Renathras said:For DPS:Who do you guys think the most likely "sleeper" class is going to be? That class that not a lot of people play, but turns out to be pretty darn useful, but doesn't tickle the class fantasy of most people
What do you think might be the "sleeper" class/classes of Pantheon? And do you think this might change over time as we get further from launch - in which case, to what new "sleeper" class(es)?
Thankfully there is no such thing as a hybrid tax in Pantheon. There is how ever LAS. In order to off tank you will need to give up access to some of your DPS options in order to have the off tank abilities on the bar, this may also include a more defensive stance that lowers base DPS while active.
I have a feeling a weak druid player is going to be a bad healer, limited DPS with not much else to bring to the table other than ports. A really good druid is going to be able to come up with ways to pick its LAS to perfectly match their group makeup and LAS choices to be a very mana efficient and chain pulling beast of a healer.
Interesting choices.
I have thought Ranger because it's going to likely have a lot of random utility (foraging, some light acclaimation/Druid spells/abilities, and a Control sub-focus via traps and special arrows), and not a lot of people seem to be focusing on it (like Monk) right now. Though I think it's funny you say people avoid them without a pet, Znushu. One reason I never liked Ranger/Hunter classes (e.g. WoW's) is BECAUSE of the pet. I like the idea of being an archer/gunner/sniper, but I don't like pet management, personally.
Also - correct me if I'm wrong, but Shaman is a Heal role, not a "Support" one (which...doesn't exist yet? Bard/Enchanter are "Control", right?) Though I can see your argument there being true as well. I've briefly considered both Shaman and Monk, but I don't like any of the races the classes are restricted to.
Trasak, why do you think Druids are going to be weak? They're probably going to be the BEST class in the game for dealing with environmental hazards. Between their bridge ability and various acclimation enhancing abilities, and they're likely going to have some light CC (roots) and defensive buffs (Barkskin), as well as Ports being potentially very valuable. So I'm not quite sure how they're going to be particularly weak..?
Renathras said:Trasak, why do you think Druids are going to be weak? They're probably going to be the BEST class in the game for dealing with environmental hazards. Between their bridge ability and various acclimation enhancing abilities, and they're likely going to have some light CC (roots) and defensive buffs (Barkskin), as well as Ports being potentially very valuable. So I'm not quite sure how they're going to be particularly weak..?
Quite the opposite. I think they have the potential to be a very good class, but the issue is that at least from the previewed abilities they will not be a spam healer. Many of the people who want to be healers want to for the simplicity of spam healers like EQ clerics and WoW Paladins and Priests. Druid are going to interact with other classes in interesting ways. Specifically, I bet the druid and Paladin will pair nicely.
If you try to spam heal with the druid or don’t use the synergies properly I bet it will be a bad healing experience. In this case it’s a bad player not a bad class. Hense why I think it might end up being a sleeper class. People will pick it due to ports then realize its not the healer style they are used to. Some will then focus on mastering its synergies and show how devastating it can be within the LAS environment.
From what we have seen in the polling none of the classes will really be underplayed to fit your sleeper idea until closer to launch shows some major flaw in them.
I think in terms of value the Dire Lord will end up undervalued for quite some time. AOE spreading dots will eventually have full groups built around it. Everyone will initially think it is just a slightly better AOE tank / anti magic tank but then the OP DPS comes out to say hello.
Impossible to tell right now. The 'sleeper' class will be the one with the reputation of being weak or gimped compared to others. People will tend to gravitate toward the classes with reputations of being OP at one thing or another. Right now they all seem great. The addition of cc type support changes the dynamic of the typical 'weak' classes a fair bit, so hard to tell.
I started out with Bard in Vanguard. It turned out to be a sleeper class. Coming off later EQ Bards weren't exactly a game changer. They could do all kinds of things in EQ but they weren't near as useful as the bards in Vanguard. After a few levels and getting used to the bard I considered it a sleeper class. Vanguard bard was amazing. One of the most dynamic classes I've ever played in any game. I could do so many things and be useful to a group in so many ways. All on top of adding some serious DPS. Vanguard gave the bards the singing ability and their songs were really good, but they didn't gimp their dps in the process.
If I had to pick, with the way they nailed the Bard in Vanguard I would say if they do it in any similar fashion to Vanguard that it will be a sleeper class.
I think that this comes down to a matter of personal taste and opinion.
For me, there are three classes that might be sleepers.
My personal pick (or the class that is sleeping on me at this time) is the ranger. I would like to know a little more about this class and their damage specific abilities. They seem to have a lot of utility and are able to buff melee heavy groups really well, but I want to know more about their own potential (if that makes sense).
I also think that the monk might be a sleeper within the community, and maybe not pure DPS monks players but the ones that do prioritize their off tanking capabilities. I think that monks could have the potential to be real game-changers in 6 man content should the tank get swamped, die, or disconnect.
My last pick for a sleeper class within the community is the druid. This is due to the shielding aspect of their healing which from past games requires knowledge of the fight and incoming damage to utilize effectively. Personally, druids are one of the classes that I am most excited to play do to the potential skill ceiling that might be found within the class.
Probably warrior. The shout thing is cool but with no DPS options (this is a good thing IMO) the warrior just won't have the fancy flashing lights that Paladins and Direlords have. Even in roleplay, it's hard to come up with particularly exciting backstories for warriors as opposed to the more lore rich classes.
I think Monk because they can't be Iksar! Iksar regen was good playing monk!
What races in Pantheon have good hp regen?
Direlord, Paladin, Monk, Ranger, Shaman; not in any specific order.
Mauvais_Oeil said:I'd rather be the emergent player in a "sleeper" class (where does this term comes from ? Never heard of it in 20 years), than a random player in an overplayed class.
Sorry, hadn't checked this thread in a while. I'm not sure if it exists or if I just made it up. But almost every MMO I've ever played has a "something" class that is really useful, but few people play due to aesthetics, difficulty, community perception of it being weak, etc. They become "unicorns", but if you find a good one, they tend to be amazing, and it's a good option for players that want to be a little more rare (and potentially, more in demand). I'm not sure what to call it, exactly, but I used the term "sleeper class" in the same sense of a "sleeper" game release that kind of flies under the radar then hits big when players start to hear about it via word of mouth and love it.
I don't know of a "official" term for it, but I just used this since "sleeper class" is the best thing I could come up with to succintly describe what I was thinking here. Hopefully my OP description was adequate to explain it. Judging by the responses, it seemed to be.
Jobeson said:From what we have seen in the polling none of the classes will really be underplayed to fit your sleeper idea until closer to launch shows some major flaw in them.
I think in terms of value the Dire Lord will end up undervalued for quite some time. AOE spreading dots will eventually have full groups built around it. Everyone will initially think it is just a slightly better AOE tank / anti magic tank but then the OP DPS comes out to say hello.
shuk said:Impossible to tell right now. The 'sleeper' class will be the one with the reputation of being weak or gimped compared to others. People will tend to gravitate toward the classes with reputations of being OP at one thing or another. Right now they all seem great. The addition of cc type support changes the dynamic of the typical 'weak' classes a fair bit, so hard to tell.
Moloka said:I started out with Bard in Vanguard. It turned out to be a sleeper class. Coming off later EQ Bards weren't exactly a game changer. They could do all kinds of things in EQ but they weren't near as useful as the bards in Vanguard. After a few levels and getting used to the bard I considered it a sleeper class. Vanguard bard was amazing. One of the most dynamic classes I've ever played in any game. I could do so many things and be useful to a group in so many ways. All on top of adding some serious DPS. Vanguard gave the bards the singing ability and their songs were really good, but they didn't gimp their dps in the process.
If I had to pick, with the way they nailed the Bard in Vanguard I would say if they do it in any similar fashion to Vanguard that it will be a sleeper class.
Oh, some further observations on the questionairre (again, it's the most recent metric I have, so take with a grain of salt that these percentages may have moved around in the last year):
Druid: 10.4%
Bard: 9.8%
Enchnter: 9%
Necromancer: 7.1%
Ranger: 8.7%
Summoner: 7.9%
Warrior: 6.5% (Equal)
Shaman: 6.5% (Equal)
Cleric: 6.3%
Dire Lord: 6%
Paladin: 5.8%
Monk: 5.6% (Equal)
Rogue: 5.6% (Equal)
Wizard: 4.8%
If we break this down by...
Tanks: 18.3% (main role)
#7 Warrior: 6.5% (Equal)
#10 Dire Lord: 6%
#11 Paladin: 5.8%
(Honorable mention #12) Monk: 5.6% (Equal)
Of the Tanks, Warrior is currently the highest, though none are particularly high. Paladin is the lowest, but PRETTY close to Dire Lord. Paladin may be hindered by the few race choices. Paladin can only be 2, Dire Lords 4 (double), and Warrior 8 (double that double or quadruple what Paladin has as far as options go. Gnomes have no Tanks, of course. None are in the top 5, and only two are in the top 10, and JUST barely at that. Tanking will, as always, likely be the most rare role. Though it's not by a MASSIVE margin, per se.
Healers: 23.2%
#1 Druid: 10.4%
#8 Shaman: 6.5% (Equal)
#9 Cleric: 6.3%
(??? #11) Paladin: 5.8%
Druid is currently the most "played" (intention to play) Healer by a healthy margin, and the top class overall. Druid alone is 10.4% while Shaman and Cleric together would be 12.8%. Now, this may change if people don't like the class, or if it's difficult to play. Cleric is likely hindered by fewer race choices, at only three. Shaman can be 5 and Druid can be 6, as well as being the ONLY choice of healer for the Halflings; Shaman is the only choice for the Skar (Gnomes have no Healers). The community may be highly prizing the Druid for its potential utility (teleports, movement speed buffs, acclamation) and some players may think it can be functional for some limited solo grinding due to its improved ability to get around the world and theorized higher DPS than the other Healers - though we, of course, know none of these things for certain right now. As things stand right now, though, Druid is looking to be the most played single class, at least when people first get their hands on the game. The Healing role, overall, looks to be pretty healthy, so it shouldn't be overly difficult to get 2 Healers per 6 man party. But with only Druids being in the top 5, it might be common to find parties with 2x Druids and Shaman/Clerics being somewhat more rare and valued.
[EDIT: It should be noted that, of the non-pure Damage roles, Healers also have no known "off-" classes, other than potentially Paladin as an off-healer. This means that Paladins, if they can offheal, may be highly prized for that flexibility since no other class will be capable of it. For 1.5 Tank, 2 Healer, 1 Control, 3 DPS parties, which will probably be the standard composition, Healer may still be the most difficult role to fill, with only Paladin - one of the most rare classes already - being capable of pulling 0.5 Tank/0.5 Heal duties for parties that want to cut it back to 1 but have some extra backup...]
Control: 18.8% (known, main role) (25.9% with Necro)
#2 Bard: 9.8%
#3 Enchnter: 9%
(Unknown? #4) Necromancer: 7.1%
(Honorable mention #5) Ranger: 8.7%
(Honorable mention #13) Rogue: 5.6% (Equal)
For the Control role, it's hard to say since we don't know if Necromancer will be there or not, but of the two we can reasonably be certain are, we have Enchanters and Bards, #3 and #2, respectively, at already close to 20% of the players even without Necro. WITH Necro, the Control role lags only behind the pure damage dealers. Necro is #4 overall, which would have Control in 3 of the top 4 spots, only missing out on #1 itself. It's safe to say that, as of right now, there will be no shortage of any of these classes or the Control role itself. Pantheon's playerbase overall seems to place a lot of value in this role. And this is WITHOUT considering the other classes that might be capable of subbing in for limited Control duties, such as the #5 Ranger and the (tied second to last at #13) Rogue. Now, if Control happens to be harder and/or less effective than the community is anticipating, this number might drop. Neither Skar nor Ogres can play any of the Control classes. Archai and Halflings look to have only Bards, Gnomes only Enchanters. Skar, Gnomes, Dark Myr, and Humans are slated to have access to Necromancers. All of these classes are available to a lot of races, as are Rogues and (to a point, but lower relatively) Rangers.
Damage: 32.6% (39.7% with Necro)
(Unknown? #4) Necromancer: 7.1%
#5 Ranger: 8.7%
#6 Summoner: 7.9%
#12 Monk: 5.6% (Equal)
#13 Rogue: 5.6% (Equal)
#14 Wizard: 4.8%
Even without Necro, the Damage role overall is going to be pretty healthy. Even moreso WITH Necro. Ranger (and Necromancer) and Summoner are probably highly anticipated because of potential solo play and overall utility. These are also the only pure Damage classes that are in the top 10, and Necro/Ranger in the top 5. Monks, Rogues (somewhat surprisingly to me...), and Wizards look to be more rare. With Necromancers, Enchanters, and Summoners floating about, it's not overly surprising that some players may shy away from a "boring" pure Wizard. As the lowest class on this list, if Wizards end up having some versatility and utility to make them more attractive to parties, they may also be a solid candidate for sleeper class. Interestingly, Orgres ALSO cannot play any of the pure Damage classes.
Anyway, given the above, I'm going to revise this slightly, with the caveat of "if these numbers hold":
I could see Monk being #1 "sleeper class". It's tied for second least played class, probably won't appeal to tons of people, but if it's functional in an off-tank role, could allow parties to push 1T/2H/1C/3DPS as the 0.5 "backup" Tank. This is obviously significant since Tanks will likely be the least played role, and so having something that can be the party's "other tank (in an emergency)" has the potential to be huge.
#2 "sleeper class" looks to be Paladin given what we know right now. Being a main role Tank means it will already be in demand for Tanking duties (this probably goes double for Undead/Demon zones/dungeons/etc), but it can also possibly work in parties that want to go 1.5T/1.5H since it can potentially function as an off-healer for parties that only have one main Healer (due to limited availability, for example), but ALSO be the 0.5 Tank to help if the main tank goes down or the party pulls more than it bargained for. If you have a party with 1 Tank, 1 Healer, 1 Control, 2 DPS, and no Monks in sight, picking up a Paladin for your #6 slot will be an attractive option since it can potentially give the party the security of a second tank and of an emergency healer on the side. Considering it's the ONLY option, at present, for a party that's only got 1 Healer but wants to fill the 6th slot with someone that can aid healing (and there aren't any Druids/Shamen/Clerics to do so), that may boost its desirability.
I've figured sleeper classes are more often than not a class that relies heavily on itemization or has a kit with a very high skill ceiling because they're usually pretty underwhelming until people learn to maximize their effectiveness.
Like the Warrior in vanilla WoW that everyone thought was dog-crap until itemizaion/talents/macros meta developed and the class became the strongest one in the game.
I'm leaning towards Dire Lords being a strong sleeper class because, what we know of their ability kit, they seem to scale off of multiple factors (health, hit-rating, damage, crits) and they have a large selection of gear available to them. I can see them being pretty average until people min-max the best way to gear them.
I'm also tempted to say Summoner since it looks like their kit can do so many different things with their utility spells and tanking/dps/healing pets, but then the pet mechanics remain to be seen, they may just end up being a jack of all trades that's kind of mediocre at everything.
Turnip - I could see Dire Lord. Summoner - at least right now - is #6 at 7.9%. Grain of salt that, but there probably won't be a SHORTAGE of them, per se. I COULD see SMN being the go-to "solo" class for people because it looks like it will be a sort of "party in a box" having tanking and healing pets, and the ability to have the healing pet out while having other pets out. Summoner might be a potential candidate for the "off-tank" role in some content. It's not preferred as a main tank, obviously, but WoW's Warlock (summoner) and Hunter (pet) have shown that it can be done in the past, especially for small group content if the tank suddenly goes down but the fight is almost over and you just need something to tank for the last little bit of the fight. FFXIV's SMN tanking pet (Titan) could also do that...well, before they made it where you CAN'T do that anymore in their current expansion... <_< Granted, Rangers, Druids, or Necromancers could all vie for that "solo alt when I want to play and all my friends are offline" slot, but Summoner might be the most approachable for that role, or maybe just what people enjoy for it. I liked soloing in FFXIV (granted, a very much more solo friendly game) back in the day on my SMN using my tanking pet, so it is kind of a fun playstyle to mess around with.
Dire Lord is looking to be on par in rarity with Paladin, as Warrior seems like it's going to be the most common tank. This is a bit of a flip from most MMOs, but makes sense considering that Warriors were the go-to tanks in EQ and Vanilla WoW, so people may be thinking that here as well. Warrior's secondary/slot role will probalby be Damage dealing, which people are more likely to see as being useful for doing quests and such than Paladin's Healing focus or Dire Lord's...Control focus?
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Counterfleche - I think it partially depends on how readily we can flex into sub-roles, and how powerful those sub-roles will be. WILL a Monk be able to tank effectively, or will it be more of a "The boss only has 5% health left" tank that can only last a very short time to finish off enemies if the tank goes down but the enemy/ies are already basically dead? Will a Paladin focused on healing be able to effectively heal, or is it more just some light passive healing on the side as it does mostly tanking? That is, we know that classes won't be able to 100% fill their off-role, even if fully set up to do so, but the question is how close will they come? Will it be like 80%, or more like 20%? Will a Warrior DPSing be like 70% of the way to having another DPS in the party...or more like 30%?
And how much are you giving up in your primary role to get there? If a Rogue doing CC does 0% damage (I know it's more, but just say...) and only can do 30% CC, then this would be something that's never used in practice and only used in soloing or some niche uses. If it can give up DD and only do 20% Damage but go 70% of the Control that an Enchnater/Bard/Necro could do, then that makes the trade-off worthwhile.
Let's take an example of off-tanking. Suppose a Monk comes to a party with enough abilities slotted to tank. Maybe 2 mitigation abilities, 1 threat generating ability, and 5 dps abilities. While the tank is up, it can use the 5 DPS abilities and do, say, 60% of a dedicated (all 8 abilities DD) DPS Monk's damage output. But when the tank goes down, it has to swap to using its threat generating ability (in order not to lose agro) and mitigation abilities (in order not to die). This will drop its damage output to, say 10-20% of a DPS Monk's, but it can tank 1-2 targets, and effectively tank bosses. It's harder to heal than a dedicated tanking Warrior/Dire Lord/Paladin, but it can do the job to salvage a pull gone bad. Or maybe it can pick up an add and tank it (as above) while the party burns it down, then go back to damage mode on the boss.
On the other hand, if the Monk above can only do about 30% of the damage when acting as a damage dealer, then only 30% of tanking of a dedicated tank when it acts as a tank (in other words, only being able to tank a boss for the last couple percent and then dying), then that flexibility won't really be all that useful.
That is, a class shouldn't do two roles AT THE SAME TIME - in the above example, to keep agro the Monk will have to spam the threat generating ability, which obviously will do far less damage than working through its DPS rotation would - but if it can move BETWEEN those roles, doing one OR the other as the situation demands (if it set up its action bars to do so before hand), and do so functionally, then that works. But if it's so non-effective in its off-role that it may as well NEVER DO IT, then in practice those off-roles don't exist.
For healing, we have only the one example of the Paladin. Can the Paladin maybe throw 1-3 tanking abilities on its bars and the rest healing and be a competent healer? Or are its heals just designed to give the party some light passive heals as it does its normal tanking rotation and not REALLY be a substitute for a healer, even in off-healing situations? That is, is its healing designed to just make the healer's job a bit easier, or can it actually meaningfully heal if pressed to do so? Could you spec a Paladin 8 abilities all healing it and be able to heal a 6 man group as effective as a lazy (but functional) Cleric, or is its healing unable to do the actual role at need?
I like the idea of having to choose your slotted abilities before you go out (so you can chose flexibility OR chose all main-role, with the flexibility tradeoff being you can fill in more if things go hairy for the party, but at the cost of less effectiveness at either role - think a Multi-Class character in Baldur's Gate/D&D vs a pure class), and the "soft-lock" being that if you use the abilities of one role, it weakens your ability with the other (e.g. the off-tanking Monk having to spam the threat ability and so not having time to use the DPS abilities and so doing less damage when it's "tanking", but when its able to go back to damage dealing, focusing on its DD buttons and thus doing more damage vs the Monk that slots only damage abilities being able to do even more damage...but not being able to step up and tank the boss if the main tank goes down), as this keeps class/role identity, uniqueness, and rarity while also allowing players flexibility in group compositions when some role (tanking or healing, etc) isn't available due to not having players around on those classes, etc.
...but that only works IF they are able to competently fill those off-roles. If they are not, then there's no point in really having them for the MOST part. Having a "half" second healer can be useful, though with the only option being Paladin (at the moment), it's unclear how useful that would be. It seems having the Paladin as a secondary (main) healer for the party who can just jump forward and grab the boss if the main tank goes down makes more sense than it being a tank that...just solo heals the party when the main healer goes down. XD
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As for the party compositions, we've seen different ones in games (like FF11) develop over time and based on gear, skill, and what the party is doing.
In general, for dungeons you're going to want 1.5 to 2 Tanks, 1.5 to 2 Healers, 1 Control, and 2 Damage. Monk (Damage/Off-Tank), Paladin (Tank/Off-Heal), Warrior (Tank/Off-Damage), Rogue (Damage/Off-Control) etc will kind of straddle to fill in those 0.5s. So you might have a Dire Lord main tank with a Warrior in partial DPS setup acting as one of the party's DPSers but being your 0.5 Tank in case of an emergency.
But this also depends on how safe you want to play it. People farming camps (or even some dungeons) might drop the safety factor of the extra tanks and healers and go 1T, 1H, 1C, 3DPS and bank on the Control keeping the situation maneagable for the tank and healer while the DPS melt face. Advanced parties might go 1H, 1-2C, 3-4DPS and use kiting or pets to "tank" while the party melts face. If you have a god-tier Control, you might be able to go with 5 DPS and forget about the healers or tanks entirely. So for more "farm" (we know what we're doing, let's play dangerous and go speedrunmasmeltdoom) parties, you might get by with more Damage and less of Tanks, Healers, or even Control. For more first time/dangerous areas/etc, you might layer up on the defenses and "just in cases". In that case, you'd go with the more Tank/Heal and maybe Control heavy parties as the ideal. The most defensive formation party I could think of would be something like 2 Tanks, 2 Heals, 1 Control, and a 0.5 T/H, so something like Warrior + Dire Lord + Cleric + Shaman + Enchanter + Paladin.
...but that's the "absolute safety". Well, I guess you could just go 3 Tanks and 3 Healers and the mentality of "we'll be here all day...but we ain't dyin'!!!"
For the most part, I think the most common thing you'll see, at least early on, will be 1.5T, 1.5/2H, 1C, 3/2D setup, with t he 0.5 Tank either being a Paladin (which would also count for the 0.5 Heal) OR a Monk, in which case you'd bring 2 Healers instead of just the 1. But this will, of course, be based on player availability. You're probably always going to want a second reser, though, in case the main healer goes down.
AAAAND this is before we even MENTION raids. :D
