Background:
This idea stemmed from
https://forums.elderscrollsonline.com/en/discussion/548925/fake-tanking.
Currently group finder (GF) requires one tank, two damage dealers (DD) and one healer. Being a MMO, the game's population has a lot more DDs than tanks and healers combined. This leads to long queue times for DDs (20-40mins queue times and sometimes it lingers over an hour). Tanks have around instant to 5mins queue time and healers have around 5-10mins queue time. Because of the short queue time of tanks and healers, DDs change their role to tank to speed up their queue time.
What is a fake tank?
A tank's role is described as taunting (taking aggro from mobs/boss), basically diverting the damage to himself rather than the group. A bad tank is NOT a fake tank. This means if a DDs with zero attributes in health can still be a tank if they have the correct gears and taunt. A fake tank is a DD (or even a healer) queues as a tank role and has no gear or skills required to be one like having less than 15k hp and no taunt. In optimal and experienced groups, tanks are required to debuff enemy and buff group DPS as well but we are talking about GF here so this is not a necessity but more of a luxury.
Problem:
This game's dungeon difficulty scales from normal base game (T3) to vet base game/normal dlc (T2) to vet dlc (T1). I am generalizing here and not an actual representation of the dungeon's difficulties. T2 and T1 can be very challenging if the tank is not effective at taking aggro and surviving. If the tank doesn't take aggro, the mobs/boss will attack DDs and healer which leads to a wipe. If the tank can't survive, the mobs/boss will attack the DDs and healer which leads to a wipe. You guys get the point. No tank support = dead group.
Fake tanks have caused many failed T2 and T1 dungeon runs and wasted everyone's time. However T3 is the grey area, they are extremely easy and can be done in 5 mins with a half decent 4 DD group but does that mean this is the right thing to do? The community is split on this. One end thinking it is okay to fake tank on T3 dungeons but sometimes people overestimate their abilities and fake tank on T2 and even T1 dungeons. The other end thinks this is harmful to the community and is an exploit of the GF.
Solution:
This idea has been floated around by others, it is the idea of having two types of queues.
- Casual = No role requirement queue
- Serious = Role required queue (1 tank, 2 DDs, 1 healer)
Casual queue is exactly what you think it means. Anyone can queue without specifying any roles. This will allow the experienced or time limited players to quickly find a dungeon group and do their daily and pledges. Players queuing into casual will go in with the knowledge that they should not expect anything out of the other players as this is a casual queue. Meaning there could be no tank, no healer and bad DDs. Thus they can be prepared to bring self sustain skills/gears. No one should complain if their group is bad because this is the definition of casual queue. For all those DDs that are fake tanking or even fake healing, they can use casual queue because it is basically no different from the current GF.
Serious queue requires roles and will need set requirements met by each player respective to their role. Why? Because that is the only way to enforce it. I'm going to give some starter numbers and requirements only for the purpose of this discussion. It does not represent what I actually think the requirement should be.
Tank:
- Min 25k HP
- Min 20k Resistance
- Have shield slotted
- Have taunt skill slotted
Healer:
- Min 30k Magicka
- Have restoration staff slotted
- Have min 3 restoration staff skills slotted
DD requirement is tricky because anyone can do damage, so wait... why do we need requirements for DDs?Simple answer is players queuing into serious queue will want others to be half decent so we can't exclude DD from this. I've done many T2 dungeons as a healer and the DPS of the DDs are just abysmal causing several wipes and a horrible experience. The only method I can think of measuring a requirement for DD is a dummy parse number. Yes, I know a parse number does not represent a player's knowledge of dungeon mechanics and how they play in a real dungeon environment. A dummy parse number DOES represent how well a player knows DPS mechanics and their rotation. In most cases, a player that spends time into knowing their rotation will have at least basic knowledge on dungeon mechanics. My suggestion is for ZOS to add a solo instance of a dummy parse room near the Undaunted Enclaves. This room will contain a 6m trial dummy (basically the 21m dummy but with 6m health) so it isn't intimidating to new players.
DD:
- Min 35k DPS on the 6m trial dummy.
Conclusion:
This will solve the two problems. Experienced players wanting to fake tank T3 and T2 dungeons for a quick run. New/experienced players that want a good dungeon run without having to worry about fake roles.
What about the new players that cannot meet the requirement of the serious queue?
- IMO, the requirements are quite low and easily achievable at CP 160.
- They can use the casual queue and maybe the players are nice enough to not rush through everything
- Join a guild, there are PLENTY of beginner friendly guilds that are more than willing to help
- Lower the serious queue requirements even more and add a super serious queue with higher requirements.
I get that people can easily switch gears once they are in the dungeon. But if they've already spent the effort and time in meeting the requirements (leveling resto skill line, getting tank gears, getting taunt skill), they have essentially fulfilled that role. This is not an end all and be all solution but I think it will help the case of the fake tank, fake healer and fake/bad DPS problem.
Thanks for reading everyone and I look forward to the discussions.
TLDR:
Have two queues to satisfy everyone. One without roles and one with roles with requirements.