Greetings all,

Not sure if this is more of a newbie yard post (if so please forgive me for not posting it there) but I just started with a small group of friends.  So far the group consists of a Sorcerer, Blood Mage and a Ranger.  I will be playing the tank, my question is which tank class would best fit my group? 

I originally made a Dark Elf Dread Knight but he seems to have a bit of a glass jaw.  Granted, I've only leveled him to 10 so his lack of level along with my lack of experience may very well be the problem.  But I've also noticed quite a few recent posts about DK nerfs which concerns me.  I'd hate to level him up only to find out that in the later game a pally or straight warrior would have served my group better.

So I come straight to the proverbial horses mouth and ask, should I stick with the DK (maybe a different race choice?) or, before the group levels too much, should I change classes all together and go with a Pally or Warrior?

Thank you in advance for your thoughts and responses.

Safe Travels,

Westfall

The dreadknight has seen alot of nerfs, but there will be alot of improvements soonish. All classes will be nerfed and boosted over time so you should play the class you like the most. Currently the dreadknight might be slightly weaker in a group, but probably the best class solo. But with upcoming fixes, the dreadknight will be roughly on similar level as the other tank classes (group and raid wise).

So play the DK if you think it is fun.

There are some pending changes to DKs that will make them more viable in the end game coming soon.  And hopefully it'll make them a more popular class again.

It's really about the flavor you want, though.  To serve your group, a DK will be fine.  Usually you'll see DE DKs are the soloist tank.  The increase to int as well as the elven mana effeciency work well with the DK's life taps.  I think the most common raiding DK race is some variant of human or orc.  It's hard to tell.  Qaliathari have a 10second racial invuln and lots of DKs prefer that.  Orcs have a damage + healing racial as well as a good boost to strength and I think +1 to con (not sure on that, though). 

Dk cant be usefull like a Paladin or Warrior. (except if devs implement the evasion debuff on Dreadful Countenance - the Dk passive debuff -)

Paladin :
-10% mit (stack with some class debuff)
5 sec invuln (group wide)
+50% accuracy and +193 Dmg
Heals, invuln
+10% dmg & +12% accuracy in offensive stance (good vs trash mobs)
Melee hate -30% for DD
Some str & int buff
Hp/ac buff
+65 str (group wide)
+something like 250 armor class (group wide)

Warrior :
+8% accuracy, spell & melee haste
-30% mit cleave (or -20% rend armor)
+10% rage, flurry mit
+3% parry, dodge, block
-12% opponent dmg (15 sec, reuse 48sec with bard or psi - not sure) With mobs lowering Dc its better than Dk one.
+25% melee dmg (8 sec, reuse 48sec with bard or psi)
+20% spell dmg (8 sec, reuse 48sec with bard or psi)
10% dmg rune (10 sec, reuse 48sec with bard or psi)
100% critic (3 sec, reuse 36sec with bard or psi)

DK with Dreadful Countenance 5 (need to increase DC all the time to keep it up) :
+13% critic (9% at DC3)
+20% spiritual Dmg (Good for Dk & necro) (10% at DC3)
-10% opponent dmg (5% at DC3)
-100 all resist

As we can see, Dk is weak. But Dk have some nice lifetap to keep himself alive if the healer die.

Lvl50 stuff

I know one DK who isn't useful to a group.

If I were starting a new tank from scratch, I would go Paladin, and the choice would be easy. The tanks will be nerfed, buffed, bugged and fixed month after month, but the Paladin gets 3 things that will never be touched and will always make them invaluable: a 500 HP buff that stacks with everything, the ability to rez, and the ability to burn their virtue pool to do some amazing things in an OH S#!T moment.

Those 3 core skills will help your group out more so than anything else any of the other tanks can bring to the table, and none of those things are likely to be nerfed or broken. 

The HP buff isn't nearly as powerful as Superior Courage at low levels.  Courage I is 120 IIRC.  Still, a good bit, but for leveling up a toon with a group of friends...biasing your choice over a 120 HP buff and a rez you won't get until level 40 is a bit extreme.  Especially considering in a 4 man group, usually the tank is the first one dead.  Rez does you no good.  Also, considering a bloodmage has a self-only invis that they can cast while in combat, a bloodmage is far better suited for group recovery than a paladin.  You get zeal and righteous supplication at 12, but your virtue pool is quite small at low levels.  You can't do the 'virtue burn' until about level 30-35 or whenever a paladin has a ~15 virtue point pool.  I forgot what level the pool gets expanded to 15.

Guenievre wrote:

Dk cant be usefull like a Paladin or Warrior. (except if devs implement the evasion debuff on Dreadful Countenance - the Dk passive debuff -)

Paladin :
-10% mit (stack with some class debuff)
5 sec invuln (group wide)
+50% accuracy and +193 Dmg
Heals, invuln
+10% dmg & +12% accuracy in offensive stance (good vs trash mobs)
Melee hate -30% for DD
Some str & int buff
Hp/ac buff
+65 str (group wide)
+something like 250 armor class (group wide)

Warrior :
+8% accuracy, spell & melee haste
-30% mit cleave (or -20% rend armor)
+10% rage, flurry mit
+3% parry, dodge, block
-12% opponent dmg (15 sec, reuse 48sec with bard or psi - not sure) With mobs lowering Dc its better than Dk one.
+25% melee dmg (8 sec, reuse 48sec with bard or psi)
+20% spell dmg (8 sec, reuse 48sec with bard or psi)
10% dmg rune (10 sec, reuse 48sec with bard or psi)
100% critic (3 sec, reuse 36sec with bard or psi)

DK with Dreadful Countenance 5 (need to increase DC all the time to keep it up) :
+13% critic (9% at DC3)
+20% spiritual Dmg (Good for Dk & necro) (10% at DC3)
-10% opponent dmg (5% at DC3)
-100 all resist

As we can see, Dk is weak. But Dk have some nice lifetap to keep himself alive if the healer die.

Lvl50 stuff

I think you're post is full of S--- like you are you mention the things a warrior and paladins can do yet you ONLY mention a DK's DC and his life taps

man u r full of S--- saying DK's are lousy tanks

How about posting here the abilities you HIDDEN intentionally from the OP to make it seem that DK's look like weaker than the other 2 tanks

let me educate you:

DK's have a true 100% invuln that blocks EVERY melee and spell with the exception of a melee strike through that ALL invulns do not work against neither paladin nor warrior invuln will block a strikethrough hit.

DK's have a 100% damage buff for 30 solid seconds a true full burst damage when tanking named or raid boss npc's thats reusable every 10 minutes LOWER with psi / bard buff

18% block bonus from DC 5 that you DK's can put up

DK's and paladins arent good trash tanks because they dont have small burst damage abilities like the warrior

but get your facts straight they can do the job, warriors DONT have a huge burst damage like pally vp or dk 30 second 100% damage buff

dont underplay your class by posting some bull to make it seem weaker than other 2 tanks the fact is each tank has its own strengths and weaknesses

pally low dps, average single trash tank, very good raid boss tank, can  heal, buff, rez

dk medium dps, average single trash tank, good raid boss tank not as solid as a paladin, can debuff, high solo survivability due to life taps

warrior high dps, very good trash tank, average raid boss tank, can debuff mitigation, group short duration dps buffs, can solo but very limited compared to a paladin or a DK

those are the strong points for each class for the OP as you can see each tank has a disadvantage but can be worked out if the or the group raid is willing to adjust

an example is me as a warrior the raid has to give me a good while to get a solid agro hold on the raid boss since I dont have a huge damage burst ability like the paladin or the DK the raid has to constantly de agro and push hate to me otherwise our dps will get agro.

an example of a high end DK having a hard time doing trash mobs would be reapers of trinity, since DK's do NOT have the ability to burst constant damage I watched Trinity do fengrot and the other warrior Punishment was able to hold agro on the adds very well due to the warrior short term burst ability, reapers was having trouble after a few spawns the adds were beginning to switch agro to the high end dps in their raid during the end of the fight however raive does snap those adds and before the FT wears off reapers add is already dead.

as you can see a DK is not as good trash / add tank as a warrior because once they use their 100% damage burst they're pretty much screwed for a good while maybe 8 mins or so with psi buffs.

however the raid can burn much harder with a DK tanking a raid boss compared to a warrior

and the raid can even burn the hardest with a paladin

with a warrior its constant de agro / agro push throughout the fight

so every tank has its uses, upside and downside dont listen to what idiots post here do some research yourself ask players in game then decide for yourself

Athryn wrote:

I think you're post is full of S--- like you are you mention the things a warrior and paladins can do yet you ONLY mention a DK's DC and his life taps

man u r full of S--- saying DK's are lousy tanks

How about posting here the abilities you HIDDEN intentionally from the OP to make it seem that DK's look like weaker than the other 2 tanks

let me educate you:

DK's have a true 100% invuln that blocks EVERY melee and spell with the exception of a melee strike through that ALL invulns do not work against neither paladin nor warrior invuln will block a strikethrough hit.

- Pally have 2 invuln with short reuse (2 and 3min) better than Dk one and u know that.

- Warrior have a 100% block vs melee dmg during 15sec every 3mins. Useless vs spell but good for melee attack.

DK's have a 100% damage buff for 30 solid seconds a true full burst damage when tanking named or raid boss npc's thats reusable every 10 minutes LOWER with psi / bard buff

- Pally have +100%dmg during 30sec every 3mins! Better than Dk.

- Warrior have +20% during 18sec every 2min  & +16% during 8sec every 1min! and the group one +25% during 8sec reuse 1min.

18% block bonus from DC 5 that you DK's can put up

Only when DC5 is up. Dk start fight with only +3% block while other have +14%!

Im not hiding anything. Im just posting abilities of each tank.

West u can look a my test here.

http://forums.station.sony.com/vg/p...?topic_id=45963

Yikes.  Let me try to give you a sub-level 50 perspective as I suspect that will be a bit more helpful

Paladin.  Everyone makes a lot of noise about paladins and their virtue abilities and so on, but to be honest most of that stuff does not happen until higher levels.  Starting out a paladin has basically one buff, one heal, and one virtue ability (lay on hands).  This is decidedly not overpowering for the class.

Paladins are good tanks and do well holding aggro against single targets.  Where they have trouble, especially at lower levels, is with multiple enemies.  Paladins also struggle in the mid-levels with damage.  Whereas warriors can dual-wield and dreadknights use big massive two-handers, a paladin uses a one-hand weapon, and sometimes those can be hard to keep upgraded.  You will find that you have to switch weapon types every 4-5 levels in order to have the best weapon possible - so sometimes you'll have an axe, other times a hammer, other times a sword, and so on.

At level 40 and above is where paladins start to become increasingly powerful and useful, due to abilities they get at higher levels as well as a bigger virtue pool to use during combat.

Dreadknight.  Dreadknights are great tanks as well.  As I mentioned above dreadknights use big two-handed weapons.  They also get some nice abilities fairly early on which give them an easier time holding aggro against multiple targets than paladins have.  Where dreadknights often have trouble is on initial aggro.  When I compare my dreadknight to my paladin and my warrior, I find that my dreadknight takes a few swings to build up enough aggro that the DPS types can jump in.  Whereas my paladin and warrior don't have that problem quite as much.  Still, once a dreadknight gets going and the DC counter (that's dreadful countenance, the progressive debuff that goes on whatever you're fighting) ticks up, dreadknights can hold aggro with the best of them.  In fact, for most mobs in long-duration fights a dreadknight has an easier time doing his job of tanking than a paladin will.

Dreadknights get several spell-like abilities but most of these are also resistable on the mob's part.  So you may find that when you use them they hit for only partial damage.  This isn't a big deal but it does mean that a dreadknight primarily relies on their melee abilities to do what they do, and the spells are gravy on top of that.

Apart from being a tank and debuffer, dreadknights don't really have any buffs or group utility to enhance the performance of their teammates.

Warrior.  Warriors are good tanks but they are vastly different from both paladins and dreadknights.  Whereas a paladin's abilities are about enhancing, healing, and protecting their group, and a dreadknight's abilities are about debuffing their opponent, warriors are really focused on combat tactics.  They get abilities that cause weaknesses that they and others can exploit during fights.  They also get "orders", which are short-duration combat buffs for the group.  More than either of the other two classes, playing a warrior effectively requires attention, timing, and skill.  A lot of warriors set up complicated macros to maximize the various abilities they have.

Of the three classes, warriors are potentially the best at dealing steady damage to mobs, and at handling aggro on multiple mobs.  However, they tend to be a bit harder on their healers than paladins and dreadknights.

Disclaimer:  I have a level 50 paladin but my dreadknight and my warrior are both still in the midlevels.  So I am basing some of this (the post-25 stuff for warrior and dreadknight) on observation and conversation with guildmates   But level 50 info is only useful if you have fun getting there first, so hopefully this helps.

Psychoticjer wrote:

The HP buff isn't nearly as powerful as Superior Courage at low levels.  Courage I is 120 IIRC.  Still, a good bit, but for leveling up a toon with a group of friends...biasing your choice over a 120 HP buff and a rez you won't get until level 40 is a bit extreme.  Especially considering in a 4 man group, usually the tank is the first one dead.  Rez does you no good.  Also, considering a bloodmage has a self-only invis that they can cast while in combat, a bloodmage is far better suited for group recovery than a paladin.  You get zeal and righteous supplication at 12, but your virtue pool is quite small at low levels.  You can't do the 'virtue burn' until about level 30-35 or whenever a paladin has a ~15 virtue point pool.  I forgot what level the pool gets expanded to 15.

There will be several times when the Paladin is last man standing in group content. I know you know this.

And picking a class so you, and all your future groups/raids, have access to Courage is a very legitimate reason. Try botting a Paladin at every raid for the past year for access to that buff, then come talk about how valuable it is.  

Those 3 things I mentioned will never change, will never be nerfed, and the other tank classes have no corresponding skill that can compete with those 3 skills.

These guys will spend 1/10 of the time they play VG under level 40. For the other 90% of their playtime they will be 40+ and Paladin wins, hands down.

In fact, I would trade toons with an equally geared (or even slightly less geared) Paladin in a heartbeat. Interested? I will even grind my DK up to whatever level you happen to be.

Riler@Xeth wrote:

Psychoticjer wrote:

The HP buff isn't nearly as powerful as Superior Courage at low levels.  Courage I is 120 IIRC.  Still, a good bit, but for leveling up a toon with a group of friends...biasing your choice over a 120 HP buff and a rez you won't get until level 40 is a bit extreme.  Especially considering in a 4 man group, usually the tank is the first one dead.  Rez does you no good.  Also, considering a bloodmage has a self-only invis that they can cast while in combat, a bloodmage is far better suited for group recovery than a paladin.  You get zeal and righteous supplication at 12, but your virtue pool is quite small at low levels.  You can't do the 'virtue burn' until about level 30-35 or whenever a paladin has a ~15 virtue point pool.  I forgot what level the pool gets expanded to 15.

There will be several times when the Paladin is last man standing in group content. I know you know this.

And picking a class so you, and all your future groups/raids, have access to Courage is a very legitimate reason. Try botting a Paladin at every raid for the past year for access to that buff, then come talk about how valuable it is.  

Those 3 things I mentioned will never change, will never be nerfed, and the other tank classes have no corresponding skill that can compete with those 3 skills.

These guys will spend 1/10 of the time they play VG under level 40. For the other 90% of their playtime they will be 40+ and Paladin wins, hands down.

In fact, I would trade toons with an equally geared (or even slightly less geared) Paladin in a heartbeat. Interested? I will even grind my DK up to whatever level you happen to be.

traitor

DK's are amazing, period QQ

Riler@Xeth wrote:

There will be several times when the Paladin is last man standing in group content. I know you know this.

And picking a class so you, and all your future groups/raids, have access to Courage is a very legitimate reason. Try botting a Paladin at every raid for the past year for access to that buff, then come talk about how valuable it is.  

Those 3 things I mentioned will never change, will never be nerfed, and the other tank classes have no corresponding skill that can compete with those 3 skills.

These guys will spend 1/10 of the time they play VG under level 40. For the other 90% of their playtime they will be 40+ and Paladin wins, hands down.

In fact, I would trade toons with an equally geared (or even slightly less geared) Paladin in a heartbeat. Interested? I will even grind my DK up to whatever level you happen to be.

You mean to tell me that you have never, as a DK, been the last one standing and walked over to the healer and clicked their rez shard?  There are only 3 distinct advantages to one's own rez spell.  The first is if the healer forgot to pass rez shards out , the second is it gives them a little bit more hp/energy upon rez (not that it matters too much as it's out of combat) and the third is if they're in a different zone it will work.  For 95% of the content, a rez shard works just as well.  It's even instant cast and requires no energy.  There have been times where a rez shard is more advantagous and I've been drawn into combat before my rez could complete.

I bot a bard on raids.  Botting a paladin is a lot less cumbersome than botting a bard, I assure you.  Especially if you're only doing it for courage and/or GoP.  And it'd be no different than botting a cleric or bear shaman for buffs.  Plenty of raids do that, too.

And why are you complaining about how courage or rez will never be nerfed?  How do you nerf a rez spell?  Make it take longer to cast?  If a healer starts their rez up to 4 seconds after I start my rez, I cancel mine as the guy will be on his feet before I ever land it.  Make it cost more energy?  That'd be pointless.  Worried about nerfing courage?  What would that accomplish?  Less HP for a raid overall.  I can't come to terms why you're getting bent out of shape over a group buff you don't have.  You have the single best debuff in the game.  It's just absolute crap that the devs made it so DC lowering mobs lower it so much and so often.  I really don't like that.  It's drying the DK class out.  I could understand if it lowered it from DC5 to 4 like every few minutes or so, maybe to even DC3 to see if it could catch a DK off guard or something because warriors and pallies have to maintain their group buffs and debuffs, too.  But in the current form, it's rediculous.

And you never know.  They may just nerf virtue abilities, too.  They did one hell of a dramatic change to them in GU4.  They cut timers and durations in half.  Some abilities took a nerf during that time, too.  Paragon used to last for 5 mins and recasted in 10.  It's now 2 and 5.  Zeal also took a hit.  Imagine a guar fight with 2 minutes of zeal and 5 minutes of paragon?

Krassus wrote:

DK's are amazing, period QQ

But I bet if I offered to switch to a Paladin you would jump for joy...right?

I just have to find some poor sucker playing an APW geared Paladin that thinks lifetaps would be super fun.