They’re rather heartening in a lovely silly way *grin*

Being a class that magnifies hate and has a transfer -and- has gotten a significant increase in DPS recently (coercer in EQ2), hate is on my mind a lot.

One of the problems in EQ2 is that hate generation is more passive than active. The active tools (taunts) haven’t had the same kinds of increases that the passive ones (dps included) do. A tank whackin’ the heck out of his active hate generation tools has less effect than the spike damage of a caster or scout. While I do think the caster or scout should get some hate (would you like it if a mega-tonne nuke dropped on -your- head?), the tank’s active tools should be better equipped to manage it.

Another problem is that those who have active dehate tools (i.e. non-sustained spells or triggered skills that drop some of your hate generation for a brief time) rarely, especially in pick-up-groups, use them because the time it takes to cast or perform them will reduce the time they have to do damage. It’s easier to rely on the passive (maintained spells, for example) agro management tools especially since those don’t take in-combat time to cast (unless you die).

Endemic of EQ2 with it’s stances, too, the offensive vs defensive min/max is really not high or low enough to warrant most to tanks to take the defensive in a “tanking” role because the hate generation (needed for tanking) from damage in the offensive stance doesn’t ameliorate the reduction in any defensive capabilities while the defensive stance’s reduction in damage does effect the hate generation more than the mitigation benefits it receives.

No tanks?

The tank model (one person or group of persons taking the focus of the enemy and thus the brunt of the damage so another person or group of persons can deal a higher amount of damage or perform some other act against the enemy) has been a halmark not only of all types of gaming but of any warfare or conflict through history.

- A flanking maneuver wouldn’t be possible without a “tank” (a tank as a group, not an individual). Flanking maneuvers have won so many different battles through the centuries it would be impossible to name them all. But there are “tanking failures” there, too: the enemy not focused enough on the forward battle being able to thwart the flankers.

- Agincourt would have been a wash for the English if not for the “tank” (the melees in the front lines) holding the focus of the French and not allowing the French to get back to the ranged lines, the archers shooting the heck out of their lines. The real damage dealers were the archers, the front lines’ only role was to make it possible for them to deal that damage.

- “Cover me, I’m going in!” the mainstay of cops-n-robbers and any other small group incursions (or so the movies would have us believe). The one doing the ‘covering’, what is he if not a tank? He’s the one drawing the focus of the enemy so the damage dealer can get into a better position or can set up a larger form of damage (the equivalent of a long cast spell in the fantasy-based games).

There would be a thousand examples, but I shan’t go writing them all *grin*.

In each case, too, the one being tanked for has an obligation to allow the tank to do his job and not draw the hate to himself… at least before it’s time.

The concept of “holding back” isn’t unique to success in teams in MMO’s only.

Cool.

You’d be really surprised how many people are horrible players in MMOs. When that dude plays alone, he never has any problems with managing hate….

This is somewhat a problem with class design and the tutorials - there is *nothing* in most games that teaches you how to manage hate/aggro.

When you’re running around, learning your skills, nothing ever says “Hey, mage, don’t use your big attacks at the beginning.”

In fact, since the biggest attacks tend to have the longest cast time, mages are often *trained* to begin the fight with them, because it’s the most efficient/safest way to do it. You use a huge blast, then more manageable spells to whittle away health.

DoT spells/abilities are typically the least common if you aren’t a DoT focused class.

And really - the idea that you should do *less* damage than you can? That doesn’t make a lot of sense to the average player….

This is honestly why I wish there was no “tank” archetype in MMOs. If everyone had aggro management tools of their own, and there was a generalized minor tanking focus among all the tough classes, I think it could work. If, rather than a tank class, all the high HP classes had a single protective or taunt ability, that could be used to peel someone off a healer/caster/squishy, but not consistently, everyone would play better, I think.

Morever, this wasn’t some service that was a minor addition. This was a specific selling point that Greg “Baelish” Short pushed regarding the “new” Eq2Players when it relaunched back in 2006 - that customers who chose to pay for the additional services would be able to at the very least view the basic profiles of every character in the system.

Players have always had the ability to block alts. That’s not a new function here. However, being able to fully block a profile was something that was removed with the relaunch and was used as an advertised feature of the service to entice further sales.

The fact that this function was removed is not merely an opinion. The fact that it was put back in place is not, either. That equates to a loss of functionality and value…for the same price we’ve been paying all along.

On the one hand I can see the point of being able to access the profiles of any one you want to prevent, as Illuminator said, fraud, but on the other hand, it could be considered a privacy issue.

If I don’t want people looking at my data, I should be able to prevent them from doing so. If I don’t want you to know I have 11 alts spread across 3 servers, I should be able to do so. If I don’t want you to know about an alt I have on the same server as my guild so I can go off and harvest or whatever in silence, I should be able to.

Should I have to pay extra in order so I can protect my privacy? I dunno. I personally am more of an opt-in proponent than an advocate for requiring payment to opt-out.