player numbers to conceal issues. And because character roles were much more limited and locked down compared to ESO.

It is one of a handful of core bad design decisions that were made in the beginning of ESO. People seem to confuse everyone doing it with it being a good gameplay concept. The trinity was a concept which was simple and was easy for a developer to work with. But when you look into in detail, it's actually only an ok way to do group content. Especially in the context of drawing in single player Elder Scrolls players, the idea of the trinity was not intuitive. Have to say I found it the most disappointing thing when I moved to ESO from Wow. Was a long time before I looked at dungeons in ESO having dealt with WoW because they were so similar and had all the same issues.

Gameplay wise, it limits dungeons to group play rather than co-operative play. What you can do with a dungeon is so limited by the need to try and make all the roles viable. And if you look through the forums or do dungeons, ZOS largely fails to achieve making the roles equal and/or needed. And many dungeons feature silly / arbitrary mechanics to try and justify the inclusion of the sperate roles. As others have commented, changes to classes and skills and other mechanics often render the concept of the trinity mote, outside of the higher difficulty levels. And even there, I'm not sure that it is holding.

Rather than accidentally ending up with the trinity no longer being of use, it would be far better if ZOS actually sat down and said that the tank/healer/dd roles in group content is going. And then planned out the transition to players as adventurers in grouped content. A proper re-vamp of group play to a solid dynamic co-operative model would allow ESO to be different in good way from so many other MMOs. It would be a tangible selling point that could help staving off any future competition.

At present, ESO dungeons are yet another clone of the trinity concept which offers little meaningful difference to other MMOs. ESO should be striving to be better than that.